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Rick Steves: Blog Gone Europe

I'm on the road in Spain, Italy, Slovenia, Montenegro and Bosnia — weaving my travel experiences into my business, and sharing what's on my mind. If you think it's inappropriate for a travel writer to stir up discussion on his blog with political observations and insights gained from traveling abroad, you may not want to read any further. — Rick

I just spent five days in the studio recording audio tours. They're designed for iPod users visiting the dozen most important museums and sights in Venice, Florence, and Rome. Reading the scripts out loud into a microphone for literally eight hours a day was a slog. But the idea that our work will help thousands of travelers made the chore a joy.

I have never been so immersed in reading, and I had two great coaches: Lyssa Brown (editor and professional voice for Cedar House Audio Productions) and Gene Openshaw (co-author of many of my guidebooks and editor of these tours). It was a fascinating week filled with quirky factoids, pronunciation challenges, and wording decisions.

As we're investing lots of time and money in these tours, I wanted to get the pronunciation and wording just right and produce tours with a long life.

“Menagerie” (of beasts from all over the Roman Empire) has a "szh" sound in the middle. The first syllable of "obelisk" rhymes with "Bob." Should I roll the rr’s in Buonarroti? Lay-en-ar-do or Lee-en-ar-do? ...sometimes the correct pronunciation is distracting and sounds pretentious to me. I no longer struggle with "gesture" (jes-jur). How on earth should we pronounce the sculptor Pollaiuolo? I went with a Sam the Sham “Wooly Bully” accent: "pole-ay-woe-low." Just when I got that, I came to the main pedestrian drag of Florence: Via Calzaiuoli ("kal-tsie-wolly"...take, it Sam).

While you write "A.D. 312," we say "312 A.D." At what point can you dispense with the "A.D." and just say the year? We decided that while Constantine became Christian in 312 A.D., Rome fell in the year 476.

Reading the tours had me marveling at the variety of information we concern ourselves with: The Colosseum is likely named for the 100-foot-tall “colossal” statue of Nero that once stood out front. Roma spelled backwards is Amor ("love") — and the temple of Venus (love) and Rome had a sign that said two different words with the same four letters (depending on the viewer's vantage point). With licensed casinos and a reputed 20,000 courtesans, Venice was Europe’s Sin City. (And what happened in Venice...stayed in Venice.)

We labored over wording questions that probably didn’t matter much: Was Roman concrete made of cement and "light rocks" or "rubble"? (We said rubble.) Did exotic animals from Africa "herald" or "celebrate" Rome's conquest of distant lands? (We went with celebrate.) Did Rome grow from a small band of "tribespeople" or a small band of "barbarians" into a vast empire? (We said tribespeople.) Should we say “The Jews of Israel believed in only one god,” or “The Israelites believed in only one god”? (We said the former.) Were they slave "marketers" or "traders"? (Traders.)

Do people care that the pavement stones in the Forum were made of basalt? Do people need the word “capital” defined (the top of a column)? Affirmative.

How did the street-corner preacher actually sound when he cried out, “Beware the Ides of March!” And how did dying Caesar utter, “Et tu, Brute?” Joking about how mean Emperor Caligula was, should we say, “He even parked his chariot in handicapped spaces" or "disabled spaces”? Is this even a sensitivity issue? (We went with handicapped at the risk of not being PC.)

Do we need to introduce Bernini by saying his entire, difficult-to-pronounce name: Gian Lorenzo Bernini? And what about Leon Battista Alberti? When noticing the tiny cross atop the towering pagan obelisk, do we say, "Here we see Christian culture is but a thin veneer over our pagan roots" or "pagan origins"? (Our choice: roots.)

The Vatican is an independent country with a few extra bits of land that come with its lead churches. Are these Vatican-owned properties called “territories”? Exactly what do people expect to gain from touching the toe of the statue of St. Peter? Can you say “ecumenistic spirit” rather than “spirit of ecumenism?” Is it too crude to say, “While seventh-century Constantinople flourished, Dark Age Europeans were still rutting in the mud"? (Yes.) Must I say "friars" rather than "monks"? (There is a difference, but “friar” makes you think of a big fat Tuck.)

Did Giotto’s tower “set the tone” for Michelangelo, or “inspire" him? Does Donatello hold his "hammer and chisel" or hold his "trusty hammer and chisel"? Do you say "The Vatican" or simply "Vatican"? (We went without the “the.”) Do people know what a tanner is, or should I say "leather tanner"?

All the decisions have been made, the recordings are finished, and the post-production work has begun. These 12 audio tours will be available here at ricksteves.com (and on iTunes) within two months. (When they are finished, we’ll let you know.)

P.S.: This summer, I ranted on this blog about how un-Christian it seemed to keep the Vatican Museum hours so short with all the tourists baking in lines for hours trying to get in. Travelers' prayers have been answered: I just heard that the Pope will stretch the museum’s opening hours. In 2008, we can expect it to be open almost daily from 8:00 until 18:00. Hallelujah!

Posted by Rick Steves on December 30, 2007
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For my daughter Jackie Steves, Christmas morning had a happy Moroccan connection. I brought home the bundle of letters that readers of this blog sent to her (via my office) over the last month with donation checks to fund sending kids from the town of Sale to summer camp (as inspired by — and proposed at the end of — her high school trip to Morocco Journal featured recently on this blog). With her teacher/chaperone, Jackie will be sure these donations get used as intended. Here’s Jackie’s Christmas morning report:

***

It’s Christmas morning. I’m with my family at our house in Edmonds, Washington. I look out the window and there is actually some snow mixed in with the rain! What a magical morning.

I woke up this morning when my brother jumped on me, yelling obnoxiously in my ear, “Merry Christmas, Jackie!” It’s good to have him home from college. In a week he’ll leave to study abroad in Rome for a semester. He’s three years older than me, and up until now I have been the little sister watching him enviously while he has gotten to backpack and be a tour guide all around Europe (without any parents!).

Pretty soon, however, I’ll enjoy similar adventures. After I graduate from high school in June, I’ll travel through Europe with a friend for a month. I’m so excited. When my parents asked me what I would like for Christmas, what immediately came to mind was some seed money for my Europe graduation trip! When that’s what I found under the tree this morning, you can imagine my elation when I thought of how this money would be the wings for some of my travel dreams.

The last present I opened was a manila envelope. Written on the outside in my dad’s handwriting it said, “To Jackie’s friends in Morocco. From Jackie and those she inspired to care and share.” Inside I found 19 envelopes, which contained checks made out to the Sale Town Association in Morocco. Most of the checks were for $31, enough to send a Moroccan child to educational summer camp for two weeks. Many of the checks were for twice or even triple that amount, enough to provide for two or three kids!

Finding those checks and reading all the thoughtful notes that accompanied them was like having Christmas all over again. The best Christmas gift is witnessing the compassion of other people. We always hear from the media about the bad side of humanity: war, greed, and waste. I can’t tell you how refreshing it is to read all the kindhearted comments that people posted in response to reading my journal. I never expected so many people to take an interest in what I had to say. Your comments instilled in me confidence, hope, gratitude, and happiness. Receiving these letters and checks has been a huge testimony that a little exchange of cultural insight can have a tremendously positive effect.

The money people donated is enough to send 27 Moroccan children to camp! I am so excited for these kids from the poor city of Sale, some of whom live in slums, to have the opportunity to go to a summer camp by the sea. Thank you so much to all of you who took the time to mail a check. You have truly been an inspiration to me. I will follow through and be sure these kids get to camp and report on things (via this blog) again later.

Have a Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and a wonderful New Year!

Peace, love, and joy,

Jackie

Posted by Rick Steves on December 26, 2007
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It’s Yuletide...literally, “the turning of the sun.” Since long before the birth of Jesus, Europe has celebrated the return of light as the corner is turned on winter, the shortest day is past, and the promise of renewed life is assured.

The December 25th party was called "Saturnalia" by ancient Romans. Like Christians built churches upon the sites of pagan temples, it just made sense for them to celebrate the birth of Jesus on the pagan festival of Saturnalia.

Whether you worship the sun or the son, life and love are the theme today across Europe (and Christendom). Norwegian farmers are lashing bundles of wheat to fence poles — a treat for the birds. And families light candles at the tombstones of lost loved ones to remember them as they enter and leave their village churches.

In Burgundy, families cook and eat Le Réveillon de Noël, the biggest feast of the year, while children gather an orange and a star-shaped cookie to put in their slippers — a thank you in advance to Père Noël for his kind generosity.

Throughout Paris today, Christmas carousels (manèges de Noël) are thrilling wide-eyed children visiting from the countryside. The Champs-Elysées is a forest of twinkling trees. Families are out lèche-vitrine (literally, “window-licking”) as department stores fill windows with festive animation and yuletide whimsy. Stores thoughtfully even put up little wooden stepladders for kids to get a full dose of the big-city Christmas wonder. And families with muffs and mittens are ice-skating 200 feet above ground at the holiday ice rink on the first level of the Eiffel Tower.

In Nürnberg, little Germans munching gingerbread (still warm out of the oven) are marveling at market square stalls well-stocked with Prune People — figurines made with a walnut head, four-fig body, and prune limbs, all dolled up in traditional folk costumes. But their highlight is an encounter with the angelic, teenage, real-life girl crowned the “Christkind.” As the children multiply around her, she raises her gilded arms and says softly, “If you are very, very gentle...you can touch my wings.”

In 1818, Franz Gruber first sang "Silent Night" in the village of Oberndorf near Salzburg. Today Oberndorf is a muddy mess as a traffic jam of tourist buses inundates the place. Each Christmas Eve, holiday-goers from Florida to Yokohama converge on the village in search of olde time charm...and find mostly just each other.

In Salzburg, the Gunners’ Club lines up atop the castle to fire off handheld miniature cannon to shoo away evil spirits. Meanwhile, parents shoo away the children so they can decorate the tree. (Tree lots here don’t even open until the week of Christmas, as buying and decorating is done just before the big day.) Later this evening, with a fantasy of gifts under the glittering tree lit by countless real candles, the door is opened, the children stampede in, and the "land of if" becomes the here and now.

And throughout England, little ones sing while mixing their Figgie pudding, cupcake-sized mince pies are cooked up (to be eaten one a day through the 12 days of Christmas — to ensure a happy 2008), and Wassail-ers are eating, drinking and being merry.

And in a few minutes, in our household, the extended family is swooping in as we celebrate Christmas in our American way. So...I’ll post this now and wish all ye jolly travelers a Merry Christmas and happy holidays!

Posted by Rick Steves on December 24, 2007
Comments (11)

Our lives arc like parabolas. Just when our kids have gotten older and no longer enjoy the ritual of decorating the Christmas tree, my parents are coming to an age when they do. It occurred to me that my Mom would enjoy the toyland-wonder of selecting ornaments from our big box and — with favorite carols playing — hanging them just so on our tree.

As we shared in the creative decision-making, I took a trip down memory lane with my Mom and realized there was lots of meaning in our decorations.

There’s the little nurse and the woven Irish clover for Anne and a football player ready to throw a long bomb for Andy. A few little beach treasures and baked and painted goodies remind us of Jackie’s preschooler days. The tiny “Julens Sanger” Norwegian carol book, with its red, blue, and white flag cover, represents my family heritage. The green and red skates with the paper-clip blades were knit 20 years ago by my grandmother before her last Christmas. I remember for Grandma, Europe was as far away as the moon. Every time I packed my rucksack and headed off for Europe, her imagination would set her eyes twinkling, and she’d say, “Ooh la la…gay Pareeeee.”

There’s some artful give-and-take to our tree ritual. I let Anne crown the tree with an angel (which I find gaudy, and always seems to be being goosed by the tip of the tree). And Anne lets me drape the tree with the ancient string of popcorn I strung with an old girlfriend back in high school. (Popcorn lasts forever if you don’t eat it.) I also sneak in another souvenir from an old romance...a Japanese girlfriend gave me a kami (or god) in an exquisite little red sack that I hang as a tiny tip of the hat to Shinto on our Christmas tree. The funky cardboard “angel heads with sunglasses” struggle in their dogged battle against conformity.

From our living room, you wouldn’t know I’ve ever ventured outside the Pacific Northwest...except at Christmas, when the little treasures that hang on our tree serve as souvenirs. Two little red carved birds on a thread remind me of my early “Europe through the gutter” days. (I dropped into the trendy Marimekko shop in Helsinki, and that’s all I could afford.) And, much as I find the Käthe Wohlfahrt Christmas shop in Rothenburg a tourist trap, we dangle several delightful German-style painted wax and delicately carved trinkets from just the right branches.

We hang several little manger scenes both to keep the Christ in Christmas and, for me, to remember the politics of the Christ child...born poor in a manger under the tyranny of an empire to bring hope to the downtrodden. And, in that vein, the smallest ornament is perhaps my favorite — a tiny carved and varnished cross I picked up one Christmas season in Nicaragua, which hangs on a long black thread from the highest possible branch. It reads paz con social justicia.

Finally, my Mom and I stood back and surveyed the tree. We tweaked a few ornaments, adjusted the popcorn like the train on a wedding dress, and stood back again. Our task was done, and she said, “Good job…it’s pretty.”

Posted by Rick Steves on December 17, 2007
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Squeezing a few days in Rome between a Greece tour and researching in Istanbul this fall, I met my friend Tim Frakes — who produces videos for the Lutheran Church (www.elca.org) — to finish a video about St. Peter.

Over the years, Tim and I have collaborated on five teaching videos, taking us from Lutheran-funded hospitals in Papua New Guinea to the room where Martin Luther translated the Bible from Latin to the people’s German (...really annoying the pope).

For this video (similar to an earlier one on St. Paul), Tim filmed places around the eastern Mediterranean where Peter had lived and worked. We planned to have me “host” the video in Rome by filming (over two days) about 20 “on-camera” bits at the Vatican and in generic ancient settings.

Filming on St. Peter's Square is always thrilling, with a backdrop of the greatest church in Christendom and so much rich Church history to share. While the square is a crowded mess through midday, it is glorious — rich colors, striking architecture warmly lit by a low sun, and no crowds — early and late. That’s when we filmed there.

(Of course, there is the nagging issue of whether St. Peter ever even went to Rome. Scholars differ on this. And as Lutherans, we didn’t want to anger Roman Catholics by questioning the veracity of the claim that Peter is buried under St. Peter's Basilica. We proceeded as if the tradition itself of Peter’s work and death there authenticated the story.)

We needed distinct and evocative sites for each of our 15 generic ancient setting on-camera performances. We tried for Ostia Antica, but failed to get permission (without paying the $3,000 fee that they asked). Finally the people at Hadrian’s Villa gave us permission, supporting our church’s educational work (but didn’t quite understand why we were “filming St. Peter” at a place he certainly never visited). As it turned out, Hadrian’s Villa was much better than Ostia Antica would have been for our needs.

Tim and I scouted the site and set out to shoot all the on-cameras. It was an exhilarating day and we were both happy with the work. Exhausted, we returned to our hotel and went out for a celebratory dinner.

Later that evening, Tim knocked on my hotel room door with panic and horror on his face. He asked me if I had seen a videocassette. One was missing.

It was the nightmare of every TV producer: While working at his laptop, he had knocked three tapes from his desk to the floor. He bent down a bit later and picked up two. Then he joined me for our pasta and red wine.

Rome is not a place where garbage moves fast...unless you dropped a precious videocassette into a trash bin. While we were out, the maid came in and emptied the garbage into a big plastic bag that went outside...and then, with incredibly bad luck, the garbage truck came and went.

We got lovely Annamaria from our hotel (The Aberdeen) to go into her building’s garbage room. With plastic gloves on, she emptied bags on the floor, analyzing the empty jugs and so on to determine which bags were from Hotel Aberdeen. All her bags had already been picked up and taken to the Rome dump. Heroically, Annamaria and her husband actually drove to the dump...only to find that all had been smashed together. Our cassette was hopelessly lost.

Tim felt so bad, considering how hard we had worked. We just agreed not to punish ourselves, changed our morning flights home, and arranged to return to Hadrian’s Villa to re-shoot the 15 on-cameras...which were absolutely critical to the production.

Back at Hadrian’s Villa, the weather was as good as the earlier day. But there was a different man in charge. We explained our story (with the help of our gracious driver and Annamaria on the phone). The bureaucrats running the site seemed to enjoy watching this humbled American film crew begging for a chance to enter and reshoot our lost bits. They said no.

I couldn’t believe this. The light was perfect. We were permitted the day before. I had a flight that night to Turkey. And the gate was closed to us and our camera. We sat there looking like abandoned little puppies, sad faces, trying to stay cool...until noon, when they finally agreed to let us in “as tourists” and re-do our work.

With time ticking away, Tim and I lined up all 15 stops efficiently and, with precision focus, re-shot the entire list. The work went perfectly, and I was impressed by how easy it was to call back the lines I had previously memorized. I think my performance was actually better this time around. By 3:00 p.m., we had shot the last bit — just in time for me to zip out to the airport and resume my itinerary in Istanbul.

Tim flew home with all the footage to complete his St. Peter video. A week later, I was home and recorded the general voice track. Within about a month, the project was compete and a new teaching video was in the mail to all 11,000 ELCA Lutheran churches.

Our friends at the ELCA website have organized all the videos Tim and I have done into one fun page at www.elca.org, so anyone can click on over and see our work.

My favorites of this work have been the Papua New Guinea show (even thought it’s pretty old…our first collaboration, which let me share my thoughts on First/Third World relations) and the Martin Luther story (since I had to sit through the old-fashioned, black-and-white versions when I was a kid in Sunday school, and this would pump up the color and energy for kids warming those same little chairs today). And for understanding the work that St. Paul and St. Peter did in the formative early years of the Christian Church, the other videos tell that story.

If you’re interested, I hope you can enjoy our latest work: The Life of Apostle Peter.

Posted by Rick Steves on December 13, 2007
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When my books were 200 pages long, I prided myself in personally visiting every listing every year. Now, with 20 books averaging 400+ pages each, I rely on a staff of researchers. We just had our annual meeting, and I had four hours to inspire and instruct our team. Here are a few concerns we dealt with:

Reader feedback: We get mountains. While tips on what has changed and areas of confusion are really helpful, most new hotel and restaurant suggestions are a disappointment. Still, we track many of these down because gold nuggets do pop up. Run down suggestions when you can.

Writing vs. checking information: Researchers are primarily information-checkers. My co-authors and I get the exhausting privilege of expanding our coverage.

Tap locals for help, but don’t be hoodwinked by cronyism. We need to survey our friendly hoteliers and B&B hosts, as they know what our readers are doing day in and day out...which tours, tricks, eateries, and so on work best. Where are we letting our readers down?

Cheap tricks: With our dollar in the tank, in 2008 we will all dredge up cheap tricks for eating, sleeping, transportation, and sightseeing at every stop.

Decipher hotel price schemes: When hotels have crazy computer-generated price schemes, try to find the average peak-season rate and suss out how travelers score the best actual prices in each place.

Avoiding lines: If there’s a line, there is a way to avoid it. We want those with our books to never need to wait through a line. Find clever ways around them.

Get deals for those with the book: Many prices assume a commission for some agency or website. Because our readers are going direct, try to negotiate for them a discounted rate that cuts out the middleman, saves our readers money, and gets the business all it would net out through an agency. But be very careful not to negotiate a discount from someone who isn’t in authority to back it up and make it happen next year. Check each discount in the book anonymously.

Don’t clutter up the book with bad-value sightseeing passes. Europe must have a university course called “Confusing Nonsensical Museum Passes.” Few are worth the trouble, much less the ink to explain in a guidebook. Really crunch the numbers.

“Live the book”: When researching, you are working every waking hour — eating, sleeping...living the book. Know what’s in the book. Know the frustrations of our readers. Do what our readers do, and report on it.

Think strategically: For example, figure out the connection from Lagos to Salema (which our readers will want to use). Avoid an expensive hotel by taking the overnight cruise from Copenhagen to Oslo. If flying home from Milan’s airport, consider spending your last night in Stresa and catch a shuttle directly to the airport from there, rather than detouring through Milan.

Don’t pollute the book with needless details (last entry 15 minutes before closing) or rare offerings (free second Sundays, English tour summer Wednesdays).

I like to illustrate a job well done by examples from last year’s research. Here are a few I used:

A new sight listing (in Berlin) written up clearly after a visit: The Film Museum is the most interesting visit in the Sony Center. Your admission gets you into several floors of exhibits (3rd floor is film and TV permanent exhibits, 1st and 4th floor are temporary exhibits) made meaningful by the included (and essential) English audioguide. The film section takes you from the beginning with emphasis on the Weimar Republic time in the 1920s when Berlin rivaled Hollywood (Metropolis was a German production from 1927). Three rooms are dedicated to Marlene Dietrich, and another section features Nazi use of film as propaganda. The TV section tells the story of das boob tube from its infancy (when it was primarily used as a Nazi propaganda tool) to today. The 30-minute kaleidoscopic review — kind of a frantic fast-forward montage of greatest hits in German TV history — is great fun (it plays with 10-minute breaks all day long). Upstairs is a TV archive where you can dial and click a wide range of new and classic German TV standards. The Arsenal Theater downstairs shows art films in their original language.

A new restaurant listing (in Berlin) that makes the dining experience clear, and offers a distinct style and great value: Zum Schusterjungen Speisegaststatte is a classic old-school eatery. It’s German with attitude and retains its circa 1986 DDR decor. The “Boot Boy” is famous for its schnitzel and filling €7-8 meals. It’s a no-frills place with quality ingredients and a strong local following. It serves the eating needs of those who lament the fact that it’s hard to find solid traditional German cooking with the flood of ethnic eateries (small 40-seat dining hall, daily 11:00-24:00, corner of Lychenerstrasse and Danziger Strasse 9, tel. 442 7654).

A cheap transportation trick: Eurailpasses don’t cover the Czech Republic, so you need to buy a ticket for the Czech portion of the trip before boarding a train. (Tip: Since the Germans charge double what the Czechs do per kilometer for tickets within Czech Republic, you can actually save money by crossing into Czech Republic without the Prague leg of the journey paid for. Buy it from the conductor for €7 and pay the €2 penalty…and save a few euros over the €14 price for the ticket bought in Germany.)

An example of a fun detail (in Luzern) that could change if Frau Segesser retires, and therefore needs to be checked each year: Midway across the old wooden covered bridge is a little chapel from the 16th century, built to guard against destruction by flood. A line of family crests acknowledge the volunteers who, over the years, have kept the chapel decorated with the seasons. Since 1987, this has been the work of Frau Segesser. While you’re paused here, notice the serious woodwork.

Posted by Rick Steves on December 10, 2007
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I just finished my last lecture tour of the year (Portland, San Francisco, LA, San Diego, Phoenix) last week, and now, psychologically, I can start thinking about next year’s travel schedule.

I need to commit for 2008 by the end of 2007 so our TV and guidebook research teams have their parameters set.

Each year it’s a similar basic routine: four months of work in Europe (April and May in the Mediterranean world, home for June, and then July and August north of the Alps). This year Jackie is graduating, so June will be a busy and exciting time to be home.

We produce, on average, six or seven TV shows a year. That’s about 40 days of filming—half in spring (in the south) and half in summer (in the north). It’s critical that I have good weather and lots of action to brighten up the footage, so I need to match the regions with the months.

In 2008, I think we’ll shoot two shows in Greece and a show in Istanbul in late April/early May, and probably three shows in Scandinavia in late July/early August.

When we shoot is also impacted by the need to provide an even flow of rough footage to spread out the demands on our editor back home. And in September — before all the shows are edited — our new series will debut. This means we’ll be committed to delivering a show a week for 13 weeks with several still in the works. It’s a bit scary because once we start the delivery schedule, there’s no room for any glitches in the production schedule. (We do this each season...and have always made it OK.)

With age and wisdom, I have learned to get over there early for some research to get in shape, tanned up, and acclimated to the road. I also give the crew a day before I join them to get some beauty shots (“B-roll”) in the can. Producer Simon and our cameraman are in a better mood to help me “cover the script” if they’ve got some pretty shots in the can first.

Once the TV days are set, I then need to divvy up the guidebook research chores. Each two-month trip is basically 20 days research, 20 days filming, then 20 more days research. My research time is determined by which regions are most used (e.g., many, many more travelers will use the chapter on Germany’s Rhine River valley than will use Norway’s Setesdal Valley), and which regions I didn’t make it to personally in the last year or two.

While we have researchers update every place covered in the books, with my visit I try to do more than check the existing material. I like to broaden the coverage and really revamp and freshen up the eating and sleeping listings. Another factor, of course, is new books planned.

For 2008, my priorities will be the following:

Bits of Italy I didn’t do last year (this is our bestseller, and — despite its immensity — I do everything thoroughly each two years…I’ll be sure to do Cinque Terre, Amalfi Coast, and Siena this year);

Vienna/Salzburg/Munich/Füssen/Danube Valley (we’re publishing a separate book on Vienna with Salzburg and Austrian side-trips in '08);

Paris, Amsterdam, London (I love doing the city books personally every other year--I did Venice, Florence, Rome in '07); and

Portugal/Galicia/Basque Country (Portugal’s past due for me, and I hope to get charged up to make a future TV script for Galicia/Basque with what I learn in ‘08 researching that zone).

Like anyone planning a trip, I need to be realistic about how much I can cover. I think this is way too much for my 80 days of available research time. Something’s got to go. Thankfully, I have a great staff of researchers and co-authors. Between us, we’ll cover it all.

Just thinking about all this European travel gets me seven kinds of all-charged-up.

Posted by Rick Steves on December 07, 2007
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