Bird of Passage
I am from a family of fairly frequent travellers, and among my many happy childhood memories, there are a lot which are related to voyages.
Although we were certainly not rich, we travelled every year - as a rule, more than once. How my parents managed to finance all this, along
with building a house, paying the mortgage, and all the other every day expenses of a family, still is a miracle to me. And I can very well
remember the catalogues, which Mama and Papa used to browse many evenings, for low priced special offers. Around Easter, we usually spent a
vacation inside Germany (Palatinate, near the French border), while in summer, and sometimes also in autumn, we travelled to the south regularly.
There, Spain (surprise! surprise!) was usually our destination. However, I can also recall holiday trips to Croatia, Holland, the Bavarian
Forest and other places. Destinations south of the Alps we always reached by charter flights (Condor, Spantax...)
Fledging
As a teenager, I made my first travel experiences outside the family, and Amsterdam was my favourite destination. But I still travelled frequently
with my parents, sister and grandma, when in the early 80s Tenerife became "our island". My parents purchased a little holiday flat there, and since
they both retired, they use to go there several times a year. In the late 80s and early 90s, I also visited the Basque Country and Albania -
the latter during a humanitarian action. Finally, in 1993 at last I managed to cross the pond, and I spent two weeks in Pennsylvania and Ohio.
Lamed Wings
In those years, my wanderlust had dwindled already, and it got lost completely for nearly nine years after my trip to the US. Partly that had
economic reasons, because I lost my job in 1996 and needed some professional realignment. While I was back in school to learn a new job,
my financial constraints were too tight to travel - besides I lacked time and motivation for it. The first year I was back in a job (1999), large
parts of my annual leave were spent for moving house. The following two years, I had to travel a lot on business (Southern Germany, Spain,
England), and I strongly appreciated every moment I could spend at home.
|
|
On the Road again
During my international projects, colleagues from the UK had first told me about low fare airlines. At that time, this idea was still fairly
exotic to Germans, and I have to admit it didn't mean anything to me. Back then, Ryanair's only destination from Hahn was Stansted, which in the
face of London's price level was not the most attractive destination to me. Early 2002, I learned that this Irish low fare airline also would
fly to other, more attractive places from Hahn, and that they sold tickets on the web. So I just had a look at their website. On of the destinations
was Pisa - until then, the only places in Italy I had seen were Trieste and Bari (on our way to Albania). So I selected a late April weekend,
entered the data, and then I didn't believe my eyes: each trip at € 3.50 !!! I shook my head, sure that there were strings attached. One of my
colleagues said: "Just press 'O.K.', what can you lose?" - Well, and so I booked a weekend round-trip to Pisa, for the grand total - including
taxes and fees - of € 32.40. A month later, I had a flight to Montpellier in Southern France at a similar price, and in autumn of 2002 my parents
and I visited Tuscany once more.
Itchy Feet
Those flight opportunities from Hahn, which is about 90 minutes by car from my hometown, would have been enough to ignite my long extinguished
wanderlust again. And then, some new development turned me into the proverbial kid in the candy store. Two German low fare airlines, Germanwings
and Hapag Lloyd Express, made Cologne their main hub. So now I had two more carriers just about 30 minutes from my home. No question that this
revived bird of passage couldn't resists... Some of the flights I had booked I had to skip for one reason or another - still I have seen a
few places this year, and some more will follow. On this page, I want to share some things with you - experiences, impressions, tips. First
and foremost, I want to inspire you - get out of the house, and discover the world!
|
