Vita

I'm enjoying reading about people's holiday plans for Europe and thought it would be fun to hear from people who have spent past holidays abroad. I wouldn't want to be away from my family for the holidays but I think it would be fun to spend Christmas in an old European city complete with snow and carolling.

Julie

We spent Christmas 1999 in Paris with our two children and three friends. It was fairly brisk but we never really had snow. What we did experience was "The Tempest" France's storm of the Century that uprooted trees in Versailles and Montmartre and other places around Paris. We were pretty oblivious to what was happening and thought it just a bad storm (causing flower pots to careen around the central courtyard in our hotel, etc) until we got into a car at the metro only to hear an announcement in French of course that we finally figured out meant that that the metro was not running. Then we started seeing pictures on tv of the damage and actually saw it firsthand when we went to Montmartre. It wasn't exactly the Christmas memory I was expecting but it was indeed a memorable Christmas.

want to go back

Last Holiday season, we were in York,Engalnd with freinds. It felt like a truly old fashioned Christmas.<BR>In the center town, there was a Holiday Festival, complete with roasted Chestnuts from vendors wearing period costumes,carollers,games for kids,lit candles,and twinkling lights. In the nearby York Abbey there was a concert of the Messiah that could be heard outside. The pubs were warm and cozy afterwards for a pint to drink by the fire.<BR>The whole town was decorated with old fashioned decorated trees, etc..We drove up to the highest part of Yorkshire, and Had Yorkshire pudding ( it was supposedly invented at this particular 500 yr old restaurant) and turkey,roast,etc for our holiday meal.<BR>There was no glitz and glamour or too much commercialism of Christmas. We would go back in a heart beat.

natalie

We spent Thanksgiving in London 4 years ago. Of course it was just like any other day for the Englanders, a beautiful snowy day. Spent about an hour on Oxford Street trying to find any restaurant that may have Turkey on the menu without any luck. At around 5:00 we decided to settle for "American Fried Chicken" a fast food play off of our KFC. No mashed potatoes, no corn on the cob to be found. It was definately one of our happiest and most memorable holidays ever.

John

Years ago we spent Christmas in Aigues Mortes, a historic walled town in the Camargue in southern France. (Ex) wife and I were just about the only guests in the small, comfy hotel; we had a nice Christmas Eve dinner, and then went to a midnight Mass in the ancient church (from whence St. Louis had departed on a Crusade a few years prior.) The house was packed, and we got a seat in the last row; behind us were standing teenagers and young people, shuffling and sniping in low voices, and a few flicking ashes (!) while the priest (who was old enough to have blessed King Louis’ fleet) gave a somewhat fire-and-brimstone sermon about not coming enough to church. (Go figure – one of his biggest crowds of the year and he hauls off on them?) <BR><BR>Service over, the standees bug out to the bars and wherever, we return through quiet streets to the hotel. The next morning, we discover that the bars and bistros (all 4 or 5) are open and doing turn-away business with Christmas raffles, giving away hams and bottles of booze or whatever, while the locals (whole families, it seems) sit around drinking Pernod or glasses of something bright red, smoking and chatting up a storm, a very lively scene. <BR><BR>By mid-day, the square is full of families strolling or fresh from church, a few kids on obviously new bikes making the tipsy ham-winners stagger a little. We climb the walls and do a circuit around the town, looking out at the Rhone estuary in the hazy winter sun. Sadly, no black bulls or white horses in sight, but we’re entertained by a big Petanque tournament going on at the base of the walls (photo on Sally Fowler’s website.)<BR><BR>Dinner back at the hotel (pretty much us and the staff) consisted of a saut&eacute;ed turkey and garlic dish that remains stuck in my memory as one of the best meals ever. All together, it was a cozy, grand day. <BR>

xxx

ttt

Patrick

Many years ago a whole group of us, all teachers, did a one week trip Christmas Day to New Years Day to Lucerne, Switzerland. The idea seemed wonderful -- snowy Switzerland at Christmas. However, we found that snow is virtually non existent there until at least January unless you go up into the mountains -- which we also did. Instead it was cold, foggy, drizzly rain, and pretty dismal. We had a great time anyway, but just not as I had pictured. And the highlight of the whole trip was assembling in the little hotel bar every night when they lit all the real candles on the Christmas tree.