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July 2004

07

Art in Aarhus

Aarhus, Denmark, is home to ARoS, a new 10-story art museum in the city center. ARoS houses art from the 1700s to the present day along with the personal sketches, letters and notebooks of Danish painter Per Kirkeby. For info, visit www.aros.dk.

Reach the Danish Tourist Board at 212/885-9700.

Wheeling and dealing with Europe

As long as I’ve been writing, my passion has been to make Europe accessible. I’ve focused on economic accessibility (you don’t need to be rich to travel) and intellectual accessibility (you don’t need to be a scholar to enjoy Europe’s history and art). But I also want to make Europe physically accessible for slow walkers and wheelchairs users.

With this in mind, I teamed up with Dr. Ken Plattner to write “Rick Steves’ Easy Access Europe,” a guidebook on London, Paris, Bruges, Amsterdam and the Rhine for travelers with limited mobility.

Chefs of London teach

The chefs of some of London’s finest restaurants are passing on their knowledge at a series of master classes arranged by Tasting Places. They are being held at a designer kitchen in Holland Park and at several restaurants.

The morning sessions in Holland Park cost from £100 (near $179) per person, with a 2-hour hands-on master class followed by lunch with fine wines.

Week-long walk in Scotland

Walkers are invited to join a 7-day walk in the steps of 18th-century Scottish cattle drovers from Spean Bridge to Crieff. It is part of the Crieff and Strathearn Drovers’ Tryst hill walking festival, Oct. 9-16, 2004. Various shorter walks are also planned, along with street theater, live music, ceilidh, pipe bands and a farmers’ market.

For info, call 01764 652578 or visit www.droverstryst.co.uk.

Canterbury Festival

The Canterbury Festival takes place this year Oct. 9-23. There will be concerts in Canterbury Cathedral and opera, dance and drama in the Marlowe and Gulbenkian theaters, not to mention a range of jazz and folk music, street theater and children’s events, plus exhibitions, walks and talks.

For festival info, phone (01227) 452853, fax (01227) 781830 or e-mail info@canterburyfestival.co.uk.

Royal Oak Foundation

The Royal Oak Foundation is the American membership affiliate of Britain’s National Trust. The National Trust owns and operates over 200 historic houses, gardens, castles and sites in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Royal Oak members enter these properties free of charge, saving on admission fees. The Royal Oak membership card is also honored at over 100 properties of the National Trust for Scotland.

St. Paul’s renovation

A major stage in the long-term restoration of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London has been completed (Feb. ’04, pg. 21). The East End face is looking as good as new following 13 months of painstaking renovation by stonemasons. Restoration of the interior is expected to be completed early in 2005.

It is open daily Monday-Saturday, with admission £7 (near $12.50). Visit www.stpauls.co.uk.

“Pieta” by Morales

 We took a river cruise in France in summer ’02. In Paris, don’t miss a “Pieta” by Morales in the Spanish section of the Louvre. Cabourg, Normandy, was our base for viewing WWII landing beaches and graves. In the war museum in Caen, a display showing film of the landings from both the Allied and German sides — in a split-screen video — was extremely dramatic and moving.

W. SWEENY
Wilmington, DE

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