Categoria: Travels

Wroclaw’s bridge of love

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Tumski Bridge is Wroclaw’s bridge of love. It’s a steel bridge over the north branch of the Odra river, at the entrance of Cathedral Island. At night its structure is illuminated by powerful spotlights. The view is impressive, with the spires of the cathedral behind. Walking on the bridge at night is even more impressive: the gas lamps of over a hundred years ago are still in operation. If you’re lucky enough, you can meet the gaslighter either at dusk or dawn. Here lovers promise each other eternal love. Love padlocks And as a mark of their promise, they lock

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In the land of Pallozas

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O Cebreiro Cebreiro, the land of Pallozas, is the gateway to Galicia for those who follow the Way of Saint James. They climb from the Meseta up to over 1.300 metres in height, the highest point of the surrounding mountains, dark and gloomy. This is also the “rain divide” between the wet Galicia and dry central Spain. Here the clouds stop their ride from the Atlantic ocean. They’ve been pouring water over the whole Galicia and the last drops fall here. Well, they aren’t really only drops. It rains cats and dogs very often. Pallozas It is also cold, up

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Kulusuk Football

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Taiga, steppe, tundra: when I was at school, geography was my favourite. It was the right time to dream on the green and brown pages of the world atlas, on the strange and fascinating words of the textbook that reminded me of the adventures that one day I would live. Tundra, steppe, taiga: the sound of these words repeated in my mind gave me almost a physical sensation, the harbinger of a smell that I imagined was typical of those places. Anyway, the tundra doesn’t smell. And it is also very quiet: no trees, no leaves, no obstacle to the

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Into the frozen void

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Do you remember Ikateq, the Greenlandic ghost village? Well, at the end of the exploration it was time for us to get back to the pier where the tiny boat was waiting for us. Tiniteqilaaq, at the edge of the known world Our next destination is the (inhabited!) village of Tiniteqilaaq. To get there we will sail along the Sermilik Fjord, one of the least explored slices of our world. In winter the fjord freezes and you can venture far inside with sledges. But it’s extremely cold, nobody is living there but seals and bears, there is no food and

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Ikateq, population one

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Roughly diamond-shaped, Angmassalik island, off the coast of Eastern Greenland, is 40 km long and 30 km. wide. It’s a mountainous island of granite polished by ice, with many small valleys modelled by the glacial erosion. Only the tops of the mountains are often sharp. Obviously, in the past they were Nunataq: this Inuit term refers to a mountain peak that rises from the ice sheet. And even to an evil person. The sea that separates Angmassalik island from the mainland creeps in form of fjords of various sizes. By sailing with a small boat, it takes a whole day to make the tour of the island. First, you

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Open air music

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The cathedral of Santiago de Compostela is surrounded by squares; between them, there are other passages, arches, and stairs. The end of the Way Plaza do Obradoiro is the stage of the daily ritual of the arrival of the pilgrims, who followed the Way of Saint James, and finally – after a hundred and hundred miles on foot – turn around the last corner and are in front of the Baroque façade of the Cathedral. On the left, there is an arch where usually street artists find shelter from wind rain or (rarely!) sun. Bagpipes, flute or guitar players, mimes

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