Travel Freak

On holiday in the homes of writers

An idea of original holiday for all lovers of books? Staying in the homes of our favorite writers. Yes, maybe there happen to take tea with Stephen King or playing quidditch with JK Rowling, but would you like to put the pleasure unique and unrepeatable to rent the house of John Keats or Robert Louis Stevenson?

This bell’articolo of The Observer presents a list of places open to the public where you can relive the atmosphere from which it drew inspiration our favorite novels. Why not take advantage: for the homeless in Kent where Charles Dickens lived during the long summer holidays, between 1937 and 1959, (and where seems to have written Nicholas Nickleby) spend from 83 to 207 pounds. Without considering that, from 19 to 22 June, you can participate in Broadstairs Dickens Festival 2008.

And what they say the room number 511 of the Ambos Mundos, in Havana, where Ernest Hemingway wrote “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” which he himself described as “a good place to write.” The list is long, from Berlin where Franz Kafka stayed that to Key West described by Tennessee Williams, up to the estate in Vermont where Rudyard Kipling spent his honeymoon (and learned to ski on skis from donatigli Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the inventor of Sherlock Holmes).

Paul St. George, an English Victorian ingnegnere, when the Union Jack sventolava on all the seas of the world, had a dream: making a tunnel between the two sides dell’atlantico that, thanks to a game of mirrors, could put communicating the citizens of New York with those of London.

150 years after the idea dell’immaginifico artist has been achieved, and Telectroscope was installed in London near Tower Bridge and New York near the Brooklin Bridge, allowing those who passed in front to cast a look of the other Part of the ocean. Of course, everything has been achieved thanks to more fiber-optic technology, but the result is the same: perfect strangers that the two sides of the tunnel is scrutano and exchange messages through an electronic blackboard.

The result might not be what they expected St. George, namely promoting relations between people thousands of miles away, at least judging from the wording of some of these “conversations”.

An Englishman to a U.S. policeman in uniform.
“How is it going la banda?”
“I’m one of NYPD Blue not the police, obviously not know how to appreciate the humor typical English.

Or an American fan of soccer, for an Englishman:
“Man U suck!” To send Manchester United to that country, perhaps because it took for Chelsea.
“Man, you suck!” Was the response british, who pronounced the same way but is the prodromo of future misunderstandings.

I am not a big passionate mountain in the summer, as Mark I can imagine to ski without… But there is a place that has won my heart for the atmosphere, the absence of mass tourism, traditions that are kept jealously: in Alagna Valsesia. The country is the last you’ll find on the state 299, overlooking the river Sesia, set by the Monte Rosa, collects the story of an ancient population of Germanic origin, Walser that Alagna moved between the twelfth and thirteenth century.

During the summer in Alagna can do a lot of walks, as the path glaciologico to discover the evolution of a glacier along a path that winds into 8 stages reported. You can also opt for the discovery of architecture and traditions of Walser following the route of ‘eco museum, an open-air route between houses, churches, mills and furnaces of the community.

Some small things that made my stay magic: seeing the many prayers Tibetan hung outside the houses of the country sway in the wind, buying fresh milk milked just a few steps from the main square of the country and lunch at guglielmina refuge where one day I would like perhaps even stop to sleep (yes, almost 3000 meters high not only eat well but you can sleep at the hotel that once was the highest in Europe).

The first time I heard of “standby” by a friend traveler incallito I thought was referring to the usual history of the waiting list of airlines… Instead the traditional formula “standby” related to the agency Todo World.

It works like this: you choose a geographical area, between the Caribbean, Red Sea and Indian Ocean, the number of nights, usually between one or two weeks, if only flight or holiday complete and the price is scontatissimo the final destination because you are only communicated to a week after their departure. On the site call roulette: if you choose, for example, the Caribbean destinations are available Santo Domingo, Mexico, Cuba, Honduras and Jamaica… Both evil does not go for a roulette!

Obviously the higher the proximity to the high season, the better prices. Departures are from Malpensa, navigation on the site is not immediate but it is worth trying. The friend who first I spoke is an absolute enthusiast and part at least twice a year with this formula!

From 24 to 28 June in the scenario Park Sant’Anna Scario to be held the first edition of the competition for the amateur theatre companies “under the Tower Theater.” Together with other laudable initiatives that are beginning to flourish in the vast territory cilentano, the Festival Theatre under the Tower proposes five days with the Theatre Company Each in its own way of Santa Barbara of Ceraso, I Saltimbanchi of Don Bosco di Polla, The Company of National Theatre of Sapri and La The company albatro “of Nocera Inferiore. The photos are Marzia, who sent us the press release together with some shutter its kind on the coast of Cilento.