Austria, Travel, Winter

Mayrhofen Spring Skiing in Tirol

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I recently joined a friend on a one-week ski tip to Mayrhofen in Tirol, Austria… and I now have a taste for spring skiing which will be hard to quash! (Our husbands stayed in London, so it was girls-only.) Where is Mayrhofen? Mayrhofen is a town in the Zillertal (Ziller river valley) in the Austrian state of Tirol.  It took approximately an hour to reach by bus from Innsbruck, following a short 1h 45min flight from London.  The village is located between the Penken and the Ahorn mountains, and is also close to the Hintertux Glacier, the absolute highlight of my week in the Alps. The Hintertux Glacier At 3,250 metres above sea level, the Hintertux Glacier ski resort is open for business all year round, even in summer (when I may be back).      The Penken I spent most of my time skiing (i.e. taking ski lessons) on the […]

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Paris, Paris restaurants, Travel

Paris Breizh Cafe Review

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Well, here it comes, our Paris Breizh Cafe Review: Widely celebrated as one of the best places for dessert in Paris, Breizh Café in the Marais district heavily impressed us during our recent visit on our last trip. We accidentally stumbled across it on our way from Place des Vosges to Marche des Enfants Rouges. You have to queue for a little while at this Breton Creperie with a Japanese touch (the owner, chef and founder, Bertrand Larcher, worked in Tokyo for some time and brought many ideas and recipes back to Paris; today, Breizh Café also has one outpost there and two in Brittany). My wife ordered ginger and lemon crepe with ice cream, I ordered galette Cancale (named after the seaside town where one of the other cafes is located) with bits of smoked, cured herring and fake caviar in sour cream. Both dishes were very tasty. The […]

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Paris, Paris restaurants, Travel

Les Papilles Bistroy Parisien

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We had heard many good things about Les Papilles (French for ‘the tastebuds’) and despite our high expectations, Les Papilles was even more brilliant than we had hoped. It starts with the friendly waiters, the lovely atmosphere in this former wine shop, and the quick service. Despite the fact that it was very busy, the wooden panels and shelves on the walls ensured that it was not getting too loud. Not sure if their ventilation system wasn’t working on that rather cold day in early March, but it was steaming hot despite the fact that they regularly opened the main door towards the street for a few minutes to let some fresh air in.       There is only one four-course menu, no choice, but that’s fine if it is four courses like these. It started with the waiter bringing a huge ceramic bowl and a large ladle to our […]

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Paris, Paris restaurants, Travel

Au Comptoir du Relais – Great food, if you don’t mind rude waiters and dirty plates

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When researching Paris restaurants before our trip, we came across French MasterChef TV judge Yves Camdeborde’s legendary bistro Au Comptoir du Relais, which translates into ‘the bar area of the hotel Relais’. This tiny and bustling art deco restaurant belonging to the well-regarded 4-star Hotel Paris Relais Saint Germain (Camdeborde owns the whole hotel) sits in a beautiful 16th Century building just off Boulevard Saint-Germain (Metro station Odeon) and has been celebrated as unmissable for many years. It seems that the hype about it grew even stronger over time. We particularly remember a number of reviews along the lines “they know they simply cannot go wrong” and thought, that’s never a good sign. The best chefs and restaurant owners of this planet do not expose this kind of attitude. On the other hand, what were our options, miss out on this much talked about ‘gem of the gastronomic universe’, run […]

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Activities, Fun, Paris, Travel

Zigzagging through Paris on a Segway

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Shortly after our visit to the Eiffel Tower, we did another tour with Flat Tire Tours, this time zigzagging through the area between the Tower, Pont Alexandre III, and the Rodin Museum (one of our top spots in Paris, which we visited directly after the Segway tour; tres romantique location, so to say).    I’m 2 metres tall and weigh over 100kg, so did at first felt rather uncomfortable entrusting my life to a wobbly, 45kg light-weight thing that sits on just two wheels and is supposed to be steered simply by me moving my heavy weight forward or backwards, left or right, on the little steering stick that is attached to the wheels and the platform between them.    The introduction and safety instruction was very short, but in Flat Tire Tours’ defence, spending more time on this would have taken the fun out of it. Nonetheless, I still […]

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