Interesting, non obvious, places in Europe

[KronkeyCroc]

So my family always pay for parents to go away on trip for important anniversaries and this year is their 50th. Previous trips for 40th was Iceland.

We might plan to all go as a family socan’t be anywhere too exotic as would be too expensive, hence looking at Europe.

Any ideas of not the usual tourist traps with interesting places to visit/ adventures to be had in Europe?

Spooky! I was just thinking of Soldeu. I think we might have been on the same holiday, BlowDryRat, as I did most of those activities. It was lovely that as Soldeu is a ski resort, summer is out of season and pretty quiet. Beautiful mountain hikes in sunny weather and no crowds!

I went on the Intrepid tour @Cattenberg. That was back when I was a lot fitter than I am now!

We loved Croatia. Mostly spent our time travelling along the coast.
However, spent a few nights in Zagreb and it was a beautiful city. From there we also took the train to Llublijana for the day (we’d been for a few days before, so a day was enough) The train journey was beautiful, through green mountains.
On the previous trip we’d travelled to Llublijana by train from Venice - a slightly convoluted journey at the time.
But it might be fun for your parents to link up a few places

@Cattenberg - we love Soldeu… currently waiting to find out if France will open up so that we can go on our planned trip in Feb.

Ghent is lovely but not huge amounts to do. Bratislava is like mini Prague in days gone by. Wroclaw in Poland is really nice - dwarves everywhere to look for, lovely buildings, parks etc. Krakow also but more touristy. Somewhere that really surprised me was Strasbourg - preferred it to Colmar. River trips, beautiful architecture, great food. I love Cologne - good museums, shopping, boat trips, zoo etc. Oslo, expensive for food and drinks but really friendly city with lots to see. Montpellier is fabulous. Stresa on Lake Maggiore. I could go on for ages

Transylvania. Go to Brasov, which is beautiful. Lots to do in and around. Or fly to Cluj.

Gdańsk is better than Krakow.

Tallinn is fabulous.

@BlowDryRat, I went on the Intrepid trip in 2014. It was great! I hope Andorra can re-open soon, @NameChangeinHaste.

I loved Iceland but Seville has been the most pleasant surprise out of all the places we've visited. Nothing beat sat drinking wine in the park on New Years Day 2020. Stunning city, great climate.
I'd go back tomorrow.

Seville is fabulous. Also Granada and the Alhambra.

[quote Cattenberg]**@BlowDryRat, I went on the Intrepid trip in 2014. It was great! I hope Andorra can re-open soon, @NameChangeinHaste.[/quote]
Ah brilliant. I went in 2016 and still have friends from that trip. It was fabulous - everyone from 18-80 year olds!

Andorra is open, but not France! 😭

Slovenia blew me away and I really wasn’t expecting it. The pic is a bar we found up in the mountains. Very very easy to travel around. Quiet roads. Ljubljana a great city.

Seville was pretty awesome too.

Guernika

We love Poland. Wroclaw is gorgeous,as is Krakow.

St Petersburg
Prague
Dubrovnik
Budapest

And not sure if it counts as less obvious but Budapest is top of my list as a place to go back to. Really has something for everyone. And Munich and Lisbon....

Yy I had a magical visit to Czesky Krumlov at Christmastime a hundred years ago, would go back in a heartbeat.

Poznań in poland is a lovely place, full of history, the people are so friendly and the food is amazing but very cheap!