Welcome to the July 2008 Europe Travel Carnival. After a sojourn at Heather on her travels last month the Carnival is back home at Europe a la Carte. Thank you to the contributors for a variety of informative, interesting and entertaining posts which I’m sure you’ll enjoy reading.

Accommodation

Kristie of Norway – An American In Oslo. writes about Where To Stay In Lisbon, Portugal. On a recent trip to Lisbon, Kirstie stayed in a “bungalow” at Lisboa Camping where prices start at 40 euros per night in the low season for 2 guests in a two bedroom bungalow. The price includes parking for one car, electricity and water. Sounds like pretty good value.

Overlooking Lisbon by McPig

I’ve never been to Lisbon but my husband has visited and he said it’s a beautiful city. I’ve read that it’s one of the best value cities in the Euro Zone.

Activities

In Cannes 2008 – Short Film Corner – Tarantino in Cannes Christine of Me, My Kid and Life: An American Single Mom Living in France. attended the Short Film Corner to seek out films that might be suitable for inclusion in the Strasbourg International Film Festival.

Festival de Cannes by G-rome

I’ve had some experience of Film Festivals, as a volunteer at the local Berwick upon Tweed Film and Media Festival in September 2007. In the Artists Trail videos were shown at historic venues around the town such as the Old Jail, Coxon’s Tower and the Parish Church.

The Soundmaker shown on 3 screens at the Ice House venue

Mary Jo Manzanares ponders Should You Buy a Paris Museum Pass posted at Flyaway Cafe, advising you to carefully consider if a museum pass is for you. Her judgment is that if you are keen to visit several museums and organise an itinerary, the pass can save you some money and a lot of time standing in queues. However not all museum passes are a good buy, so you need to check carefully what’s included and what you really want to see.

Paris Louvre by fakelvis

If you are in the mood for a flutter during your stay in Germany, Sebastian talks about the difference between casinos in Germany and the United States in Casinos In Germany – German Casinos Provide Great Entertainment posted at German Travel Guide, I must confess that I’ve never been in a casino as I’m not attracted to gambling (we Scots like to hang on to our money).

Casino Baden-Baden (the oldest casino in Germany) by ntl_shag

Travel Tips

Chris Cook discusses ways to save money at ATM’s overseas.” Understanding ATM Fees: cutting the cost of bank fees overseas posted at noambit -Travel Europe. It’s important to understand the charging structure of ATMs to ensure that you don’t end up paying more than you have to.

Marilyn Terrel tells us not to ignore the culinary delights of the Alsace Wine Route such as Ribeaupierre cheese, white asparagus and tartes flambees (the Alsace version of a pizza) in Secrets from the Alsace Wine Route: Fromage Pilgrimage posted at Intelligent Travel, Marilyn stayed in the medieval village of Riquewihr, which is surrounded by vineyards.

Descending into Riquewihr by AlphaTangoBravo/AdamButler

Restaurants

In the post Why Europeans Aren’t Fat from the Joshua Seth Blog, Joshua was performing his hypnosis show on a cruise ship touring around Europe and he picked up on a refreshing attitude toward food and eating in several Mediterranean countries. He observed fresh, local simple food on offer such as grilled octopus in Greece and authentic pizza in Italy and the pleasure of eating slowly in good company whilst enjoying great views.

Vesuvius Pizza, Naples by Sami Keninanen

Joshua sounds like a fascinating character who used to do voices for cartoons in Holywood and then decided on a change of career to hypnotist. What a great way to see the world while working on cruise ships.

Destination

Jersey a Perfect Vacation Spot from Ultimate Vacation Spots tells us of Jersey one of the Channel Island, which are part of the UK, despite being closer to France. Jersey has beautiful beaches and some flora and fauna not found in any other part of the UK, It’s another place that I’d like to visit although I probably saw most of the island during the long running TV detective series Bergerac.

Corbieres Lighrhouse, Jersey by MarilynJane

NAOMI’S BACK posted at Diary From England, recounts Noami’s recent trip to Spain where she stayed in Mijas, a pretty town inland from Fuengirola. She did a day trip to Gibraltar where she enjoyed seeing the plastic bag snatching Barbary apes and their young.

Mijas by Hunda

Other topics

Richard P. McLaughlin bemoans the The Price of Gas posted at Oh, the Places You’ll Go, If Americans a are complaining about petrol costing $4 a gallon at home, they are in for a nasty shock when they see that it costs around twice that price in Europe. It’s making us all think twice before undertaking trips by car, either for days out or longer breaks. I have a diesel super mini which returns over 60 miles to the gallon but that’s still costing me around 10 pence a mile for fuel.

Sunset in Petropolis by Bike Carson

The next Europe Travel Carnival will be published on Monday 4 August 2008, please submit your posts here by 28 July 2008. Please only submit posts that are relevant to travel in Europe. Only one post per author will be published although you may submit more than one post.

If you’d like to host the Carnival, which is published monthly on the first Monday of the month, please contact me at karen at europealacarte.co.uk.