Posts about Destinations

Niagara Falls Canada: Halloween 24/7

26.10.2024

The Niagara Falls represent one of the most impressive wonders of nature of our day and rightfully enjoy their reputation as an untamed – and untamable – site of awesome beauty. Reason enough for Hollywood movie producers to make this dramatic setting their filming location for ‘Niagara‘. In her role as Rose, the creepy psycho-thriller puts screen goddess Marilyn Monroe through a bloodcurdling cinematic ordeal: evil-minded husband Joseph Cotton alias George urgently wants to get rid of his unloved wife. At one point he vanishes and is believed dead, but reappears. Shrouded in a misty waterfall spray and in the presumed privacy of the Rainbow Tower, he strangles Rose to death. But there is a witness …

Fictional Hollywood stories aside: What comes now is REAL! The Nightmares Fear Factory calls itself ‘the scariest and best haunted-house attraction in Niagara Falls Canada’.

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Aurora Borealis in Iceland

Iceland: Sleeping in a bubble

22.10.2024

When mystical veils of polar lights are wafting across northern skies in unknown shades of green, observers from near and far are eager to come and watch the stunning spectacle. A great many people have the Aurora Borealis on their bucket list of things to do at least once in a lifetime. Witnessing the awesome natural miracle when in Iceland can happen in the most comfortable of ways: by dreamily lying on one’s back underneath the transparent skin of an unconventional „hotel“ room in the shape of a bubble. Glamping under a canopy of stars means freedom and shelter at the same time.

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Scotland: Is the Wild Haggis fact or fiction?

10.10.2024

Bringing down the rare Haggis scotticus – the Wild Haggis – to secure the next traditional Haggis meal – requires utmost agility and perseverance by human persecutors equipped with equally-measured lower extremities. One must know that Wild Haggii vary in characteristics and that it is two different genera who roam steep and rough highlandish terrain. In both cases the legs on their left are different in length from the ones on their right – and vice versa. Either way, their unusual physique allows them to swiftly climb and scuttle around their regular habitat unperturbed by topographical challenges, albeit in one single direction only: Wild Haggii featuring longer legs on the left, move around clockwise, whereas the ones relying on extended limbs on their right, will logically proceed counter-clockwise. A refined GPS system usually prevents painful head-on collisions and all Haggii, limbed in whichever fashion, are said to lead a fairly peaceful coexistence.

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The Empire State Building: High ambitions

7.10.2024

What’s feasible?

1929: „How high can you go so it won’t fall down?“ John Jakob Raskob (one of the executives representing the Empire State, Inc.) is said to have asked the architects of the prestigious new edifice, Shreve, Lamb & Harmon. The main objective being to devise the highest building not only of New York City, but of the entire world. Initially they had hoped that 80 daring storeys should suffice. Yet, there was a fierce mine-is-taller-than-yours competition going on in NYC in the first third of the 20th century and construction of the rivalrous Chrysler building was already in full swing when Raskob’s project just got started. Walter Chrysler’s building did become the tallest one, albeit temporarily. In the end, he was outraced by just a few meters of the finest Art Deco architecture shining brightly over 350, Fifth Avenue.

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Oktoberfest Munich: O’zapft is’!

17.09.2024

On Saturday, September 21st, 2024 at high noon sharp Munich’s Lord Mayor – will once again ceremonially exclaim: ‘It’s tapped!’ The Oktoberfest, a festival recurring for the 189th time, has been exerting its magnetism on the crowds since 1810. It means huge fun for regular folks, works as an illustrious place-to-be-seen for celebrities of all shapes and sizes and could even enhance or jog a career of one trade or another. And it serves as a welcome runway for the presentation of suitably traditional garb (such as Dirndl, Lederhos’n or Lodenjanker) – or for a rare species of couture whose daring crossover creations are at times hard to swallow for the more conservative.

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