First Discovery – The Pink City

It was in Toulouse I discovered that dusk can be pink, particularly if you watch it from the banks of the river Garonne. The light can be rather fickle, especially when it strikes from a high or low angle on the marble of the grand edifices which bedeck the city’s historic centre. The Place du Capitole, its daytime beauty matched at night by a lighting display, is the point of departure for any route through this city in the new Languedoc-Roussillon Midi-Pyrénées region. This is where the Capitole building stands, now home to the City Hall and National Theatre. Its eight pink marble columns symbolise the power of the eight districts that made up Toulouse in the 18th century. The square also has some hidden treasures, like the paintings under its colonnade where the city’s history is recounted.

Second Discovery – Home to Carlos Gardel and the Inquisition

In Toulouse I learned that Carlos Gardel was born in France, despite the Uruguayans claiming the king of tango as a fellow countryman, as I did that Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, author of The Little Prince, had stayed at the Hotel Le Grand Balcon, like all the pilots in the Compagnie Générale Aéropostale. Toulouse is also the birthplace of institutions, as antagonistic as they are important, like the Inquisition – founded to combat the Cathars – the Jeux Floraux, and the Gay Science, dating from the 14th century.

Third Discovery – A Vast Heritage

Toulouse is the site of the largest Romanesque church in the West, the Basilica of Saint-Sernin, also one of the major stopovers on the Road to Santiago on its passage through France. Close by stands the Convent of the Jacobins, a magnificent example of monastic construction and, further along the Garonne, we come across the Basilica of Notre-Dame de la Daurade, consecrated to the Black Madonna, draped in mantles made by great dressmakers.

Fourth Discovery – Pablo Picasso

It was in this city that I realised how passionate Toulousians are about Pablo Picasso. Les Abattoirs Museum, regarded as one of the leading cultural centres in Toulouse, features as an exhibit The Remains of the Minotaur in a Harlequin Costume, the work of the universal artist from Málaga.

Fifth Discovery – Aeroscopia

Toulouse is France’s aerospace capital  – the Airbus factory is located at Blagnac – particularly after the inauguration of the Aeroscopia Museum which, covering an area of 7,000 square metres, houses such legendary aeroplanes as the Concorde and the Super Guppy, the forerunner of the celebrated Beluga.

Sixth Discovery – Its Markets

In Toulouse I discovered that markets have a life of their own in France and that, apart from being venues for shopping, their restaurants attract a host of customers. The Victor Hugo Food Market, the Marché Cristal – where fruit and vegetables are sold in the open air – and the Marché des Carmes are some of the best known ones.

Seventh Discovery – N5 Wine Bar

Here, as in the rest of the country, the wine bar concept is very much in vogue. A fine example of this is the N5 Wine Bar, where you order wine by the glass (choosing both the type and the amount) and your order gets chalked up on a card which keeps track of your consumption. Be sure to try their tapas, such as the culatello di Brozzi, foie gras or Bronat cheeses.

Eighth Discovery – Toulouse Nightlife

Lastly, Toulouse is the French city with the most pronounced Spanish influence. You can tell as soon as you arrive when you start chatting to locals or when you give yourself over to the Toulousian night. In France’s fourth largest city, the people go out onto the street, regardless of the cold, and live it up for as long as they can hold out. Toulouse nightlife draws droves of locals and foreigners, many of them students, who gather at the nightspots on the Rue des Filatiers and the Carmes, Trinité, Wilson and Victor Hugo squares.

Toulouse is the perfect destination for a weekend getaway. Check out your Vueling here.

Text by Tusdestinos.net
Photos by Toulouse Tourism

A trip to Birmingham in the period from mid-November to the run-up to Christmas has a surprising added enticement, particularly for lovers of Christmas markets. That is when the Frankfurt Christmas Market and Craft Fair is held, a market in the purest German style in Britain’s second largest city. What’s more, it is the largest market of this type both in the United Kingdom and outside German itself. Not to be scoffed at!

For a few weeks, a number of quaint wooden stalls transform the city centre into a picturesque village revolving around the theme of Christmas. This magnificent market is sited in Birmingham’s emblematic Victoria Square – the heart of the city, with its Town Hall and Council House – as well as in Chamberlain Square and Centenary Square. As befits the occasion, Christmas lights and decoration are very much in evidence there.

So, what can visitors expect to find in the market? First, all kinds of Christmas decoration and gift objects, most of them hand made, such as wooden toys, candles and dolls. A large portion of the market is dedicated to craftwork sourced both locally and abroad.

Additionally, in line with German Christmas markets, fair-goers can spice up their visit by trying some of the German and Austrian culinary delicacies on offer: German sausage, pretzels, schnitzel, German beer, like weissbier (wheat beer), the popular mulled wine known as glühwein and hot chocolate. The market also offers attractions, ideal when accompanied by children, and the atmosphere is gingered up by live music.

More Christmas Shopping

In you haven’t had enough with just the market and require a stiffer spot of Christmas shopping, Birmingham is the perfect place to splash out. Here are some relevant recommendations:

Bullring. the city’s shopping area par excellence. It runs from New Street to St Martin’s Church and features no fewer than 160 shops, as well as two department stores. You are unlikely to remain impassive at the sight of the stunningSelfridgesbuilding, designed by the Future Systems architects studio and a veritable icon of the city.

Jewellery Quarter. As its name indicates, this is where jewellery business are concentrated. Here, 40% of the United Kingdom’s jewellery is produced. Located in downtown Birmingham, it boasts a tradition going back several centuries. The quarter houses some 100 retail outlets where you can purchase both new pieces and vintage jewels by weight.

Great Western Arcade. A shopping arcade located between Colmore Row and Temple Row, in the heart of the city. One of its major attractions are the premises themselves, as the stores are housed in an elegant Victorian building.

Custard Factory. Enthusiasts of things original and striking will find themselves at home on these premises, the former Bird’s Custard factory, situated in the industrial district of Digbeth. The interior is taken up artists’ and creatives’ studios, side by side with shops and bars where you can take a breather. There is a grand total of 30 stores displaying the latest trends in fashion, vintage garments, contemporary jewellery, artworks, bicycles, skateboards and many other things.

Mailbox. If exclusive design and luxury brands are for you, look no further than this shopping area located in Commercial Street. This complex includes the BBC Birmingham studios, the Harvey Nichols luxury department store, and two hotels. The back of the building, which gives onto a canal, is full of terraces with bars and restaurants for you to relax in after all your hectic shopping.

Ready for a Christmas shopping spree in Birmingham? Check out your flights here.

Text by ISABELYLUIS Comunicación

Photos by Horst Gutmann, Custard Factory, Basti V, Tony Hisgett, Guy Evans

On winter, the urban heart of A Coruña changes the aspect to become a Christmas paradise out of a fairy tale.

Despite the cold and the short days, for a few weeks A Coruña shines with warm Christmas lights that illuminate this beautiful city to make us forget the winter inclemency.

From November 28th to January 2nd, María Pita Square – one of the most beautiful and known spots in the city – becomes the Christmas village, with traditional wooden houses with snow on the roof and paths surrounded of firs that seem like the Christmas markets in the rest of Europe.

This place has lot of magic and fun opportunities for the kids, who could enjoy attractions made for them. Leisure activities, stalls for wishing well – benefits go to local charities from the city – and Santa Claus house, where Santa receives the kids and answer their wishes.

This is an activity for all the family, with more than a 100 workshops to learn how to design a Christmas tree or Christmas Cards, among others. These workshops take place daily in the afternoon (from 17:15 to 19:15h.).

For any age there are activities night and day, two or three daily music performances, in the stage in front of the City House.

Near the Christmas village, at the exhibition room of the City House, there is a traditional nativity scene, with the classic reproduction and including other famous people from the history of A Coruña, distributed on 100 m².

To the most remarkable dates of the holidays, Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve, the hospitality in A Coruña offers many activities to enjoy with your friends. And, of course, on January 5th by the afternoon, the activities are for the kids: the Three Magic Kings parade around the city for the enjoyment of everyone.

With this variety of offers, is not strange that every year thousands of tourists go to A Coruña and the Christmas village of María Pita to enjoy the magic of Christmas.

Picture from entrelazosyabalorios

Why not take a trip to A Coruña? Have a look at our flights here!

Windmills, wooden shoes, dykes, bicycles, canals, Gouda cheese –all of these symbolise the Netherlands, but the tulip has an even greater claim to emblematic status, and, along with other flowers, is one of the country’s main exports.

The tulip’s name is derived fromdulband, an old Persian word for “turban”, and the flower was originally cultivated in the region comprising today’s Turkey, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, where it had religious connotations and adorned the tents and palaces of sultans.

The Flemish scholar and pioneering horticulturalist Carolus Clusius (1526-1609) was the first person to manage to cultivate tulips in Europe, and is regarded as the founder of the Dutch tulip industry.

The tulip was initially a luxury item for which large sums were paid, and in the 17^th C. a speculative “tulip bubble” expanded to gigantic proportions –a sale of 40 bulbs for 100,000 florins was recorded in a year when a Dutch workman earned about 150 florins a year. But the bubble soon burst.

Today, entire fields carpeted with the colourful flowers adorn the Netherlands, especially in the northeast, the Kop van Noord-Holland region, and Bollenstreek with its famous Keukenhof, the world’s largest floral park, with as many as seven million tulip bulbs sprouting every spring.

This year’s National Tulip Day falls on Saturday, 17^th January. It is regarded at the start of the tulip season, which finishes when late tulips are picked and the end of April. It is celebrated throughout the Netherlands, but Amsterdam’s Damm square is the place to be.

Tulip growers show their best early flowers there, turning the square into a mosaic of colours and textures, to the delight of tulip fanciers, including many foreign visitors, who are regaled with bouquets to take home.

In the course of the tulip season Dutch growers will sell more than 1,700 million flowers. Most of them to export markets.

Serious tulip fans should also visit Amsterdam’s Tulip Museum, which tells the story of the tulip in its historical context. The museum is in the Jordaan neighbourhood, just across the bridge from the Anne Frank house.

Check out or flights here!

Report by Scanner FM

Photograph by Kang-min Liu