/Summary: 1980 Trip to Europe

(May 9 to October 26)

We flew to Dallas, then on to Frankfurt, Germany. The camper was ready to go, so we crossed into the Alsace, Lyon, Sarlat, and Cahors, and south across France. After a visit in Lourdes and the tiny country of Andorra, high in the Pyrénées Mountains, we returned to France, to visit Carcassonne, the formidable double walled city with 52 towers.

We enjoyed the remains of the Roman Empire in Arles, Nimes, St. Remy, and still-under-excavation Glanum. The campsite in Avignon was on an island in the Rhone River.

We celebrated our 29th Wedding Anniversary by spending a night in one hotel (OK) in Monte Carlo, and having dinner (not OK) in another. We ferried to Corsica, where we visited Ajaccio, and Bonifacio, then by ferry to Sardinia for a few days.

In Cagliari, we boarded an overnight ship to Trapani, Sicily. Visited Palermo, ancient Greek temples at Agrigento, the hilltop town of Enna, then thoroughly enjoyed the City of Taormina and its Greek Theater, just below smoking Mt. Etna.

Our trip north included stops at the Isle of Capri, Pompeii, Naples, Rome, and the renovation of The Sistine Chapel. Then on to Siena, Florence, San Marino, and Venice.

Spent a couple of days in Ljubljana and Postjana, Yugoslavia, then after a visit in Vienna, drove to Budapest for a couple of days. A one night stand in Liechtenstein means we have visited all of the “little ones”—Andorra, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, San Marino and the Vatican.

Drove from St. Moritz to Zermatt, at the base of the Matterhorn, then a few days in Paris, the Chateaus in the Loire River Valley, Brittany, and Normandy. Visited Arras, then enchanting Brugge, Belgium, crossed and recrossed by canals.

London, Glastonbury, Bath, and Oxford, in England, are striking and colorful, as is Stonehenge. Drove to Wales, ferried to and from a week in Ireland, a few days in Scotland, more time in London, then across the Channel to Amsterdam.

After a few days in West Berlin, a half day in East Berlin, we traveled approximately non-stop, to Mettlach, Germany. After a visit to the Alsace of France, on to the airplane in Frankfurt. An exceptional 171 days in many fascinating places.