MINI TRAVELOGUE-DOWN THE MEMORY LANE OF EUROPE DTPAs Mega Event-Tour cum Internatioanl Seminar in Europe By Sushma Agarwal

Reminiscences of the trip came live when I sat drooling down the memory lane. The programme was in doldrums in the earlier stages but thengoing, not going, ultimately GOING for a HOLIDAY IN EUROPE.A DREAN COME TRUESome goosebumps, some fright thinking of the long flight journey of 12 hours to London the silent fear with the fresh haunting memories of the crashed flight from Dubai in Mangalore. But the fear which took place within the frameworks of our so called brain evaporated soon with the excitement of going to EUROPE. The D-Day was in our lap and we were at the Netaji Subhas Airport with our DTpian brothers ready to bid us a memorable goodbye with roses. The flight was uneventful. Some found it exhausting, but the body and mind were not much affected by jet lag as there was literally no time to bother about the exhaust. Our journey started right from the word GOThe coach was waiting for us as soon as we arrived at the London Airport. We visited Madame Tussaud, where there was a long queue awaiting us along with the unpredictable London Rain Showers. Coloured Dresses with multicoloured umbrellas on the head on the streets of Londonseemed as we were so used to being in London. The rooms are filled with wax sculptures which more or less resemble pop stars, movie actors, politicians and of course members of the royal family. Our very own Sachin Tendulkar, Gandhiji, Indiraji, Amitabh Bachhan, Aishwarya Rai and Salman Khan were the favourites. Shah Rukh was conspicuous with his absence, I believe he was scared to be besides Salman. The Chamber of Horrors reminds us of the London Dungeon. Here also murder and death are the central themes. We made the mandatory stop at Buckingham palace where we witnessed the changing of the guard along with every other tourist in London. I am convinced, however, that this changing of the guard is just a genius way for the British government to get every tourist of London in the same place at once so they can find out just how many there are that day. It was packed! Of course you have to see Westminster Abbey, Parliament, Big Ben, and the London Eye when you visitso we did. To close our London sightseeing, I rode the impressive London Eye, a kind of ferris wheel on steroids. We ooh-ed and ahhh-ed at all the right places and took the pictures which you can see below. It truly is amazing how many important locations they can pack into a small space and still make you feel like there is a lot of open space. There are so many diamonds, emeralds, rubies, and other precious jewels that they look almost fake. We then made our way to the east side of London where we toured the Tower of London, including the White Tower, the Crown Jewels, and the Tower Bridge. The sight of the HARRODS store sent the cameras clickingand the mouths wide open.. Three days of sight-seeing had come and gone and we almost had too much to show for it! Weve tried to find a balance between seeing as much as we can while also thoroughly enjoying each sight, but I will say it has been difficult at times. Thereafter, we went on the refreshing and splendid cruise on River Thames on board The millennium of Peace. The crew was very kind to explain the buildings and places we could see on our cruise on the banks of the majestic river Thames. The buildings ranged from interesting hotels (including The Grapes, where Dickens completed. Oliver Twist) to HSBC and Citibank headquarters, various docks, floating pubs, Mayflower pub et al. En route, we were awed by Greenwich which gives us the GMT. We turned from there towards Westminster. This route also held us spellbound as we looked on the wonders of this ancient center of trade. Although taking the Eurostar train between Paris and London via the Chunnel (the underwater tunnel underneath the English Channel) is usually not the cheapest way to travel between London and Paris, it is certainly the fastest and most convenient (the

journey only takes 2.5 hours). The Eurostar leaves from the center of London and arrives at the Gare du Nord in the center of Paris. This means no hassle in getting to/from the train on either end of the trip. The Eurostar is also a high-speed train, so the whole journey from London to Paris is over in a few short hours. Plus, while youll be in darkness while you are traveling underneath the Channel, the pastoral views of southern England and northern France are beautiful and provide travelers with interesting (and very green) scenery to enjoy as the train speeds by. Eiffel Tower Turns 120, into Space Needle Next year, in celebration of the Eiffel Tower's 120th anniversary, the iconic structure will get a temporary, upgraded observation deck made out of carbon Kevlar. The project will extend the top floor plate of the tower by grafting a high performance carbon Kevlar structure on it. The structure will be temporarily bolted to the slab without requiring any modification of the existing structure. The Eiffel tower in Paris suffers from its success. Since its creation the amount of visitors coming to reach its top has increased to reach its limit capacity. 6.5 million People wait between 35 minutes to over an hour to reach the elevators. The floor area of each level decreases with the height because of the tower geometry, resulting in very long waiting lines and crowd management problems. Seine River has always been the beating heart of Paris: its inhabitants always considered the important river, building important monuments near the Seine and decorating its banks , which are now part of humanity's worldwide heritage of Unesco. Seine River Cruise is a not to miss experience if you come to this romantic city: This is a very relaxing way to visit Paris, observing its oldest and greatest monuments from another perspective. Cruise on the Seine and observe from the so-called BateauxMouche one of the best urban landscapes in the world! Seine River Cruise includes a two-hour tour of Paris, as well: Champs-Elysees, Arch of Triumph, Concorde Square, Invalides, Eiffel Tower and Trocadero,The Opera, Notre-Dame Cathedral, Louvre Palace-Museum (the paintings and the walk to view the paintings both left us gasping) Orsay Museum, Madeleine Church.

I think every tourist to Amsterdam gets trapped in one of these Clogs Very kitschy, but good for a laugh nonetheless. There are a number of these in front of souvenir shops around the city. Get to Amsterdam and get clogged! Cheese factory, [Link] enjoyed the picturesque village like view but [Link] /Amsterdam/Holland was very beautiful Cologne in Germany: But the real landmark is the Klner Dom, a massive cathedral. Apparently it is the most visited tourist attraction in Germany, but the hordes must come later in the season as it was fairly quiet when I went. Its hard not to be amazed by the scale of the place and you can only imagine how impressive it must have appeared to the citizens of Cologne when they built the thing. Started in 1248 it took 600 years to finish! Otherwise the city has a charming old-town around the cathedral, however it was all rebuilt after WW2 bombing so its a funny mix of styles, and not really old at all. Rhine river cruise: Kln-Dsseldorfer (KD) is the largest operator of day cruises on the Rhine River (Rhein). True to its name, KD has roundtrip cruises in both Cologne and Dsseldorf but most Rhine River cruises on this section of the river are from nearby Bonn to Linz. Eating lots of fruits and vegetables. Most business class hotels in Europe feature extensive breakfast buffets containing a wide variety of fresh fruit, yogurt, healthy cereals, fresh juices and so on. Eating fruit made us feel great! Rather, we got more Indian Food that we could eat in India. The hosts were more than eager to serve their Bros & Siss from India. But, we leave our mark where we go i.e. fill our small purse packets with the mouthfreshners served after food for the journey. So we made it back home without getting sick, without getting tired, actually returning totally energized by our time in Europe, because.... though some said that they needed a holiday after the hectic holiday in Europe. We made our way to a very beautiful park in Cologne coz we finished our lunch fast, full of mothers and their children enjoying the outdoors, people riding bicycles....I wish that my legs and lungs were stronger so I could have covered more territory and breathed in even more of that clean air...The feeling was [Link] in a park in Cologne..

The coach was a fantastic place to be in as we spent quite a lot of quality time in there with Anthony on the drivers seat. We ate, dirtied and cleaned up the mess in the coach, played Antakshari, had joke sessions, sang bhajans and caught up with the lost sleep.. what a family it was. Never travel alone, a family as this is a DREAM to travel with and we did. Every journey started with a JAIKARA from our Sr. Past president Shri M.C. Jagwayan- Balaji Maharaj ki Jai with Aghorjis voice thundering behind. We were now adding towards our Seminar in St. Gallens in Switzerland. We were delayed not by the traffic but becoz of our extensive shopping in the toilet breaks at the petrol pumps every two hours or so the CONFERENCE room with facilities of International standards took away the sleep from our [Link] were once again charged up ready for the seminar in the eerie hours of night i.e. at 10.00 p.m. The Conference went on very well with the refreshments served in a superb manner. We ate whatever we could and took away what we could not. Lucerne always think that if a city is built around water it's worthwhile seeing it from the water, it gives you a totally different perspective. We took a tour on Lake Lucerne, of which there are more details in my Tips. A beautiful sunny day, a leisurely cruise, a glass or two of crisp white Swiss wine...perfect. The scenery is beautiful and changes as the boat sails along - the city, gorgeous individual lakefront houses, very expensive I'm sure, open countryside, wooded hillsides, and all with the picturesque backdrop of the mountains. Of course, there are modern areas in the city and tourism is big business, the mainstay of the economy. Walking to the Lion Monument from the lakefront you'll pass through one of the modern areas, which is where the tour buses park. If you see it full of buses it means the little park which has the Lion Monument in it will be crowded! Say "Switzerland" and watches & chocolate come to mind. We had enough watches, but you can never have enough chocolate! Seeing the Store [Link] ran as if we were buying bagfuls of watches but the price tags were not buyer friendly or rather say pocket friendly. Apart from the wellknown 'designer' brands of bars and individual chocolates, Lucerne has shops with mouthwatering

displays of basic slabs of chocolate in a bewildering choice of flavours and textures. What better place to end my thoughts on Lucerne than in a chocolate shop! Mt. Titlis: The cable car system connects Engelberg to the summit of Klein Titlis (3,028 m) through three stages The visible greeneries over summer is simply magnificent. we switched over to the world's first revolving cable car to get to the summit of Klein Titlis (3,028 m). There is this part of the mountain at Mount Titlis that look like a statue of Buddha from a distance. It was discovered by a Chinese adventurer back in 1996. Another view of the Engelberg town. Mount Titlis is a proven attraction amongst Asian tourists. Chinese nationals, Indian nationals, Hong Kongers, Indonesians and of course Malaysians. Being Asians, more often than not we join a guided tour for the sake of convenience. You get Masala Chai, paw bhaji and idli at the top served by some Indians originating from Jaipur. The Masala Chai has its customers [Link] after tea from tea bags We visited the TrummelBach Waterfalls and the power of water roared into our ears and through it to our heartsIt was adventurous climbing up. Jungfraujuch is the third highest mountain of Bernese Alps, but at 3454 mt is the highest train station in Europe. The entire journey from either Grindelwald or Lauterbrunnen through Kleine Scheidegg to Jungfraujoch is fantastic and an experience in itself. You have to change trains at Grindelwald and then at Kleine Scheidegg. All the three trains timings are connected with one another and these stations are very small, hence do not worry about missing the trains. In the last leg of the journey from Kleine Scheideg, the train runs inside the mountain, stopping at Eigerwand. There is a large window at this station inside the mountains for a breathtaking view of the snow covered valleyAfter reaching the Jungfraujoch station, you have to take a lift to the top. There is a hotel, two restaurants, the Sphinx observatory research station, and the glistening "Ice Palace" at Jungfraujoch. The Ice palace has a collection of ice sculptures. I bet, every person clicked with his or her head peeping out from the ice tunnel shivering with crackling teeth.

There is a flat, snow-covered area on the plateau, where one can walk around and play in the snow. There is also a 'Top of Europe' Glacier Restaurant, where you can sip hot coffee overlooking the magnificient glacier. Here are the pictures for the same: The trip to Jungfraujoch was an exciting trip with the train journey being the highlight of this trip. In the evening we returned to Interlaken to the cosy interiors of our hotel It doesn't matter where you look, the views are staggering. A truly beautiful part of the world, and so tranquil. And then the last leg of our Journey To Frankfurt Airport visiting the Mercedes Benz Museum and the Rhine Waterfalls at Schaffhausen, a treat to the eye. Some names clip out of the Brainbox, actually we saw too much in a span of 15 days to retain the same. We were now all wanting to reach home but then there was a silent craving to continue with some more parts of Europe. There was a silence amongst all of [Link]? exertion? homesickness? we did not know. But lots of memories which came alive made us quite happy & content to have come here.