The Town That Builds a Medieval Monastery

They wear homespun clothing made from flax. They use wicker baskets for transportation. Workers in the German city of Messkirch have started building a monastery. The technology is exclusively medieval. The template for the monastery was provided for in the never realized a plan dating to the 9th century intended to be built in St. Gallen, Switzerland. Is it a gimmick, tourist attraction, or archaeological research?

Cleopatra's Needle on the Embankment

One of the things you do when in London is walking along the Thames. That will inevitably bring you to the Victoria Embankment where Cleopatra's Needle is standing tall. The needle is an obelisk, and it has absolutely nothing to do with Cleopatra. Otherwise the name is apt.

Yemen: The Way Into Today's Mess

Yemen is not a usual tourist destination. It could be one, if the country had a minimum of organization and structure. But that was lost and willfully destroyed during the cold war in the last century. If you want to know the reasons why you are unable to enjoy the Yemen historic sites and landscapes, here's a book to read. 

Slow Travel: Walking From Somerset to India

Parents like to remind their children to eat slowly. And slow cooking has progressed from being a fad to being a way of life. Time to think about slow traveling. And quite frankly, you can't see anything when doing Europe in three days. My advice, take a page out of Thomas Coryat's book and start walking.

Superhighway from Londinium to Isca

A Roman road was uncovered in Puddletown Forest in Dorset. While the existence of the road was a well-known historical fact, it had been well hidden by the forest that it could not be located so far. The harvesting of a planting of Norway spruce firs by the Forestry Commission brought parts of it to light finally.