829 Packing Light; Sweden Beyond Stockholm; Check-In

19:17Rick Steves:Oh, fishy heaven for a good Swede Viking. Exactly. Delicious. So we love it. It's very peculiar, but it's a very small town thing. Small town. Okay, so there is a benefit if you're traveling and trying to understand Sweden to connect with the small town. This is Travel with Rick Steves. We're talking with our two Swedish tour guides, brother and sister team here, Igor da Silva and Gabriela Ilvesdatter. They both lead Americans all across Scandinavia. Now, if you're staying in Stockholm, as most people probably would, there's a number of very nice day trips you can make that get you out of the city.

19:53Rick Steves:Igor, what can you tell me about Sigtuna and Uppsala? Uppsala, I would say, is like our Oxford. It's our university city. So the oldest university in northern Europe is in Uppsala. It's from the 1500s. And we also have northern Europe's biggest cathedral, the Uppsala Domkyrka. And why would a town outside of the big city have the biggest cathedral? Because that was the capital. The historic capital. Exactly. Uppsala. Uppsala. And it's worth a visit. But your father took me to one of the most memorable places nearby, and it's called Old Uppsala, right? Gamla Uppsala. Gamla Uppsala, exactly. And what would you see if you were taking a group to old Apsala?

20:39Rick Steves:Not the biggest church during the Christian time, but long before that. We have these prehistoric burial mounds that are amazing. And these predate the Vikings. We're talking Bronze Age, and they are amazing. They're really fantastic. Wow. And nearby, on your day trip out of the capital city of Stockholm, you can stop by Sigtuna, which must be one of the oldest towns in Sweden. It is, and it is usually referred to as the first capital because in the beginning, the king moved. We didn't really have a capital. So Uppsala is sometimes referred to as a capital because it was the king's seat for a while.

21:13But Sigtuna is usually the one we say was the first capital of Sweden. And we have these beautiful ruins. It's a really, really cozy city. I would say it's a must. If you're venturing outside of Stockholm, Sigtuna is a must.

21:26Rick Steves:There you get a compliment because it's a little town, a beautiful, charming, fairytale town. Exactly. And Igor, it has runestones. Yes. What's the big deal? Runestone, what is that? The runestones, first of all, it's how the Vikings wrote. So we didn't have letters. So it was the Viking letter. And the runestones, they told a story. And usually it could be very ordinary stories. It could say Rick traveled to Norway for Viking. Because Viking is a thing you did. It's not a thing you are. So viking means, vik is bay, you go from bay to bay. So viking is something you do. It's a verb. It's a verb.

22:10Rick Steves:So we've talked about day trips from Stockholm, and you mentioned briefly, Igor, the archipelago, which is just so beautiful. If you like boats and islands and little cabins, that's a delight. Let's talk about further afield. We've got the center of the country, very traditional. When you think of, you want to get the most traditional small town slice of Sweden. What's the region that's famous for that? Dalarna, which has the famous Dalar horse. If you have seen a wooden red-painted horse with some floral patterns on it, you've seen a Dalar horse. And that is absolutely a very traditional part of Sweden.

22:49Rick Steves:So you can go there if you want that. It's almost iconic for that region. It's more traditional. You can see the Open Air Folk Museum in Skansen in Stockholm if you want to. But to see the Open Earth Work Museum real life, you could go to Dalarna. Exactly. And that is where we have a town called Falun, which is a very important town to us. We have a Swedish delicacy, a sausage that comes from that place. It's called Falukorv. Korv is sausage. We even have the red paint. We talked about these cottages. The typical red paint we paint our barns and our wooden homes with is called Faluk red. So red from Falun.

23:27and fallen as this town in the province of Dalarna.

23:30Rick Steves:When you drive through Sweden, you think, whoever is selling the red paint around here has a good business because there's a lot of red paint. I remember once staying in a humble guest house with red paint in Växjö in the middle, where people go to trace their Swedish ancestry, and the people who ran that guest house had an immigrant's cottage that they rented. Do you know about it? Is this a thing, an immigrant's cottage? It is, and there is even in Växjö, there is even in a museum that helps people especially Americans, that want to research their ancestry, and they help them find all of these different kinds of documents and papers to try to help them.

24:08Rick Steves:Because this region was so poor. You can measure the amount of people emigrating to leaving by how poor an area was. I mean, the center of Sweden was one of the poorest areas, and it had one of the highest percentages of immigration coming to a great extent to the United States. But sometimes they just abandoned their cottage, and now you can go into the middle of these vast forests and hang out in these very, very humble cottages. Yes, the area of Småland, really the farmers there struggled because the ground is so stony. So it was hard for them to make anything grow and the lack of food and the poverty, well, made them move.

24:44The same reason people are moving today, to find a better life somewhere else.

24:49Rick Steves:This is Travel with Rick Steves. We're talking with Igor da Silva and Gabriela Ilvesdottir, two guides from Sweden, and they're talking about where you might go in Sweden outside of the obvious first stop, which would be the capital city and the dominant city, Stockholm. So Sweden is a huge country. I think it's much bigger than Norway and Denmark, especially in square miles. And Igor, I understand you like to hike in the north. Yes, I do. Yes, I do. This is Lapland, right? This is Lapland. Tell me about, as a traveler, what I might enjoy in Lapland. So first of all, nature is very accessible.

25:23We have something called Allemansrätten. It's the law of public rights to use the nature. So every Swede can use the nature even if it's private land. Allemansrätten? Allemansrätten, exactly.

25:38Rick Steves:So everybody can walk anywhere. You can sleep out if you're polite. Exactly. We only need to respect nature, leave no trace. And this works. And it works. That's great. And we love it. So when you're hiking, tell me a little bit about the nature that you would encounter in Lapland. Oh, it's so beautiful. So imagine, it's a little bit like Alaska, I would say. It's Lapland, it's mountains and no trees and vast landscape. And you walk and walk and walk and you see no people. No trees, you mean you're above the tree line? We are above the tree line. All right. And we walk, usually, me and my friends, we walk on the King's Trail.

26:15It's 440 kilometers, 270 miles long. And a day apart, we have cabins. that the Swedish Tourist Association take care of. It's very simple, modest, but we go from cabin to cabin, and we meet other people there. We have dinner. We cook. Great. And it's very easy.

26:36Rick Steves:Okay, I'm a tourist. Yeah. Do you see the aurora borealis? Do you see the northern lights? Do you see reindeer? And do you encounter lapiculture? Not during summer, but what you will see is the midnight sun, and this messes up your perspective of time, but in a good way. Imagine hiking 11 p.m. and you see the sun. I love it. I love it. And reindeer? And reindeer you see. Sometimes you see more reindeer than people. Ah. Yes. And Sami culture. And Sami culture, of course. And during winter, it's the best place, one of the best places in the world to see Arora Borealis. Sami people were historically nomadic, right?

27:16Rick Steves:Yes. And now they have to stay put? or do they still roam? They stay put. They don't roam as they used to. That's a difficult adjustment. It is, but they have a lot of help with technology now. So they have their snowmobiles, they have drones to follow the reindeer, so they don't need to move. Does the government help them or are they a problem for the government? They help them, but there is a lot of difficulties. And we need to put up windmills and stuff and we are putting it on their land and they don't like it because it scares the reindeer away. And this is a hard question because we need green energy.

27:53Rick Steves:Every country has these problems. We don't have windmills scaring away reindeer in our country, but, you know, every country has something similar like that. And when we travel, we appreciate that. Gabby, a couple of things I wanted to talk about before we finish. The glassworks, they're so beautiful for the tourists to see in the middle of Sweden and then the city of Kalmar. Ah, two fantastic things. So in this province of Småland, where so many Swedes emigrated to America, where they came from, this is what we call glass country. And there you have just beautiful glass being made. So you can go and visit these places.

28:27Kostaboda is one of these famous manufacturers of fantastic glass. And it has become one of the iconic Swedish symbols almost.

28:36Rick Steves:And they still welcome tourists to visit. You see a demonstration, you see the gallery, and maybe you spend some money. And you can go there and even try to blow your own glass, which is amazing. It's a lot of fun. So you can study that in the middle. It's just the glassworks. And then Kalmar. What an amazing city with a great maritime heritage and a wonderful castle. It is and a fantastic history. So Kalmar is referred to as the key to Sweden. So for a long time, the Swedish-Danish border was just 10 miles south of Kalmar. Well, no, a little bit more. The Danes took half of Sweden at one time.

29:07Rick Steves:Those Danes. Those Danes. I know. Those pesky Danes. God, they bugged the Norwegians too. I know, I know. So yes, exactly. And this is one of the places with a lot of history, a lot of battles. We have this fantastic castle located there to defend our border. One of the best castles in all of Europe. Absolutely. It's the Kalmar Castle, K-A-L-M-A-R. One of my magic moments is about a 15, 20-minute drive, I think, from Kalmar. Åland? Åland. And in Åland, I meant a Viking burial ground. stones, the shape of a Viking ship sticking out of the dirt and standing in the middle of this circle of stones thinking about a Viking burial ceremony.

29:48Imagine. Oh, so cool.

29:50Rick Steves:I want to finish just with a magic moment that you guys might have. Igor, I know you're a sailor. Yes. Take me on a moment in the wonderful archipelago that seems to go halfway to Finland from Stockholm. You know, all hours you can sail to the east of Stockholm. Yeah, for me there's nothing better in this world to be in a sailboat with your friends, just sailing, relaxing, and then you go to a nature harbor and you don't pay anything and there's other boats and you connect them with total strangers and you go jumping from boat to boat, sharing your food, swimming together, and it's a brilliant way to have a community and I love it.

30:28It's the best thing in the world. Crayfish? Crayfish, oyster, shrimp. What would you be drinking? Burning wine, of course. Burning wine. Yes. What is burning wine? So burning wine is our liquor, made from potato, of course. Yeah. So it's very strong. What is the Swedish name for that?

30:49Rick Steves:Brännvin. Brännvin. Literally burning wine. Literally burning wine. Wow. Okay. Gabby, what is your magic moment that we can finish with? What I really love to do is actually also hiking. So to go to mountaintops and just look at the world from above. I am a city girl, though, so I do love Stockholm, of course. But when I leave Stockholm, my thing is to hike up mountains or in wintertime ski them. We have lovely, lovely skiing. And not that far from Stockholm, which is the great thing. It's just a couple of hours north and you have this amazing nature. You guys, thank you so much for inspiring us to look a little bit beyond the capital when we're going to have time to visit your country, Sweden.

31:33Rick Steves:Tusen takk. Tusen takk. Tak som okej. You'll find more to help with planning a trip to Sweden with our show notes this week at ricksteves.com slash radio. You know, it's been a while since we've talked to listeners like you about your travels to share memories and to help us get ready for our own adventures. Let's do that next at 877-333-7425. It's travel with Rick Steves. So where have you been traveling lately? We're opening our Travel with Rick Steves phone lines right now at 877-333-RICK to check in with listeners like you. Tell us what's made your travel special and where you recommend visiting so that we can all share in the adventure.

32:17Rick Steves:Anne is using that number right now from Bloomington, Indiana. Anne, thanks for your call. Good to be with you. Thank you. Yeah, where have you been traveling lately? So I have been to Zeylon, especially Middleburg in the Netherlands. Huh. And what did you find there? I was actually there because they have an Institute of American Studies there because the Roosevelt family are Roosevelt. Franklin and Teddy Roosevelt are from that part of the Netherlands. So I was there partly for work and then partly for travel. Now, where exactly is Zealand? Because I know Holland is the core of the Netherlands.

32:56Rick Steves:The Netherlands is a whole bunch of provinces. right? And when a lot of people confuse the Netherlands and Holland, but calling the Netherlands Holland is like calling America Texas, I would say. That is about true. So Zeeland province is the furthest south and furthest west province of the Netherlands and it is made up of essentially three what would be islands if it weren't for the fact that the Dutch are always moving the water away. Okay, so that's down on the coast next to Belgium. Correct. All right. I didn't realize the Roosevelt's had Dutch heritage. Yep, that's the part of the Netherlands they were from, and the Zeelanders are very proud of that.

33:41Rick Steves:You know, the Netherlands is very popular, and Amsterdam is super popular, and it's pretty predictable when you go to Amsterdam what you do as an American tourist in the countryside. Not many people go to Zeeland compared to just doing the touristy must-see stops in Holland. Yes, and I think a lot of Americans would very much enjoy if they went to Zeeland. It's set up very much for tourists, but the tourists who go there are Germans primarily. So everything is well set up to be a tourist, but it's just not that many Americans who go. And one of the most wonderful things about Zeeland is that most of the time you're only a few minutes from a beach.

34:21Rick Steves:When you say it's set up for tourists, what do you mean set up for tourists? Well, there's not very many big hotels, but there's lots of places to stay. So it's very easy to find accommodation. And then they have really wonderful restaurants, and then it's quite easy to get around. I've never, I have to say, driven there, but I went only by train and bus, and it's quite easy to get. And by bicycle, of course, the Netherlands, right? I would say that for a visitor to the Netherlands, it's easier by public transportation than any place in Europe. A car is nice to have, but you don't need a car in the Netherlands.

34:57Rick Steves:Distances are short. Train lines are amazing. If the trains don't go there, bus lines go there, which are coordinated with the nearest train station. And, of course, you can rent a bike at or near any train station almost and pedal to where you like. And then you take part of that wonderful dual network of roads, one for cars and one for bikes. Exactly. I've never tried to have a car in the Netherlands, and I've never missed it one bit. Have you biked? I have, yes. Tell us what that's like. First of all, it is all flat, so it is easy to do. And as you say, it's quite simple to always find a bicycle.

35:30Many places in Zeeland, if you rent a small house or an apartment, the bicycles will come with it. It is, however, a little bit of a contact sport. You really have to know how to do it because people in the Netherlands take their biking very seriously. And they will know if you're a foreigner because likely you'll wear a helmet, and none of them wear their helmets.

35:51Rick Steves:Yeah, you nailed it. They take their biking seriously. I think it's a coming-of-age thing for a Dutch kid when they're 16 or whatever. They take this test. And to have your license to be fully legal on the roads with two wheels, you have to know the rules of the road just as much as car drivers in our country. Exactly. But fortunately, tourists don't need to take the test, and we can just hop on a bike. Yeah, that's right. And it's a delightful way to enjoy the Netherlands. Anne, thanks so much for reminding us there's more to the Netherlands than Holland and Amsterdam. Well, it's my pleasure.

36:27Rick Steves:Take care. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Patrick's on the line in Palm City, Florida. Patrick, thanks for your call. Oh, you're welcome, Rick. Where are you traveling? What are you thinking about? Well, we went back to France for the first time in like 20 years. We've been there many, many times. We had a really great time. We went to a few places we'd never been before. We went to Dijon. We went to Bordeaux. And we went to a little town to visit friends up in the Pyrenees called Foix. How did you like the Pyrenees, Patrick? The Pyrenees was really good. It was in like an ancient town. There was a church there that was half Romanesque, half Gothic.

37:09And also while we were there, they had the Fête de Musique. which is a music festival they have all over France. And so you would just walk around the town and there were people playing music everywhere. So that was really good.

37:23Rick Steves:Patrick, did you know about that festival or did you just bump into it as you were in Foix? Yeah, we bumped into it. You know, my best festival experiences, I've got to admit, have been just, hey, there's a party going on, you know, and then it's serendipity. And when serendipity knocks, you say, come on in. Yeah, that was that. And also, we wanted to go to Bordeaux because we heard there was a good restaurant, so we decided we'll have a couple days there. And when we got there, they said it was the Fête de Vain, the wine festival. Wow. And I was like, well, we lucked out. We got to Bordeaux at the right time.

37:59Rick Steves:A wine festival in Bordeaux. Well, you know, two things. First of all, you were going to places that are not so much on everybody's bucket list. So you were steering away from the crowds that are plaguing so many travelers. If you just went to Paris and the Loire Valley and the Riviera, you'd have a different crowd scene. So that's a great thing. And then you were flexible enough to jump at the opportunity to enjoy these festivals that you just stumbled into with a little bit of good luck. And when you go to the towns that are not so famous for tourists, I think you find a lot of people at the festivals are locals, either from that town or from that region, a family day out or whatever.

38:37Rick Steves:And a great way to celebrate the local culture, like a wine festival in Bordeaux. I can't imagine anything more tasty. Yeah, the market there was also really good, really good food. We had oysters and different things with duck was really good there. You know, in France, Patrick, markets are like festivals in themselves, aren't they? Yeah. No, I enjoyed that as much as just about anything was the morning walking around the market in Bordeaux. You know, thinking of those festivals, those were small festivals that you visited that are not on the international map. And then there are the big festivals, you know, the Running of the Bowls in Pamplona, just over the border from where you were in southern France, and the Carnival in Germany or Carnival in Italy.

39:24Rick Steves:There's so many big festivals. We had so much fun a few years ago putting together a one-hour special on public television just celebrating the greatest festivals in Europe. And if anybody's planning a trip to Europe, you might want to check that out. Every show we've ever made is available. You can just go to my website at ricksteves.com and watch any of those shows. But the one-hour special on Europe's festivals could get you in the mood and let you know how fun it is to hit an April fair in Andalusia or a fall harvest time festival like Oktoberfest. Europe just comes alive when you hit a festival, doesn't it?

39:59Oh, yeah. That was a big treat for us. That was really amazing.

40:04Rick Steves:Hey, Patrick, thanks so much for your call and enjoy your future travels. Oh, well, thank you, Rick, as well. Take care. Bye. This is Travel with Rick Steves. We're checking in with our travelers today, and you can email us or call us. We're at radio at ricksteves.com, and our phone number is 877-333-7425. And Dylan's calling in from Vancouver in Washington. Hey, Dylan. Hey, Rick. Thanks for calling. You're welcome. Hey, I thought I'd just touch base with you. Some advice for the listeners. My wife and I have taken our kids to Europe four times now and also to Costa Rica. And so we've kind of had some hard knocks and great times.

40:42So I thought maybe a little bit of advice on traveling with children might be pretty useful for the listeners.

40:48Rick Steves:Wonderful. How old are your kids? Right now they're teenagers, but the first trip we took them to England and Scotland and they were only about six and nine years old. But now they've grown up to become teenagers, and we've gone through trips since then about four times now. Okay, so lots of parents are tuning in right now. Dylan's got some advice from the School of Hard Knocks. How do you have a family of five on the road in Europe or Costa Rica or whatever and have a great time? Well, it's actually just four of us, but the key things that I found are when they're younger, the countryside is better than big cities.

41:23Running a car is definitely the way to go. So trains are doable, of course. We did that in France, the train from Spain to France. But with a car, you have kind of a little retreat you can go to when you're done with any of the sites. What we've found over the years is that the kids get older. The sites that we visit tend to change. And when they're younger, we found that traveling more like a local worked a lot better. Like we would, after only doing one museum a day, we'd go visit a local playground, for example, so the kids could get all their wiggles out on a playground with all the other European kids.

41:58Rick Steves:Did you work to incorporate the kids into the itinerary planning, or was it Father Knows Best? We absolutely worked to include them. One of the things we did, for example, we visited castles in England, and prior to the trip, I tried to sketch out and investigate which castles would be having a festival or an event on when we went, because I knew that the kids would be more interested in something that's interactive, where they can put on a costume, shoot a bow and arrow. So we would ask them, you know, hey, does a castle sound fun? And if they said yes, we would do that. If they didn't, then we would try to find something else that they would want to do.

42:35Rick Steves:You know, I don't think I've been to a big castle in England anyways that didn't have lots of interactive stuff going on for kids. It just seems like every day is a field trip waiting to happen. It is, definitely. There's a lot to do for the kids because one thing to think about is the locals take their kids there and kids are kids around the world and they want to be entertained when they're somewhere. You know, we travelers think everything is designed for us. But, you know, you can make a case that it's more designed for school groups visiting in a lot of cases and local family outings. And don't forget that as parents, we can capitalize on that with our own kids.

43:11Absolutely. A hundred percent. So one of the key things to think about is, for example, kids like fast places to eat. Like we would just go in a grocery store. Almost all the grocery stores in Europe have a deli counter or quick-take sandwiches. And that would work really well for meals as opposed to a fancy sit-down restaurant, for example. Because the parents in Europe need food like that.

43:30Rick Steves:I think the kids like that more than having to sit through a long restaurant meal. Oh, absolutely. They definitely prefer it. They've given us lots of feedback on that over the years. I remember when you were talking about your kids in the car. I had a little deja vu memory of joy. I remember when I was a little teeny bopper, we would have these goofy things that I would do with my mom and dad. In Germany, you know, the word for exit is fart and the word for journey is fart so, you know, every exit on the road says ausfart or if you go to the if you're going to take a trip to the zoo, it's a zoo fart and if you're going to go a round trip, it's a round fart.

44:06Rick Steves:So we would just sit in the bed laughing about the farts in Europe but kids can have fun, especially if the parents can get down on their level and make it a party. Absolutely. And that's what we found. We have some real nice family memories and lots of funny jokes about the small things, like the silly school of ducks we saw outside of a moat or in a moat in a castle in England. And so we find that those little small memories are much more powerful for them than seeing a piece of art that they're really not that familiar with. Did you ever go to any of the just big commercial kids' destinations, the local versions of Disneyland or Legoland?

44:41We sure have. And I was going to recommend that as well. Like, it's a kid's trip as well as an adult. So we went to, for example, we went to Alton Towers, which is an amusement park in northwest England or in the Midlands. And we liked it better than Disneyland. It's not as crowded. The rides are funner. And we didn't see a single American. And we were there right in the middle of summer.

45:02Rick Steves:Very good point. You know that a lot of Americans are hell-bent on going to Disneyland in Paris, but you'll have a more local, less expensive, more real and laid-back and kind of charming experience if you go to the Asterix Park in Paris. Or in Germany, there's a place called Fantasialand, Fantasyland. And I found it was fun for our kids to see a European angle on, you know, Westerns and cowboys and Indians and that sort of thing from a European perspective. It was a cultural experience to go to Fantasialand in Germany for a bunch of American kids. Yeah, we always found it really funny to go to, like, out west land at an amusement park in the middle of England and what their take is on it, because we live out west, and so we would just sometimes laugh and shake our heads.

45:45But it was a really fun time for all of us, and so much less crowded and cheaper than going to Disneyland. So we had a really good time hitting up the local amusement parks for the kids.

45:55Rick Steves:Dylan, you are just an inspiration from a parenting point of view, And I think a good takeaway is if you can afford it, if you can pull it off, it is such a beautiful thing from a parenting point of view to take your kids with you to Europe. Yes, it's been a lot of fun. We visited many countries. We like Scandinavia a lot because it's very spread out, not quite as crowded. Like Paris in the middle of August to be with kids was pretty rough. We've also been during the Christmas season, and that was really nice because it wasn't as crowded. Kids get tired at the end of the day. So even if the sun goes down at 4.30, we would be back at the hotel or the apartment we rented at that time anyway to eat dinner.

46:34And the chateaus and all the locales in Europe, the big tourist sites, they dress them up for Christmas. There's Christmas trees, decorations, and we all loved it.

46:43Rick Steves:Your kids are really blessed to have that experience to bank in their memory as they grow up. Dylan, thanks so much for sharing your wisdom as far as parenting on the road. Thanks, Rick. Bye now. Michael's calling in from Mount Vernon in Ohio. Hey, Michael. Hi, how are you today? I'm great. Thanks for calling. I don't have a faux pas, but we do have some very memorable experiences. My wife and I have been traveling in Europe for 30 years, and our bucket list contains the idea that we want to meet the people and learn the culture, not necessarily to see the big sites and the big cities and so forth.

47:23So we're kind of the opposite of what a lot of travelers do. But because of that, we really gained some absolutely marvelous experiences. As an example, we were in Italy for three weeks, and there was a hill town called Civitella with a magnificent castle ruin. And there wasn't much going on, but they had a little museum. So we went in there. there was a two-room museum that featured what happened during World War II in that village. And apparently what happened was that the German army was upset because there were partisans in the area. And if anybody's seen a World War II movie, you know, the Germans come in and they take hostages and they, you know, murder 20 or so members of the village.

48:16In this actual situation, they murdered 110 boys and men in that village, and that's what this museum was about. They had a display case with pictures of all of these men and boys, and it still reverberates in my mind to see that. On a happier note, though, we shared recess with nine students from a one-room school in Mouten, Switzerland. We had rented an apartment, and this school was above that apartment, and that was absolutely one of our most memorable experiences. I think the teacher gave them a little longer recess because we were out there having so much fun.

49:02Rick Steves:And did you have any sort of takeaway from that visit? Well, our takeaway is it reinforces our style of travel. Oh, yeah. We know that people have a bucket list. They want to go to Rome and see the Coliseum and the Eiffel Tower in Paris and Tower of London. And bucket lists satisfy a lot of American travelers. What we like to emphasize is getting away from the tourist crowds and the tourist spots where you only meet Europeans that are there because they're serving the tourist market. Yeah, your philosophy is great, to get beyond that sort of tourism. Yeah, exactly. And our philosophy is to get a car, drive to find these other little villages that are not touristy and get to know the locals.

49:56So we stay on farms. We would rent an apartment so that we can kind of blend in to the local community. And for us, it's much, much more rewarding.

50:09Rick Steves:And the examples that you just shared about the beauty of that approach to European travel or travel anywhere is a great testimony to the fact that that is how you have those experiences. Thanks, Michael, for sharing that. Okay, thank you. Okay, happy travels, and keep making those serendipitous moments happen. You bet. Thank you. Bye-bye. Travel with Rick Steves is produced by Tim Tatton with Kazmira Hall and Donna Bardsley at Rick Steves Europe in Edmonds, Washington. Andrew Wakeling and Sherry Court upload the shows to our website. Sheila Gerzoff handles affiliate promotions. Our theme music is by Jerry Frank.

50:46Take a look at Rick's list for what to pack in your suitcase and share tips with fellow travelers. It's part of our online travel forum. It's at ricksteves.com.

50:55Rick Steves:We'll see you next week with more Travel with Rick Steves. Hey, I'm Rick Steves. In my work, I've always measured profit, not in dollars earned, but by trips impacted. And after over 40 years of teaching travel, it's clear to me that if you equip yourself with good information and expect yourself to travel smart, you will. For us, content is king. That's why we offer a world of free content at ricksteves.com. All the TV shows we've ever produced, 50 hours of practical lectures, talks ranging from packing smart and tech on the road to cruising and language lessons. a thriving family of travelers comparing notes in our forum and more.

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