Many years ago I made the decision to travel only during off-peak season times — usually during fall and winter — so as to avoid this kind of thing:
Apart from the claustrophobia of crowds such as the above, I decided that there was nothing — no tourist attraction, no museums, no vista — that was worth that kind of hassle.
And I’m not even considering the fact that among those crowds in the pictures are undoubtedly scum like pickpockets and other such wealth redistributionists.
It has bitten me on a couple of occasions, of course, most notably in winter when establishments such as restaurants and hotels will “close for the season” (New England and the French Riviera being the most notable). So be it. I make a note, and move on.
I also make an exception for things like Christmas markets — especially in southern Germany and Austria — mostly because I enjoy them more than I hate the crowds that throng them. Here are Heidelberg, Salzburg and Vienna (in order):
Note that the freezing temperatures didn’t seem to put off too many people — mostly, I suspect, because they’re locals (ergo accustomed to the weather). Certainly, from memory, German was the most common language I heard in all three places; Japanese, Chinese and other such diversity: not so much.
Then of course there are crowds that would be welcomed, such as at the Goodwood Revival*:
…and if you’re not willing to put up with crowds for the last of these pics, I don’t want to talk to you.
Then there’s the Chelsea Flower Show for New Wife (a very keen gardener), which is taking place as I write this:
But being in a summer crowd of thousands at the Spanish Steps in Rome, or waiting to get into the Louvre in Paris?
Pass, with prejudice.
*note that I said “would”, because I have yet to go to the Revival. One of these days, Rodders…
Ah, Goodwood. I go to the Revival every year. For those that don’t know, that’s the Settrington Cup race and the cars are pedal powered.
I too avoid the crowds. I prefer the Autumn for travel. The noisy brats are back at government daycare so they’re not running around getting underfoot when I’m trying to enjoy something. The weather is cooler so I don’t get dehydrated in the sun.
This is true. over the course of three visits to Austria and Bavaria I have been in those places on every day of the months between July 31 and September 30 (if my math is correct, give or take a day). After school starts, more museums, concert halls and places the guidebooks extol are open again. As the locals will tell you, the weather is cooler but more predictable. (in August in Austria you can get any kind of weather; hot and humid to the point that swimming in the glacier-fed mountain lakes does not sound insane, to three days of rain with snow on the mountain peaks with two railroad bridges and three places in the autobahn undermined by what the news referred to as the “High Water Catastrophe”. In September it was cool to cold and we only got rain when we tried to drive to Switzerland.
That Salzburg photo — Is that the Getreidegasse? That would be the Casino on the hillside then. You have to have a foreign passport, or be the guest of someone with a foreign passport, to enter the Casino. My mother held on to everyone’s passports and didn’t want to leave our cousins’ house, so we couldn’t enter, and her cousin’s son-in-law couldn’t go in, either. None of us have been inside as a result. my Cousin’s daughter, however, had been. Funny how that works.
If they aren’t handing out winning lottery tickets, there are few things I value enough to wait in line for.
Stationed in Nürnberg in the mid-70’s. A buddy owned an Opel sedan. He, myself, and two others piled in after final formation on a Friday afternoon and head for the Oktoberfest in Munich for the weekend. We took our Army issued camping gear and slept out in the countryside. As one buddy later described it, “You could have put plywood on the heads of the crowd and added another layer”. A cherished memory from another time. With apologies to the late journalist Joseph Galloway and the late Lt. Gen. Hal Moore, I was a soldier once, and young. Today? No thanks. Cold beer in the frig will do me just fine.
I would never, EVER, go to New Orleans during Mardi Gras. The Christkindlmarkten in Bavaria and Austria, yeah, no question. I’ve never been to either, but my wife has been to southern Germany during the Christmas Market season and told me they were beautiful.
I visited several Christmas markets in Bavaria last December. Yes, they were crowded. No, I didn’t care. Cold, occasionally rainy but wonderful. The best two were in smaller towns: Rothenburg ob der Tauber (magnificent doesn’t even begin to describe it), and Regensburg. Nüenberg, out hotel overlooked the main market and had a cigar shop two doors down—what’s not to love about that—and Munich’s massive markets were nothing if not overwhelming. But still fun.
The downside was my wife fell and broke a bone in her hand in Rothenburg. She ended up in a tiny local hospital getting surgery, but we carried on and still had a good time otherwise. Can’t say enough about the excellent medical care she received, and that it only cost her €600 start to finish, which we recouped from insurance after we got home.
The other thing that was a bit sad happened when we got up in the morning in Nürnberg. We looked out as the vendors were setting up their stalls for the day and saw that instead of locals having their own versions of gluhwein, it was brought in by a tanker truck that filled up everybody’s stalls with the same concoction. Pffft.
As for the rest of Yurp, I’ve been to a number of major tourist destinations in high summer. You couldn’t pay me enough to do it again, with the possible exception of the west coast of Ireland. But Paris, Prague, Munich, and the rest? NEVER AGAIN between about May and September!