#culturaltravel

Foul-tasting hot water with laxative ambitions, rapidly declining sightseeing standards and two detours from Karlovy Vary — on the day Czechia set its all-time temperature record.By the time I finally made it to Karlovy Vary, I had already been to Czechia more times than I could easily count. Prague and Brno were familiar territory, and I had even

From lapis lazuli to bare flesh: seventy-five minutes of beauty, scandal and darkness at Madrid’s Prado. Even before entering the Prado Museum in Madrid, visitors are greeted by two men who largely define its character. Diego Velázquez, the seventeenth-century court painter who transformed royal interiors into some of the most sophisticated visua

Hamlet’s castle, a brilliant royal tax, two queens and the grave of a man who never existed - “Gentlemen, you are welcome to Elsinore!” London, Rome and Paris sell themselves. Helsingør needs a story. Fortunately, it has one of the most famous stories ever written. Shakespeare placed Hamlet in Elsinore, the English name for the Danish town of Hel