The Reality of Milan: The Cathedral That Came by Water
The marble under your hand on the roof of Milan Cathedral was cut in the mountains north of Lake Maggiore, and it…
Regional Guide
Europe
Everything for your Europe trip: attractions, routes, seasons and money-saving tips, plus cheap flights to Europe, all in one place on PenguFly.
Cheap flights to Edinburgh: pick the door before the fare
Flight search results make Edinburgh look like a single destination with a single price. It has two doors: the tram outside the…
The Reality of Split: The Town Inside an Emperor’s Palace
A café chair on Split's Peristyle can sit beside a Roman column without either object seeming misplaced. That is the clue. Diocletian,…
Cheap flights to Florence: choose the airport by the train into town
A cheap ticket to Florence is not necessarily a ticket to Florence Airport. From the States, I would judge the booking by…
The Reality of Amsterdam: The Houses Built for Hoisting
Amsterdam's canal houses make convincing scenery. Stand on a bridge and the brick fronts line up along the water, gable after gable,…
The Reality of Bordeaux: The City Facing the River
Stand on the Garonne quay and Bordeaux stops looking like a city that happens to have a river. The water bends in…
The Reality of Florence: The Art Is the Receipt
Florence is very good at making art look inevitable. Turn a corner and there is marble, bronze, or a dome occupying the…
Cheap flights to Tenerife: the two-airport split and the trade-wind cloud deck
Landing on an island in the Atlantic sounds simple enough until you realize the destination operates through paired commercial airfields built in…
The Reality of Catania: Basalt, Water and the Volcano
Catania is built out of the thing that keeps threatening it. The pavements are lava, cut into slabs. The Baroque churches are…
The Reality of Málaga: Stone, Salt and the Unfinished Tower
Málaga never cleared the ground before it built. The Moorish fortress on the hill stands on Roman marble because its masons carried…
The Reality of Tirana: Reclaimed Concrete and Painted Stone
Most capitals deal with an awkward inheritance by pulling it down. Tirana climbed on top of its own. The pyramid raised as…
The Reality of Helsinki: The City That Keeps Letting You In
An ordinary transit ticket — the same one that takes you three stops on a tram — will also carry you across…