Things to Do in Europe

Covering more than 270 square miles (700 square kilometers) and reaching a thickness of as much as 2,460 feet (750 meters) in places, this vast glacier is Iceland's fourth largest. It sits atop the active Katla Volcano, which has erupted many times over the centuries, spewing meltwater, rock fragments, and ash into the air.

 

With unstable ice, crevasses, and changeable weather conditions, the Myrdalsjokull Glacier can be dangerous to explore solo. For these reasons, most visitors go as part of an organized guided tour from Vik or Reykjavik. Many glacier experiences take place on Solheimajokull glacier, an easy-to-access section of the larger Myrdalsjokull Glacier.

 

Choose between Super Jeep tours, snowmobiling excursions, guided glacier hikes, and ice climb adventures that take place on the vast ice cap, or quad bike rides around the base of the glacier. Longer tours typically incorporate other south coast attractions, such as Eldhraun lava field, the town of Vik, Skaftafell National Park, the black-sand Reynisfjara beach, and Seljalandsfoss and Skogafoss waterfalls.

 

 

Myrdalsjokull Glacier is located in South Iceland, just west of the town of Vik. The only way to get there is by car or organized tour. Take route 221 leading off from the Ring Road (Route 1). A car park is located at the end of the road. From there, it's a short hike of approximately 0.6 miles (one kilometer) to the glacier's edge.

 

Tours run to Myrdalsjokull Glacier year-round. Snowmobile tours are available throughout the year, while ice cave tours usually take place from October through April. Summer is Iceland's peak tourist season, but even then, Myrdalsjokull never feels crowded. Try and pick a clear day to visit, as this is when the blue ice and other colors of Myrdalsjokull are most striking.

 

The Land of Fire and Ice is home to many slow-moving glaciers. In fact, some 10 percent of the country is covered by glaciers. Other notable examples include Langjokull, Iceland's second-largest glacier, and Vatnajokull, Europe's largest glacier, which sits atop the most active volcano in Iceland, Grimsvotn.

For one week in May every year, Valencia's streets turn into a gallery of giant, often cartoon-like sculptures. Come the end of the week, these colorful behemoths are incinerated in building-high bonfires, illuminating the town and filling the city skies with smoke. Though your visit to Valencia may not coincide with this fire- and firework-filled event, you can still become acquainted with it by visiting the Museum of Las Fallas.

But first, to understand the museum, you must grasp what makes up this wild celebration, and specifically the fallas themselves. The fallas are essentially massive, usually paper-mache-made sculptures, typically infused with some sort of political or pop-culture reference. Hundreds of these creations are erected in city squares and street junctions around town, with each big falla having a miniature version next to it, which is called a ninot. Typically both are burned during La Cremà (which takes place the last day of Fallas), but each year one ninot is saved based on popular vote.

And that's when the Museum of Las Fallas comes in, as it is where each of these small fallas (all the way back to 1934) are on display. Viewing each year's salvaged piece will not only give visitors unique insight into the festival but also into the evolution of the artwork and, of course, citizens' interests at the time. Posters and images of Fallas past are on display as well, providing guests with a well-rounded look at what one of Spain's favorite festivals is all about.

The Museum of Ethnology, or Ethnologisches Museum, houses collections of goods that were created outside of Europe and then brought to Berlin in the 19th and 20th centuries. The collections are divided into geographic regions and arranged thematically to provide insights into non-European cultures and show their diversity; an important part of the museum's mission is to foster global understanding and to go beyond the Eurocentric viewpoint.

The "Art of Africa" exhibit teaches visitors about developments in African art history by showing the religious and social significance of sculptures and everyday objects, while "Africa in Berlin" examines the relationship between Africa and Europe. The "American Archeology" exhibit looks at the cultural heritage of pre-Spanish cultures in Central and South America and includes objects that date as far back as 2000 BC. Other exhibits include the South Seas collection with typical boats and houses of the Pacific islands, the "Myth of the Golden Triangle" exhibit which examines ethnic minorities in Southeast Asia, and the "Islamic Worlds" exhibit, looking at different experiences of Muslim cultures. 

Of France's 62 million residents, it's estimated that as many as 7 million of them have Arabic roots. In appreciation of this multiculturalism, France partnered with 22 Arabic nations to found the Museum of the Arab World (Institut du Monde Arabe) in Paris in 1980. Housed within a contemporary building designed by renowned French architect Jean Nouvel, the museum houses a collection of Arabic art, scientific objects, textiles and other items spanning thousands of years.

Spread across four floors, the newly renovated museum's collection includes everything from pre-Islamic ceramics to modern Palestinian art. The building itself is noteworthy, as the intricate latticework on the building's southern exterior was inspired by a traditional Moorish screen.

The museum regularly hosts large temporary exhibitions, with past topics such as contemporary Moroccan art, silks of al-Andalus and hip-hop in the Bronx Arab streets. The museum's Center for Language and Civilization offers Arabic classes for both children and adults.

Occupying a 16th-century house with a bright red and yellow facade, the Museum of Edinburgh (formerly Huntly House) tells the rich history of the city, from prehistoric times to the present day. Among the star exhibits is the collar and bowl of Greyfriars Bobby, a dog who kept watch at his master's Edinburgh grave for 14 years. 

Many visitors arrive at the museum via hop-on hop-off bus tour and browse the exhibitions independently. Both permanent collections, devoted to Edinburgh's history, and temporary exhibitions are housed inside, and are designed to be self-guided. The museum's collections also feature examples of Scottish crafts, including glassware, silver pieces, and porcelain. Fans of the TV show Outlander may recognize the Museum of Edinburgh building. It, together with the surrounding Bakehouse Close, was used as a filming location during series three.

The Museum of Edinburgh is situated in the Old Town, just off the Royal Mile opposite Canongate Kirk. The nearest trains station is Edinburgh Waverley railway station, which is about 10 minutes away on foot. 

The Museum of Edinburgh opens Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. The museum is typically busiest during July and August, school vacations, and at weekends, though crowds are rare. Get there for opening to experience it at its quietest. 

The museum contains many objects of note. Examine the National Covenant of 1638, which called for changes in Scotland's governance and set in motion the events that would ultimately lead to the Scottish civil war. Perhaps the most crowd-pleasing display in the collection is the collar and water bowl of Greyfriars Bobby, a Skye terrier who famously waited by the grave of his master, an Edinburgh policeman, in Greyfriars Kirk for more than a decade after his death.

With over 20,000 Asian artifacts, the Museum of Asian Art in Berlin is one of the largest museums of ancient Asian art in the world. It came to be as a result of the German Turfan expeditions, which were conducted between 1902 and 1914 in Xinjiang, China. It focuses more specifically on works dating back to 4000 B.C. and originating from the Indo-Asian subcontinent (Sri Lanka, Nepal, China, Pakistan, Japan, Thailand, and India, to name a few), most notably Buddhist sacred sites.

The famous Turfan collection is one of the museum's most sought-after highlights; it features 1800-years old paintings and sculptures from what is today northwest China. The museum features plenty of other crowd-pleasers, including the precious Berlin Yuegutang Collection (Chinese ceramics from the Neolithic period) and a collection of Japanese paintings and East-Asian lacquer objects. India is also well-represented, with several thousand-year-old terracotta sculptures and a true-to-size round stupa and the rectangular temple, a testament to India's sacred architecture. The museum houses a traditional Japanese room where tea ceremonies are observed.

The Musical Instruments Museum in Brussels celebrates the making of music with thousands of instruments from around the world. In one section, visitors can explore different instruments throughout history, from antiquity to present day, while another section displays popular instruments from Belgium, other parts of Europe, and from other continents. Another part of the museum focuses on string and keyboard instruments. Here visitors can learn about pianos, harps, violins, and more. There's also a section of mechanical, electrical, and electronic instruments, plus clocks and bells. The star of this section is the componium, which is a 19th-century orchestrion that automatically composes an infinite variety of music. 

Many of the museum's exhibits are designed to allow visitors to hear what the instruments sound like. Through wireless technology, the music is transmitted to your headphones when you stand on numbered spots on the floor. Headphones are included with the ticket price, or you can use your own.  The museum often has temporary exhibits focusing on different topics, instruments, and instrument inventors. There's also has a concert hall and a workshop room. On the roof of the building is a restaurant with excellent views of the city.

As travelers make their way through the different parts of the museum, they'll embark on a chronological journey through Anatolia's past. With relics from different periods of Anatolian history including those from Palaeolithic, Neolithic, Chalcolithic, Bronze Age, Assyrian, Hittite, Phrygian, Urartian and Lydian civilizations, there are also classical Greek and Roman artifacts on display in a separate section of the museum.

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Museumsdorf Düppel (Düppel Museum Village) is a seasonal open-air museum in Berlin that allows visitors to experience medieval ways of life and craftsmanship at festivals, markets, and other events. The reconstruction of a German village is built on on the same site as a village where farmers lived 800 years ago; the with residences, storehouses, workshops, fields, and gardens all likely look just as they did in the year 1200.

From Easter through October, visitors can see and smell medieval plants and animals like the "˜Düppel pig' and the "˜Skudde sheep,' species that have been bred back from near-extinction. Local volunteers demonstrate medieval craft techniques like blacksmithing, tar-making, and textile arts. The museum kitchen offers hot and cold dishes, cakes, and coffee. The entire family will enjoy the interactive experience of touching, testing, listening, smelling, learning, and participating the different features of the museum. There is a small permanent exhibit, and learning programs are also offered for school classes and groups of visitors.

The Museum Van Loon is located in a fine mansion overlooking the Keizersgracht canal; it was designed by Adriaen Dortsman in 1672 and the house's first tenant was Ferdinand Bol, a pupil of Rembrandt. Between 1884 and 1945 it was home to the Van Loon family, who founded the Dutch East India Company (Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie or VOC) and were one of the wealthiest families in Amsterdam. Today this is one of the few 17th-century canal-side townhouses in Amsterdam to have retained its original integrity and the elegant double-fronted mansion still stands with its vast proportions intact. It certainly reflected the Van Loon family's elevated social standing by its sheer size, with grand apartments stuffed with Louis XV furniture, fine porcelain and precious silverware leading on to a procession of yet more ornate rooms. Furnished in the style of the Dutch aristocracy of Golden Age, the walls are smothered with family portraits and the grand staircase is constructed from decorative marble with an ornate brass balustrade. A formal knot garden lies behind the house; beyond that is a coach house built in the style of a colonnaded Greek temple. 

The Prado and the Reina Sofia are must-see museums when in Madrid, but the often overlooked Museum of Lázaro Galdiano has been called "the best kept art secret" in the city. The elegant mansion housing the collection was once the home of Jose Lázaro Galdiano, a 19th-century Spanish publisher, entrepreneur, and art collector. Galdiano gifted his exquisite collection of almost entirely Iberian art "” including works by Goya, El Greco, Velazquez, Zurbarán, and Murillo "” to the state upon his death in 1947. 

Today it is an impressive display of more than 13,000 works of art ranging from sculpture and furniture to jewelry and ceramic, among some of Madrid's finest paintings.  You'll also find the work of French, Italian, and English painters on the second floor. The room dedicated exclusively to Goya's work is particularly special, though the house itself with its fresco ceilings and magnificent ballroom is worth a visit alone.

Established in 1969, the Museum of Technology, also called Tekiniikan Museo, is the only technology museum in Finland. The museum is operated privately by the Museum Technology Foundation which was established by a variety of engineering and industrial organizations within the city. The Museum of Technology focuses on the history of invention and innovation within the technology sector in Finland. It seeks to preserve the history of industrialization in Finland, and creates a historical lineage of industrialization in Finland dating back to its days as an agrarian society.

The museum is located on a small island in the middle of the Vantaanjoki River. The island itself is incredibly important historically. It was here that the Swedish King Gustav Vasa built an administrative center and established the city of Helsinki itself in the 1500s. As the city industrialized, the shores of the river became the life-blood of the various factories and industries in the city. Thus, the riverfront location makes great sense as the host of the Museum of Technology.

With its ancient roots, Marseille is the perfect city to host the Museum of African, Oceanic and American-Indian Art (Musee d'Arts Africains, Oceaniens et Amerindiens). And the Vieille Charite, with its fascinating architecture, is the perfect place to house it.

The Vieille Charite may not look like much from the outside, as it was originally a poorhouse dating back to the late 17th century. But inside, visitors are treated to a massive courtyard with symmetrical rows of beautiful arches, where light plays over the pinkish stone from nearby quarries. At the center of the courtyard is a jewel box of a chapel; all in all, it would be a worthy sightseeing destination even if it didn't house a museum. 

Or should it be museums, plural? In addition to the permanent exhibitions of the Museum of African, Oceanic and American-Indian Art, which features striking ethnographic pieces and ancient artifacts, there are several temporary exhibits in other gallery spaces, as well as the Museum of Mediterranean Archaeology (Musee d'Archeologie Mediterraneenne). 

The museum and its exhibits provide a wonderful, off-the-beaten path activity that's perfect for the whole family. Note that the site is widely known as the greater Vieille Charite, rather than the specific museum names.

Helsinki's Museum of Finnish Architecture dedicates three stories to design, with a special focus on Finnish architecture from 1900-1970 in its permanent collection on the second floor. The Finnish collection is especially interesting for those interested in Modernism and renowned Finnish architects like Alvar Aalto. 

Located in Helsinki's design district, first floor temporary exhibits showcase both international and Finnish architecture.

As the second-oldest museum of architecture in the world, a visit to the small museum is an interesting way to learn about Finnish culture and Scandinavian style. Located in a beautiful neo-renaissance building dating back to 1899, the archives on the second floor are open to the public and feature over 50,000 drawings, many of which are originals. The archives also include an extensive selection of photographs, slides, and models. On the ground floor there's a bookshop and library. 

A nod to Venice's rich classical musical heritage, the small but fascinating Music Museum (Museo della Musica) is one of the city's little-known gems. Housed in the beautifully restored church of Chiesa di San Maurizio, the museum explores the art of violin making and the preservation of rare musical instruments.

Visitors can learn more about Venice's most famous composer, Antonio Vivaldi, and gain insight into the city's violin-making legacy, but the most compelling aspect of this free museum are the instruments themselves, dating from the 17th to the 19th century. The collection includes a wide variety of string instruments, including violins, cellos, and harps, with highlights including a 19th-century lyre and an exquisite mandolin inlaid with mother-of-pearl. True lovers of classical music can combine a tour of this small museum with an evening concert in the nearby Church of San Vidal by the Interpreti Veneziani ensemble, which performs works by famous Italian and German baroque composers.

The Music Museum (Museo della Musica) is located inside the Chiesa di San Maurizio (Church of San Maurizio) on Campo San Maurizio, a short walk from Piazza San Marco.

If visiting in the popular summer months, you can duck into the Music Museum to escape the crowds during the peak hours of midday and have a few minutes of quiet respite while enjoying the impressive collection.

One of Italy's most famous musicians, Vivaldi was born in Venice in the 17th century and wrote a number of the most recognized pieces of classical music in the world, including The Four Seasons. His work greatly influenced later composers like Bach.

As befits one of the most important decorative-arts museums in Europe, there are two locations for Berlin's Museum of Applied Art ("˜Kunstgewerbemuseum' in German); the Kulturforum near Potsdamer Platz and an outpost at the Schloss Köpenick on an island in the Dahme River. The former is housed in purpose-built gallery designed by Rolf Gutbrod in 1985, which was refurbished in 2014 to provide a home for an expanded collection celebrating the landmarks of European design from medieval times to present day. Highlights include examples of medieval religious art, Renaissance silverware and the ornate rococo Chamber of Mirrors transported from the Schloss Wiesentheid in Kitzingen, Bavaria. Recent additions include a spectacular Fashion Gallery "” exhibiting 130 dresses dating from 1795 to present day "” and important pieces of Jugendstil and Art Deco glassware and furniture.

Temporary exhibitions featuring artifacts from the museum's repository are held at both venues but the major selling point of the ornate, moated Schloss Köpenick is its permanent display of reconstructed period rooms. Dating from the 16th to the 18th centuries, they are perfectly matched to the Baroque backdrop of the castle and every detail of their decoration is accurate down to the last piece of furniture and stuccowork.

Behind the facade of a dark, grey Neogothic structure lays a collection of artifacts that tell the story of the city of Brussels. This intricate building is known as the Maison du Roi ("King's House") and is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The structure is also known as Broodhuis (bread market), a nod to its use as such in the 13th century.

From its early development to medieval era to present day, learn about the city's history through its tapestries, paintings, sculptures, and photographs. Altarpieces, porcelain and silverware round out the collection of historical objects on display. Exhibits cover everything from urban development to the social, political, and cultural life of the capital. Envision the past with 3D models to scale of the city in different time periods. Of particular note is the costume collection of the statue of Manneken-Pis, an emblem of Brussels said to have nearly 800 wardrobe choices.

The Vieille Charite in the heart of Old Town Marseille houses not one, but two museums "“ the Museum of African, Oceanic and American-Indian Art (Musee d'Arts Africains, Oceaniens et Amerindiens) and the Museum of Mediterranean Archaeology (Musee d'Archeologie Mediterraneenne). Formerly a poorhouse and then an orphanage throughout its four-century history, the structure's restoration in the mid-20th century was championed by architect Le Corbusier. The site has since served as a fun destination for fans of art and history, as well as those who simply want something a bit off the beaten path.

Unlike its sister museum, the Museum of Mediterranean Archaeology focuses on the history of the immediate area and features items found in the region and specifically in and around Marseille. With that, the museum not only tells the history of Marseille, but of Mediterranean Europe in general, and can be an enlightening take for visitors from around the world.

Moving from the Museum of Mediterranean Archaeology to the Museum of African, Oceanic and American-Indian Art is an easy transition, as both complement one another. There are temporary exhibits as well, and the most recent featured works by Picasso. For cruise day trippers, the Vieille Charite is an easy stroll from the cruise port.