Places to visit in Europe

After the acclimatization in Britain and Ireland, your choices are infinite. In Scandinavia, where they speak very good English, too, Stockholm can be easily navigated by hire car from the airport, and is a pleasant mixture of historic and modern, sexy and straitlaced. The medieval charm of Gamla Stan has been lovingly restored to house art galleries, covered and open air markets, and nightclubs for every taste. For a sense of traditional Swedish life, visit the open air folklore museum at Skansen.

If you like the variety of smorgasbord, check out the giant market at Ostermalms Saluhall to see just how many different kinds of herring the Swedish can put together (almost as many as the French with their cheeses). Copenhagen is of course the home of Hans Christian Andersen and you'll find his old house down at the harbour, along with a lot less whimsical nightlife for sailors and other lonely hearts. But there's still something of Andersen's fairy tale atmosphere in the Tivoli Gardens ablaze with the colours of 160,000 flowers, particularly spectacular when illuminated at night.

Oslo, big capital of a small country, is spacious enough for dozens of cross country. ski runs inside the city limits, much favoured by businessmen commuting in the wintertime. In a beautiful setting of moorland, lakes and fir tree forests, the town has grown prosperous through Norway's North Sea oil and you can watch construction of the gigantic oil rigs down at the city docks.

The museums of this seafaring people will also show you their ancient Viking long boats and the Kon Tiki balsa raft that crossed the Pacific a few years ago. In the Vika shopping district, you'll find some terrific ski sweaters or mink coats, and art lovers will appreciate the Edvard Munch Museum to which the great Norwegian neurotic bequeathed the bulk of his work.

Finland car hire

Finland is attached to, but not strictly speaking part of, Scandinavia, and car hire from the airport at Helsinki is easy to prebook. Its capital Helsinki acts as a kind of bridge between the Russians and the Swedes, Danes and Norwegians. The city's roots in the western world are clear in the striking modern architecture of Aalto Saarinen. Aalto's splendid Finlandia Hall is the ideal place to hear a concert of the great Finnish composer Sibelius.

The onion domes of the Orthodox churches are an equally clear indicator of the Russian presence in Finnish life. Helsinki boasts the cleanest air of any capital in Europe and broad spacious avenues to enjoy it.

The shopping is much appreciated by the wives of Moscow based Western diplomats who fly in for the hairdressers and boutiques around Esplanadi Park. Connoisseurs insist that the local vodka is the best in the world, bar none, and their children love the pancakes with raspberries.

If you may, from the purely practical point of view, have some legitimate hesitation about driving in London, on the Continent a hire car can be a real asset. European freeways are first class, and the secondary roads, with some exceptions in Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece, are excellently paved and signposted. The important thing is to have the right means of transport at the right moment.

For instance, as fast and convenient as it may be, instead of flying to Paris from London, you could take the cross Channel ferry and then the train to see something of the beautiful Normandy' countryside on the way into the French capital. For visiting Paris itself, the local subway (Metro) and bus systems are efficient and a lot of fun, too, but you should consider renting a car for your excursions outside the city to, say, the magnificent chateau at Versailles or the horseracing in idyllic Chantilly. A car will make it easier for you to plan a picnic and so give you an excuse to take full advantage of Paris's marvellous street markets for your provisions.

Things to do in Paris

For the best way to enjoy Paris is to try, for however brief a time, to participate in the Parisians' daily life rather than make your stay there just another sightseeing tour. Visit those bakeries, cheese shops and wine merchants. Don't always take your breakfast at the hotel, get out early to a corner cafe and have your coffee and croissants with the locals.

But don't neglect Paris's traditional sightseeing, either. There are some tricks: get your first view of the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame ca­thedral from a Seine river­boat, bateau mouche. Go to the Louvre Museum early Monday morning, not Sunday, to the super modern Pompidou Centre in the evening, not the afternoon, to the flea market at Clignan court at dawn with the early bird antique dealers.

In Paris you'll be able to sample all the regional cuisines of the country the snails of Burgundy, oysters of Brittany, goose of the Perigord and of course the wines, not just the great labels of Bordeaux and Burgundy, but also the lesser known regional wines of Cahors, Provence or the Loire. There's something here for all 13 five senses, plus that sixth intuitive sense for adventure.

Fly or drive down to the French Riviera. From Nice east to the Italian border via Monaco and Menton, or west through Antibes, Juan les Pins and Cannes to Saint Tropez, you pass through towns whose names evoke lazy luxury, easy fun in the sun, sea and sand.

After years of pollution, the French Mediterranean beaches have cleaned up their act. Nice has a pebble beach, but superb white sands are to be found in and around Cannes, home of the international film festival in May, or outside Saint Tropez, where the girls look like film stars all summer long.

Things to do in Nice France

In Nice, take a walk along the stylish Promenade des Anglais (the English are credited with discovering the Riviera) to the old town and its Italian style fish, fruit .and vegetable market. As Nizza, Nice was for long an Italian possession, and its older neighbourhoods still have a certain Italian atmosphere. Monaco is famous for its Grand Prix motor race through the downtown streets of Monte Carlo (also in May) and the casino gambling. Choose between the old fashioned elegance of crystal chandeliers over the roulette and baccarat tables or the more recent Las Vegas style rooms with craps and slot machines.