The three-country run

I was describing my experience writing for Let’s Go to a group of sort-of colleagues over dinner some months ago, and explained to them that I liked traveling for LG because--even though it could be lots of work and the itinerary was constrained--it gave me a good outline of what to do with myself when abroad. Whereupon, one of these folks--someone who consciously cultivates a persona of mellowness--laughed and told me this was an indication that I’d been living in the east two long (dead right, as it happens), and that the point of travel is to do nothing, or at least nothing in particular, but rather to let experiences come your way and take things a moment at a time.

This struck me as a wise and worldly philosophy--and also one that I am constitutionally incapable of putting into practice in my own life. When I travel, I need projects to give shape and purpose to the time. I readily concede that my take is perhaps not a particularly relaxing approach to travel, and may well be indicative that I would benefit from professional mental assistance, but nevertheless it’s where I’m at for this trip, and thus--particularly for the two or so weeks after finishing my language course when I’ll be traveling throughout Central Europe without any structure at all--I am on the lookout for projects.

So far I have one. There appears to be a trend in Europe to do three-country marathons--e.g., Slovenia-Austria-Italy or Germany-Austria-Switzerland--and while there’s no way in hell that I’m going to run 26.2 miles, the notion of traversing that many nations in a single run does seem seductive. Add to the seduction my fascination with Liechtenstein, and I think the broad readership smells what I’m cooking: a three-country run of DF’s own. Begin in Austria (needs to be the starting point because there might be border control problems), traverse Liechtenstein, and then cross the Rhine and into der Schweiz. And this run will not only run across the territory of three countries, as do the others, but it will have the rare distinction of traversing the entire width of a nation in less than an hour. Now, to be fair, we’re talking about Liechtenstein here, and its entire width is about 6km, but still--it’s a project. I’m going to write the folks at the Liechtenstein tourist bureau about it. Perhaps I can get a corporate sponsorship.