Liechtenstein
Vaduz
A capital small enough to cross on foot, its reigning prince asleep in the castle overhead.
Vaduz runs to a single pedestrian core, the Städtle, with a polished black art museum at one end and the prince's castle on the rock above. Liechtenstein's capital holds roughly 5,800 people, and the family that has ruled here for three centuries still lives in the building watching over it.
The Kunstmuseum's dark cube is cast from concrete ground with black basalt and Rhine river pebbles, polished until the street reflects in it; the white cube joined to it has shown the private Hilti Art Foundation collection since 2015. A few doors along, the Liechtenstein TreasureChamber keeps Fabergé eggs beside rock brought back from the Moon on Apollo 11 and 17, NASA's thank-you to the small country whose factory coated its spacecraft against cosmic radiation. Above the rooftops, the princely Hofkellerei has made wine since 1436 and tends the Herawingert vineyard, pouring its Pinot Noir at tastings in town. Vaduz Castle itself remains the reigning prince's private residence, closed to visitors and visible from everywhere, which is the point: this is a country small enough that the head of state lives over the high street.
Solo
The museum quarter compresses into a few hundred metres of the Städtle, so a solo day moves from the black-cube galleries to the TreasureChamber unhurried, with the castle circuit to finish.
Couple
Book Torkel for dinner among the vines of the Herawingert, then walk the trail below the castle as the Rhine Valley lights come on; the whole evening happens on one hillside.
Family
Children get an official souvenir stamp in their passports at the Liechtenstein Center, then find real Moon rock in the TreasureChamber; the pedestrianised Städtle keeps the day traffic-free.
Friends
A group can cover the capital on foot before lunch, share a Hofkellerei wine tasting in the afternoon and argue about the promenade sculptures in between.
- Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein is a polished black cube of basalt and Rhine pebbles, joined since 2015 by the white cube of the Hilti Art Foundation.
- The Liechtenstein TreasureChamber displays Fabergé eggs and Moon rock from Apollo 11 and 17 a few steps from parliament.
- A 5.4-kilometre circular trail links the Städtle museums, the Old Rhine Bridge, the princely vineyard and Vaduz Castle in about ninety minutes.
- The Hofkellerei has made wine for the princely family since 1436 and pours its Herawingert Pinot Noir at tastings in town.
Restaurant Torkel serves dinner inside the prince's Herawingert vineyard, in a medieval press house whose dining room is built around a wine press carved from a single trunk.
Taste the estate's own Pinot Noir at the Hofkellerei in Vaduz, where the princely winery has poured and sold its wines on home ground since 1436.
Hoi An
Vietnam
Mustard-yellow merchant houses glowing under thousands of silk lanterns beside a tidal river.
Malindi
Kenya
Vasco da Gama's 1498 pillar still stands where Swahili and Italian menus share the street.
Muscat Old Town
Oman
The Sultan's palace stands framed between two forts the Portuguese raised over the harbour.
Jaisalmer
India
A living fortress carved entirely from golden sandstone rising like a mirage from the Thar.
Liechtenstein Trail
Liechtenstein
Walk an entire country in five days, 75 kilometres from Balzers to Schaanwald.
Alte Rheinbrücke
Liechtenstein
A 135-metre timber tunnel over the Rhine; somewhere inside it, you change countries.
Schellenberg
Liechtenstein
Schellenberg keeps two ruined castles on one ridge; the bigger one lets you barbecue inside.
Triesenberg
Liechtenstein
Seven centuries on, this mountainside still speaks the Walser German its settlers carried from Valais.