A to Z travel challenge in 2025

Wattenwil was the last stop for the challenge in Switzerland, thus Wrapping it up nicely.

I was amazed at this old tech piece for weather conditions gauging that my friend explained was used in the pre-computers-phones era:

Vevey town bathed by lake Geneva which separates Switzerland from France was the target for V, and what a target it was!

Vevey is a buzzing town specially near the lake with many parks and lake-access zones.

U was next on the itinerary and the powerful sounding town of Ueberstorf served the purpose.

One of my party found an amazing route through the town's "backgardens" which lead to an amazing short walk through a farm where there was a shop with a local selling locally crafted items.

This is the village where my accommodation was in for this trip. Not much to see, but a decent location close to Bern.

For the next batch of letters (S to W), I was in Switzerland with couple friends who indulge me and my challenge, kicking off things with Schüpfheim town.

This cute town in a valley, surrounded by mountains on all sides set the tone for the rest of the days in Switzerland. Lush green forests and peaky snowy peaks.

Whilst visiting family in Canada, we did a road trip from Toronto to Ottawa. On the way we stopped in the 'one thousand isles' area, in Rockport village. Rockport sits next to St. Lawrence river and across it is the USA.

So far the smallest and quickest-to-visit entry on this challenge is Quarley for Q.

A remotely located place with shy few public structures within short distance of each other, of which we saw the WW1 memorial and the town village hall.

Shout out to my companions(💻, 🏀 and 💎) who came along and travelled many miles for this.

For my final Polish stop, a fitting end with a 'P' - Prądnik Korzkiewski, a village inside a beautiful, peaceful and quiet valley.

For a nice change, Olkusz was a big town where I spent couple hours wondering around and bought some local delicacies 🥜 🍎.

Nagłowice has a colossal church which this time around was not on a hill, but very accessible and easy to get to. I didn't spend much time here, so not much to say 😢.

A very practical town square with all the essentials around it and a church on the hill constitute the town of Małogoszcz.

Wonder if someone is still living there?

Leszczyny was an interesting stop, a small but impressive church adorned this village and it was a nice peaceful stop to stretch my legs a bit.

My first stop of the day was in Kunów, where I just visited the town square and had a small wonder around.

Because this was early morning and after spotting couple of Polish men drinking wine bottles I decided it was time to go.

Janik is a small town where one can see classic trademarks of ex-USSR architecture, e.g. block like buildings. Joyful and colourful place nonetheless.

Kicking off my Poland excursion we have the town of Iłża, a tucked away town overlooked by a castle on a hill, starting off with a medieval Polish vibe and a beautiful creature of the feline persuasion.

Close to Reading, the peaceful town of Henley on Thames served as my H for the challenge. Bathed by the iconic Thames, this is a very picturesque town with a big park nearby and boasting amazing scenery which is augmented by the wildlife.

Guildford in south-west London is a buzzing hub town home to the University of Surrey and a giant cathedral atop a hill. Lot of shops and restaurants; to the latter point the best burger I had in a long time was here, in a place called 'Boring Burger', an oxymoron name if you ask me.

Small village which has at least 1 pub. There are also some horse 🐎 stables in the area and I was lucky to see some of them being strolled through the road. My visit was bleak for the most part, not so different to the Prometheus (Alien franchise) scientist of the same name who turns into a xeno-zombie creature.

Eton Wick, unbeknownst to me was right next to Eton, as in, the Eton college, a highly prestigious college in the UK. It certainly was a tad different to the previous college I pass by that day (Slough&Langley College). From here you can see Windsor castle in its fine splendor.

Not so far from Datchet you can walk around The Queen Mother Reservoir though you're not able to see the body of water per say as the area is fenced off to the public. If it's any comfort, on the north side of the reservoir, you can spot sheep 🐑.

The fortified medieval castle of Carcassone is something else, smooth, clean and sitting atop the hill with a great view of the city!

B in the bag! I reached Bram from Castelnaudary by cycle 🚲. Bram is a tightly packed village with a lot of shops.