September 17, 2018
For those of you who’ve followed my #100yearsago tweets, this should be a familiar name: the Isonzo River, scene of repeated, grinding, futile battles between the Italians and Austrians in the First World War. The Isonzo River cuts its way through a steep mountain valley in the Julian Alps to the north, exiting around Gorizia, […]
September 19, 2018
Klagenfurt is the capital of the modern state of Carinthia, in southern Austria. Statue of the 18th Century Austrian Empress Maria Theresa in Klagenfurt, Austria Klagenfurt was founded in 1246 by Bernhard von Spanheim, Duke of Carinthia But the story of Klagenfurt, and Carinthia, goes back much farther in the mists of time. According to […]
September 16, 2018
Before it was transferred to Italy after World War I, Trieste – on the Adriatic Sea – was the main port city of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It was a major center of shipping and commerce, and the self-conscious grandeur the Austrians tried to achieve there is obvious. My hotel in Trieste, the Excelsior, was one […]