Paris

Day 1.

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Like all good cafes, they have regulars who wouldn’t welcome intrusion from tourists. Respectful of that, our group will split up during the various visits to the cafes; here in Paris some of the group will start in at the legendary hangout of Hemingway, Picasso and Henry Miller. One of the truly great local Parisian cafes.

The second group will begin their tour across the road at a Café which began as a simple café for workers and starving artists. At its zenith it was the hub for many famous artists between the two world wars.

Lafayette’s Grave

From Montparnasse we travel to a tiny cemetery at Rue de Pictus where the body of General Lafayette is buried in soil brought from the United States so the hero of the American civil war could be buried in America soil forever. The American flag has flown over his tomb for 160 years. Two or more robed nuns from The Sisters of the Order of the Sacred Heart and Perpetual Adoration have recited prayers here in this chapel 24 hours a day for 190 years.

Late morning we leave the General’s Grave and head to the Marché Barbès, a fantastic outdoor market in the 18th Arrondissement.

The rest of the day is free or you can to visit a number of our recommended interesting galleries and odd museums not usually a part of the tourist trail: Sugegstions will be given. At around 5pm we meet for wine and aperitifs at a noted café, an institution in Paris: In the late 19th century. If you’ve taken the Catacombs tour, you’ll be needing one.

Paris

DAY 2

First up is a visit for part of the group to the Left Bank and to experience the famous that Rimbaud, Verlaine and Mallarme three of France’s greatest poets met.

Georges Proust’s Museum of Magic

After our coffee, those so inclined will join us on a visit to Georges Proust’s Museum of Magic in the Marais district, the museum itself is housed below ground in ancient vaulted chambers built of stone. There are magical antiques, interactive illusions (around 15 interactive “curiosities”) and magical devices in the subterranean museum, reached via a stairway down from street level. Instead, art fans might like a visit to Centre Culturel Suisse. For the real contemporary art fan. This small museum which is sponsored by the Swiss Government, is a cutting edge, beautifully thought out exhibition space.

La Maison Rouge The Maison Rouge is a contemporary art space in the Bastille. Founded by a private collector, this beautifully designed museum, which sits right on the banks of the river, has rotating exhibitions, usually two or three at a time, including an exterior patio site for installations. The afternoon is free, perhaps the daring my consider another very unusual tour: Suggestions offered.

Then at 5pm we gather on the Right Bank on the grand Champs Elysee to share wine and a meal at a café where at dinner with James Joyce and his family, Samuel Beckett first met Peggy Guggenheim and took her home with him that night for a prolonged ‘get to know each other’ session. Later that night we board the overnight train to Saltzburg in Austria.

Salzburg

Day 3

After checking in and freshening up from the overnight train journey, one group heads to a 300 year old Café, amongst its historical  habitués was Mozart and his father. Considered to be the oldest and most famous of the Viennese coffee houses in Saltzburg.

The second of our group have coffee at another nearby Café. Be prepared to have a cup of coffee with half of the Vienna Philharmoniker orchestra.

From the Niemetz we experience the first of a number of Xmas Markets that are held throughout Western and Eastern European capital cities. With the snow falling, a cup of hot wine and a sausage from the stalls is all we’ll need to feel the Xmas magic of Saltzburg.

The afternoon is free to explore Salzburg, either by taking one of the many tours on offer or simply walking the streets and discovering the town for your self. At 5pm we meet for drinks at our selected Café.

Saltzburg

Day 4

After another briefing from Bryan before we head off to another very popular café.

While yesterdays café has always benefited from the musicians at the festival hall, todays venue draws the crowds from the Landestheater Theatre and other stages nearby – actors and guests alike. After our coffee we visit Mozart's Birthplace. In Getreidegasse no. 9, is where the Leopold Mozart family lived from 1747 to 1773. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was born here on January 27, 1756. The afternoon is free to mooch until we meet back at our hotel and then have drinks at the Railway Station before catching the 6pm train to Vienna.

Vienna

Day 5

We begin our Vienna Caffe Krawl in the 1st District of Vienna. Our first venue represents one of the last great Central European tradition of writers and artists coffeehouses as exemplified in Vienna by the Café Central before the First World War and the Café Herrenhof before the Second.

Our other group heads to another close by Café, surely one of the truly great Central European cafes. Always referred to as ‘the writers café’ Sigmund Freud played chess here, members of the Communist International met here, writers used it for settings in their novels –Daniel De Silva’s ‘A Death in Venice’ is set here. Both these cafes are the true heart of the European café, international newspapers are read over a coffee and somehow here within the Central’s walls, the past has been frozen in time.

Warmed by some of the finest coffee in Vienna, who can resist one of the really unique tours of Vienna. The Third Man Tour allows us to retrace the steps of Orson Welles (as Harry Lime) and Joseph Cotten (as Holly Martins) when they made this movie in 1948, under the direction of Carol Reed. A third of all the scenes in The Third Man were shot on location in (and under) Vienna.

At 5pm we meet at our selected Café: A hidden treasure for those who want the real deal. Scruffy, Bohemian place, smoky and dark. If we choose, we will eat here and enjoy another side of Vienna and her cafes.

Vienna

Day 6

We begin our day with a café described as: ‘the kind of cafe where you feel you have finally arrived. The kind of place with original furnishings and fixtures from the 1920s, mirrored walls and modernist interior that make you feel at home. And it has the largest selection of international newspapers in the city.’ And from all reports, some pretty grumpy waiters. Then onto a renown Café where one perfectionist among the waiters carried with him a colour chart of twenty numbered hues of brown in order to serve his customer just the right shade of coffee.

For something different should you choose it: The Undertaker’s Museum –by appointment only. In the 19th century, a bell was attached to a rope within the coffin which allowed the recently deceased should they unexpectedly reawaken, to signal the alarm. There are some displays showing how corpses were dressed up and seated on a chair for one last photograph.

Or it’s a more traditional ‘get on-get off’ bus tour for those visiting Vienna for the first time.

For the art or music minded we’ll keep an eye on what is on offer nearer to departure day. Late afternoon we meet for one more coffee at another of Vienna’s 600 cafes before boarding the train for the Budapest.

Budapest

Day 7

We start the morning in Vorosmarty Square at the sensational cafe. After coffee we wander the square housing the city’s fabulous Xmas Fair and then down some steps and onto the metro (the first underground metro in Europe) and off to the delights of Széchenyi Thermal Baths for one of many dips in Budapest’s fantastic thermal baths.

After lunch with accompaniment of a gypsy violinist, the afternoon is spend wandering (or staggering) around the Castle district on the Buda side and then a visit to one of the most famous and oldest Cafes in Buda. The rest of the afternoon you’re free to take in many interesting museums and galleries, not to mention the bookshops.

Budapest

Day 8

We begin the morning with a coffee at a Central Café and wander the Great Market and Vaci utca-the stylish fashion street, before a visit to the stunning Hotel Gellert Baths for a dip in Budapest’s most stunning thermal bathhouse, meeting up again at lunchtime at a recently refurbished Café. The afternoon is free until we meet at another famous café around 5PM. Then for those who love opera, a tour of and a night at the Hungarian State Opera –consider by most to be the greatest and most beautiful opera houses in the world.

Day 9

Budapest-Sarejevo

We depart Budapest from the stunning Keleti Railway Station on the train at 9.30 am for Sarajevo. Before that we’ll have coffee and stock up with some picnic goodies for the twelve-hour trip. We arrive in Sarejevo at 9.39pm that evening.

Sarejevo

Day 10

No organised plans today. This is a small city where we will simply wander the streets and discover together the rich café and market life that abounds. We’ll coffee and dine with the locals and see another side of European café society.

It was in Sarejevo where Archduke Ferdinand’s assassination precipitated the outbreak of WW1. Hailed as the Jerusalem of Europe, Sarajevo houses Catholic churches, Muslim mosques, a synagogue and Orthodox churches all within walking distance of each other.  After a wine late afternoon for those who wish to do so, we’ll return to a local eatery discovered during the day for an early dinner as we are on a 6.45am incredible train journey to stunning Mostar the next morning.

Mostar

Day 11

After one of the most stunning train journeys we reach the magical town of Mostar. The town is exceptional for its dwellings and monuments including the fabulous Stari Most bridge destroyed during the Bosnian War and then rebuilt. After coffee at a unique café set inside a cave , we spend the day simply admiring the city sights, which include the Old Bazaar, the Turkish House and one of the many old Mosques. We meet up again at 5pm for a wine before finding another local for a early Balkan nosh-up. Train to Ljubjana

Day 12

It’s a Balkan picnic on the train to Slovenian capital, Ljubjana. Train departs at 7.30 am, we arrive and change trains in the Croation capital Zagreb and arrive in Ljubjana - one of Europe’s best kept secrets, late that night.

Ljubljana

Day 13

After a morning coffee at our selected Café and then a top up, we take a walking tour past the major sights of the old part of Ljubljana and then a funicular ride to Ljubljana Castle. In the afternoon we head to the Antique Flea market to pick up a treasure or for the art minded – a gallery crawl of some of Ljubljana’s outstanding art galleries and architecture by the famous and outstanding architect Joze Plecnik. We meet at 5pm again at another café for our late afternoon sustanance before heading off to an optional dinner.

Ljubljana

Day 14

At todays morning café , though it houses perhaps the loveliest of all the "antique" cafe interiors in Old Town, this little place often gets passed by. Noted for not only its coffee but for its excellent tea and desserts, olde-apothecary-shop ambience, creaky furniture and pleasant service.

The rest of the day until late afternoon you are free to take one of the many walking tours of the town or simple meander on your own through this beautiful city. In the afternoon we board a train/bus to0 take us into the Italian border town of Trieste. A town where James Joyce wrote Ulysses and the home and factory of the very famous coffee brand: Illy Café.

Trieste

Day 15

Our day begins with a walking Café Krawl to the 8 best cafes in town. These Cafés are all able to evoke more than one century of the city’s history through events that tell us about culture, invasions, literature and freedom. In the afternoon we visit the Illy Café factory where we’ll see the most advanced coffee making factory in the world before we take lessons from the Illy staff on how to make a great coffee. Evening free.

Day 16

Venice

Early coffee at one of the above before boarding the 9.30 train to Venice.

After checking into our hotel we head to St Marks Square and visit two of the most famous and oldest cafes in Europe. The rest of the afternoon is free to take a walking tour of Venice (highly recommended) before meeting at Harry’s Bar for the obligatory Bellini prior to having dinner at a non-touristy trattoria in the Jewish quarter of Venice.

Day 17

Venice/Padua

After an early coffee, we spend some of the morning walking the Jewish Quarter or visiting the Guggenheim Museum. Around 11.30 we take the train to Padua to visit the oldest café in Italy and the famous Basilica del Santo. Construction of what is known to the people of Padua as Il Santo began in 1232 and gave rise to unusual hybrid result. Many people arrive in Padua purely to see this site.

Day 18

Venice to Monaco

After a quick café at the railway station café at St Lucia station we board our train to Monaco along the French/Italian coast –the beginnings of one of the great train journey’s in Europe. Day and evening is free to wander this gorgeous city or for the daring frock up and have a go at the casino.

Day 19

Monaco-Barcelona

After café at the Café Paris and shopping for snacks and wine for our train journey, we board the train to Barcelona as it hugs the coast overlooking the French Riviera. This is a train journey you won’t forget…(unless you fall asleep after lunch or imbue too many Bordeauxs). We arrive in Barcelona at 10pm that evening.

Day 20

Barcelona

A late morning visit to a Café on the Ramblas before a must visit to Spain’s greatest architect, Gaudi’s Casa Battlo and then a highly recommended tour of the Placa De Musica by the other great Spanish Architect……

In the afternoon for art lovers, we take the funicular railway up to Joan Miro’s museum and then to the outrageous but fabulous and unfinished Gaudi masterpiece the Sagrida Familia. Then onto a tapas bar until its time to enjoy the delights of Café Els Quatre where Picasso first presented his art at 16yrs of age. It was here it could be argued, where Modernism was given birth.

Day 21

Barcelona

 We start our day in the old quarter at the Xocolateria la Xicra in the heart of medieval quarter. Then a walk on to another the Café on the Ramblas for a top up and maybe a warm croissant before we have a free day to see the many wonderful bookshops, art galleries, an exhibitions before meeting up for tapas and wine at 5 and a free evening.

Day 22

Madrid

After an early coffee at the Railway Station we speed by the new fast train to cosmopolitan Madrid, arriving there at lunchtime. After checking in and a quick change and shower, we lunch at the famous hangout of Dali, then onto another Café  for a tapas and sherry before calling it a day –at least until 8pm that night when we return to yet another great café for dinner with ex-pat Lonely Planet writer Anthony Ham (subject to him not being absent on a writing assignment – he does know we are coming!).

Day 23

Madrid

An early coffee with Anthony Ham at one of Anthony’s favourite haunts before visiting possibly the finest art gallery in Europe the Prado. Then as it’s the last day of our tour we thought an afternoon eating and drinking at a wine tasting might be the appropriate way to end out wonderful journey.

Day 24.

Tour concludes after breakfast – coffee, what else!

''Orient Expresso' is for the serious café dweller, the lover of literary and artistic tales, the curious traveller interested in cafes and their history and the unusual travel gem not found in the popular tour guides.