For our 2007 Christmas shopping expedition, we stayed in Cochem in a hotel overlooking the Moselle, and we also looked at Bernkastel and Trier.

Late in 2009, I went on a tour of Germany with Eddie & The Hot Rods. I found this little market in Freiburg.

Even later in 2009, for Ann’s birthday we went to Valkenburg in Holland. We’ve been to this little town a couple of times before, and it’s one of our favourite places. When we heard that they had Christmas markets as well, to attraction was irresistable.

This first set of pictures comprises a few general shots around town, Santa’s arrival on a steam train, and a couple of shots of our hotel.

On the evening of the day we arrived, the Saturday, Ann’s birthday, we visited the larger of the two main caves, The ‘Municipal’ Cave.

On the Sunday, we visited the ‘Velvet’ Cave. We got there earlier in the day, and there was a long queue. Fortunately, the queue moved fairly quickly. The cave had a Dickensian theme, cased on ‘A Christmas Carol’.

In 2010, we bases ourselves in Calais, and had a look at a few towns in the area (and Leclerc in Boulogne). We saw a few markets that were either closed or under construction - not very festive at all. In the end, we drove along the coast to our old favourite in Ostende. This was much more like it, but it rained for most of the day. On the plus side we also visited Auchan in Grande-Synthe to stock up a bit.