Liechtenstein

There are some truly amazing and fascinating places on this planet.

Vaduz in Liechtenstein isn’t one of them.

It’s picture postcard perfect to the point of being a little bit sinister; it reminded me of the Barony of Vulgaria in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, although that makes it sound considerably more interesting than it actually is!

There’s a pretty cool castle (main image), but it’s still the home of the hereditary ruling family of Liechtenstein, so you can’t even have a nosy round.  There are vineyards, and the wine was quaffable enough but you wouldn’t take it home.  There are some stunning alpine vistas and trails, but Liechtenstein is fairly out of the way, and I’m not sure it’s worth the special effort for a nice walk with a pretty view.

The Maree restaurant at the Park Hotel Sonnenhof is perched up on a hill with a view across to Liechtenstein Castle, and we had a lovely long lunch there on the terrace – this itself is worth the visit if you’re passing through.

But “passing through” is really what Vaduz is all about.  The bankers all seem to go home somewhere else at the weekends, there’s not really enough to do for more than one day if you’re visiting, and there are busloads of tourists who really only seem to stop long enough to queue up for a stamp in their passport and take the toy train ride round the city.

So even though I couldn’t find a dry martini anywhere, I had a decent enough weekend. But it was probably a day more than I needed, and I don’t feel obliged to go again.