Our original plan was to spend as little time as possible in Luxembourg because we heard it was extremely expensive. We thought we would use the city as a base to visit Germany (Trier), France (Metz) and perhaps Belgium. However our first full day in Luxembourg City changed our minds.
Luxembourg is a fantastic country with many things to do, not just in Luxembourg City, but throughout the country as well. 
It’s reasonably priced; if you’re from a major North American city, you will find the pricing comparable (Some cheaper eats, mid-range, high-range), with affordable transportation (same fare across the country), so are most of the tourist sites. Best of all, if you have a car, the entire country is drivable within a couple of hours. We didn’t, but if we go again (and we plan to), we will certainly rent one. 
Before we began our morning proper, we went down to the
DoubleTree Hilton reception, and purchased a
tourist/travel pass for one day (
you can buy multiple days but we didn’t know how much time we were going to spend in Luxembourg). The tourist pass gets you unlimited train and bus rides, and over 70 tourist attractions in the country – all for
13 euros a person. It’s quite a deal, and it’s available at the tourist office in the city center, or at hotels (such as the one we stayed at).
Our first stop was the
Bock Casemates, an old natural fortification in the historical district of Luxembourg City.
We explored the tunnels, with our guided map in hand, and learned about the history of the fortification. It was an interesting stop, and as a strategic location in fending off armies of the Burgundians, Spaniards and French to name a few – a very interesting historical site.
After that stop, we took in the sights of the river flowing
Pétrusse, followed by
Notre-Dame Cathedral, and finally passed by the
Grand Ducal Palace (tours were available, but we didn’t do one). Just wandering a few hours around the small city to take in the many picturesque sites led us to realize that Luxembourg deserved much more time than previously allocated!
We spent a few hours exploring, and it was well worth it. It was also kind of cool that we were the only people in the museum, and had a guard follow us everywhere (trying to look inconspicuous).
We broke for lunch at a small and reasonably-priced restaurant near the Grand Ducal Palace.
The second site we saw was
Fort Thüngen, another popular tourist attraction that requires a few hours of your time.
It tells the rich history of the fort with an incredibly detailed audio guide (all included in our
tourist pass).
TIP: Of all the places we visit, Jason and I always find that audio tour guides provide the best experience. We had the audio guide for the Co-Cathedral in Malta a few days ago, and this one was just as good. Very informative for every piece of the fort, and well worth the visit.
Finally, we kept wandering the streets until the late hours, had dinner in the city and went back to get some much needed rest!
Hi! Bonjour! I’m Sophia, a traveler since birth, a lover of nature and culture and a linguist! I want to share with you all the wonderful things you can do and experience if you just set your mind to it and travel!
