Have you ever had such a good vantage point that you can see the whole of Europe laid out below you?  We have!

There are two alternative ways to do this:

1. Become an astronaut.

2. Go to the Atomium in Brussels.

As NASA do not offer family package options for astronaut training, we went for Option 2.  Look – there’s Europe!  I never knew it looked so much like an adventure golf course (even though various historical figures have tried to play it as such over the centuries).

Mini Europe is just great.  If I gave you a quick summary of what it offers you would think it sounds cheesy.  In effect it’s a model village.  The models represent well-known buildings from all over Europe.  At most of them you can press a button and it will play you the national anthem of that country through tinny speakers.

Cheesy, right?

WRONG!

Mini Europe is well worth the trip!

There is a certain juxtaposition throughout.  All of the models are at a consistent scale of 1:25, yet all of them are consistently dwarfed by the Atomium.  But what I love is the fact that the Atomium looks equally model-like.  The two attractions compliment each other exceptionally well.

Mini Europe has some 350 buildings spanning 80 cities – not bad for a mini-golf course!  We saw sights from home:

In fact, we saw sights from our Coastal Path!

What I admired most about Mini Europe was the fact that some of the models looked so very real.  This is Grand Place in Brussels:

Mount Vesuvius (one of the few models not to a scale of 1:25) even spewed smoke at us.  A floor plate vibrated as it erupted!

During our travels we met some vikings – they were rather fierce!

There were some guards to offer assistance, but they all looked far too friendly for my liking.  Certainly, they were no match for such fierceness.

In Italy I tried to help out with the harvest, but those grapes were very heavy (especially after a bottle of wine or two).

At the end of the tour there was a gimmick I really liked – you could take a picture of yourself and email it to your friends, there and then!

Location of the Mini Europe (copy and paste the co-ordinates into Google Earth):

• Mini Europe: N 50° 53.650 E 004° 20.330