Hi! I'm Elena! Welcome to my travel blog Creativelena.com.
For me, it is all about “life-seeing instead of sightseeing”: Join me as I create, eat & live my way around the world. Curious?
*Check out my book, “The Creative Traveler’s Handbook”, for learning more about what we mean by creative travel. Travelling means the world to me, makes me fit for everday life and sometimes, I trust, also calmer on the inside. Read this blog with a smile, share what you love and remember to check back regularly: After all, when was the last time you did something for the first time?
It’s this thing with “little hideaways”, that you first have to go out and really find them. It’s in a place called “In der Spitz” for instance, a place where local wine estate, Heurigen & the recently opened Boutique Hotel “WeinSpitz” join up to create a unique piece of local, Lower Austrian wine culture, that you […]
“Tucked away at the foot of the Ötscher mountain”, among the gently rolling hills of the alpine upland in Lower Austria, I read into Brigitte’s “business card” aptly describing the surrounding farm holiday concept. She offers me both a sweet smile, as well as a slice of freshly baked apricot cake as a welcome to […]
Wine, food & the “longest bar in the world”. That’s how the so-called “Genussmeile” in the Vienna forest district likes to be known, itself both a #winelover & foodie stretch of about ten miles between the local towns of Baden & Gumpoldskirchen. Essentially, it is made up of all different kinds of stalls, selling local […]
Angekommen am Althammerhof. Ich lasse die Fenster meines Autos herunter und atme tief durch. Ein herrlicher Geruch aus taufrischen Wiesengräsern und “würziger Landluft” steigt mir in die Nase. Als ich aus dem Auto aussteige und schon die Stufen zum Hauseingang des Althammerhofes hinaufgehen will, meckert mich plötzlich eines der vielen Schafe in unmittelbarer Nähe an. […]
Looking at the mighty Ötscher mountain, is the first thing that captures my attention as I travel to the Bodenhof farm estate in southern Lower Austria, at the border with the province of Styria. Even before I get to greet the Schenners, I can’t take my eyes off the beauty of that mountain, suddenly so […]
“Unique. Natural. Ecological. And heart to heart.” Such is the promise when you visit the website of the “Ecological Guesthouse Luger“, a small country house awarded for its excellence in environmental standards. Right upon arriving among fields of yellow flowers, I do find the atmosphere promoted by the Luger family just as it promises to be: Unique. […]
It’s not even ten minutes I need. Ten minutes to get lost, to get away from the highway to Vienna, and into the gently rolling hills of the Vienna Forest district, hugging the Austrian capital city to the Southwest. “Maria Anzbach”, the little town’s name, is my destination today: I’m pretty sure you’ve never heard […]
Taking the car for a ride around South-Eastern Crete is … a very good idea indeed. As with many popular Mediterranean destinations, I have been warned about the signs of mass tourism in Crete, the countless hotels, the shopping streets – exactly a reason not to travel there. However, the East of Crete, the largest among the […]
Greece. “A travel tale in the (spiritual) traces of humankind“, is what I wrote about my first real visit to Athens in February this year. Those feelings of awe still ring true today. If anything, my understanding about Greece, the current plight of its people due to the crisis, has all but deepened. Perhaps despite […]
Imagine you find yourself in a garden. Not just any garden, no. A garden full of light and life. It’s the middle of the summer, and bees are humming, a butterfly lands on your shoulder, tickles you ever so gently on your skin. Swaying gently in your hammock, you close your eyes and forget all […]
