Battlefields of Europe

Amsterdam’s most popular art museum opened in 1885 to house William V’s personal art collection. It now holds an unbelievable collection of Rembrandts, Vermeers, and other Dutch masters, plus an extensive collection of Asian and decorative arts. Upstairs there’s a collection of 17th- and 18th-century dollhouses, furnished just as real houses of the time would have been.

Canals and crocuses. Bicycles and bluebells. With more canals than Venice (and more flower merchants than perhaps any other city in the world), downtown Amsterdam is an explosion of color and light reflecting off the water. Take a glass-topped canal boat ride--the best way to see the gabled houses and nearly 1200 bridges. Visit a diamond factory to see how the stones are cut. And take a tour of Anne Frank's house, where three different Jewish families hid for more than two years during World War II. See the bare rooms where they lived before being betrayed and deported to concentration camps.

"Band of Brothers" depicted the difficult terrain and frequently isolating fog that made the Ardennes forest inhospitable ground on which to fight the Battle of the Bulge. The German surprise attack began December 16, 1944, and while they moved forward quickly they also ran into more Allied resistance than they had expected. The Germans were slowed, then stopped, and then finally retreated from Bastogne on January 13, 1945. The Ardennes American Cemetery and Memorial contain the graves of 5,328 American soldiers and the names of 462 Americans missing, many of whom died during the Battle of the Bulge.

On December 21, 1945, during the Battle of the Bulge, German attacking troops had surrounded the Belgian town of Bastogne. Asked to surrender, General Anthony McAuliffe replied, "Nuts." The Allies went on to defeat the Germans, and McAuliffe's defiant syllable now adorns bumper stickers, t-shirts, and signs throughout the town. The Bastogne Historical Center commemorates the battle with three-dimensional reenactments, films, and historical equipment, including portions of a B-17 cockpit that was shot down, American and German guns, and uniforms.

During World War I, the Germans attacked the heavily fortified city of Verdun with as much firepower as they could. The battle opened with a ten-hour, two-million shell barrage and lasted ten months. While the French eventually won, the battle destroyed nine French villages, killed more than 250,000 citizens, and left a pockmarked battlefield still largely barren of trees. French Field Marshall Phillipe Pétain earned a high reputation during the battle, leading to his later disastrous appointment as Prime Minister during the Vichy Regime. A less problematic honor was awarded to another battle contributor -- soldiers surrounded by German forces sent a passenger pigeon to the command post asking for reinforcements; the pigeon safely delivered its message and then died from having passed through the gas-filled battlefield. The French awarded the pigeon the Legion of Honor.

Luxembourg's National Museum of Military History takes a unique approach. They've worked with veterans from both sides of the war to create realistic displays, to capture the daily life and the suffering of both armies, and to help heal the rifts between the survivors. The museum also examines the history Luxembourg's army, both before and after World War II.

Ingenious military engineering allowed the Allied forces to land at Arromanches on D-Day. Barges towed 600,000 tons of concrete across the English Channel, sinking them to create an artificial harbor, and then 33 jetties and 10 miles of floating roadways allowed the troops to land in France. Learn about this feat and other at the Arromanches Museum, where dioramas, interactive displays, and models detail the Allied landing.

See the D-Day beaches where on June 6, 1944, thousands of Allied troops landed in an effort to recapture the coast from Germany. All along the beaches, deserted German bunkers have been turned into memorials and the stark white crosses and stars that mark the cemeteries are grim reminders of the war.

This city was made for walking. Stroll grand boulevards with sweeping views of the city, pristine parks with trees planted in perfect rows, and narrow streets crowded with vendors selling flowers, pastries and cheese. Then head to the Île de la Cité, a small island in the Seine, to see Notre Dame Cathedral. Look up at the great stone buttresses, grotesque gargoyles, and massive stained-glass windows.

Visit one of the original college towns. Since the Sorbonne’s founding in the 1100s, the Left Bank has attracted not only intellectuals but also the cafés, bookstores, and cinemas that tend to accompany them. It’s also attracted its fair share of famous residents – a plaque marks one of Hemingway’s apartments on rue du Cardinal-Lemoine, and the imposing neoclassical Panthéon holds the tombs of Voltaire, Rousseau, Victor Hugo, and Marie Curie.

What's that huge white arch at the end of the Champs-Élysées? The Arc de Triomphe, commissioned by Napoleon in 1806 after his victory at Austerlitz. Your licensed local guide will elaborate on this, and other Parisian landmarks. See some of the most famous sites, including the ornate, 19th-century Opera, the Presidential residence, the ultra-chic shops of the Rue du Faubourg St-Honoré, and the gardens of the Tuileries. You'll pass the Place de la Concorde, where in the center you’ll find the Obelisk of Luxor, a gift from Egypt in 1836, and the Place Vendôme, a huge square surrounded by 17th-century buildings. Spot chic locals (and tons of tourists) strolling the Champs-Élysées. Look up at the iron girders of the Eiffel Tower, built for the 1889 World's Fair to commemorate the centenary of the French Revolution. See Les Invalides (a refuge for war wounded), the École Militaire (Napoleon's alma mater), and the Conciergerie (the prison where Marie Antoinette was kept during the French Revolution).

The ultimate palace, Versailles was built by Louis VIX, and housed the royal family and its groveling court from 1582, when the Sun King moved in, to the French Revolution. Everything in Versailles is worth a look, from the 250-foot-long Hall of Mirrors, with themed salons-"war" and "peace"-on either side, to Marie Antoinette's faux country hamlet. When being a queen became too much to bear, she would pretend to be a commoner, tending her sheep and wearing peasant clothes. (Please note Versailles is closed on Mondays.)

See the city from the water on an hour-long cruise along the River Seine. The Seine cuts right through Paris, dividing the city in half. See the Eiffel tower rising up on the Left Bank, the walls of the Louvre on the Right Bank. A guide will point out other monuments and architectural marvels as you pass, many of which are illuminated by clear white light at night.