Travel Theme: Entertainment

When you move away from the television set or CD player in your living room, entertainment usually takes two forms. There’s the kind where the entertainment is the reason for your travelling, and there’s that which wasn’t the main reason for your trip.

For instance, we often travel to Southampton or Brighton to see a show or a stage musical, but we’ve been further afield especially to see a performance. The Edinburgh Tattoo springs to mind, as does the inimitable conductor and violinist André Rieu. To see his concerts, we’ve travelled to London, Leeds, Birmingham … and twice, we’ve gone to his home town of Maastricht.

We’re not holding our breath waiting for him to come to us, for there’s no really suitable venue within easy reach.

And, there’s the other kind … sound and light shows in China, Egypt and Tunisia; theatre in China, an equestrian show in Australia, shows on cruise ships (which can vary from the outstanding to the abysmal on the same ship!)  … even the in-flight movie has its place here. But, we didn’t go especially to see any of these; they were just one part of the trip.

My favourite, though, is the busker. Here is the unrehearsed spontaneity which I like. Walk down just about any street and you’ll hear at least one. Maybe they’ll be performing with one eye out for the cops or some jobsworth Council official, who’ll tell them to move on. Or, maybe they’ll be officially sanctioned, like the steel band which greeted us at St. Maarten.

It could be that none of these things float your boat, and you’re just content to sit in the sun with a book and an MP3 player. That’s all right; that’s entertainment, too.

This week’s Travel Theme. For more entertainment, visit  http://wheresmybackpack.com/2016/01/15/travel-theme-entertainment/