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Bavaria drops masks on public transport

As of yesterday, the German state of Bavaria has finally dropped the mask mandate on local public transport, after two and a half years.

Along with Spain, Germany has been the most mask manic country in the western world and has continued to enforce the slavish dogma with an iron fist while every one of its neighbours has tacitly admitted the futility and failure of the measure.

Bavaria now joins Saxony-Anhalt in once again allowing freeface travel on buses and local trains.

It must be noted, however, that long distance trains fall under the remit of the federal government, which is still stubbornly dragging its heels and insisting on FFP2 beaks being religiously worn.

Fortunately for libertarian travellers, there is a very simple workaround to this.

All buses, trams and city U-Bahn and S-Bahn services are now freeface.

Trains are split into regional services (coded RB or RE), on which gag rags are no longer required.

Forced muzzling still applies on InterCity, EuroCity and InterCity Express services (coded IC, EC, and ICE).

Just like travelling on a cheap LänderTicket, avoid anything with a “C” in the train number.

With all this in mind, a simple city break in Munich and a trip to the Christmas markets should once again be back on the menu for non-adherents of the mask cult.

It is good to see this positive move in Bavaria. Germany is a country I have been very fond of for many years and I have been dismayed to witness first hand some of the disgraceful behaviour that has taken place there in the last few years.

Hopefully this belated outbreak of sanity will quickly spread to other states and sufficient pressure can be put on the federal regime to finally put an end to the misery.

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Flight review – Nordic Seaplanes, Copenhagen – Aarhus

Whilst in Copenhagen, I was presented with an interesting opportunity to try out a new style of flying – a 45-minute flight with Nordic Seaplanes to Aarhus, one of the oldest cities in Denmark.

At a one-way price of around €95, this seemed too good to turn down.

Unfortunately I was advised 24 hours in advance, that my planned 8:45 departure was cancelled and offered a seat on the afternoon flight.

As this was only a day trip, I opted to take the following day’s morning departure instead and I was quickly rebooked.

The flight departs from the company’s city terminal, a short distance from the iconic Little Mermaid statue.

The experience started with check-in 20 minutes before departure and a coffee in the small, but comfortable, lounge a very short distance from the boarding area.

The cabin is laid out in a 1-2 configuration and on boarding I was pleased to be assigned to one of the single window seats towards the rear.

Flying by seaplane certainly gives a different perspective from flying by jetliner and it was nice to experience the take-off over the city of Copenhagen.

The landing in Aarhus, with a steep nose-down angle was even more exhilarating.

The arrival was at the small terminal a short taxi ride from the centre of Aarhus.

Overall, this was an enjoyable and time efficient way to travel and involved none of the usual annoyances of air travel, such as time consuming check-in procedures, long security queues and extra travelling to and from airports.

My flight from Copenhagen to Aarhus was an enjoyable and trouble free way to travel and I would definitely use this service again.

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