The big news this week is that it is time for a hot chocolate, with optional marshmallows. Christmas market season has shimmered back on to the calendar, with illuminations being switched on all over Europe – and unlike last year, when fears of a winter energy crunch were rife, there seems to be much fewer suggestions this time around that organisers will save energy by limiting their hours of operation or dimming the general glow.
The Christmas market tourism scene is as crowded as a pop-up ice rink in December, though all the lists usually agree that Vienna is among the heaviest-hitters, with Rathausplatz, the square in front of its town hall, attracting more than three million visitors every year to its Christkindlmarkt. It is fair to say that Frankfurt in Germany also makes something of an effort, as does the French city of Strasbourg, which boasts the oldest Christmas market in Europe – it dates from 1570 – and helps itself to the title “capital of Christmas