If you have a burning desire to travel or you just want to see a bit more of the planet, packing up your backpack and heading off on a gap year can be a fantastic way to clear out the mental cobwebs and come home a more well-rounded person.
But instead of following the usual traveller trails around the world, why not build an itinerary based on your own interests?
I’ve put together a list of the top places for science lovers to visit, so read on to find out which European destinations you should be calling at first.
1. CERN, Geneva
Best known for its work on finding the mysterious Higgs-boson particle (otherwise known as the God particle), CERN is a science behemoth.
Home to the European Organisation for Nuclear Research since the mid 1950s, the laboratory features an underground circular tube known as the Large Hadron Collider. Particles are accelerated around the 27km route and forced to smash into each other, which forms new types of matter that are of great significance to the scientists working on the project.
Visitors can walk around the awe-inspiring Universe of Particles exhibition, which is housed in a dome designed to symbolise our planet. A guided tour of the lab is also offered at CERN. This takes between two and three hours but must be booked at least a month in advance and guests need to show their ID to be allowed to enter.
While there are some public transport links to the lab, it might be easier to take your own vehicle there. You can hire a car from Geneva airport and drive there in less than 20 minutes.
View more of my Switzerland travel tips.
2. Maria Sklodowska-Curie Museum, Warsaw
Eminent physicist Marie Curie made history by discovering polonium and radium, and her work twice won the Nobel Prize in Physics. Her lifetime dedication to understanding radiation has been honoured with the museum in Poland’s capital city.
Established by the Polish Chemical Society in 1967, the building – where Ms Curie once lived – has since attracted countless numbers of visitors keen to gain an insight into the life of this incredible scientist.
View more of my Poland travel tips.
3. The Mendel Genetic Garden, Old Brno
Gregory Mendel is perhaps not so well known as his successors in the field of genetics, but he is considered by the scientific establishment as the founder of that area of study.
The former Augustinian friar managed to demonstrate the inheritance of certain traits in the pea plants grown in the old monastery’s garden and experimented with hybrids by cultivating thousands of the vegetables.
His garden in the Czech Republic is in the process of being restored to its former glory, and visitors can wander round to see where the great man staked out his plants and scribbled down his findings.
View my Czech Republic travel guide for more inspiration.
More Popular Science Attractions
These are some other really amazing destinations if you have a passion for science:
• Mid-Atlantic Ridge, Iceland
• Cite de l’espace, Toulouse, France
• Body Worlds, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
• The Nobel Museum, Stockholm, Sweden
If you enjoyed this article you might like to view more on my travelling blog.
