Don't Worry Be Happy

(Brag alert!) As our time in Europe draws to a close I'm reflecting on the year of travel I've had - 5 continents! This is a record even for me. In January I went to South Africa with an overnight stop in Dubai (Asia). In April I was in New Zealand (Oceania?);  Europe and North America round out my year of 5 continents. And I still have 3 months left! Like most people I don't really enjoy the travel part of travelling but what I do  enjoy are the new experiences, always learning (history, culture, geography), increased awareness and appreciation for everything I have, and the memories I get to keep forever. We returned to Barcelona for a couple of nights before flying out and I double down on what I said about it - you can't make a city this fabulous and not expect to be sharing it with tourists. I previously posted pics of the amazing Sagrada Familia and this time Sam and I booked tickets ahead to see the interior. This pic is a small  portion of one of the f...

Truth be told, we might not be here except for the humorous name. I was looking for a place to stay along the sea - perhaps a small Spanish town - and this one seemed to fit the bill. When we arrived it seemed like we had found our way to a quiet spot without many tourists and very little English spoken. The language part was correct but not the tourist part. Also the quiet part was because it was siesta time - religiously practiced here. By Saturday morning the beaches started to fill up but still not any where near capacity. Peniscola has two main beaches - the south one which is smaller, quieter and across the road from our apartment - and the north one which is extensive, crowded with many stalls selling clothing and other tourist stuff (or crappy-do-dah as one person put it). This is the view from our window - the south beach is right there behind those trees. In between the two beaches is a small piece of land jutting into the sea and on top of the hill is the castle buil...

Most people who have visited here give a pretty good rating to this city and I can certainly see why. First of all it's full of architecture that ranges from the sublime to the ridiculous. The Sagrada Familia is both ridiculous AND sublime. This is the church that has been under construction since architect Antoni Gaudi started it 130 years ago and will be finished in about another 10-15 years. The spires already reach high into the sky over the city and the final ones will be much higher. If you zoom into the top photo you'll see very tiny people around the bottom - just to give you an idea of the scale. Gaudi also designed many other buildings around the city - many of which make you wonder whether he was inspired or using architecture-enhancing medicines! Barcelona is part of the Spanish area called Catalonia and this region is currently doing a Quebec-style referendum to achieve independence. Like Quebec, they have food, language, and culture that differ ...

If you want foie gras (liver pate) in this part of France be prepared to take quite a while to make your selection. There are cans or jars, there is duck (mostly) or goose, there are different percentages of FG (i.e. 50% foie gras), there's whole or block, semi-cooked, preserved etc, etc. There are huge sections in every supermarket dedicated to it and every village market has FG vendors. The other day we drove about 50 km to Sarlat-la-Canéda (no relation to Canada) which has to be the foie gras capital of the world. We must have seen more than a dozen stores that sold ONLY FG. But like most places in the world except North America, don't expect to find peanut butter which is why I've started travelling with my own little jar which is almost gone since some of my travelling companions (Scott?) may have been enjoying it as well. Fortunately for me he has also been researching where to find it in Barcelona which is our next stop. Not sure why Europeans haven't embrace...

In 2012 Ross and I were fortunate to spend about 6 weeks in this region of France known as "The Lot".  Here we are back again and it is just as lovely. The village we were in previously, Prayssac, was quite small - about 1500 residents, but the village we are in now is much smaller - it's listed as having about 400 people. We've seen 3! There's the guy that runs the bar/restaurant (below) - about 100m from our house - we sampled some of their wares while waiting for the property manager to arrive with the key to our house (that's another story). Then there's the woman who sells us baguettes and pain au chocolat at the boulangerie/patisserie. About 200 m down the road. A nice selection of baked goods. Then around the corner from the bakery, down the little stairs and across the creek with the river rats in it, is the little grocery store where we buy our cheeses and other things. The church, of course, in the middle of town. The bells ring on the ...