Category Archives: 4) DESTINATIONS — not in U.S.

July 8, 2013 · 4:24 pm

On the overnight train from Gdansk to Krakow

We wanted adventure, we got adventure, here in a sleeping car with a bunk bed en route from Gdansk to Krakow. Our Polish friends all came to see us off at the station near midnight – Adam and his mother, Michel and his girlfriend Anna ( who came with a parting gift – bottle of Goldwasser, the Gdansk liquor that includes visible flakes of Gold. (See foto below) Our luggage is pretty boozy…D already has a bottle of Ukrainian vodka he got for a gift.

Our Polish friends took care of us well throughout our three day trip, eager to show us around and very generous, which was very sweet and gave us some insights into real life in Gdansk and Poland that we would not have gotten otherwise. yesterday, Adam and his mother ( in another foto below) picked us up and whisked us off to the Bishops cathedral, home and park landscaped with lovely flower beds. There was a Saturday morning organ concert in the cathedral and my eyes were not deceiving me: the gold trumpets of the angel statues embedded in the ornate organ really did move around when the music played. They also drove us past Lech walecsa ‘s house nearby. Then Michal picked us up and drove us about an hour away to Malbork Castle, an enormous 13th century castle housing Teutonic Knights from Germany who were also, oddly, monks as well as hired guns for Poland to fight Russia who later ended up fighting and defeating Poland. At night, we went to The modern high rise apartment outside the old town where Adam and his mother live for a huge meal of cold cuts, various salads and cheeses and meat spreads and chunks of white cream with a layer of red jello with strawberries. Next stop, the Baltic Sea pier in Gdansk where there was a lively disco and some restaurants and some people swimming in the dark cold water. From there we went to the high tech domed observatory of adam’s former school where he showed us Saturn and various stars through a telescope. We didn’t get back to the hotel until about 12:30 pm.

This morning, Adam picked us up and we went to the very interesting Roads to Freedom exhibit documenting the Solidarity Movement, complete with replicated shops showing the scarcity during communist times and lots of test old photos and footage of the struggle during the 1970s and 1980s. A new larger museum is in the making but I really liked the simplicity of this one.

Adam handed us off to Michal and Anna who drove us to the nearby resort seaside town of Sopot which was packed with vacationers on a spectacular summer day. We met up with Michal’s mother and had very good pasta and risotto at one of the many busy restaurants surrounding a wide plaza that leads to a long wide pier jutting out into the Baltic, and a little marina with very large pleasure boats. you had to pay to walk the pier, which was a bit surprising. we were joined by some very well healed pele, including some stunning, presumably Polish young women.

Michel and Anna patiently joined us as we shopped for some amber gifts back in Gdansk on Mariacka Street, then Adam and his mom returned and took us back to their house for dinner, shopping at. Huge tesco for train provisions and a visit at sunset to the Dramatic 1950s era monument across the river from old town marking the start of World War Two. What a visit. We loved seeing our friends (Michael, Adam, Anna who we last saw in Des Moines in 2009) and their lovely mothers and city. Here’s hoping we meet again.

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July 5, 2013 · 4:21 pm

Reunion in gdansk

D. Arrived this morning from Bucharest after 13 days of touring farms in Ukraine, Moldova and Romania. Sight for sore eyes and we had a lot to catch up on. The Gotyk Hotel where we are staying is charming. (See top photo) It’s alllegedly the oldest house in Gdansk, circa 1451, on one of Gdansk’s most beautiful streets, Mariacka Street ( see second photo) in the shadow of the enormous St. Mary’s church,the world’s largest brick church. Hotel is small with old world decor with Gothic flourishes but modern conveniences.

The Old Town, meticulously restored after being bombed to bits during WWII almost looks like it could be in Holland or Belgium, with beautifully adorned flat fronted buildings with murals and statutes and gargoyles. At the end of our street, there is the river that leads to the Baltic Sea. The riverside street is lined with amber shops and tourist stuff but nearby are refreshingly gritty big ships. There is also a tall ships festival here this weekend so there are lots of old pleasure boats and reenact-ors dressed in old military garb (word has it they will stage some sort of naval battle tomorrow.) This place is packed with tourists.

After eating some delicious pierogi at Pierogarnia U Dzika (see last photo), checking out the distinctive embroidery of the Kushubian region of Poland ( whose residents have a distinctive culture and language) at Galerie Sztuki Kaszubskie and chatting with a Swedish tourist who is also staying at our hotel (Everyone’s favorite topic: the snowdon situation and obama) we met up with M. whom we last saw four years ago when he left our house in Des Moines after staying with us for several weeks. As handsome and sweet as ever, he is now a 23-year-old Gdansk dental student living with his girlfriend who he got attached to during his Iowa trip ( she also was a Polish exchange student). He showed us all around the Old Town and along the river and we stopped for a beer at his favorite local brewery, Browar Piwna. So nice to see him and to have him show us around his town!

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July 4, 2013 · 9:12 pm

On the train from Berlin to Gdansk

Despite some lingering concern that flooding in Germany is still disrupting rail service, my train left Berlin’s impressive new train station (hauptbahnhof) right on time, in true German style. Now we are zipping across fields of corn, wheat and some other shimmering yellow crop, through forests of spindly fir trees, stopping at the occasional village with red tile roofs and, sometimes, wind turbines, between Berlin and Gdansk. God is there anything better than a train ride to a brand new place, listening to music on an iPod, feeling decades younger than You are. Probably but I do love the liberating feel of riding a train. Never feel that way on a plane or a bus. Sometimes I feel it in a car but I’ve still got to drive or sit in a confined space. I am in a six person compartment with a sliding door and three young women who seem a little less enthralled by the ride.

What I could use is one of those computerized maps on airplanes so I knew when we are in Poland. I wonder if there will be some telltale signs…beyond signs in Polish. Not sure I know the difference but the latest sign sure looked Polish and some of the young women in my car said we are indeed inPoland and have been for the past 30 minutes or so. Who knew?

My last day in Berlin was pretty laid back. I wandered around Charlottenburg, the gentile neighborhood near my hotel, past elegant buildings and attractive cafes. I browsed around KaDeWe, an opulent department store akin to Harrod’s, although the food halls didn’t have as enticing food. near my hotel in Wilmersdorf, I stumbled upon a quiet well tended residential street (Duisberger or Dusseldorfer Strasse) with a plaque at the corner explaining that this was where Charlottenburg’s Jews were relocated before their ultimate grim destination, the death camps. Took me aback. Reminded me of a conversation I overheard during my first day in Berlin. The dad kept pointing out to his two little kids this sight and that sight but his son kept asking “are there any concentration camps here?” Dad tried ignoring his question but finally said gently, “No, this is a city that is coming back and has all this cool stuff.”

Just arrived in Gdansk and some kind young people here for a big music festival helped me find my hotel, tucked in the old town, a house circa 1451. Two of our favorite bands are playing at the festival, turns out. The National and The Kings of Leon! Who knew? Below are some photos from the train journey!

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July 3, 2013 · 6:55 pm

Berlin by bike…the way to go!

I wanted to be one of those cool Berliners (or tourists) breezing through the Brandenburg Gate on a bike and today I was. What a kick! For six euros (less than a 6.50 transit day pass) I rented a sturdy thick tire bike from a bike shop near my hotel and pretty much rode from 11 a.m, until 7 p.m. I rode all over the place, checking out new places on my list and revisiting others I had already seen. And I was impressed at how well laid out this city is for cyclists. There are bike lanes all over the place, some in the street, some in the sidewalk (it took me awhile to figure this out but I just followed other bikes along a narrow corridor in the sidewalk that apparently is for riders.) I had a vague sense of where I was going (mainly east and then south) and when I occasionally had no idea where I was, another helpful tourist information sign would appear (ex: Alexanderplatz 1.2 and an arrow pointing the direction).

The best part is that I could cover so much ground in a few hours, see so many things and get a feel for how different parts of the city connect with each other, something you don’t get when you are popping and out of the U bahn (underground subway). From my Wilmersdorf home base I rode east through the Tiergarten, sort of a Bavarian Black Forest version of NYC’s Central Park or even of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, with lush green lawns, lots of trees, dirt paths to ride, a lake or river in there somewhere, although I never found it. Next stop, Brandenburg Gate which was even more packed with tourists than yesterday, if that’s possibly. Along with the tourists were fashionistas attending Berlin Fashion Week nearby. (My new geriatric German sandals, bought today at an orthopedic shoe shop located, as fate would have it, around the corner from my hotel…would make the fashionistas shudder. See photo below, along with yet another photo of the view from the roof where I have been enjoying my late evening meal.)

Onto the Holocaust memorial and then Checkpoint Charlie where this time I found another “wall” documentation center of sorts, focused on “terror.” Next stop, a return to the other worldly Alexanderplatz and its Jetsonesque tv tower and famous lumpen world clock. This time I found Karl Marx Allee, famous for its drab communist era concrete high rises. Then I suddenly found myself in Kreuzberg, a bohemian bordering on seedy at times neighborhood with a big Turkish population. I ate donar kebab and drank chai at a well known Turkish restaurant, Hasir, and stopped for a Turkish pastry at the equally well known Turkish bakery Melek Pastanesi nearby. Then onto the East Side Gallery, another stretch of remaining wall that has dozens of bold murals by various artists on one side and more of berlin s remarkable graffiti on the other side. Both sides were well worth a look.

I returned to my neighborhood and had a soda at a little cafe where the owner asked where I was from. “You’ve probably never heard of it, Iowa,” I said, fully intending to give my standard explanation, I.e. near Chicago. But instead the guy responded with a knowing smile, “des Moines?” Turns out he had visited dsm several times, in his previous life in Computer software. So glad I decided to come to Berlin!

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July 2, 2013 · 7:28 pm

Prenzlauer Berg… The soho/village of Berlin

So my ankles are aching and I have begun to bore a hole in my sandals which I fear may not make it to Poland. But Berlin is worth it. Today, on a perfect sunny day, I set out for Prenzlauer Berg, a trendy neighborhood with leafy pocket parks, pretty architecture, fun boutiques, and one enticing restaurant after another. Sort of reminded me of a mix of the east and west village of NYC. I hAve been using a somewhat outdated but still useful guidebook my London friends lent me, called 100percent Berlin, which has six walks. Beyond the fact that they are longer walks than my feet can handle, they steered me to some good spots, including Kulturbrauerei, a sprawling complex of art venues in an old brick brewery complex; the shops around Kollwitzplatz, And shops along Kastanienallee. Some boutiques didn’t take credit cards, which is a bummer. Alone took visa but not MasterCard; another took MasterCard, not American Express. I bought a few high design little paper journals, a retro Berlin tea towel, and two little cardboard VW buses that you assemble (the whole store was these ingenious cardboard things that you assemble, from boxes to waste baskets). (See http://www.werkhaus.de) The paper store was called Georg Buchner Buchladen.

I had the best chicken schawarma hummus I have ever had at Babel, a popular Lebanese place on Kastanienallee. Lots of people were eating at picnic tables there, which did turn out to be a good sign. Each slice of chicken had a crispy crust full of flavor but the meat was still moist. How can that happen? I also had a delicious chocolate bottomed macaroon at Lindner, one of the many pastry shops.

I went on to the Berlin Wall Documentation Center which gave me a far better understanding of the wall and what it did to Berliners than sites like Checkpoint Charlie. First of all, you get it visually because a section of the wall (or walls since there were actually two walls facing each other across a grassy no man’s land) remained. And stretched out across a long corridor of grass where remnants of some a building and church that were knocked down to build the wall. There were also displays with photos and recordings and old home movies showing how the wall tore families apart (one in particular showed a couple getting married on one side of the wall while the bride’s parents watched from a window on the other side). There were also photos and movies of people jumping out of windows in buildings lining the wall so they could get to the west…including a nine months pregnant woman. And then there were photos of people being evicted from these buildings and the building windows being bricked up to stop the jumpers.

From there I went to the grand Neue Synagogue which was built to resemble the Alhambra in Granada in the 1800s, but didn’t survive the war, nor did most of its community, of course. Some parts have been restored and there is an interesting exhibit about jewish life now and then, plus you can schlep to the dome for great city views. Definitely worth a visit.

On the way back to the s Bahn I picked up at excellent pork Vietnamese Bahn mi sandwich (hey, I am nothing if not a reform Jew, and an Iowa transplant, hence the love of pork) at Babane, a “banh mi deli” which I am eating at a table on the fifth floor roof top patio of my lovely hotel in Wilmersdorff. On the way back here I stopped to people watch for awhile at the Brandenburg gate, which is awash in tourist of all stripes. my favorite site was two veiled middle eastern women taking a photo, as requested, from a guy in a cowboy hat! I took the other scenic bus west, the 100, which did not disappoint.

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July 1, 2013 · 8:57 am

Mitte South, Potsdamer Platz, Alexanderplatz, gendarmenmarkt, artemisia

Greetings from Berlin where my biggest frustration has been trying to get Internet access on my iPad. I had the same issue in London at my friends house but finally got it. never had any issues in Peru, when I last used it in a foreign land. I did go to a computer store nearby and the guy pressed one button and charged me 15 euros. I thought he was joking. But no.

Anyway, I walked myself silly today and although I made several wrong turns, after awhile I started to understand the lay of the land, literally, and how the various u Bahn and S Bahn trains connect, plus the 100 and 200 Buses, which are cross town buses, doubledecker no less, that offer a great respite from walking long straight streets and some terrific scenery.

I am still trying to work out where “the wall” ran and what is east vs. West Berlin. But it was intriguing to see bits of the wall here and there – the bits by the now super modern Potsdam Platz appear to be covered not only with graffiti but wads of chewing gum. A lot of Berlin requires a better imagination than I have so you can see ugly wall where there are now huge modern buildings and Hitlers bunker where there is now what appears to be an apartment block. ( Right across the street from the other women only hotel I was thinking of staying at, Intermezzo.) while Berlin has its imposing older monuments, the Brandenburg Gate, the post WW2 communist architecture and the 21st century monuments, most notably the Holocaust memorial (which got me choked up as I found myself wandering deep inside the maze of bar slabs of grey stone, laid out in a dizzying number of fluctuating heights) are really the most captivating. Anywhere else, say Chicago and its Cabrini Green housing complex, these bleak concrete slab buildings might be knocked down. But here they are a source of fascination, maybe even pride, a historical record of the brutality of communism. This seemed particularly the case around Alexanderplatz, with its famous bizarre Jetsonesque tv tower and strange mosaics and painted murals on occasional communist era buildings. I also find myself looking at the graffiti differently, as another historic artifact. So that is interesting because architecture I would gave dismissed and graffiti I would have disdained at home, is here in Berlin a surprising source of fascination.

So far, I am enjoying staying at this women only hotel. As I type outside on the fifth floor rooftop overlooking the Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorff area, three women in their sixties, from Canada, Germany and Australia are talking about life, carrying for elderly parents, their adventures as retirees, where to eat dinner, which U and S bahn stations have the most stairs.

I did have my fix of grilled Bavarian coarse fried sausages, mashed potatoes and sweet cooked cabbage that I remember eating in Munich and even had a midday (Augustiner Hell) beer at Augustiner Gendarmenmarket, a lovely reconstructed square. When in Rome. But I cannot seem to bring myself to eat curry wurst…which looks even worse than I thought: sausages served with curry powder and then, even worse, ketchup. Ick.

Other interesting sights: a guy juggling while riding a unicycle in front of traffic stopped at a busy intersection (when the traffic started, he put out his collection hat and got out of the way);eight or so tourists riding some awkward contraption that they sat atop in a circle and peddled; tons of cyclists and tourists on bikes, which seems the best way to see everything. Hope to do that!!

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June 21, 2013 · 7:46 pm

Thoughts on leaving…

Clockwise:Charlottenburg Palace, Fernsehturm Berlin, Reichstag building, Berlin Cathedral, Alte

So as I’m rushing around trying to do all the last-minute errands  and tie up  work projects before leaving on a three-week trip to Berlin and beyond, I find myself feeling surprisingly sentimental about the calm, comfortable, everyday life I’m shelving briefly. Maybe that’s an unexpected bonus of travel, suddenly appreciating what you’re leaving behind and will soon return to!

Des Moines, Iowa
—  City  —
City of Des Moines

Clockwise from top: 801 Grand (Principal Financial Group), Greater Des Moines Botanical Garden, Kruidenier Trail bridge, and the Iowa State Capitol

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May 16, 2013 · 9:23 pm

Lessons learning while buying train tickets for Eastern Europe

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Who would have thought it would be easier to buy train tickets online for  Peru than for Germany  and  Eastern Europe? Okay, I’m not willing to say that’s true yet. But buying tickets online for train trips this summer through Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic was harder than expected. I managed to find some of the train schedules on the DB Deutsche Bahn website (a German company http://www.bahn.com) but the site didn’t always list  the fares – or indicate when or if the tickets could be purchased online. (In some cases, it looked like I’d have to buy them by making a phone call to Europe.)

Rail Europe Logo

Meanwhile, on the site that I could buy at least some tickets online – Rail Europe (www.raileurope.com) – I couldn’t always find schedules or fares. I finally had to call Rail Europe and pay a $15 fee for phone assistance – which turned out to be worth it, even if I had to leave my name on an answering machine and wait for  an hour for Rail Europe to call me back (better than lingering on hold I guess.) Here are some things I learned through this process:

– If you can find a train schedule but NOT the price or when/if the tickets can be purchased via DB Bahn, email their help line (Sales@bahn.co.uk) and you will get some if not all the information. (This is helpful especially if you’re trying to see if it costs more to take the train or fly.)

– If you can’t figure out how to buy the tix online via Rail Europe, call and pay the additional fee ($33 all toll when you add the processing fee, which includes the cost of mailing the ticket – which are paper and not available for online printout.)  I was told that it would have been very hard  to do-it-myself online because the three train trips I needed to book are unusually complicated. They’re not the typical Yank tourist routes (Berlin-Gdansk anyone? Not to mention Gdansk-Krakow and Krakow-Prague). And they involve three different countries with varying ways of selling train tickets. (The Poles, for example, won’t let you buy your ticket more than a month in advance but I could buy the tickets involving Berlin and Prague about two months in advance.) I also found help by emailing service@raileurope.com.

– Figuring out the price and booking a sleeper for an overnight train is tricky because the countries we’re visiting – unlike some others, apparently – require that you buy two separate items for each journey (a ticket, which  gets you on the train, and a reservation, which specifies a seat or compartment on the train, – as I understand it.)

– A Eurail  pass, which   we’ve used in the past, didn’t work for this trip because of our particular schedule and because we’re taking two overnight trains. Oh well. I liked the ease of the Eurail pass – but then I was traveling for months, not weeks, when I used one on several occasions.

– Read the fine print – especially to see how many stops the train makes! There’s also various classes/speeds of train. I never really figured this all out.

– The Polish Rail website wasn’t much help.

– Rick Steves’ website also has some good information on train travel http://www.ricksteves.com/rail/

– Trains vs. Planes: Sometimes flying is comparable in price to riding the train (ex: Gdansk-Krakow) but not always (example Krakow-Prague where flying was much more expensive.)  Planes of course are a lot faster – for Gdansk-Krakow flying takes 1.5 to 2.5 hours (direct vs. connecting flight) while the direct overnight train takes  11 hours. But we went with the train 1) because we so seldom get to ride a train, especially an overnight train and still find this romantic (that may change.) 2) the times of the direct planes didn’t work well with our schedule  – one was 6:30 a.m. and the other 5:30 p.m.   3) It’s often a hassle to get to the airport vs. the train station. 4) we  do save money by taking an overnight train and not paying for a hotel that night, for what that’s worth.

– I did opt to fly (EasyJet) from London to Berlin rather than take trains. (way too complicated…)

– Paper tickets. Apparently I can’t print tickets out online. And the paper tickets won’t be mailed out until a few weeks before our departure date (even though I bought them two months in advance) because the Polish ticket can’t be issued until a month before we travel. Grrr… Here’s hoping it all works out.

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May 12, 2013 · 4:05 pm

Highlights of County Cork (Ireland)…Ballydehob, Schull, Mizen Head and beyond!

Happy Birthday Myra! This  is for you! (But others are welcome to enjoy!)

My friend Myra and her family are traveling to County Cork, Ireland (and beyond) this summer so, as promised, here are highlights from our 2004 trip there, culled from entries hastily scribbled in my journal (journal #44 to be precise.) Please excuse any misspellings – chalk it up to tricky Gaelic spelling and my hard-to-decipher handwriting!

Another good resource: http://www.schull.ie/index.html, (complete with a sound track of fiddlely-dee music – as our English friend Francine refers to Irish music).

COUNTY CORK
  • We rented a 200-year-old stone house in the countryside with a tiny pond, outside the small village of Ballydehob. (I wish I knew exactly where.  Below are some family photos. We shared the house with friends from London.)
The kids (Morgan, Lily, emma, Noah) and Russ after a run, outside "our house" in Ballydehob, 2004

The kids (Morgan, Lily, Kate, Noah) and Russ after a run, outside “our house” in Ballydehob, 2004

Noah and Morgan outside "our house" in Ballydehob. 2004

Noah and Morgan outside “our house” in Ballydehob. 2004

  • We spent much of our time in the larger village of Schull (pronounced “Skull”) where we visited the Sunday morning farmers market. (Of course!)  We bought some  locally-made Gubbeen cheese (my favorite on this trip; the mature, non-smoked version is best!),  sausages and bread for a picnic by the water; visited the ruins of a church with a famine (?) graveyard; and had a drink at The Courtyard, which we ended up visiting several times. We watched local musicians play during a traditional sing-along. We also ate one of our better meals at the pub – which, oddly, was Thai food. At the Sunday market,  I also bought  a hand-knit sweater (which I still wear). Here’s a photo of the kids exploring the ruins by the water in Schull.

The kids exploring the ruins along the bay in Schull

In Scull, we also went to a ceilidh (pronounced kaylee) at the village hall – which is not to be missed. It was a cross between a square dance and a talent show, where locals and visitors (from all over including Germany, France and, oddly, the Canary Islands) danced reels and line dances to live accordion music, as well as performed ad hoc. (Francine got up and sang a song. So did a weather-beaten  old man sitting beside us who didn’t say a word otherwise. He sang beautifully; Some young girls did Irish stepdancing, a la Riverdance.  A little boy played a tin whistle. ) Then we all broke for tea and biscuits (of course!

In Schull the kids also went sea kayaking. One of our best meals was home-cooked – we brought back fresh mussels and salmon that we bought along the water in Schull.

DAY TRIPS FROM SCHULL:

#1) We drove about 45 minutes southwest to Mizen Head, a very dramatic slab of sculpted rock jutting out into the ocean (or so I wrote). We toured the lighthouse station, stood on a suspension bridge above a deep slash in the rock   (shades of Ithaca!) and saw several seals. From there we drove to the small fishing village of Crookhaven (see photo at top), where we ate  crab sandwiches and seafood chowder at O’Sullivans Bar, sitting at an outdoor  picnic table overlooking a narrow channel full of sailboats.  A few brave souls (not me among them) tried swimming in the ice cold sea (or “paddling” as the Brits call taking a dip.)

Mizen Head: the most south-westerly point of Ireland.

#2) We took a day trip via ferry to “Clear Island”  (see photo below; AKA Cape Clear or Cléire), a wild, largely uninhabited small slab of craggy land which we will forever refer to as “UnClear Island” since the little isle was shrouded in dense fog. But it was a fun trip. During a long hike in the fog, mist and “soft rain,”  I completely lost sight of Emma – who I was pretty sure was ahead of me – but when I called out to her, she answered back. Phew!Clear Island.jpg  I also had my first ever Irish coffee in the pub by North Harbor, where we caught the ferry back. (see photo below). It really hit the spot since we were chilled from our long slog  in the fog. The ferry ride aboard the Karycraft took about 45 minutes and was very amusing, thanks to our skipper, Kiernan Malley, who not only told stories about the area but sang a song or two while playing the accordion and ,presumably, steering the boat (We later spotted him working in a car garage in Schull. A man of many talents!)

Betsy drinking her first Irish Coffee in a pub with Noah on "Unclear Island" outside Schull

Church at Gougane Barra – built on island near monastery/well site at end of 19th century.

#3) Another great day trip:  Bantry Bay to the seaside villages of Glengarriff and Castletownbarre (where we ate seafood chowder at MacCarthy’s Pub), around the Beara Peninsula and stunning Cod’s Head cape.

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The junction of Main Street, North Road and the pier in Castletownbere

OTHER PLACES WE VISITED IN IRELAND:

Picture for category Romantic Gifts

COUNTY KILKENNY

We stayed in the pretty and welcoming  Oldtown Farmhouse b&b  in the village of Stoneyford, outside Thomastown.  We really liked the city of Kilkenny, with its medieval castle and cool Kilkenny Design Centre with great crafts (where I bought celtic-design earrings that I also continue to wear!) The Centre has a collection of work by the now world-famous Dublin-born designer Orla Kiely (who has had a recent gig in the U.S. with Target stores). We also visited an amazing 12th century monastic ruin outside Stoneyford (where we stayed at a farm b&b).
By the water in Schull
Emma in Co. Kilkenny at a monastic ruin

Mountain view from Oldtown Farmhouse

DUBLIN

We stayed in Howth, a small village outside Dublin (we commuted into the city) with a cool cliff walk over looking the ocean. We stayed at a very low-key  b&B called Gleann-na-smol B&B (where we found some other visitors from….Iowa). Very nice host family.

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    Gleann-na-Smol B&B
  •  In Dublin we did the typical stuff – walked around Trinity College, St. Stephen’s Green, Grafton Street, at pizza at the Badass Cafe at Temple Bar, walked over the Ha’Penny bridge.Image

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the Ha’penny Bridge

 

Go dté tú slán (which means safe journey in gaelic – but who knows how to pronounce it!)

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April 27, 2013 · 3:50 pm

A Color version of the Peru story I wrote for Delta Sky magazine

ArticleDeltaSkyMagPeruColor_April2013 (2)

photo(29)I’ve had such a nice response to my Peru story in the April issue of Delta Sky magazine, with friends, family and neighbors coming across it during flights. Even heard from a long lost high school friend. The latest act of kindness came today from another reader who liked it so much she gave her copy to friend – then realized that she hadn’t read the last page. So she found the black and white version I posted on my blog. She also made a color PDF of the story and sent to me. How thoughtful! So here it is. (see above.)

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