Castles that you can overnight in are not hard to find in Europe. But what if you were the only guests? And the owner sang you happy birthday over a homemade, double-decker strawberry cake on a long candlelit table under Renaissance arches and dorms? My 2007 visit to a privately owned castle in the Bohemian […]
Travel Stories
Memory is a Funny Thing…My Journey Back to Poitiers 32 Years Later
Memory is a funny thing…Sometimes triggers are predictable—any Talking Heads tune transports me instantly back to my college dorm—while other times, memories can hijack your reality out of the blue. When I stepped into the square in front of the Hôtel de Ville in Poiters, France 22 days ago, I wondered which memories might wash […]
Native Son of Algodonales
“You should have contacted the church,” Santiago suggested. “There was a great fire around the turn of the century which wiped out all of the local government records…for better or for worse.” “Sometimes it’s good to have a fresh start, you know?” he glanced at us sideways. “All of the bad things wiped clean.” We […]
On Sunday There Is No Menu
“On Sunday, there is no menu,” the waitress informed us with her eyes downcast and her hands in the air. “We serve family style.” We smiled. And our bellies rumbled. We’d just arrived from a whirlwind drive—on an inspired route courtesy of the “local roads only” setting on our car’s nav—through a shimmering Aspen forest […]
Riomaggiore or Bust!
A bit of backstory… Steve and I first met back in 1985 when he was my teaching assistant for a biology class I was taking at UC Santa Barbara. I was a lowly undergrad and he was working on his PhD in molecular biology. (What a catch, huh?) We connected over travel. I’d just returned […]