Europe
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Summer Vacation Is Almost Here!
More Details: Summer Vacation Is Almost Here!This summer, I finally get to take a real vacation, not just a couple of days of here or there. Actually, I get to take TWO real vacations! The two vacations came about differently and it was certainly hard to plan them as I did not control when one of them took place and the…
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Photo of the Week: Orange Fire in Oslo
More Details: Photo of the Week: Orange Fire in OsloA few years ago around this time of the year, I went to Oslo for business. And I ran into this beauty!
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St. Paul Outside the Walls: Rome’s Less Seen Basilicas
More Details: St. Paul Outside the Walls: Rome’s Less Seen BasilicasAs one may expect, Rome does not lack in the church category. All types and sizes up to the best know, St. Peter’s Basilica in The Vatican. However, there are three other major basilicas in Rome: St. John Lateran (first among the four for being the oldest), Saint Mary Major (Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore),…
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Holy Week in Malta: A Wonderful Experience
More Details: Holy Week in Malta: A Wonderful ExperienceOn this Good Friday, I recall a unique and quite accidental experience during Holy Week 2006. We had traveled to Italy and were planning to experience Easter Mass at The Vatican. Because of my friends had a colleague from the U.S. who was traveling back to his home country of Malta for Easter, we asked…
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Monticchiello: Charm in the Middle of Tuscany
More Details: Monticchiello: Charm in the Middle of TuscanyA few years ago, in one of my trips to Italy, we spent a few days in Tuscany. We opted to rent apartments in a small mountaintop town called Monticchiello, a charming place, sandwiched between Pienza and Montepulciano (lucky folks!!!). We truly lucked out: the town was quaint, quite small, and its location was central…
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The “First Cousins” Capitals: Copenhagen, Oslo and Stockholm
More Details: The “First Cousins” Capitals: Copenhagen, Oslo and StockholmIt has been an interesting exercise to try to think of the Scandinavian countries and come up with a good and succinct outline of what makes them different from each other without requiring a degree in history, architecture, and other similar fields. So I decided to not be that ambitious and limit this to taking…
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Photo of the Week: Viewing Venice from my Window Seat
More Details: Photo of the Week: Viewing Venice from my Window SeatVenice, Italy is such a unique place. It is almost out of Disney’s mind. But it is not. It is truly unique and a sight worth seeing once in your life. I have been fortunate not only to have seen it, but to have been there twice. It can be a maddening place with the…
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Photo of the Week: Two Sides of the Coin
More Details: Photo of the Week: Two Sides of the CoinWhile visiting St. John Lateran in Rome, Italy, I ran into a group of tourists posing in front of the basilica (it is one of the four main basilicas in Rome, along with St. Peter, Santa Maria Maggiore and St. Paul Outside the Walls; however, it is the oldest and actually has the highest rank…
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Ideas for Paris Travel with Pre-Teen Kids
More Details: Ideas for Paris Travel with Pre-Teen KidsA friend asked me what to do in Paris as she was going with her kids for a week or so. I do not have kids but I was one once and that, coupled with the fact that I have stayed at a Holiday Inn, fully makes me an expert at recommending stuff for kids.…
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Photo of the Week – The Alps of Transylvania
More Details: Photo of the Week – The Alps of TransylvaniaThis scene was what we were rewarded with after arriving at the Cabana Curmatura in the Transylvanian Alps in Romania and hiking on for another hour. I dream of returning to amazing Transylvania. Too bad people’s only notion of it is the legend of Dracula: there is SO much to enjoy and explore there!
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The Livable Capitals: Santiago, Bern and Berlin
More Details: The Livable Capitals: Santiago, Bern and BerlinAs I listed the capital cities I have visited, I kept thinking which would could be the “most livable.” Livable, for me, means not an intense place, not one with millions of tourists ruining summer months, with character, and some great redeeming feature (the ocean, the mountains, a great river running through it, an amazing…
