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Peru Begins: Exploring The Splendid City Of Lima
Some cities really win you over – easy to feel part of, full of life, with an infectious vibrancy which pulses through the streets. Lima has all of this and so much more…..grand plazas, tidy green spaces, impressive and varied architecture, even a dramatic stretch of coastline. The more we wander, the more we find, and the more we love. There is so much to see, so many good things to tell, that it’s hard to know where to start. Maybe we’ll start with food….. Any country which states that it is the birthplace of ceviche, and still boasts it as its national dish, has got to be a country…
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A Few Days In Magical Seville
It feels like a significant point on this journey as we head into Seville, drop the rental car off at the airport and get a ride into town. Apart from a night at the ferry port, Seville will be our last stay in Europe before we swap continents and head for Africa, this is the last of our Spanish cities as well as the point where we hand back the last of our rental cars until Morocco. All in all, it feels like a bit of a watershed moment. Our long journey through Spain is nearly done, a journey which started in Catalunya, took us through Zaragoza and into the…
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Unravelling Granada’s Complex Cultures
I don’t think we realised before we came here just what a melting pot of cultures exists in this fascinating, absorbing city, but we very quickly find ourselves being completely enthralled by the heady mix of history and evolution which has created the Granada of today. It really starts when we walk out of the cathedral, through a plaza or two and turn left into something which is the most stark of contrasts. For starters, the huge cathedral, Spain’s second largest after Seville, is a bastion of Catholicism absolutely filled with religious icons, glorious paintings and reliefs depicting many stories from the life of Jesus. Yet take just a few…
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Last Days In France: Down The Valley Of The Têt
Dark clouds sometimes gather over Le Canigou, the iconic mountain of the Eastern Pyrenees which looms over our village, and during one evening we catch the sound of distant thunder rolling around the towering giants, but Vernet-les-Bains stays dry. The last drop of rain we saw was when the heavens opened in Paris almost three weeks ago; the summer sun has been in charge since then. Our village of Vernet-les-Bains is so good, its beautiful mountain setting enhanced by the little square where Bar Chez Jean-Louis serves beer to weathered old guys endlessly puffing on cigarettes and the tapas bar next door gives us a little foretaste of the Catalan…
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From Style On The Streets To Horses On Ice: Milan, St Moritz & The Bernina Express
Elegant, stylish, classy: words we would all associate with Milan and accolades which this city effortlessly lives up to, with its lofty majestic buildings and wide open piazzas. By day these imposing, ornate structures tower over the streets in proud glory; at night, tastefully illuminated by well placed floodlighting, the grand buildings assume another yet more alluring pose in what is effectively an architectural catwalk. Emerging from the metro and out into the square at Duomo station is to soak in one of THE great cathedral views as the shaped facade of this magnificent building soars above the piazza like some giant ice sculpture. The famed Duomo is in good…
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Hola Guadalajara. Olé! Tequila!
Now and again something inside the grey-white cloud flickers like a fluorescent lamp behind a curtain, then a streak of lightning shoots sideways across the sky. A vertical bolt flashes directly to the ground. With eastward movement and night time approaching, there is a point where, from the aeroplane window, the orange sunset is reflected in clouds, yet the darkness of dusk is clearly visible further east beyond the colour. As we near Guadalajara, the thunder storm, at roughly the same altitude as the plane, just adds to this unusual scene. A few delays en route means a late arrival, so it’s morning before we get our first chance to…
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Tinos Blows Us Away, So Does Meltemi
The Meltemi wind blows through the Cyclades for many months of each year – we’ve experienced it before but nothing like these last few days here on Tinos. It was windy on Sikinos a couple of years ago, but wow this has been different. For instance… When we collected our hire car, they warned us about opening the doors because they get more damage from doors blowing open on to other cars, or walls, than anything else. You don’t sleep through the night because the wind is too loud. It’s difficult to walk in a straight line. It’s difficult to hold a conversation. You can’t wear a hat. Wearing a…
