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Category: State of travel

Whither to go?

We’ve gotten really predictable these days. A nice, if crisp, sunny day means that we take Kimmy to her favorite playground, while Becky stays home to prepare herself for her next outing with her friends. Very little variety in that. At least, we still seem to find fun even in…

On Travelog

As I have mentioned elsewhere, for the last few weeks I have been chipping away at our old travel diaries, transcribing the observations about sights, museums, restaurants and hotels into Travelog entries. To my own surprise, I’m actually finished with that now. While I have what I think is a…

I’ll have a bratwurst, but not a hot dog

I’ve been working through my old travel diaries a bit, converting the salient bits to a digital form within Travelog. When in Germany several years ago, every lunch that we apparently had consisted of various wursts with beer. Or so the diaries state. Which reminds me of a paradoxical thought…

Pardon my French

You realize that you have a problem of Babylonian proportions when you address a waitress at a Paris café, “Mademoiselle, un peu plus de pain, por favor“. With throaty ‘r’s , no less.

A getaway to Paris

Leaden skies, low temperatures, long intervals of drizzling rain, intermittent gusts of cold wind. I could be talking about your boilerplate British weather of late autumn. In fact, it was the weather that accompanied our weekend in Paris. As if that matters! We love Paris too much to let such…

A trip to Rochester

We dithered a bit in the morning whether to go anyplace or stay home. Early in the week, we sort of decided that if the weather was nice on Sunday, we’d pick one of the nearby points of interest that we have not yet visited and go there. In the…

Have we ever said that we love Paris?

One of the hotel associations that Natasha occasionally checks out in her travel planning routines was holding an anniversary online sale a couple of weeks ago. The promotion offered tremendous discounts on short stays at upmarket member hotels. Even though I do not have vacation days left this year, a…

Back from the grand adventure

All good things come to an end. Unfortunately, life is not fair that way. And our big summer holiday is now over. It was grand by any measure. Total distance driven: 5106 miles. Countries whose license plates we encountered along the way: 29. Airports used on my hops to get…

Back from Tuscany

Man, I seriously hate England right now! It is becoming a nagging refrain this summer, but sunny skies and hot but bearable temperatures see me off at our latest stop – this time, in Tuscany, – and overcast and cold weather is what greets me in the Blighty. Heavy rain…

Back from French Riviera

I’m told that the weather in London has been its customary gloomily rainy for the last week that I’ve been away. On the Mediterranean coasts of Spain and France, conversely, clear skies and balmy temperatures prevailed throughout my latest jaunt. We spent the last few days on Costa Brava just…

On a European beach…

… you see exposed breasts of various colours, shapes and sizes.  From perfectly toned ones to amorphic sagging what-letter-in-the-alphabet cups.  And that’s just men’s. About one in five women, by my estimation, goes topless at the beach these days as well.  The Germans are at the forefront of the movement,…

Back from Costa Brava

Spent the day in a bustling and vibrant Barcelona, went to sleep in the God-forsaken Mottingham… Fun life I lead sometimes! The big summer holiday took off splendidly, the long two-day trek from London to Costa Brava notwithstanding. We arrived to a beautiful setting, gorgeous weather and, most importantly, the…

Map of Europe

Despite my self-sustained image of the world traveler, I have only been to 37% of European countries. Natasha is actually one up on me, in a way that I fear will keep forever, – she has been to Belarus as a child. The map below outlines the gaping chasm of…

Which US states I’ve been to

One of my new UCF friends, Jeri, has reminded me with one of her recent posts of a topic that I wanted to expand on since that huge “about me” meme (see #39 on that): Which of the 50 US states I have visited so far. This list is bound…

London City airport note

We are in between visitors, for a few days anyway. My mother-in-law departed back to Russia this morning. Her trip’s first leg took her to Frankfurt from the London City airport, which again impressed us in terms of check-in and controls experience. You can literally be at the gate within…

Back from Antwerp and Gent

My loving children will forgive their old man for saying that it is infinitely nicer to travel without them. Our weekend getaway to Belgium was neither a dream trip nor even a particularly fascinating one, but it allowed Natasha and I, for the first time in ages, to spend time…

Back from Costa del Sol

Southernmost part of continental Europe turned out to be not warm enough for a dip in the Mediterranean Sea at the end of May. That was the only negative about our week on the Costa del Sol. The weather was sunny, the resort that we stayed at provided all possible…

Back from Paris

Ahh, Paris… There is nothing like it in the whole wide world. Not for us, at least. I don’t know what it is, honestly, but we always feel entirely at home in this most romantic of cities. This time around, we benefited from exceptionally bright skies and warm weather, which…