Ever since the movie/book Under the Tuscan Sun, Americans have been in love with Tuscany. The food, wine, rolling hills, castles, and villas – what’s not to like? However the one problem I have with Tuscany is that everyone loves Tuscany and this equates into too many tourists for my liking as well as rising [...]

I arrived in Costa Brava the day after I finished walking the Camino de Santiago, it was an abrupt transition – so when my hosts, Visit Costa Brava Toursim board, said that I could go hiking in the area I was excited but my feet had a different plan.  My feet wanted to simply relax [...]

“You have arrived at your destination.” I stopped the car and looked around and thought – now what? My GPS on my rental car led me to Orfes, a very small village in the district of Vilademuls. If Spain was a Russian stacking doll it would be Spain, Catalonia, Costa Brava, Vilademuls, Orfes as the [...]

Travel in Europe for me is pretty easy compared to the rest of the world. However – easy should not be confused with uninteresting. Europe challenges me to dig deeper, look harder, observe more to find the subtle cultural differences that exist between European culture and my own.. I sometimes feel like my magic super [...]

  When you first arrive, you hear them. They will wake you up in the morning with a abruptness that makes you sit straight up in bed. But soon the sound fades into all of the other new sounds and stimulation of Europe and they become unnoticed in your normal day. Church bells in Europe [...]

  Let me first just say – I’m biased – I of course think when I walked it in April/May was the best possible time to do it! Yes, I did get rained on a bit and it was muddy, but I will take those conditions any day over heat and people!  Most days were [...]

“What do you mean you haven’t heard of El Celler de Can Roca? It’s the 2nd best restaurant in the world!” This is the 1st reaction I received when I asked about the restaurant we were going to that afternoon for lunch. This was the beginning of my lunch of numbers. A lunch I will [...]

I lean my head back on the seat and gaze out the window as I gently rock back and forth. The landscape accelerates by me in a blur and I allow my brain to explore it’s dark depths. I think, “this could be anywhere, it looks like Illinois, Nebraska, or Wisconsin. I continue to suspend [...]