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 […]
Put the words German and Food together and you think about hearty, heavy food – with visions of sausages, sauerkraut, potato dumplings, spaetzle, and cabbage dancing in your head – and sitting heavily in your stomach. Being my first trip to Germany this is exactly what I was expecting, however my first night in Berlin […]
Politics are normally conducted behind closed doors – seedy deals, negotiations, handshakes, promises, and sometimes even sexual favors (aka – the blue dress). But in Berlin, a city with a dramatic political past, politics are transparent. Politics The Reichstag building was part of that dramatic past and paid the price in many ways including burning […]
“Be careful, watch your head.” the guide says as he shines a flashlight up towards the low doorway. I’m startled upon hearing his warning – I look up and break my laser like concentration on the floor leaving my feet to fend for themselves on the uneven ground as I watch out for my forehead. […]
Even fun has a shelf life – this is what runs through my mind as I walk around Spreepark, the abandoned, dilapidated amusement park in Berlin. I can’t help but get visions of the many cemeteries I have visited in the past – the former amusement park is like a graveyard of fun. I walk […]
I walked deep into the middle and with each uneven step I seemed to descend from where I had started at street level. I could no longer see the horizon; all I could see were gray stones surrounding me, towering over me. Under my feet was a grid pattern which seemed to simulate the larger […]
Our short, spunky guide named Grit had us all circle around her in the cold dimly lit prison cell and started by asking us a simple question, “What is the first article of your country’s constitution?” The group was international and one by one each person tried their best to remember their country’s political backbone […]
I went from eating tuna out of a can with my fingers to eating caramelized foie gras with pear Cabernet Sauvignon reduction and smashed apple. This is the crazy diverse life I lead and it’s the vast swings like this that I adore about my existence. I was invited to Costa Brava for a gastronomy […]
I had heard it over and over – “you must go to Berlin – you’ll love it.” I had tucked it away in my ‘planning’ folder and was sad that I didn’t have time to stop there last summer as we drove through Germany for the Mongol Rally. So this year I was determined to […]
450 miles, 5 weeks, my work is complete. I realized that after 4 weeks of following yellow arrows across Spain that there was a massive similarity to the Wizard of Oz and the yellow brick road. This is how I felt grooving into Santiago! Arriving was…very wet. I woke that last morning to rain and […]
