We have arrived safely in Indianapolis. We would like to thank all of you who have followed our blog and emailed us while we were traveling. The trip was amazing, but it is good to be back. We are a bit tired after traveling for most of two years. We hope to rest and recuperate and then catch-up with family and friends.

We last posted on October 10^th. In the last month, we covered a lot of ground and have many things to share with you. From Geneva, we drove to Beaune, France the wine capital of Burgundy. We spent two days exploring the city and the vineyards around Beaune, which produce some of the world’s best and most expensive, red and white wines. One of the outstanding sights in Beaune is the Hospices de Beaune, which was founded in 1443 as a hospital for the poor. The Northern Renaissance architecture was amazing. It was also one of the first hospitals to admit men and women in the same facility. Today the Hospices de Beaune holds a charity auction of wine that is one of the largest and financially successful wine auctions in the world.

One of the vineyards we visited near Beaune was the Chateau Meursalt. The Chateau dates to the 11^th century and was owned by a lawyer. We toured the tasting rooms and the “caves”, underground tunnels where the wine is aged. The Chateau produces both red and white wines. The Chateau produces grand cru and premier cru red and white wines. As you may recall, grand cru in Burgundy is top of the chart while premier cru is the second best on the chart.

From Beaune, we drove to Epernay, France, which is the center for the production of Champagne. In Epernay, you will find Moet & Chandom, the maker of Dom Perignon, as well as Pol Roger, Winston Churchill’s favorite Champagne, Perrier-Jouet, Mercier and many others. Some of the houses are located in Reims, which is not far away.

We did a tour of Veuve Cliquots house and cellars in Reims. The name means the “Widow Cliquot”. She was the only woman to run a Champagne house. We learned a lot about the production of Champagne, which is substantially different from our lessons on Bordeaux and Burgundy wine production.

Just letting everyone know that we finally posted our photos from our last blog!  Just click on the “PHOTOS” tab and hope you enjoy! 

October 10, 2014

We last posted on September 26^th. That has been 13 days ago when we were packed and ready to leave Greve for destinations undecided. During the last 13 days, we have been very busy. We have been to Milan, Lake Iseo, Lake Garda, Venice, Lake Como, St. Moritz, Appenzell, Zermatt and this evening we arrived in Geneva, Switzerland. We have been busy, seeing a lot of wonderful places, and enjoying every minute of it. Unfortunately, we have only 22 days left in Europe.

 In Milan, we saw the Cathedral of Milan. Not only did we tour the inside of the Cathedral, we went to the top of it so we could see the beautiful view over Milan and to get a better eye for the structure and how this magnifcent place was actually built.  It is the third largest cathedral in the world, took six centuries to build, and is the greatest example of Gothic architecture in Italy.   As you will remember, Gothic architecture is best known for its pointed arch above the entry door, the ribbed vaulted ceilings and the external flying buttresses for support. The cathedral also has one of the venerated nails from Jesus’s cross.

We also viewed the Last Supper painting by Leonardo Da Vinci in Santa Maria delle Grazie. Da Vinci started the work in 1495 and completed it in 1598. Unfortunately, he tried a new technique of painting on a dry plaster wall, rather than a wet plaster wall, which would have been a true fresco. Da Vinci new technique did not work and has been painted over several times and little remains of the original work of Da Vinci. Nevertheless, the painting is inspiring. It is the second most recognized painting in the world after the Mona Lisa, another Da Vinci. The third most recognized painting is ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, by Michelangelo.   Rita and I have been fortunate to have been able to see all three of these paintings. We were not allowed to photograph the Last Supper, or anything inside the building where it is viewed.  Sorry about that.  No pics of it.

Our less religious endeavors in Milan included a visit to the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II where Rita took a spin on the bull’s balls for good luck, which is a local custom in Milan. The Galleria is one of the world’s oldest shopping centers. Today it is filled with luxury shops like Prada, Gucci, etc. The bull’s balls are part of the tiled floor at the Galleria and are part of the symbol of the city of Turin, Italy. Local custom is that if you stand on the bull’s balls and spin around, you will have good luck. I hope Rita has good luck, because the bull’s balls certainly did not!! So many people spinning on them have worn them away. Instead, there is just a hole in the tile where the bull’s balls used to be.

From Milan, we drove around Lake Iseo and Lake Garda in Italy on our way to Venice to see if any celebrities were still hanging out in Venice after George Clooney’s wedding. The Lakes were beautiful and surrounded by mountains. Unfortunately, there is some pollution in the air that makes them seem a bit smogged in like Los Angeles is at times.

Venice was lovely even though it rained one day. We did not see any celebrities, but we were not disappointed with the sights in Venice including St. Mark’s Square, the Grand Canal, the Bridge of Sighs, the Doge’s Palace, the battle of the orchestra’s, and the Rialto Bridge.

Since we could not find George in Venice, we decided to visit him at his home at Lake Como.   We rented a boat for the afternoon and drove by his “compound” of four homes on Lake Como. They were nice, but not over the top. But, his compound has lovely gardens. He bought his home from Mrs. Heinz (of Ketchup fame), who owns another home on Lake Como, as do the Rockefellers. Unfortunately, George was not at his home.

A short drive from Lake Como over the Italian Alps and into the Swiss Alps is St. Moritz. St. Moritz is a ski resort for the rich and famous of Europe. We were there in October and it was pretty much closed because the summer season was over and the winter season had not started. But, the drive to St. Moritz as through the most beautiful mountains and alongside blue lakes made the visit worthwhile for us.

We spent only one night in St. Moritz and from there we drove North and a little East through Switzerland and even entered the small country of Liechtenstein for part of the drive before we arrived in an area of Switzerland known as Appenzell. Appenzell is farmland nestled into green, rolling hills. It is not just any old green, but the greenest green you will ever see in your life. The cows have bells around their necks and when you stop and get out of your car, all you hear are the cowbells ringing from hillside to hillside. The music of the bells is beautiful to hear. Appenzell is composed of independent Swiss. They did not allow women to vote until 1991. They also defied the Swiss national government by refusing to teach German or Italian in school, but instead teaching English. Their homes are made mostly of wood and all the windows have the most beautiful flower boxes. Most of the homes are painted bright colors. Appenzell looks idyllic to us.

From Appenzell, we drove to Zermatt, Switzerland by way of Lucerne. We only had a couple of hours in Lucerne, but the old city was beautiful. Lucerne is located on the Reuss River, which flows through the city into Lake Lucerne. In the middle of the River and old city, there is a wooden bridge known as the Chapel Bridge, which is the oldest covered bridge in Europe even though a large part of it was destroyed by fire in 1993. The Chapel Bridge is the second most photographed sight in Switzerland after the Matterhorn, which is located in Zermatt. On our drive to Zermatt from Lucerne, Rita drove the Novena della Passo in a blinding fog.   It is the second highest pass in Switzerland. Rita could not see a thing, but that was also very good because there were no guardrails. In places the road was only single lane, and, of course, as we climbed to the 8,130 feet to cross over the pass, there was snow.   Rita was white knuckled and scared SH*TLESS!!!! We didn’t speak during our entire climb up and down the pass, but rather held our breaths and silently prayed. After an hour of driving, we descended from the pass into sunshine and were greatly relieved.

Zermatt is a ski town in the Swiss Alps that border on Italy. It is a small village of 3500 people. Besides skiing, people go to Zermatt to see and photograph the Matterhorn, one of the most beautiful and recognizable mountains, in the world. We spent three days in Zermatt waiting for the weather surrounding the Matterhorn to clear so that we could take a photograph. But, the wait was well worth it. Once the weather broke, we also rode a train to 10,000 feet above sea level to get a better view of the Matterhorn and 29 of Switzerland’s 35 peaks over 13, 135 feet.

Today we drove from Zermatt to Geneva, Switzerland along Lake Geneva and through Montreux and Lausanne, Switzerland. We are spending a couple of days in Geneva to unwind before we enter France for the final leg of our journey. Stay tuned.  We’ll post the rest of the pictures soon, we have to check out now!! Loosing our great wifi connection!

Finally the Pictures from our last blog!  Beginning with our drive to Lake Iseo and Lake Garda.  

It has been three weeks since we have posted; and we have been very busy. The biggest event of the year in Greve is the Chianti Wine Festival. This year was the 44^th year for the festival. The triangular shaped main Piazza Matteotti in Greve is closed to car traffic and booths are set up on the Piazza for approximately 50 Wineries/Vineyards that produce Chianti wine in the vicinity of Greve. You buy a wine glass for $26 and it entitles you to taste the wines of 7 Wineries/Vineyards. The festival starts on Thursday and runs until Sunday. This year the opening days were marred by rain.But, on Sunday evening there was a record crowd on hand.We went to the festival on Friday to kind of check it out and had a good time!

Then, on Saturday, Rita had friends from Ft. Wayne, Louise, Kevin, Bonnie and David stopped by Greve on a drive through Chianti. They stayed with us at the villa for 4 days and we had a nice visit and caught up on all the news from back home.

We have completed our fifth week in Greti/Greve/Chianti/Italy. It has started to feel like home. We are getting used to the store hours and restaurants. We feel comfortable with the villa, pool, and tennis court. We have not met any Italians, but that is the result of our language inadequacies. The Italians we come in daily contact with our friendly and interested in us and are a pleasure to deal with. There are minor frustrations still, but even those are becoming less. For example, we needed gas the other day to go on a road trip and learned that the gas stations, like other shops, also close between 2 and 4 PM. It is also hard to get used to no grocery shopping on Sundays or Wednesday afternoons. But, we have adjusted.

Next, are a few of our “Impressions on Italy and the Italians.” First, almost every restaurant gives you something free. It may be a glass of Prosecco, as an aperitif to start the meal, or a lemoncello to complete the meal, or it might be a small appetizer as you start your meal or some chocolate or other type of small dessert at the end of your meal. It is a pleasant gesture that we would like to see more of in the U.S. restaurants. Second, Rita is not used to seeing rabbit on the menus and in the grocery store. The rabbits stare back at you with big bulging eyes in the meat case at the grocery store. It is a little unnerving.

Third, the Italians, like the French, always serve the shell on their lobster, mussels, oysters, shrimp and langoustine. They do this in order to show the customer that the shellfish is fresh. But, it is pretty darn hard to cut those shells off. Usually, the restaurant is NOT willing to remove the shells in the kitchen. So, we have eaten very little shellfish. Fourth, the daily diet of the Italians seems more restricted than other countries we have visited. Dinner always starts with salami or ham, or fried zucchini flowers or some other appetizer, followed by a pasta, followed by meat, (very little chicken and no fish), and dessert. The Italians seem to pass on the cheese course that is so common in France. And… there is no such thing as a “Caesar salad” or garlic bread, or cheesy garlic bread or any garlic bread for that matter and last…. this is for all of you white sauce lovers… there is NO ALFREDO sauce in Italy… that is all American.

The pharmacies in Italy are wonderful. The Pharmacist is very highly regarded here, seems to be just as highly regarded as a doctor. Not only are drugs subsidized and therefore less expensive than in the U.S., but also, there are always two or three clerks in white jackets, referred to as Pharmacist/Doctors, willing to give you medical advice for free. And, they will sell you a prescription drug with out having to have a script, if you tell them what ails you and what you’ve used before.

The season in Greve is changing from summer to fall. The weather is slightly cooler, the nights are pleasant and most importantly the green, scrawny grapes we have been watching for five weeks have now turned a beautiful purple and the grapes are large, round and bountiful. The extra upper grapes have been cut away so that lower grapes can become larger. In fact, 6 kilos of grapes may be cut away to make the remaining 2 kilos of grapes better. This coming week, from the 11^th to the 14^th is the big 4-day wine festival in Greve. One of the biggest festivals held in Chianti. We are excited about attending the festival and tasting the Chianti wines. In addition to the red wine, we have found a few white wine grapes in Chianti.

We ate a great dinner at “il ristoro de lamole” in Lamole. It is on a mountaintop near Greve and is the Number 1 restaurant in Chianti, if not for its food, certainly for its view. You have to drive up the mountain with numerous hairpin turns on skinny-ass roads with NO guardrails to get to the restaurant. But, once there you can see for miles across the beautiful Chianti valley all the way to San Gimignano.   The presentations were as lovely as the food tasted.   We (meaning I) relied on GPS to get us there. That was a mistake. She (GPS is a she when it’s wrong!) took us to the wrong side of the mountain. To make up for loss time, I drove like a mad man, and not only did I make Rita sick to her stomach, she could barely unclench her white knuckled hands from hanging on to get out of the car, so we had to wait for her stomach to return to normal before she could eat. That was the first and only time I drove, and haven’t driven since!!! Rita drove home, to say the least.

This week we took a 4-day road trip. This time we went south to Siena, by way of San Gimignano.

August 24, 2014

Well, we have been in Europe for 113 days; in Chianti for 23 days; we have 35 days left in Chianti; and we have 70 days left in Europe. But, who is counting!

During the past two weeks, we have been exploring Chianti, trying to get to know the people, the food and the culture of Italy. The people seem more reserved than the French to Rita and me, but in fairness to the Italians, it may be nothing more than we know some French and we do not know any Italian. We were in a restaurant the other day and asked if we could order a small quantity of food. The waiter immediately asked us if we were American? When we advised him we were, he said the Americans eat smaller portions of food than the Italians. When the Italians go out to eat, they want large portions and they eat for a really long time.

Driving has been more hectic here in Italy. The Italians honk their horns a lot more than the French and make gestures with their hands and fingers. We can’t tell if we are driving worse, or the Italians are less patient, or if they just don’t like the French because our car has a French plate.

The Italians eat a lot of pasta, beef and pork. We have looked everywhere for fish, but were unsuccessful in finding a fish restaurant until this week. In Greve, we found Ristorante Il Portico that serves wonderful swordfish and John Dory, (see above picture) both white fishes. The swordfish is grilled and the John Dory comes with white wine, capers, and olives. Both fishplates were to die for. We will definitely be spending more time there.

We have been trying to adjust to the Italian clock. It has been really hard. The Italians start the workday around 10:00AM, but not exactly, they work until 1:30 PM, but not exactly, and then EVERYTHING closes until 4:00PM, but not exactly. At 4:00PM, but not exactly, every thing opens again and stays open until 7:30PM, but not exactly. There is also no rhyme or reason to the days that the stores and shops are closed. Some are closed on Monday, but as we try to go to the grocery store, cleaners, greens market and pharmacy, we find that each has its own day for closing and some close a full day while others close a half day. We like to get up at 7, ride bikes, play tennis, eat breakfast, clean up, and then plan our day. But, it is usually 11:00 or 11:30 before we are cleaned up and ready to go. But, this only gives us an hour and a half to do our shopping which is usually not enough time to go to several shops. So, if we don’t go in the morning, we have to wait until 4:00PM!

Since we have been in Greti/Greve, we have made one road trip to San Gimignano. We visited San Gimignano a couple of years ago and loved it so we wanted to make a return trip. It is an ancient walled city with numerous towers that were used in time of war.

We also had a wonderful tour of Castello di Verrazzano Winery. The Verrazano Family came to Chianti in 700AD. They built a castle/fort on a mountaintop and their descendants owned the original property until 1958 when the last of them died. The winery produces Chianti wine and balsamic vinegar. There are still plenty of woods on the property, which also still has wild boars roaming about in the woods.

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On Tuesday, August 19th, we took our first Italian cooking class in the village of Certaldo, which is a walled village that sits on top of a mountain. We had trouble finding the place, even with GPS, but soon re-read the instructions, and it said to either walk up or take the funicular… Yeah, we took the easy route, of course.  The class was taught by Giuseppe and her future daughter-in-law. We made a four-course meal consisting of fried zucchini blossoms, chicken cacciatore, homemade pasta with pomodoro sauce, and panna cotta with fresh fruit. Of course, we had white wine, red wine and lemoncello as a digestive.

Well, when we last left you we were in Portofino. Although we hated to leave Portofino, it was time to move on to our next villa in Greti, Italy. Greti is an even smaller village than St. Leon sur-Vezere. The population of Greti is 357. It is 2.5 kilometers from Greve in Chianti and is under its jurisdiction. Both are in the province of Florence, Tuscany, Italy. The only photo I have of Greti is the wine shop for the Castello di Verranzano, which is located at a cross-road in Greti.

The Castello belongs to the Verranzano Family. Verranzano was an Italian sea explorer who discovered the Bay of New York and New York later named the Verranzano Bridge after him.

Our villa is nice. It is not a Tuscan farm-house, but rather a contemporary home in a subdivision with two other similar homes, (if you can call three houses in a row a subdivision). We have three floors, 4 bedrooms and 4 baths. For one reasonable price, the villa includes a large swimming pool, not heated, and a tennis court that is only heated when Rita and I get into a dispute over a close line call. The villa has a patio where we can take our meals over looking the pool and tennis court. From our patio, we can see the Tuscan hillsides, vineyards and, occasionally, a beautiful sunset.

Where has the time gone? We last posted two weeks ago. You are probably wondering if we are still alive. We are alive and well. But, we have been busy with visitors, packing up our house in St. Leon sur-Vezere and changing countries. Let us explain.

When we last left you, we were preparing for a visit by Yann, Peggy, Cheyenne and Tinael Desmadryls. They arrived on the 19^th. We had a great visit. The kids loved playing in the pool.   Cheyenne is 10 and Tinael is 6. We were amazed that a brother and sister could get along so well and play together for four days without any problems. What great kids and a lot of fun. We visited St. Christophe Rock where the Troglodytes lived. Over 1000 of Troglodytes built homes in the rocks above the Vezere River. The homes were carved out of 1.5 kilometers of rock. Next, we visited the Prehistoric Park to see how the Troglodytes lived and hunted 40,000 years ago. Then, we visited the Chateau de Losse. On our last day, we visited the Chateau Clerans, which is next door to our Maison Clerans and owned by the same English couple. Cheyenne showed us her gymnastic skills at the pool and her artistic side by making a computer out of paper. Tinaeal is into soccer and practiced in the court- yard kicking the soccer ball. Yann and Peggy were a lot of fun and we enjoyed eating out and cooking in with them.   Yann does not eat cheese or drink wine. Can he really be French???   Peggy puts Camembert cheese on a baguette with butter and dunks it in her coffee for breakfast. Now, that is very French.   Yann, Peggy and the children left on the 22^nd for three weeks on the Mediterranean Sea.

As soon as Desmadryls departed for the coast, Rita and I started packing for our move from the Maison Clerans to Italy. It took us longer than we thought because we had accumulated a bunch of kitchen items and food that we planned to take with us. We also had to say goodbye to all our acquaintances in St. Leon sur-Vezere. We will miss Nadine at the grocery store, Lyon at the Auberge du Pont and Marie at the Le Petit Leon. We will also miss the Thursday night market in St. Leon sur-Vezere where they play French music, eat, drink and shop for fresh produce. Finally, we checked on our neighbors Blanchette, Mon Ami, Lydia and the fourth cow whose name I have forgotten. One of the cows is pregnant and is due any day, but she did not have her calf by the time we left. We will miss St. Leon sur-Vezere. It is a small, quaint, quiet village of 400 inhabitants, but we have grown very fond of it and the way we were welcomed into the community.

On July 24^th, we loaded the car and headed for the Mediterranean Coast, like all the other French. We worked our way to Eze Village, a stone city on top of a mountain on the French Riviera next to Monaco. From our perch on top of the mountain at the Chateau Chevre d’Or, we had a spectacular view of Cap St. Jean Ferrat and Cap d’Ail. It was amazingly quiet on the mountaintop. Yet, we could watch all of the yachts, and there were too many to count, come and go up and down the Mediterranean Coast from Monte Carlo to Nice and Cannes.

On July 30^th, we said goodbye to France and drove from Eze Village to Portofino, Italy where we are staying at the Hotel Splendido Mare. Rita did the driving. As you know, she hates tunnels. So, as we left Eze Village I suggested we count the tunnels we had to pass through on our way to Portofino. I guessed there might be 20 such tunnels. Well, three hours later and 218 kilometers later, we arrived in Portofino after Rita had driven through, DRUM ROLL……….. 140 tunnels!!!!     We could not believe it. We averaged a tunnel every 1.5 kilometers.

Today is July 31^st, and we are resting another day in Portofino. It is a lovely Italian city on a small port. Although the port is small, the yachts are not. Some of the yachts are over 300 feet in length and have helipads for landing helicopters. One of the yachts, which is tied up in the harbor, is owned by a former partner at Goldman Sachs. He was involved in a $1. 6 billion buy out. I guess that is how you get a yacht. I thought it was interesting that his nickname is Captain Magic! In contrast to Captain Magic, you can also find a gentleman feeding the pigeons on the harbor early in the morning. The world takes all kinds of people.

Tomorrow we head for a destination unknown. We will decide in the morning where we are going when we get in the car. Love the freedom.

We do know where we will be on August 2^nd. We will move into our new villa in Greti, Italy. It is 2.5 kilometers from Greve in Chianti, virtually the center of Tuscany. Until then, keep smiling.

Peace and Love.

Norm & Rita.

P.S.  We’ll post pictures soon, our internet has not been quite strong enough to download all the pics!

July 18, 2014 – St. Leon-sur-Vezere

It has been 2 weeks since we have posted. During those two weeks, we have been very busy. On Wednesday July 9th, we got up at 4:30AM and Rita and I drove the 5 hours to Paris so that Rita could meet with French Immigration to complete her requirements for a long-term visa. We had enlisted Alain and Dominique Desmadryl to assist us with some of the more burdensome paperwork required. They were very gracious and helpful to us. After having breakfast with Dominque, (Alain was in the hospital recovering from hip replacement surgery), we drove to French Immigration to take our place in line with many others seeking immigration to France. If you remember, I flunked my first attempt to get my visa a couple of weeks ago. So, we used what we learned from my experience for Rita, and Rita sailed right through French Immigration without any problems and got her long-term visa approved. While I was waiting on Rita to get through French Immigration, I talked my way into the office and convinced them to consider my second application at the same time they were considering Rita’s first application. (I had my second appointment next week, but did not want to make the 5-hour drive back to Paris.) Surprisingly, French Immigration was accommodating to my request, considered my additional paperwork and also issued my long-term visa at the same time as Rita. Whew!!!!! What a relief. We were afraid that we would have to leave France after 90 days if we did not get our visas. Without visas we could not go to Italy for 90 days after our visit in France. That night, we stayed in Paris on the Left Bank at the Hotel du Seine and went to dinner at Au Bourguignon Marais to celebrate. Rita had bouef bourguignon and I had white, red and rose wine from Bourgogne. I also had some great avocado, crayfish and fish along with my wine. The dessert was Berthillon ice cream, the best ice cream in Paris.

On July 10th, my daughter Angela and Rita’s friend Mary Thompson arrived in Paris on the same flight, took the train and the metro to Paris and met up with us at our hotel. We did some Paris sightseeing, which included Notre Dame, Eiffel Tower, Champs Elysees and Arc de Triomphe. We had great cocktails at Fouquets Barriere and dinner at a place Rita found called Chez Toinette in the seedier area of Paris. After dinner, we walked the streets of Paris and ended the night with cognac. My daughter had come to Paris to see us because she has recently become engaged and was excited to share her thoughts and feelings with me. Mary had come to Paris because she had always wanted to see Paris and have dinner in a French restaurant.

July 5, 2014 – No 4^th of July Fireworks in France….

Today is our 63^rd day in France. Having a great time. Yesterday was July 4^th in the U.S. with hotdogs, barbeques, and fireworks.   In St. Leon, well actually Thursday, was the first night market of the season, which starts in July.   There was lots of beer, French music, vendors of foie gras, fresh legumes, French creole food and other food and drinks. The population of St. Leon probably had an additional 200 visitors for the night market.   The “tourist season” is in high swing here right now. Tourists are starting to flock to St. Leon. We get new campers every night. This Sunday, there is a festival in our little town and it is rumored to have a lot of activity that day. We were warned to move our car to the entrance of the city if we want to drive it that day, as the streets are blocked off and no cars can get in or out.

Of course, France has a 4^th of July also. It is called Bastille Day and will be held on Monday, July 14^th. Everything closes down. There is dancing in the streets, lots of food music and fireworks. We are looking for to celebrating Bastille Day in France.

We are also looking forward to new visitors. My daughter, Angela, and Rita’s sister-in-law, Mary Adams Thompson, will be coming in the week of July 10^th and staying until July 18^th. We are soooo excited to see them.

The past week has been busy. No new births to report this week. But, we did take a road trip. We left on Monday to avoid some rainy weather and drove 4 hours south to the coastal city of Biarritz, which is on the Atlantic Ocean about a half hour from Spain. The weather on the coast was lovely the first day. But, the second day it turned on us and became rainy and foggy. Nevertheless, it was a good visit. Biarritz has a wonderful sand beach that is rare as far as we can tell for France. The entire beach stretches out before a beautiful lighthouse. It also has the Hotel du Palais that was built by Napoleon for his wife Eugenie around 1854. We did not stay there. It was a little rich for my blood. But, we did stay next door to it. The sunset the first night was beautiful.

But by the next morning, there was roaring surf pounding the rocks in front of our hotel. The first night we got a chance to catch up on Cosmopolitans at the hotel bar. Then, we dressed up and went out to dinner. After dinner we watched the world cup football matches in a bar full of French and German spectators. They are really rabid fans. I guess similar to our Colts’ fans.

Biaritz reminded us of an old beach town in Florida or California. It was rather small, with nice neighborhoods, beautiful churches, narrow streets, markets and lots of outdoor dining choices.

From Biarritz, we headed toward home and away from the rain and stormy weather in Biarritz. But, when we arrived in Bordeaux, two hours later, the sun was shining so we decided to head north to the Margaux, Pauillac, and the St. Estephe wine region of Bordeaux. We took the La Route des Chateaux and photographed all of the best Vineyards along the Route. We saw Chateau Margaux, Chateau Lafite Rothschild, Chateau Mouton Rothschild, Chateau LaTour and Chateau Haut-Brion. All of these Chateaux are known for producing the best red wines since 1855. Of course, the prices of these wines are astronomical and beyond the reach of most mortals. We saw many of bottles of wines priced at $1,500.00 to $18,000.00! We are pleased with our photos as our souvenirs instead of bottles of wine.

From Bordeaux, we turned east and headed toward St. Leon, but, not without stopping for the night at St. Emilion. We went to St. Emilion last year and loved it. Like Bordeaux, St. Emilion is another wine producing area of France. It is a lovely village of 2000 people and dates back to pre-historic times. It is much smaller than the vineyards we visited in Bordeaux. But, it does have some fantastic red wines.   Some of them are also priced above the reach of mere mortals, but there are some that are quite reasonable. For example, the Chateau Ausone and Chateau Cheval Blanc, which sell for an average price of $837 and $689 respectively per bottle, fall into the best of the best. But, good everyday St. Emilion red wines can be had for under $10 per bottle although good ones go for $30 to $50 a bottle.

While walking around St. Emilion taking photographs, we saw lots of people touring the wine country by bicycle. They average about 80 kilometers a day and ride in groups of 10 to 20. We also take photos by accident whenever we travel. A perfect example is the photo of my leg accidently taken while removing my iPhone from my pocket.

On the final leg of our return trip to St. Leon, we stumbled upon Chateau Monbazillac, just south of Bergerac in the Dordogne, near to where we are staying. It produces all “sweet” dessert wines. So, we have to stop, taste, take photos and buy some wine to take home.

In closing, the final photograph on our website should come as no surprise to those of you who know us well. We have decided to stay in France and have started a meal on wheels business. It will be called “Norm’s Cuisine”. Our first delivery truck has been purchased and our logo placed on it. We are checking out French law to see if our truck needs any operating authority. If it does, I will be calling Andy Light for authority advice and Greg Feary for insurance advice. International transportation law is really exciting!

Have a safe week. Next week, we will report on our two visitors Angela and Mary, Bastille Day, Rita’s “first” trip to Paris for her visa interview and my second “trip” to Paris for my interview. Stay tuned. (She’s not going to like the weighing in and eye exam either!!! How do you explain (a/ka/a translate) mono-vision lasik surgery to the French!!)

Bonjour!   Well, you can tell my French classes are working out very well. I am progressing slowly. We have been told by some native English-speaking people who are used to speaking fluent French, that even after 10 years, it is still a struggle to speak in French and think in English. Most of them have plans to retire in a country where English is the native language. They are just plain tired of translating everything. (Especially the jokes!)

Last Friday, we drove 5 hours to Paris so that I could meet with the French Immigration office to complete my Visa Application. We need Visas because we are going to stay in France for over 90 days. I took a medical exam and passed except they said I was too fat. Then, I took an eye exam and they said that I needed glasses, but they didn’t ask me if I wore contacts! I did pass the eye examination. At the end of the day, they asked for my passport photo and proof of accommodations to prove that I have been living in France. They rejected my passport photo even though it is the one in my passport and the identical one accepted by the French Consulate in Chicago when I applied for my Visa. Apparently, they have official photo “cabines” called “Photomation” in France and that is the only photo they will accept. They are similar to our photo booth. In addition, my proof of accommodation was in English and they wanted it to be in French. So, it was rejected also. They rescheduled me for another appointment on July 18^th to bring them a new passport photo and proof of accommodation. We spent one night in Paris and drove home the next day dejected for being rejected!

The French Immigration office also finally found Rita’s paperwork this week. They had lost it for over 6 weeks. Technically, she did not exist and was not in France according to their records. But, they could kick her out of France after 90 days if she did not get their approval to be here! Her records were paper clipped to my records and surfaced when I had my meeting with them. So, Rita has to complete her Visa requirements on July 9^th.   Assuming we both pass this time, it will have taken us three trips to Paris to get approval. It is frustrating to experience all this bureaucracy, but I understand that the US is even worse!

We at least took a few pictures after dinner!

Notre Dame at night

We have had two exciting events this week.

Preparing for our visit with family.

First, Rita’s family from Lille in the north of France, came to visit on Saturday and are staying until Friday. We have Isabelle, her daughter Jasmine (4), her mother Lina and their cousin Yoran (12) in our home. We have been swimming, playing cards, visiting castles, specifically Chateau Puymartin and Chateau Milandes, and enjoying touring small beautiful villages.

Chateau Puymartin and the legend of the lady in white. (Madame Blanc)

The Chateau Puymartin has a roof of stone. The stones cost 700 Euros ($955.00) per square meter and each square meter weighs over a ton.   They are laid by hand and are not held in by mortar or cement, but merely by laying one stone against another. It was built in the 12^th century. The roof was repaired once with cement in between the stones and it had to be re-done as it did not allow for ventilation and was not good. The owner of the castle caught his wife in an affair and locked her in a tower for 15 years. She never left the tower before she died. He even buried her in this room behind a eucre colored block, which you can see in our pictures. You can rent a room here at this castle as a bed and breakfast place, but they say that if you do, you will see a lady in white, Madamme Blanc…. She comes out only at night. Later, in the 18^th century, there was a 40-year fight over the ownership of the castle between a brother and sister and eventually the sister won out. The property is still owned by the original descendant’s.

View of Chateau Milandes from the parking lot across the street.

The other castle, Chateau Milandes was the home of Josphine Baker, an American black woman, who went to Paris in 1925 and became a showgirl, singer, dancer, and a comedic star at the Folies Bergere (being topless probably didn’t hurt her career!) She was the only woman to march beside Martin Luther King at the March on Washington and to give a speech. She was a great humanitarian, got involved with the Red Cross, set up an organized resistance network where she hid arms in the cellar and installed a radio for communications and she carried secret information on sheet music that had been inserted with invisible ink!! She also traveled with Captain Abtey as part of the counter-intelligence services to Marrakesh, Africa, Maghreb, Libya, Egypt, Beirut, Syria, Palestine and Lebanon to spread the word of Free France. She was awarded a second lieutenant in the Women’s Auxiliary of the French Air Force, a Medal of Resistance, and was given the Legion of Honour award and the Croix de Guerre as she had worked risking her life for 5 years during World War II.

We received our cooking lessons this week from Lina. She is a really good French cook. We had wonderful salad dressing, polenta with gruyere cheese, rice salad and a vegetable tarte and a tuna/broccoli tarte; All of which we will be making again, soon. Hope they turn out!

 Secondly, our neighbors had a baby!!! We were all awakened by our neighbor’s cows that live next door by loud, continuous mooing. Rita thought that I had gotten up and went out side to talk to them, as I do everyday by mooing to them. After an hour of this annoying mooing, we decided to check it out and we learned that one of my cows that I say Bonjour to every day her had a baby calf “en plain air” as the owner/farmer told me in French. Now we know why this particular cow had a purple hair band on, we thought it was the hippie of the group! It was really funny because the birth was met with such excitement by the entire village of 400 residents and day visitors. They would line up across the street from our Maison to take photos of the new calf. Rita was surprised that the calf was standing and walking within a few hours of birth. “Neither Stephanie nor Missy did that” she said! But, then she was also surprised that the birthing mother went about her normal daily routine of walking and grazing immediately after giving birth with the little calf nursing on her as she walked and grazed.

Standing, walking and eating within the first 24 hours!

Well, I think I have caught you up on most of the things that have been going on at Green Acres in France. We are having fun. Experiencing the language, food and culture. So, all in all, it is a good trip. Check out our photos to see the things discussed above.

Paris Skyline including Eiffel Tower from the rooftop restaurant of the Holiday Inn St. Germain de Pres.

Notre Dame at night

We think this is what the French do when there is no water in the fountain and sunny skies above!

The Dordogne countryside from the top of Chateau Puymartin.

The hand-laid stone roof of Chateau Puymartin.

The Chateau Milandes, the former home of Josephine Baker.

Chateau Milandes from the front.

Beautiful palm trees at Chateau Milandes.

They had a bird show after our tour, (had NOTHING to do with the castle) but we decided to watch it! Here is an eagle coming towards us! Look out!

Isn’t is amazing how close he is?

Another view

Yohan handling this big creature!

Hey Mary (Mary R) …. Is this my Owl????

Or is it this one?

Or is this my Owl???? We yelled his name, “Owl” and he turned around for me to take this picture!

View of another castle nearby Puymartin in the background. They are everywhere!

Norm trying to hold her back, yeah right, that’s not going to work!

Jasmine playing with her new duck friends!

Fresh Paella at the market in Sarlat!

Mother and calf are doing fine! The population of St. Leon-sur-Vezere has just increased by one.

Standing, walking and eating within the first 24 hours!

Norm and Lina in the Le Source Garden.

Le Source ( the restaurant) has a new friend for Jasmine… Meet Anna Sophia!! Yeah, I’d say she has a princess name too!

The most beautiful garden setting for our dinner!

At our last celebratory dinner with Lina, Jasmine, Isabel and Yoran!

Whitefish dinner topped with crayfish! AMAZING!!!

Free Range Pork dinner!

Here’s how you say it Rita…. TROIS!

Here is Jasmine’s facial expression trying to show me how you pronounce “trois”! TWA!! I still can’t do it right!

Dessert!! So Pretty! and Yummy!

Anna Sophia telling us goodnight! Bedtime calls.

Lina, Isabel, Jasmine, Rita and Norm… Bye Bye!!

Saying good bye to Yoran, Lina, and Jasmine!

Six weeks, or forty-two days, we have been in France. This week we got to see the Chateau Clarens, which is next door to our maison, up close and personal, but only from the outside. It has been beautifully restored, with formal gardens, a swimming pool and a view of the river Vezere.   The owners were away this week and their property manager invited us to do a walk around. It is 5 stories. The rumor in the village of St. Leon-sur-Vezere is that the Chateau is for sale, but no one knows how much the owners are asking for it.

Chateau Clerens

On Tuesday, we took a cooking class at Le Chevrefeuille, which is a hotel and restaurant (more like a bed and breakfast or what they call a “Gite” here in France) which is about 7 km away from St. Cyprien, a small village nearby. The class was taught by Ian, who is English, but started the hotel a few years ago with his English wife Sara. Le Chevrefeuille means honeysuckle in French. The hotel is small, lovely, well maintained and looked after by Ian and Sarah. We only had one other couple in our class. They were Matt and Amanda, a very nice young couple from Australia, but have lived all over the world in the last 12 years.

The class started with a visit to the fresh market at La Bugue, another small village, nearby us. Each of the villages has a fresh market day. At the market, we bought goat cheese, “fromage de chevre”, which was only one day old from the farmer who raises the goats. We also bought mushrooms, “champignons”, from the vendor who searches the woods for them, finds them and then sells them in the market. Next, we bought fresh vegetables including cauliflower, “chou-fleur”, flat beans or broad beans, “feve”, and peas, “petit pois”. Ian knows all the vendors, speaks fluent French and, of course, the whole shopping experience is a social event, more than a shopping trip.

The last thing we bought was foie gras. The foie gras was 36 euro or about $50 US dollars per kilo, which is 2 ½ pounds. Thus, foie gras is about $20 a pound. Foie gras is goose liver. But, it is a liver from a goose that has been forced fed corn until its liver is six to ten times its normal size. France is the largest producer and consumer of foie gras, where it is considered a delicacy. The procedure of force feeding the geese is very controversial and many countries, and most noticeably the state of California recently, have banned the sale of foie gras. When the foie gras vendor was explaining to us the procedures for force feeding the geese, she said in very broken English that the geese were “force fed” and then changed her sales pitch to just “fed” to be more politically correct.

After shopping for about two hours, we returned to the hotel kitchen and began preparation of our dinner. We started by making a dessert of individual chocolate molten lava cake using lots of fresh vanilla. Then, we made a tri-colored salad of avocado, which is “avocat” in French, peculiarly the same word as “lawyer” in English, fresh tomatoes and the fresh goat cheese we bought in the market.

Our Green Salad

See the rest of our cooking class photos. After completing the salad, we made mini-cups of “veloute de chou-fleur”. This is a deliciously, thick cauliflower soup made of chicken stock and liquefied cauliflower, rather than cream, butter and flour. Next, we made green olive tapenade by blending capers, anchovies, olive oil, garlic, and green olives. For the next course, we quickly fried the foie gras in its own duck fat. Finally, we prepared “confit du canard” which is the leg and thigh of the duck broiled and then shredded. Of course, Ian had prepared a wonderful sauce made out of the mushrooms, stock, wine, and some chestnuts and we used the broad beans and the pois as the healthy sides. To accompany the food we prepared for dinner, we had white and red wine. The class lasted for 7 and a half hours and was a wonderful introduction to French cooking.

On Wednesday, we went to Les-Ezyies, another small village close to us for lunch. The restaurant had a beautiful garden. Les Ezyies is built into the limestone rocks and around the caves where those pesky little Troglodytes lived. We are looking for trolls, but have not seen any yet. On the way home, we drove by beautiful castles like the Chateau de Marzac in our photo section. Finally, as we approached our village of St. Leon-sur-Vezere, we watched the beautiful sunset.

The rest of the week was spent on personal maintenance, meaning cooking, cleaning, shopping, and eating. We also take turns at the pool, pretending we are Zonker Harris, the Doonesbury character, who was a professional tanner. The pool has been wonderful since the temperature had climbed to 30 degrees Celsius, which is about 86 degrees Farenheit.

On Friday, we returned to Le Chevrefeuille for fish night, invited by our new-found friends Matt and Amanda from our cooking class. A lot of the restaurants around here don’t have a set menu, they just prepare whatever they get at the market that day.  So Matt and Amanda pried the secret menu out of Ian and let us know that is would be a Friday fish fry!  Rita, being the Catholic that she is, has been to many lenten fish fry’s in her days, was all excited about fried fish, like lake perch or cod, in bread crumbs, hush puppies, French fries and maybe a little slaw on the side. But, the meal was a little more French than that. We had salmon, and some wonderful appetizers, vegetables, cheese, dessert and wine.  It could have been a Michelin Star resaurant meal!! We ate on the patio and had a wonderful evening with good food and good conversation. If you want to know how small the world is, anouther couple sitting at the table next to us  – met and attended school at DePauw in Greencastle.

Imagine that!

Well, that is all for now. We have found an old movie channel on our TV that shows movies from the 80’s and movies based on true stories, so we are getting ready to watch “The Outsiders”.   Rob Lowe, Diane Lane, Patrick Swayze, Matt Dillon, Tom Cruise, Ralph Macchio, and Emilio Estevez.

OH BOY! How do you say “popcorn” in French???   ….

P.S. Happy Birthday Bella!! Wow, 15 !! Soon you’ll be driving!

Week Six of French Impressions

Here we are with Ian putting on the finshing touches to our green salad we all made in class! Thank goodness Ian didn’t ban our iPhones!

Here we are with Matt and Amanda on the left and Ian on the right side of Rita looking over the fois gras stand at the La Bugue market.

Here is Ian pouring the cauliflower soup into these tiny cups! Another use for the many espresso cups in France. Just enough to wet your appetite and not get too full to enjoy the dinner.

Here is the duck after it had been roasted in a very hot pan for about 20 minutes and we are shredding it.

The beautiful gardens at Les Glycine resaurant in Les Eyzies de Tayac Sireuil.

Lez Eyzies built into the limestone rocks.

Such a beautiful little village street.

Chateau Clerens

See the magnitude of the Chateau?

Sunset on our way home from our dinner with Matt and Amanda at Ian and Sara’s place.

Castle “Chateau de Marzac”

Today we start week two in our house in St. Leon-sur-Vezere. The week has passed by quickly. We have been settling into our house trying to get used to the way of French country life as perceived by two Hoosiers. As an update to last week’s blog, our allergies are better. We are both on French over the counter drugs. We like the French pharmacies. Our allergy medicine costs us about $5 a week. Rita says at CVS the medicine would run us $25. We are still learning new French words not learned in French class. This week we learned: la tapette a mouches which is flyswatter, because we had to buy one for the house since we have no screens and the doors and windows are open much of the time; le brouillard, which is fog because the mornings are foggy; and une coupe, la couleur and les meches because Rita needed a cut, color and highlights this week.

We are trying to get into the French way of life, but we have suffered some setbacks. Last Sunday, we did things around the house in the morning. Then, we got dressed up and went to the grocery store. Unfortunately, we arrived at 2:30 PM and the grocery store closes on Sunday at 12:30 PM! We also have to get used to buying our bread each day. The bread, called baguettes, is baked daily and available for purchase at the boulanger, the bakery, before 8:00 AM. If we don’t go to the boulanger by noon, we don’t get fresh bread because they run out. Then, there is the boucherie, or butcher shop, where the meats are cut and sold fresh daily. They close in the afternoon and are only open a few hours in the morning and again a few hours in the evening. Finally, if you want fresh fruit, le fruit in French, or fresh vegetables, les legumes in French, you don’t buy them at the grocery store, you buy them at the fresh market which is held one or two days a week in the villages.

This week we bought some really fresh eggs, see the photo of the feather in our egg carton. We visited Perigeaux and saw the beautiful byzantine cathedral Saint-Front see photo. Perigeaux is about 45 minutes from us and has a population of 30,000. It also has a medieval section with many restaurants and timbered houses. In our village, we there was a la petanque tournament. There must have been 100 people in our village of 400 who came to play. La petanque is also called boules and is similar to bowling. See photos.

Our nearest village of any size is Montignac. We went to the fresh market in Montignac yesterday to buy strawberries. Dordogne is the strawberry capital of France, cherries and raspberries. Then, we ate pizza for lunch at an outdoor café riverside along the Vezere River. The riverfront is well maintained and beautiful. We took another canoe ride on the river. This one did not end well either. I guess I shouldn’t let Rita steer the canoe. See photos.

One day we drove to Hautforte, France to see the Chateau Hautforte. We only toured the perimeter of the Chateau and took photos which we have or will post as soon as Rita gets around to it ( J K). But, it was impressive. It was first occupied in the year 1000! One of the owners was Baron Henry de Bastard. What was his parents thinking??!!

Another day, I was homesick for an American hamburger so we stopped at Le Tourny, a small café in Montignac so I could satisfy my homesickness. See photo of my burger. It came with a cooked egg on top. Actually, it was pretty tasty! And, of course the French fries, called frites, are always excellent. Watch out McDonald’s!

While we are out driving around, we try to visit some of those one hundred most beautiful French villages so we can cross them off our bucket list. This week we visited St. Amand-de-Coly. (Damn, I get tired of typing village names with hyphens.) It is dominated by a Romanesque fortified church which you can see in our photos. The walls of the church are 12 feet thick.

Next, we continue to be baffled by the French supermarket where we go for all of our entertainment. They don’t have self scan lines. They don’t have cash only lines. They don’t have “less than 10 item” lines. You also bag your own groceries and, if you want to be truly French, you don’t get your money out to pay until all of your groceries are bagged and put in your “caddie or chariot” French for grocery cart. Of course, all of this contributes to long lines at the checkout. It is so funny to watch people stand in line and observe all of this. It shocks us that it is not more efficient, but “c’est la vie.”

Finally, I have placed in our photos an aerial view of our village. The Chateau and Church stand out as landmarks in the photos. Our house is right next door to the Chateau, but it is not in the photo sorry. No we did not take the photo from a hot air balloon, but we wish we had. It is a photo of a photo on the wall at the town hall or Marie in French.

Next week, we take our first French cooking lesson. We hope to blog on French cooking next week.

We have re-read our blog above. I thought it was from Green Acres and Rita thought it might be from the Beverly Hillbillies. What do you think?

Impressions from  St. Leon sur Vezere, Haute-Fort  and Montignac!

Aerial view of St. Leon-sur-Vezere with our next door neighbor’s Castle and our landlord’s Castle.

Hamburger is hiding under the egg! It is on a bun with all the trimmings. Only the egg was unexpected.

Rita is no longer in charge of steering the canoe!

Petanque tournament in St. Leon-sur-Vezere.

Perigeaux’s Cathedral Saint-Front. Byzantine architecture.

See the feather in our egg carton?  Those are really fresh eggs!

This would be considered a modern front door here in Montignac! We like them all!

We liked this home because it was a corner lot.

Here is a typical front door in Montignac.

Had lunch on the river bank in Montignac.

Just a little street we walked by in Montignac.

Saint Amand-De-Coly

Haute Fort

View of a few of the restaurants in Montignac.

Our first view of the Eiffel Tower!

Our favorite lady, Notre Dame. A visit is not complete without paying a visit to Notre Dame..

View from our hotel on Rue de Seine.

Les Deux Magot Cafe. Yes, it is called the two magots. No visit to Paris is complete without having an aperitif or two here on the left bank.

Our wonderful French family going back to 1968. Dominique, Alain, Aude, Yann and me.

Same group, without Dominique, but with Rita.

We drove to the French Riviera, St. Raphael to check out a house to rent. We stayed at this hotel on the beach.

A rare sand beach on the French Riviera at St. Raphael.

This is the main square at Sarlat la Caneda.

A timbered building in the old town of Sarlat.

A quaint street scene in Sarlat.

Market days are Saturday and Wednesday in Sarlat. This is an artisan bread maker. We eat lots of fresh bread and none of it is Wonder Bread!

You want fresh fish? This is the place. The market in Sarlat. Just cut the heads off before you cook!!

How about fresh produce? There is plenty to go around in Sarlat market.

Rita loves potatoes and white asparagus is in season!

In addition to food, the Sarlat market has other vendors. In this photo, the vendor is selling umbrellas.

We did a weekend in Brittany after Sarlat. This is the beach at La Baule. Notice the nice sand!

Evening was coming rapidly when we snapped this photo on the beach at La Baule.

A photo of our hotel in Dinard on the North Coast of Brittany. Our Megane is the first car you see in front of the hotel.

The beach at Dinard. Notice the low tide and wide sandy beach.

A photo of our hotel in Dinard on the North Coast of Brittany. Our Megane is the first car you see in front of the hotel.

No trip to Brittany/Normandy is complete without paying a visit to Mont St. Michel. It is incroyable.

We had lunch at La Mere Poulard a famous omelette restaurant in Mont St. Michel.

We spent the first day of Rita’s birthday at this hotel in Brantome in Dordogne. A great location.

This is one of the modern showers we blogged about. It has two rain shower heads and jet sprays on the sides. It also has a sign about saving the world by not laundering towels each day!!

Modern, or Contemporary Vanity, with towel warmer for those cool mornings.

A great chocolate dessert for Rita’s Birthday.

Dordogne is known for Foie Gras. Foie Gras is goose liver. It is really good. Yes, I know there is an ethical question about the forced feeding of geese. But, when in France it is hard not to partake.

Rita and I tried canoeing one day. It did not end well!

This is a privately owned Chateau (Castle) we ran across in Dordogne.

This is a pizza place in Sarlat with live music where we had dinner one night.

This is Rita in Sarlat buying produce in the market for the first day in our house. She used a lot of pointing.

To the left of our car is a limestone cave that our hotel was using as a parking garage! We didn’t go into the cave. We were afraid there may be troglodytes in it!

The first view of our house in St. Leon sur Vezere for the next 9 weeks. Rita did well. So far, so good.

This is the main house. It has four bedrooms and 4 baths You are welcome to come visit us.

Photo of main house with pool, covered of course.

Photo of living room.

Photo of kitchen with Chef.

Photo of master bedroom. No screens or air conditioning. You have to make choices. It does have a heated pool.

Photo of master bath.

This photo shows the name of our house and our nearest neighbors in the background.

This photo is of our landlord’s gatehouse which is located right next door.

Photograph of a home in St. Leon sur Vezere.

We are in Maison de Clerans. This is Chateau de Clerans, the Castle which is owned by our landlord and located right next door to us!

This truck is parked inside a home at St.Leon sur Vezere where it is being used to rehab an existing home.

This is a photo of our delicatessen. It is just one of 4 restaurants in St. Leon sur Vezere.

Today is Saturday. We have completed one full week in our French house. The first 5 days were pretty overcast and rainy and cool. Not a great start to our first week, but it could have been worse. The weather has started to improve. We are approaching the 70s and the sun is now waking us up in the mornings. That is the good news.

The bad news is that with the nicer weather Rita and I are noticing that being in a rural setting has brought on our allergies. We do have itchy red eyes, runny noises and sneezing. Hopefully, this will be short lived.

The first week has been spent on personal maintenance. We go to the market almost every other day because we want fresh produce, meat, fish and chicken, but also because the refrigerator is European style which is only half the size of its American counterpart. Every other day, we have also stopped by the Inter-Marche or Carrefour, which is France’s answer to Walmart. It takes us an hour to shop because everything is located in a different area than where it would be in a US supermarket. In addition, we shop with a dictionary so that we can look up words describing foods we did not learn in French class. For example, we did not learn the word for “flour” which is “farine”. We did not learn the words for “2% milk” which are “demi-ecreme lait”. We did not learn “buttermilk,” which is “lait battu” or “babeurre”. When the dictionary does not work, I stand around and look lost until an English person fluent in French comes along, notices me, and offers to help! Sometimes, this is much faster than the dictionary and besides I am learning to be an expert at looking lost in French!

Yesterday was farm day in Sarlat. All the nearby farmers brought live animals into the village, I guess so that you young French children could have a petting zoo. There were pigs, cows, ducks, turkeys, goats, and chickens. It reminded me of Old MacDonald and got me wondering if there was a French equivalent. I think there is, but it might be “Monsier Dupont a une ferme et dans cette ferme il y a un chien” etc.

The house has worked out lovely so far. We do have some unwanted visitors at times. There are flies because we have no screens. We also have an occasional bee. Of course, Rita’s favorites are the daddy long legged spiders.   Naught!! Last night, we had a bird, but fortunately a cat came along and the bird disappeared. I know “How you gonna keep them down on the farm….”

I started my French lessons on Thursday. My instructor comes to the house and her name is Patricia Mongendre from nearby Montignac. She asked me what I wanted to do for my first lesson and I said I wanted to practice conversational French. So, she responded, in French, “what would you like to speak about? Please start.”   We spoke to each other while sitting at the kitchen table for an hour. It is probably the most French I have ever spoken. I am looking forward to my next lesson.

Next week, we hope to be over our allergies and to take day trips to the various nearby villages. There are at least 8 of the most beautiful villages in France within 30 minutes drive of us. Yes, there is a contest each year, and the French vote and choose the 100 most beautiful villages. Hopefully, we will have some more photos for you then.

Have a great day. –Norm and Rita

Today is Monday. It is Memorial Day in Indianapolis. Yesterday was the Race. We were able to listen to the Race live on WIBC. It was exciting.   We both missed being at the Race. My parents never missed a Race when they were alive. I went to almost all of them during my adult life. Of course, Rita went for many years before she became associated with Andretti Autosport, so the day was very sentimental for us both. Being from Terre Haute, I always looked forward to the singing of the song “On the Banks of the Wabash” which was written by Paul Dresser who was born in Terre Haute. It was especially significant this year since Jim Nabors was signing the song for the last time. No matter what you think of Gomer, he can really sing that song. And, of course, we both like to watch the release of the balloons. My daughter Angela was born during the 1973 Race. So, the Race is very special to me, Martha and my daughter. Angela went to the Race this year for the first time since she was a child. She said she enjoyed it and had a great time. She even rode her bicycle to the Race!! Lets hear it for Ryan Hunter-Reay for winning the Indy500, and Marco Andretti and Carlos Munoz, all Andretti team drivers.

Today, Rita and I ventured out to do our grocery shopping to an Inter-Marche, an all purpose grocery store.   The store was very big, very nice and had a great selection of items. It was not too much different from a WalMart except the people working the check out get to sit while they work. Also, you put money, a dollar thirty-seven, into a lock to release a shopping cart and get your money back when you return the cart. The store had some American products like Heinz Ketchup, Coca-Cola, and Knorr’s bouillon cubes. But, the majority of the products were strictly French.

This is our second full day in the house. It rained all day. So, we stayed inside. Rita worked on finding us a place to rent in Tuscany. I worked on my beauty sleep. I was successful. Rita has a few promising leads, but nothing in hand. We watched cooking shows from England, Nigela Lawson, and then cooked dinner together. We had chicken, rice and a salad. Dinner was very good. So, were the Cosmos, which were homemade and less than $22 each! 

It is kind of chilly here in the mornings and evenings. We had the owner of our house turn on the heat for us. We are also doing laundry after being on the road for 21 days.

My comment on the French today is that all of our hotel bathrooms have had signs saying to save the world by not laundering towels each day so that our precious water will last longer. This is a very laudable goal, but the message seems to me mixed since most of the hotel bathrooms have multiple showerheads and multiple jet sprays using more water for showering than any laundry of towels would use. 

It is also interesting to us that the French regulate everything except what you think they should regulate. Just one example is that in Dordogne, where we are staying, all swimming pools must have a black liner. But, there is no regulation requiring on how hot the water in a faucet may be. There seems to be no limit. The water is as hot as those special hot water faucets in the US that are used for soup or tea. We have almost burned ourselves several times. 

BTW, what do you know about troglodytes? We seem to be in the center of where they were invented or, at least discovered. Troglodytes are cave dwellers. They are known to be short in stature, brutish and ugly except to other troglodytes. In any event, we are in the center of Troglodyte country. There are lots of caves and cave drawings in this area. The most famous are 17,000 years old and are located in Montignac, which is 15 kilometers away. We keep watching for Troglodyte crossings on the roads, but have not seen any up to now. We will keep you advised.

Tonight we are watching the French Open on TV. Just watched an exciting 5 set match. Last week, we caught some of the Cannes Film Festival. Yesterday, we watched the end of the Monaco Grand Prix. There is always something going on here.

Well, pray that the rain will stop. If it doesn’t, send us a boat. The Vezere River is a rising. St. Leon-sur-Vezere is not on high ground.   –Noah and Naamah. Although the Bible does not name Noah’s wife, Jewish tradition says her name was Naamah, which means the “Beautiful” and was a descendant of Cain.

It is our 22^nd day of our dream trip to France and Italy. We have been looking for a home to rent in France for six months. We decided to not book from the U.S. over the Internet because the Internet can make anything look good. We wanted to see the houses in person before making our decision. So, we came to France with high hopes of seeing homes up close and personal before making our decision. Well, that did not happen. It sounds easy, but it is much harder than you think. In addition, we found that by the time we started looking in France most of the better houses in our price range were gone. We were feeling pretty depressed about the house hunting, but Rita continued her research for countless hours and located one home she really had to have. But, the owners were not available to decide whether they wanted to rent their house for this season. At the last minute, about four days ago, the owners became available, decided to rent their home, and we took it sight unseen.

The front of our new home.

And here is our backyard, the pool cover is ON, the doors open to a large barn with ping pong, darts, fusseball table.

The home has four bedrooms, four baths, a kitchen, living room (which they all call “the salon”) and a heated swimming pool. It is located in the village of St. Leon-sur-Vezere in Dordogne, France. The village is very tiny. I think 400 people live here. It has a church, is located on the Vezere River, a bread depot, a small grocery store and maybe three restaurants. Our neighbors on one side are farmers who have cows and bulls in their fields right outside our gate as we exit our house. The neighbors on the other side are our landlords. They live in a CASTLE with walls and turrets and everything your mind can imagine from Cinderella!! Yes, it is called Chateau de Clerans and our house next door is called Maison de Clerans.

Our landlords castle, at least what we can see of it!

Our neighbors on the other side! For real!

“Clowns to the left of us,

Jokers to the right…”

“Here we are…,

stuck in the middle with      you!!”

Anyone remember this  song?

Kitchen

The “Salon”

One of the 4 bedrooms

Dining area

We got possession of the house last night. To prepare for possession, we went to the market in Sarlat to buy groceries. It is a very large market selling fresh farmer produce, cheese, meats, poultry, fish, pate, foie gras, and flea market arts and crafts. We bought cheese, wine, pate, jambon (ham), baguette (bread), and stuff like olive oil, red wine vinegar, butter, eggs, etc. It was fun shopping in Sarlat. But, it did take awhile because each merchant specializes in primarily one item. So, we stood in line for cheese. We stood in a line for pate, we stood in a line for fresh produce, etc. We also had to practice up on our grams and kilograms because that is the way the food is sold. Rita and I asked ourselves what happened to the American initiative many years ago to convert ounces and pounds to grams and kilograms???   In any event, we ended up with more of some items and less of others that we wanted until we got the system down. (You have guessed that our system involved our thumbs and forefingers squeezed closer or farther apart to indicate the quantity we wanted!!) You also have to appreciate that shopping in France is a “social event”. It takes a long time because shoppers and shopkeepers kibbitz (I don’t think that is a French word) about the day, weather, politics, kids, quality of the produce, etc. It is sheer happiness to watch the shoppers and shopkeepers smile, laugh and actually enjoy shopping.

Heres a few of the sites we saw on our way, via Brantome, (because we left a key fob there from a few days ago) so we had to go back and fetch it.

This is a private home we are driving by, so we stopped to take a few pictures of it.

Isn’t it gorgeous?

With food in our Renault, we drove to our village to see our home. Of course, we got lost. But, we were only lost for about 10 minutes. When we arrived, we couldn’t believe that the house was exactly as represented on the Internet. Everything is perfect. Rita did a great job. Our host Beth O’Reilly showed us the house and how to use all the appliances and gadgets and then we were alone, in our house, and not a hotel for the first time in three weeks. We immediately did a closer inspection of the house and confirmed again that we could not have done better. We unpacked for the first time in three weeks, because the hotel rooms have been too small to unpack in and put our things away. And, then we headed off on foot to the village for dinner. The village is really quaint.

Yes, this is a truck squeezing through these buildings on this very narrow road in our village.

Our beautiful village. St.-Leon-sur-Vezere, France

Today is Sunday morning. Rita has figured out how to use a French press coffee maker. We are sitting at the kitchen table while I write this post and Rita is checking airfare and train schedules for family and friends who may want to visit us. We are comfortable, relaxed, and ready to start living the dream. French lessons begin this week for me. We will start looking for a local person to teach us French cooking also.

Thanks to everyone who helped us get to this point in our travels. A special thanks to the Desmadryls, Alki who encouraged us at our lowest emotional point with sage advice to be patient and everything would work out, and family and friends too numerous to name here.

More to come. BTW, the West-Kardashian wedding was wonderful. It was great seeing all our friends Anjoelina, Brad, George, Harrison, Julia, Lindsey. We will send photos as soon as we find a place to develop the film.

Oh, and just a quck picture of our littlest granddaughter at her first dance recital!  (These were texted to us on our drive up to the house)

She’s the one in the middle with the PERFECT arms!!            (of course, LOL)

Her favorite part was when “everyone clapped for me!” Uh oh, look out Hollywood!

Yesterday we left La Baule, on the Brittany South Coast and we drove through rolling green hills, serene pastures where white cows were grazing, and lots of apple and pear orchards to Dinard, France on the North Coast of Brittany. Interesting fact of the day—Alfred Hitchcock used a mansion on the bay at Dinard for his model of the house in Psycho his 1960 big movie hit. There is a statute erected to him on the town square with him being attacked by birds which was his 1963 movie.

 What I learned yesterday. I have always been in charge of finding hotels. Rita has always been in charge of driving; and we share responsibilities for finding restaurants. It is called “division of labor”. But, yesterday I could not decide between two hotels on the beach in Dinard. One was $300 a night with no free Wi-Fi and the room was basic without a view of the Atlantic Ocean. The other hotel was $200 a night with free Wi-Fi and an Ocean view and an upgrade from the basic room. So, I asked Rita to go into the latter hotel and see if the less expensive hotel (I did not say cheaper on purpose) was acceptable. If so, I thought we could save a $100 on our budget since we were over a $100 yesterday. Well, Rita went in checked out the hotel and came out and reported to me that it was acceptable to her. So, we unpacked the car and moved into the hotel where I learned that she chose a suite for $400 a night. Rita is no longer responsible for hotel selection. I asked her what she was thinking when I sent her into the hotel to see if we could save $100 and she came out with a room costing $100 more than the room under consideration in the more expensive hotel. With all the wisdom of a woman’s logic, she responded that it was my fault because I was using Internet rates and Internet rates did not apply to walk-ins. Also, there was no ocean view in either of the other rooms. To use an Andy Light phrase, “Rita, you baffle me”!

I do have some good news. After 7 days of trying to book a house, which honestly seemed like two weeks to Rita and a month to me (I am less patient than Rita), we were able to book our first choice. The house has 4 bedrooms and a heated pool. It is located in St. Leon-sur-Vezere, Dordogne, a rural area, in the middle southwest of France. It is one hour from Bordeaux and probably 3 hours from the French Riviera. We move in on Saturday. Now the dream begins in earnest! Hopefully, we can set up some French lessons for me; and some cooking lessons for the two of us. We have plenty of room if you want to come and visit us. We will be in St. Leon until July 26^th. WE ARE TERRIBLY EXCITED TO BECOME A PART OF A FRENCH VILLAGE!

 This is my comment of the day on French hotel bathrooms. First, they are bathrooms where one takes a bath. If you want to go to the toilet, you go to the water closet, which is in an entirely different room from the bathroom, usually down the hall. Second, the bathrooms have all been extremely modern or contemporary in design. They have rain showerheads, jet spays coming at you from all directions, handheld sprays and no doors on the shower. They have electric towel warmers, hair dryers that require you to hold a button down to make them run or else they will stop when you release pressure on the button (not a big deal, but your finger does get tired before your hair is dry and for the life of me I cannot figure out why they make hair dryers in hotel bathrooms this way, maybe my friend John Barth can answer this question for me since he has spent 30 years in the beauty business selling, among other things, hair dryers), and very stylists sinks and faucets. I am not use to all the whistles and bells. I usually end up getting squirted in the face from all the jet sprays. In addition, the bathrooms rarely come with washcloths. I don’t know what the French use in their place. Surely, they don’t use their hands? OMG! Finally, soap has been rare in bathrooms with bath gel substituting for soap. I have not figured out how to use bath gel without a washcloth. I think it takes lots of practice.

 Well, we are off to Le Mont St. Michel today. More later.

We left Sarlat in the Dordogne area of France yesterday and decided to go on a short drive. The weather was beautiful, 81 degrees, so we headed to the Atlantic Coast. After a short, 7-hour drive, we arrived in La Baule, France that is on the Atlantic Ocean. The drive was mostly through farmland. There were plenty of cows and a few sheep. The farms were very large. The highways were well maintained and very clean. Maybe the highways are clean because the French are not suppose to eat or drink anything while driving to comply with its laws. Traffic moves along at good pace. I think we cruise around 80 miles an hour and sometimes top out at 95 miles per hour. The drivers are courteous and patient. But, they all drive very fast. When you pull out into the passing lane, you better check your rear view mirror and be ready to floor it because cars can, and do, come up on you very quickly. So, you don’t pull out into the passing lane unless you are ready to boogey.

 We did make one stop on the way to La Baule. We walked around the fort and old port of La Rochelle. La Rochelle was having a festival so there were many families out strolling around the city enjoying the nice weather. La Rochelle has an ice cream store called Earnest le Glacier. It is located in the old port area and we had learned of the store from Yann Desmadryl.   So, we looked it up and there was one long line to get into the store, but we decided to wait in line and are glad we did. I had vanilla and chocolate fudge brownies. Rita had crème brulee and white chocolate. The ice cream was soft, but not as soft as gelato. It was also very creamy with a lot of flavor. In fact, Rita and I are willing to call it the best ice cream we have ever had. So, thank you for the recommendation Yann.

When we entered La Baule yesterday, we passed a long line of stopped cars on the other side of the highway. The line was over 14 miles long! When we arrived in La Baule, we were told that some pony jumping event, which draws large crowds from around the world, had just ended and thus the long line of cars stopped on the highway working their ways home. La Baule has a nice long sand beach. The sand is light brown to white. It is a real pleasure to find such a beach in France and is such a change from the pebble beaches that you find on most, but not all, of the French Riviera beaches. The ocean front boulevard is surrounded with apartment and condominiums, but most are only 4 to 6 stories high. The beach is dotted with little restaurants where you can eat with your feet in the sand if you choose.

We are staying at the Hermitage. We always choose our hotels by location, then price. We rely primarily on tripadvisor.com and hotels.com. They are usually pretty good sources, but like anything you have to read all the reviews, positive and negative, very carefully to avoid being surprised. We have tried to use tripadvisor.com for restaurants, but we do not believe it is as reliable a resource for restaurants as it is for hotels. One problem is that when you show up in a restaurant recommended by tripadvisor.com, you seem to be sharing the restaurant with English speaking tourists who have read the same restaurant reviews that you have read. So, you end up eating with English, American, Australian and Canadian tourists instead of with locals. Finding restaurants preferred by locals is much more difficult to find. But, we do make the effort and occasionally find a pleasant surprise restaurant where only the locals eat.

Last night, our hotel bar had cosmopolitans. We were pretty parched since we had gone almost a week without our favorite cocktail because cranberry juice is almost impossible to find in France for some reason that is unknown to us. It is odd since French bars offer other less popular drinks regularly such as sex on the beach and manhattans which are on every bar menu. Therefore, we have been drinking mostly wine. So, in the lobby bar we downed two quick cosmos to relax us from the 7-hour drive. The cosmos were served with mixed nuts, olives, tapenade and cashews gratis.   When we went to leave the bar, we learned that the four cosmos were $95 USD or $23.50 each. Since we are on a daily expenses budget, we shot half of our meals budget on the two drinks or all of our daily miscellaneous expenses. We may have to give up drinking cosmos! Or, eat half as much or eliminate miscellaneous expenses!

Well, we are still homeless, but trying everyday to locate a house to rent. Either the houses do not please us or the ones that please us are too expensive or when we find one we like and it is not too expensive, it is booked. We have used just about every website on the Internet to locate a house. It is a long slow process burning up about 4 to 5 hour of research each day. We know now that we should have booked a house much earlier. We did not consider that in peak season most of the great locations would be taken. Oh, well, we are not looking for sympathy. As Alki always says, the Marine Corps told its recruits that if you want sympathy, you will find it in the dictionary between shit and syphilis. The Marine Corps is right. But, we did want you to have a flavor for what we are doing on a daily basis in France. We are not just sitting around eating bonbons. Travel is hard work.

 It is noon and we are ready to hit the road again. We have no destination planned. We normally get in the car, look at each other, and then look at a map of France and start discussing places on the map within a one-day drive that we think we may want to see. Once we have reached a consensus, we type in the destination on the GPS and our day begins afresh in search of new adventures and dreams. A bientot. –Norm and Rita.

May 15, 2014. St. Raphael, French Riviera, France.

When I was a young boy growing up in Terre Haute, my father spoke GI French at the dinner table that he had learned from being stationed in Paris, France during the big War, to end all wars. This experience caused me to dream that one day I too might be able to travel to France. Well, I have been blessed and have had the opportunity to travel to France several times in my life. But, the dream changed with age and time and the dream evolved over my lifetime from traveling to France, to live in France for an extended period of time. This year, I looked forward to implementing the dream by living in France, taking French lessons to improve my French and taking cooking classes to share in the French love of food. That was the dream. It was vague and fuzzy as most pleasant dreams are. There was a vision of a French farmhouse, fields of lavender, forests, nearby villages, and great farmer’s markets. What the dream lacked was definition. Now that we are in France we are struggling with how to make the dream a reality.

We have looked for our farmhouse online for six months to make our dream a reality. While there are many websites, friends and families willing to assist us with our search, the search has been more difficult in reality, than either of us would have ever imagined. First, you have a budget. That is reality. The chateau in the forest and the villa overlooking the French Riviera are not on our budget. Next, you have to choose an area, and in reality, you have to build a foundation under your dream. We thought we wanted to rent a home in Dordogne France known for its woods, markets and foie-gras. But, we questioned whether 3 months in such a bucolic setting would be too peaceful and quiet. So, when we left Paris on Tuesday, we abandoned the dream of a farmhouse in the forests and went for the bright lights of the French Riviera with iPad and Mac in hands searching for a villa by the Mediterranean Sea and a little more excitement than Dordogne. Our first stop was Avignon, a nice walled city in the south of France approximately an hour from the Mediterranean Sea. The Popes resided in Avignon for about 70 years and built churches, cathedrals, bridges and a lasting relationship with the French people. But, it was just an overnight stop for us. Our next stop was St. Raphael, which is directly on the Mediterranean Sea. We inspected a house, a mile from the Bord de Mer, which had four bedrooms, a swimming pool, in a gated community that needed codes to get in and out of, and, was within our budget. But, as we drove around the area, there was lots of traffic, no farmer’s markets, no forests, and seemed to be filled with hustle and bustle which obscured our dream. We spent the evening discussing the pros and cons of renting in St. Raphael, or somewhere else in France, which would more nearly fit the dream. After our gut check last night, this morning we have decided to go back to our original plan and drive 7 hours to Dordogne to see if the reality and the dream match there. More to follow.

Norm and Rita

We left Indianapolis for Detroit at 4:00 PM on Sunday, May 4, 2014 on Delta.  The flight was 45 minutes of light chop.  Rita thought it was very bumpy. At 6:00 PM, we left Detroit for Paris, France.  We arrived in Paris at 8:30 AM.  The entire flight was bumpy; and Rita got very little sleep on the plane. But, the sun was shining in Paris when we arrived and it was a beautiful 70-degree day.  The taxi ride from Charles de Gaulle airport to Paris was bumper-to-bumper traffic, took an hour and cost $115.  We noticed two things right away about the commute.  First, everyone was very patient. We never heard a horn. Secondly, we noticed that no one changed lanes frequently.  It took us a few kilometers to learn why.  The motorcyclists use the “space” between the lanes so changing lanes would have been a reckless maneuver.

We are staying at Hotel de Seine on rue de Seine in St. German de Pres on the left bank in the sixth arrondissement for under $300 a night.   This is the artists and student section of Paris. It is a very chic area with lots of bars, cafés and restaurants.  Our hotel room has two rooms, a bedroom and a bathroom. The rooms are very tiny although typical for Paris. We would guess that the bedroom is 15 x12 and the bathroom is 5 x10. We have no place to put our suitcases or really unpack so we are working out of our suitcases on the floor. Speaking of suitcases, I brought my carry-on suitcase from last year, but Rita won our “discussions” and brought a much larger suitcase this year.  So, this year’s rule is: “You brought it.  You carry it.” And, she has!  (Upon arrival at Indpls airport when they weighed HER luggage, it was overweight at 60 lbs!)

Today is Sunday and we have been very busy since our arrival. Most days we walk; and walk; and walk some more.   We are not so much sightseeing, although we have seen the major sights, as absorbing the culture and observing the French people who we find beautiful, friendly and helpful when help is needed. Since we have not been concentrating on seeing the sights of Paris, we have been freed from the obligation to take photographs of every sight for the purpose of recording our trip and/or sharing our trip with family and friends.  This freedom has been exhilarating and has allowed us to be better observers of French life. It has also allowed us to enjoy some smaller slices of French life that we might have missed if we were rushing here and there to take the perfect photograph.

We spent one evening with our French friends Alain and Dominique Desmadryl who drove to Paris to host us at an old French restaurant specializing in authentic French food called Chez Denise.  It is the first restaurant we have visited that did not have a menu in English or a waiter who spoke some English. The restaurant was packed on a weeknight and sitting immediately behind us in the restaurant was Jean-Paul Belmondo, one of France’s most popular “older” movie stars.  Rita ordered beef, which came on a skewer; and I ordered steak tartare. But, Dominique ordered “brains” and Alain ordered “kidneys”.  One of us tasted both (guess which one) and found them pleasant tasting, but would probably not make a habit of ordering them again anytime soon!  After dinner, we taxied along the Champs Élysées, which was beautifully lit at night, around the Arc de Triumph, which is France ‘s tomb of the unknown soldier, and then to Cafe de Flore, an historical literary haunt of writers such as Hemingway, Satre, Camus, Beavoir and my law partner Tom Farrell, for a nightcap.

Another evening was spent at La Cuisine Paris, where we joined 7 other tourists to try our hand at making a French dinner.  The chef instructor was very helpful, as well as patient, while assisting us with preparing a strawberry-rhubarb tarte, asparagus wrapped with French ham, a tomato and red pepper sauce and tapenade stuffed chicken breast.  It was a delightful evening to learn about the French through, what else, French food and wine.  A very enjoyable evening we would recommend to anyone who visits Paris. One of the tourists in the cooking class was a grandmother who was raised at 70th and Pennsylvania streets in Indianapolis!  It is truly a small world.

Saturday we spent the day with Yann, Peggy, Aude, Cheyenne and Tinael Desmadryl. They took us to the top of the Montparnesse Tower to see the view of Paris from their tallest building, 56 floors, but….. you can also go to the 59^th floor and view the city from the open air observation deck! Everyone went up to the 59^th open-air deck but Rita, she stayed on the 56^th floor and took more pictures. Then of course, as we are leaving to hang out with our friends, it starts to rain, so we decided to get a crepe or coffee. Our first stop didn’t have any crepes so we bribed the children with ice cream. We were waiting for the rain to slow or stop, and again, as we left it was nice and started to rain again after about 10 minutes. So we decided to find a place to eat and start out slow to enjoy the evening. We ate at La Rotonde and had a three hour dinner, let me tell you, we cannot believe how well mannered and good the children were for this length of time!! They were content, ate their meals, (Cheyenne, who is 9, ordered raw smoked salmon, which came with blinis and loved it.) Of course, after such a long dinner, and since the kids could not have been better, they got to have dessert for the second time! We’re sure they’ll remember Norm for that!

Rita has spent all of her spare time in the mornings and evenings trying to find us a home to rent in the south of France for June and July. It has proven to be much more difficult than we thought it would be.  Many homes are large enough to accommodate a family of four, plus brothers an sisters, nephews and nieces and grandparents because the French tend to vacation as a family unit.  Other homes have a pool, but no air-conditioning, or have air-conditioning, but no pool.  A heated pool for Norm does not exist. Some homes are too expensive while other homes are unacceptable because of their condition or location. Nevertheless, we have honed in on 3 or 4 leads and hope to select one before we leave Paris on Monday, May 12, 2014.

In conclusion, we will share some bits of French culture we have learned so far on this trip. Dogs are everywhere, including the restaurants;  the French people go out of their way to help you with friendly advice; French men are every bit as fashionably dressed as the French women; fresh food, locally sourced is the basis of every meal; lunch is long and a part of the established social fabric of France; the French enjoy their neighborhood bars, cafés, bistros and brasseries where they not only enjoy good food and wine, but share the experience with their friends and neighbors; food is expensive, our breakfast of two orange juices, one coffee, and two omelets with a small side of potatoes and salad was $84.

Rita will post pictures soon.

Love and miss you all!  Rita and Norm

We finally arrived to the city of the Eiffel Tower!

Our TINY room! Who cares when you are in Paris!

This little gal was dancing away in the streets right on the corner of our street.

What we walk out to each day from our hotel room. Seriously, this is only about 6 steps away!

We love the activity in our little neighborhood!

This is your typical “cafe after cafe” in our neighborhood, we love this!

We bought our breakfast here.

Paris so soooo fashioable! Even the cars are dolled up!

This building blew us away!

If you can enlarge this, please do so. This is how they cover the buildings while they are rehabbing them. Notice the top where the picture is drawn to match the building!

This is the street we walked down to our cooking class, every street is beautiful!

This is the view from the top of the Montparnasse Tower!

Hotel des Invalids in the background.

The travel sirens have called to us again.  Last year, we went around the world in 184 days and visited 30 countries.  The purpose of the trip was “sightseeing”.  We wanted to see for ourselves, up close and personal, those places in the world that take your breath away when you see them in a photograph , video or movie.   The round the world trip was everything we thought it would be.  We saw breathtaking man made sights like the Sydney Opera House, Angkor Wat,Hagia Sophia, the Eiffel Tower, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, Chartres , the Colosseum in Rome as well as natural sights  such as the Swiss Alps, the Austrian Lake District, the Mediterranean Sea, the Seine, the Danube, the Croation Coastal Islands, The Bosphorus Straits, the Chao Phraya River,  Waiheke Island , Moorea and Bora Bora.

This year, we want to immerse ourselves in the culture of a country to get to know it the best you can as a visitor.  We are not thinking “EAT, PRAY , LOVE”.  It will be more like, “What is this on my plate? ” ” Did you miss the turn again?”  and  “Think I should pee?  No, it will only be a short drive.”  We have chosen France and Italy.  Our plan is to leave on May 4, 2014 and return on November 1, 2014.  We will fly to Paris and spend a week or two.  We hope to see our French friends, Alain, Dominique, Yann, Peggy and Aude.  Then, we will  rent a car and drive to the south of France where we plan to find and rent a house for 3 months.  Our preference would be to locate near a small village or villages where we can visit the local farmers’ markets, take French lessons and cooking classes.   Then, assuming we can tear ourselves away from the south of France after 3 months, we hope to drive to Tuscany, Italy and do the same things all over again–rent a house, take cooking classes and who knows maybe take Italian lessons.  Of course, like our trip last year, we have made no advance plans after Paris and renting a car.  Our plan is to go to wherever the travel sirens call us to go each day.

We are hoping to share this adventure with as many of our family and  friends that will come to France and Italy to stay with us.  We would be happy to provide you with a place to sleep and share some food and wine with you.   Of course, your airfare will be on you!  Come and see us.  It will be fun. For planning purposes, we will be somewhere in France in June and July and somewhere in Italy in August and September.

So, this weekend we are “practice packing”.   We are “discussing”  luggage, do we take carry on luggage only like we did last year or something larger?  We will let you know who wins or how we compromise.  The “discussion”  is not only over carry on luggage, but also over whether we check our luggage, and that may depend upon whether we take TSA approved quantities of shampoo, conditioner, cologne, perfume, shaving cream, contact lens solution, and all those bottles and containers of mysterious liquids that are suppose to make us beautiful, or buy all of these liquids, creams and gels once we get to Europe.

We hope that if you can’t visit with us in France and Italy, you will follow us on our blog.  We would love to have you and would love to hear from you often.  So, sit back, relax and enjoy the show.   Love,  Norm and Rita

December 1, 2013  – Indianapolis, Indiana

“No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his own pillow.”  Lin Yutang

Well, we have been gone 184 days.  Our dream trip of a lifetime can be summarized by the following numbers:

34—The numbers of flights we have taken

71—The number of hotels that allowed us to stay in them.

5—The number of train rides we have taken.

14—The number of ferry trips we have taken.

13,052—The number of kilometers we drove in Europe.

30—The number of countries we have visited.

32,962—The air miles we have traveled.

12,200—The number of photographs we have taken.

6819—The number of photographs Rita’s iPhone could hold before having to delete any.

8712—The number of hits we received to our blog.

1356—The number of solitaire games Rita played on my IPAD.

13—The number of solitaire games Rita won.

We have seen breathtaking sights and captured them in photographs on our blog, including:

Fatima

Melk Abbey

Lake Bled at night

The snow capped Zugspitz

Neuschwanstein Castle

Ronchamp

The Jung Frau Mountain

The Susten Pass in Switzerland

Positano

Lourdes

St. Emillion

Chambord

Eiffel Tower

Chartres

Brussels Grand Place

Drive from Oslo to Bergen

The Kremlin and St. Basil

The Diocletian Palace in Split

Dubrovnik from Mount Srd

The Taj Mahal

The Lake Palace

Bangkok from the Sky Bar on the 63rd floor of Lebua

Ta Prohm

View from Villa in Phuket

The Skyline in Singapore

The 12 Apostles

Waiheke Island

Sunset on Aitutaki

View of Cook’s Bay and Opunohu Bay from Belvedere

The lagoon at Bora Bora

We have also had our share of adventures which we captured in photographs and shared them with you on our blog, including:

Seeing the Royal Family

Visiting Scotland, the home of my ancestors

Wandering the Djemaa El Fna

Walking out on the Maria Bridge

Driving the Susten Pass

Driving the Amalfi Coast

The ride from the airport to our hotel in Istanbul

Visiting Samos, Greece

Traveling the highways everywhere in India

Elephant Ride

Camel Ride

Driving the Great Coast Highway

Wine tasting in New Zealand

Lagoon Tour and Snorkeling on Aitutaki

Wave runner tour of Bora Bora Lagoon

Finally, we shared our trip with our European family and friends as well as those of you who followed our blog, including:

Lisel Scharf and her family

Anne Scharf

Isabella S. Zanella and her family

The Popot/Desmadryl Families, Dominique, Alain, Yann, Peggy, Aude, and the grandchildren

Everyone has asked for our thoughts and feelings on the trip.  First, it has made us appreciate family, friends, faith and our home, Indianapolis.  We could not have done this trip without the love and understanding of our families.  Friends gave us support and encouragement throughout the trip.  We were constantly reminded everywhere we went how important our faith is to our day-to day lives and how it connects us to others around the world whether we worship God, Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, Vishnu or some other supreme being.  And, home, well that is where our hearts are; and we are fortunate to call Indianapolis our home where most people are good, decent, and honest, hardworking, and a pleasure.

The most rewarding thing to us about the trip is that we set a goal, and we accomplished that goal.  That is immensely satisfying to us.  It is an accomplishment that few people can claim as their own.  But, we can make that claim.  We dreamed of going around the world.  We made a plan to go around the world.  We successfully completed that plan.  It was no easy task to plan and execute successfully 34 flights in 184 days to 30 countries without a mistake.  That is an extremely rewarding feeling.  It warms our hearts to know that our efforts have met with successes beyond our wildest dreams.  While we made substantial sacrifices to make our dream successful, we never looked back once to second-guess our decision.  No matter what the future holds for us, we will always have the memories.

Norm – I could not have made this trip without my faithful companion Tonto.  Tonto’s original responsibility was to be in charge of IT.  But, she ended up being in charge of the budget, finances, expenses, cell phones, iPad, MacBook, TV remotes, light switches in hotel rooms, cameras, blog, nursing, cheerleading, driving, electronic toll booths, ATM machines, boarding passes, pop culture, decisions on dinner, face timing, and everything else I am not good at.  Thomas Jefferson said:  “One travels more usefully when alone because he reflects more.” Ernest Hemingway said: “Never go on trips with anyone you do not love.”  Mark Twain said: “I have found out there ain’t no surer way to find out if you love people or hate them, than to travel with them.”  Personally, I think they are probably all right.   I could not have made this trip without Rita, nor would I have wanted to do so.  Rita was the best traveling companion.  We spent 184 days together, 24/7, and when we were not out and about sight seeing during the day, we were together in a hotel room at night that was approximately 400 to 600 square feet!  In other words, we shared one room, not a whole house, with each other as most of you do with your loved one, for 184 nights.  As one of Rita’s close friends warned her before she left: “Do you know that you will be with Norm every second of every minute of every day for 184 days!”  There was no place to hide or get away from each other.  But, we never had a fight or a serious disagreement.  Try spending six months with your loved one in basically one room of your house sometime!

Rita – I’ve got to say that first of all, I never imagined in all my lifetime that I would ever take a trip around the world.  Remember from the very beginning, on the “about us” page, I never daydreamed; I was always too busy studying, working, or raising two girls on my own.  When I had “down time”, I usually caught up on sleep.  LOL!  But in the last several years I’ve had an inkling of what dreaming was all about and watched first hand how you can turn those dreams into reality.   Well, this was one heck of a reality!  Going on this trip was the most amazing adventure anyone could imagine.  Being able to experience the culture in all of the cities, seeing the religious sights, castles, mountains, the people, the traffic, and oh yes… the food, was more than anyone could ever imagine.  I have to admit that some of the destinations on our agenda, I had NEVER heard of prior to this trip.  But, even so, I was willing to travel to them and see what they were all about.  None have disappointed, every place was fascinating in its own way.

I still cannot pinpoint a “favorite” place, because all of them were very special in one way or another.  I would have to say that meeting my Aunt Lisel and her family and being able to see the house my mother grew up in and the town where she was raised, Aunt Anne, who entertained us with her singing and dancing, Isabelle and her family, who welcomed us into her mothers home in Lille, had a wonderful dinner with them and a look at their town, which we found to be really a sleeper city with a lot to offer, is very high on my list of the great moments of this trip.  The visits to Fatima, Lourdes and Ephesus would be next on my list, as those places were overwhelming with all the religious history.  Participating in the evening walk at Lourdes was something we didn’t even know about and turned out to be a very special and touching experience.  Walking through the streets and on the same steps as St. Paul in Ephesus and being able to walk through Mary’s house was another moving experience. “Life if not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away”. –  Maya Angelou

Now about traveling with Norm…. I’ve got to tell you all that he is a walking GPS.  I cannot tell you how many times I would walk out of our hotel room and turn the wrong way just to get to the elevator!  Then, as we would walk out of the hotel, onto the street, I would do the same thing!! I am so geographically challenged, that I would have never made it to the first airport correctly without my personal GPS! He is also very good at picking hotels based on their location.  We would walk out of one, and he’d say… “Yeah… the restaurant is up two blocks over there on the left”.  Wow!! How did you know that??? Well, when researching where to stay, he always takes into consideration, the restaurants nearby, things to see and do and anything else on our agenda for that certain city.  There is much more time involved in this part of the preparation than you would think.  It takes months to figure out all of the logistics of this type of travel.  Maybe he could be a travel agent.  He’d be perfect! I certainly appreciated all the work he put into this trip even before we boarded our first flight!

One thing I wished I could have accomplished was to have Norm take off his watch.  I think because he has always counted his time, it may be something that he will always do.  He gave me the countdown on everything, like “7 more hours till our flight”, or  “8 more minutes till we take off”, but mostly it was more like “we were supposed to depart 11 minutes ago!”  I’m still not sure if it has to do with the timekeeping habit or because he wanted a nice tan line where his watch was!

Traveling with Norm was very, very easy, (except for the carry-on luggage part). Ironically, we had to check our luggage almost always, as our American carry-on is much larger than European carry-on standards! Other than that, being with him for 6 months, in close quarters, every minute of every day was a breeze! I am very grateful and appreciate being able to enjoy this journey with him.  I’d do it again without a doubt!

I must share one of the funniest experiences! The first time we went to the ATM to withdraw money, I’m showing Norm how to punch in his secret code, pick the denomination that he wants, hit the green “enter” button, and wha la… your money comes spitting out of the machine! He was so tickled by that and could not believe how easy it was to just walk up to a machine and have it give you money!! Norm, at 65, had NEVER used an ATM prior to this!  “It just gives you money??”  Was what he kept saying as we were walking away, shaking his head.  I can’t imagine living without an ATM machine!!

In addition to the people we’ve thanked below, I would like to personally thank Michael Andretti, JF Thormann and John Lopes for allowing me this time away from Andretti Autosport to take this wonderful journey with Norm.  They were all very understanding and very supportive even though I was leaving them without someone to step in for me.  We immediately enacted a plan and found someone to take over for me quickly, which eased the transition for both of us.   It gave me a huge relief knowing that they would be taken care of while I was away.   It was very hard for me to give up the racing life, as it gets in your blood, and it took me a long time to NOT think about whether all those contracts were getting done, but eventually, I did get the hang of relaxing and enjoying this most awesome adventure.

Thank you so much for that!

“Regrets? …I’ve had a few.”—Frank Sinatra.  We were within 10 minutes of Pompeii and chose to push on to Monaco, rather than tour Pompeii.  That was a really bad decision.  After driving all day, we chose not to spend the night in St. Tropez and pushed on till midnight to stay in a bad hotel in Sete.  That was a stupid decision.  We regret that we hit Paris during a heat wave making it impossible to walk the city.  We missed wandering around the streets of Paris.  In Bangkok, we ran out of time to take the Hangover Tour.  We regret that very much.  In Phuket, I did not have a chance to take a day trip to Phang Nga Bay, because of Rita’s illness.  After Phuket, we had to decide whether to turn north to Laos, Vietnam, China and Japan or go south to Singapore, Bali, Australia, the Cook Islands and Tahiti.  It was a difficult decision to make.  We chose the southern route.  I am not sure we made the right decision.  Time will tell.  In New Zealand, we did not have time to see the South Island.

Thank you’s are owed to our children and grandchildren Angela, Jada, Kyle, Mandy, Kayla, Connor, Stephanie, Ben, Annabelle, Tyler, Missy, Bob, Isabella, Owen and Brody for sharing us with the world.  It was difficult to leave our families behind, but they have been very supportive of us.

A big thank you is owed to the firm for making this trip possible.  It has been very supportive and encouraging from my first emotional meeting with Greg to discuss my desire to do this trip before I got any older.   I sincerely appreciate the help you have given to me while traveling, the way you jumped in to make this trip possible and the way you serviced my clients while I have been traveling.

Finally, the trip would not have been possible without Anne Messer, who helped us in innumerable ways while we were gone.  Thank you Anne.  Thank you Shane, Joe, John and Dawn who helped me replace my phone after it drowned while swimming.  Thank you Kim who helped me with the transfer of money while traveling.  Thanks to Lynne and Pam for their helpful travel tips on Melbourne and Bora Bora.  Finally, last, but not least, we would like to thank Alki for urging us on and being one of our biggest supporters and cheerleaders.  And, a big thank you to all who emailed us and placed comments on our blog. There were tough times on this trip and your emails and comments gave us encouragement to keep going.

As we enter the month of December, we will be especially appreciative of family, friends, faith and music and the part they play in our lives.  These were the things that were reinforced in Rita and me again and again in every country visited and every culture we observed.  To have a happy life, fulfilled and loved, we need family, friends, faith and music to sustain us, challenge us and nurture us.  These things can keep us healthy and young and will comfort us as we prepare ourselves for our next life.

Happy 12^th birthday to Jada Garvin.  Next year you will be a teenager!!  Enjoy your day.

This blog will be dedicated in memoriam to my best friend Jim Poshard, who died 30 days after we left on our round the world adventure.  He went with me everywhere on this trip and was at home to greet me when I returned.  You will be missed, but never forgotten.  Love ya man!

“That’s all folks”.  THE END.

Norm & Rita

Oh… It’s a Christmas Miracle!!

Our house has Christmas lights on the outside, all done and lit up when we came home, and walked inside to find all of our kids who weren’t at the airport at our house and the whole inside is decorated for Christmas!

GOD BLESS OUR KIDS!!

November 21 – 30, 2013

We arrived in Papeete, Tahiti, one of the French Polynesian Islands, on the 21^st.  It is a city of 300,000 so it is easy to forget that this is some people’s vision of paradise.  There are lots of cars, people, highways and shopping in Papeete, the capital.  When we arrived at our hotel, we got a pleasant surprise.  We got bumped up from our regular room to an overwater bungalow (“OWB”) with a view of Moorea, another French Polynesian Island we intend to visit later in the week.  We didn’t  have much time in Tahiti, two days, so we wasted no time renting a car and Rita drove 100 kilometers around the island. The highlight for us was to see the Memorial/Museum to Paul Gauguin, a famous French impressionist painter, who chucked it all, a successful job as a stockbroker, a wife and 8 children, at age 43 to pursue his passion, which was painting, in Tahiti.  Of course, when we arrived at the Memorial/Museum, it was closed for repairs.  But, the remainder of the trip was still interesting.  We saw waterfalls, blowholes, a lighthouse and some great beaches.  When we returned to the hotel, we went to see a Polynesian Dance Show.  It was excellent with a lot of performers doing traditional hula style dancing.  I hear that Indy is under a cold spell right now, 19 degrees.  We are having 84 degree weather.  Sorry about that; but not too sorry!  

On the 23^rd, we moved from Tahiti to Moorea.  Moorea looks more like what I think a South Sea Island should look like.  Of course, my vision of a South Sea Island is based upon seeing the movie South Pacific when I was 10 years old.  In the movie, there was this island called Bali Hai which was lushest green in full techni-color, beautiful bays, craggy mountain peaks and beautiful beaches.  Well, fast forward 55 years and you have Moorea with lush green craggy mountains and beautiful harbors like Cook’s Bay and Opunohu Bay.  We rented a car and drove the entire island which is only half the size of Tahiti and which has a population of just 13,000.  There is a great overlook on the island called Belvedere which allows you to see a full view of Cook’s Bay and Opunohu Bay at the same time separated by Mount Rotui.  A spectacular place to visit for the view, but because the view is so expansive, photos from Belvedere do not do the view justice.

It was interesting to talk to Mooreans who profess to be self sufficient.  Many of them have gardens year around because of the climate, and grow their own vegetables.  When they are not working, they fish.  Some told us they catch 90 pounds of fish, fillet it and freeze it and it sustains them for 3 months.  It seemed like the soil and the sea really provide for these people who have relatively few wants,  a lesson there for all of us.  Conquer your wants, know your needs, live in the present and be happy, don’t worry! 

On the 25^th, we returned to Papeete and caught a short flight to Bora Bora, which has a population of 8000 full time residents.   This is our last stop on our round the world adventure so we will be permanently signing off soon.  We have no idea what it will mean to us to end our journey, but we will spend 5 days in Bora Bora contemplating our trip, what it has meant to us and our hopes for the future. We will post our photos of Bora Bora which will primarily be about motus, snorkeling, Mount Otemanu a/k/a “Bird Catcher”, the lagoon and the fact that everyone thinks this island is one of the most beautiful islands in the world, if not the most beautiful island in the world.  We are staying in an OWB at the Four Seasons.  This was our big splurge to wind up our trip.  When we got here, they bumped us up to a Mount Otemanu view OWB, rather than a lagoon view.  When we took our first walk to see the resort, we had not walked 50 feet and saw a stingray in the water swimming under the bridge to our OWB.  It was really cool!  The grounds are magnificently manicured.  The Sunset bar serves great sushi and other things for Rita to eat.  The cosmos were the best we have had on the trip.  (I think we say that every time we have one!) They have a lot of activities at the resort. We are trying to narrow down our choices.  Thinking about a wave runner ride around the island and a sunset cruise.

Tuesday evening we took our resort’s boat into Viatape, the main and only city on the island of Bora Bora.  We ate at the Matira Point Restaurant. Had a pleasant meal of salmon and mahi mahi both of which were caught that day.

On Wednesday, we went snorkeling and laid on the beach in the afternoon.  We saw a lot of fish while we snorkeled and fed them bread. But, they moved so quickly that they were hard to take photos of.   In the evening, we took a sunset cruise with Rinaldo, a 33 year old Dutchman, from France who came to Bora Bora with his wife to follow their dream of scuba diving.  Ah, to be so young again.  The sunset was spectacular. 

Thanksgiving day we had breakfast in our OWB.  We sunned on our deck.  Then, we had a Thanksgiving Buffet with all the trimmings.  But, unfortunately all the trimmings did not include mashed potatoes, green bean casserole or pumpkin pie.  But, the traditional cosmopolitans were fantastic, all four of them.  We are truly thankful and know we are blessed and wish to share our blessings with others. 

Friday, we can’t believe this is our last full day of vacation.  It has gone so quickly and the reality of returning is starting to set in.  Rita arranged a wave runner trip around the island.  That was really fun.  She is as fast on a wave runner as she is when she drives.  37 miles per hour on water seems a lot faster on a wave runner than it does in a boat.  The water was crystal clear, Mount Otemanu was green against a blue sky with puffy white clouds, and the trip took about two hours.  We had a great time.  Tonight we had dinner at St. James in Viatape.  We had tuna and beef tenderloin.  Thus, ended not only our last dinner in Bora Bora, but also our last full day of vacationing.

When we return to Indianapolis on the 1^st we will post our thoughts and feelings regarding our trip to share with you.  Thanks for following along.  See you soon.  Love Norm & Rita.

Our last stop was Tahiti, Papeete, Moorea and Bora Bora.  Here are the pictures from our last stop.

Well, it started out great, as we got upgraded to this! and only b/c the hotel was sold out!

Our sand pool.

Cute little bridge we had to walk over to get to the waterfall.

We felt like we were in a Hollywood movie.. Miami Beach in the 60’s!

Our live entertainment!!

Moorea! We stopped along the way to our hotel to catch a view of this side of the island.  Looks beautiful!

View from Belvedere of Cooks Bay!

Panoramic view from Belvedere with both bays!

Bananas anyone?

This is a fake Palm Tree… a/k/a cell phone tower. They are all disguised like this in Moorea!

O.K. all you lakers…. Let’s get our pontoons looking like this!

Sunset from our hotel bar.

Ahh.. yes, then Bora Bora!

First sighting of Bora Bora.

Our transportation to the hotel.

Looks like Norm’s ready for this place!

I guess Rita’s ready too!

Nice entryway!

Oh, yeah… we can call this home for 6 days!

This is the lagoon beach where you can snorkel with very pretty fish!

Come on in, it’s great!

Took a sunset cruise.

REALLY?? TWO story bungalows??

We ate at this restaurant. Red roof is Matira Beach Restaurant.

Yeah, she can drive a boat just as fast as a car!

Sunset in Bora Bora.

After our sunset cruise, we had dinner here.

Thanksgiving Day Rita woke up to this!

Glub… Glub… Happy Turkey Day!

Here’s a few pictures of wedding island right before we ate our Thanksgiving Day Buffet!

We also had some fun on these!

Rita???? Can you keep up?

Our last dinner out in Bora Bora, at the Saint James. Won’t be smiling like this tomorrow!

We arrived in Rarotonga on Friday.  They have not had any rain in 45 days.   So, it rained Friday and Saturday!  Whoa is me.  Why do things always happen to me!  I have this dark cloud over my head that follows me everywhere I go. I see myself as Pig Pen in the Peanuts comic strip.  LOL.  Rarotonga is a small island.  It has about 6,000 full time residents.

The flight from Auckland was almost 4 hours or about 2000 miles.  That is like flying Indy to Los Angeles for a couple of days on the beach; and it is raining.  There is nothing else to do here, but lie on a beach, relax and snorkel.   If it ever stops raining, we will take some photos for our blog.  But right now, we can’t see the beach it is raining so hard.

In order to get here, we had to fly over the International Date Line.  “Rita did you feel that bump!  It was the IDL.”  I had her going for a while.  The IDL was established in 1884 and is an imaginary line that runs from the North Pole to the South Pole basically along the 180-degree longitude.  When you cross it going eastward you subtract a day and going westward you add a day.  It is an arbitrary imaginary line on the globe where the calendar date advances a day going westward and subtracts a day going eastward.  So, we left Auckland on Saturday and arrived in Rarotonga on Friday.  Weird, huh?  Maybe I am a day younger now.  That would be nice. I wonder if I crossed it 365 times, would I be a year younger?

We have very limited Wi-Fi on the island and cannot use it in our villa.  We have to go to the common area and use it in the open-air lobby.  I sat there in the lobby with my jacket on, drinking some wine, and complaining to Rita the entire time about the rain and how cold it was.  She of course wanted to strangle me and kept telling me to quit buying all the MB’s… see you have to pay for your Wi-Fi by the MB, so if we even open FB, our 100 MB of Wi-Fi runs out in 5 to 10 minutes.  Rita saved hers by shutting her Wi-Fi off and on when she uses it.  Clever IT person, she is.

This island has had some interesting cultural history.  First, there were cannibals in parts of these islands.  They have great T Shirts for sale that say:  “Send more tourists.  The last lot was delicious!”   I hope they are kidding.  Secondly, 92% of the Cook Islanders are defined as obese.  So, coming here at the end of our trip after eating 184 days of restaurant food was a good idea.  Even though we have gained some weight, we both look REALLY small compared to Cook Islanders.  Fat is a sign of wealth and beauty here.  Boys and girls at puberty and again prior to marriage are sent away into seclusion for 3-5 days at a time to gorge themselves into more beautiful people.  In the last few years, this obsession with fat has been changing as the result of better health education.

We are staying in a thatched roof hut over the beach.  I guess I should pay attention to the tsunami evacuation route signs that are everywhere.  The island is surrounded by a coral reef approximately a half-mile off the beach.  Not to be confused with Jimmy Buffet’s band the Coral Reefers.  The coral reef is where the waves crash, not on the beach.  But, we can still hear, well Rita can, I, of course, can’t hear anything from our hut; the waves crash even though none of them ever reach the shoreline.  Inside the coral reef, between it and the shoreline, is the lagoon.  This is an area of still water, no waves, and so all the sand has settled out of the lagoon water so that it is crystal clear.  You can stand in chest deep lagoon water and see your toes.  The lagoon water is also warmer than the Pacific Ocean water because it is still water, not moving much, and thus the sun has a better chance to warm it.  The lagoon water is also filled with all kinds of colorful fish and crabs.  In fact, we ran into a crab on the beach last night on our walk before dinner.  He was from Rhode Island, was here with his wife, and did not have anything good to say, just complained all the time. Damn curmudgeon.

On Sunday, yes you got it—more rain.  It rained all day.  So, we rented a car,

Rita drove a right hand drive car, on the left hand side of the road and we made a circumnavigation of the island, all 34 kilometers or 19 miles, in two hours.   Since it was Sunday everything was closed.  We did not see anything but rain and fog on the island tour.   I think we took two photos on the drive.

 When we got back to the hotel, we ate dinner at Vaima, a very good restaurant with live music by a male and female duet.  When you look at the photo of the duet, can you tell which one has wealth and which one has beauty?

On Monday, we took a 23-passenger propeller airplane to another Cook Island called, Aitutaki.  It is even more remote and quiet than the wild and crazy island we just left.  The population of Aitutaki is only 2,000.  Rita wasn’t sure she wanted to take such a small propeller plane, but decided to go when I waived goodbye to her at the jet way and they started to close the door on the airplane!  As the plane lifted from the runway, we could see the bright sunshine come through the clouds and bask Rarotonga in all its glory.  Don’t know where the sun had been for 3 days!  But, it showed up the second we took off!!

 Aitutaki means island of the Gods.  A Tahitian, who left Tahiti in order to escape the tribal wars, named the island of Aitutaki.  When the Tahitians were leaving, they came with all of their family, brothers, sisters, husbands and wives, children and on the way they were pursued by enemies, but escaped them when a storm kept the pursuers from catching up with them.  The storm broke right on the edge of the lagoon.  After the storm, the Tahitians saw the island of Aitutaki and made there way onto the beaches, which has many fruits and vegetables and no enemies.  This is what the legend is around this island.  I would like to believe a part of this and a part of the wiki story that says it was a God who discovered this island.  There are these wooden statues all over this island and it is a “God”, of what we have no idea.  I had my photo taken with a wooden statue of the original God so you could see him.  What an intimidating experience to be photographed next to such a big God!

We are staying at the hotel Etu Moana whose name means blue starfish.  We have blue starfish in the lagoon in front of our villa.  We also have large clams in the lagoon and all kinds of other tropical fish.  We also have too many sea cucumbers in our lagoon for our liking.  They are black things, about 6 inches long that look like

poop and emit a white sticky substance when attacked by their predators.  They also can expand to 20 to 30 percent of their size when attacked by a predator sort of the way silly putty expands. They are not harmful to humans, but they wash up on the shoreline and look like blobs of poop and you have to watch where you step in the water to avoid them so you don’t get sticky white stuff on your toes.  The natives use the sea cucumbers as squirt guns!

This island is a lot like Rarotonga in that it is surrounded by a coral reef so the waves break offshore and the island has a lagoon of clear, warm water surrounding it.  In fact, it is known for its lagoon and the clarity of the water in the lagoon.  The lagoon is the primary reason tourists visit this island.

The first full day on Aitutaki we rented a car and drove the 4 miles around the long island.  The car had 114,000 kilometers on the odometer and had no air conditioning.  There are numerous wild roosters and hens on the island.  They fly and roost in trees at night.  We also saw two pigs along the side the road.  We visited the local Supermarket and drove by the brand new reservation office for our airline company, Air Rarotonga.  For dinner, we went to the Pacific Resort and sat on its beach to watch the sunset and have, what else, Cosmopolitans.  The sunset that night was the most beautiful one we have seen on this trip, by far.   On the way home, we saw large crabs scurrying across the road, but no “Crab Crossing” warning signs! 

About 3 years ago, I bought a photograph at the Broad Ripple Art Fair of the perfect South Pacific Island with palm trees and surrounded by pure white sand and beautiful clear water.  I asked the photographer where the photo was taken and he explained that it was taken on one of his trips to the Cook Islands.  He explained that the island in the photo was used by the “locals” on Sunday for barbeques and had a post office on it, but he did not recall its name.  So, when we were planning our trip across the South Pacific and saw that a somewhat straight line from New Zealand to Tahiti passed near the Cook Islands, we had to include the Cook Islands on our trip to see if we could find the island in my photograph.  Our advance research led us to believe that One Foot Island in Aitutaki lagoon may be that island.

Our second full day, we took a tour of the Aitutaki Lagoon by boat and visited various motus, or small islands around the lagoon including Honeymoon Island and One Foot Island.  Honeymoon Island got its name as the idyllic pure white sand island for Honeymooners of course. There was in fact a wedding performed on the island several years ago.   One Foot Island got its name because it is shaped like a foot when viewed from above. But legend says that the islanders believe the island got its name because a tribe of warriors chased a boat to kill the male inhabitants.  In the boat there was a boy and his father but the warriors didn’t know there were two people on the boat as they only saw the father.  The father beached his boat on the island and told his boy to run and hide in the trees.  The father then stepped in his son’s footsteps making it appear that only one person was on the boat.  When the warriors got to the island, they followed the footprints, found the father and killed him.  But the father saved his son because the warriors were unaware of his presence hiding in a tree.  (or, as Norm believes, One Foot Island may have been the nickname for the original god that he had his photo taken with!)  One Foot Island had a post office on it and we believe that it is the one in the photograph that I purchased at the Broad Ripple Art Fair. 

We also donned snorkel and mask and checked out what was going on underneath the water in the lagoon.  We were amazed at the number and color of the fish.  We saw one fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish!! We also saw a turtle, a stingray and a giant clam. Finally, we went to the islands where Survivor was filmed. We saw where they held their tribal council, and other tribal gatherings, as these have been left untouched since the filming.  Upon seeing these uninhabited islands where they filmed this show, we can’t even imagine how they could find food to eat, let alone survive for however long they are kept there.  There is nothing on these islands except coconuts, the local fruits that grow, and maybe a few chickens.  Our boat driver told us that none of them (the peeps from survivor) could even catch the chickens.  After the boat trip, we could truly appreciate why people come to this island.

We leave tomorrow for Tahiti.  This will be our last stop on the trip.  We plan to visit three Tahitian Islands, Moorea, Tahiti and Bora Bora. 

Love you and miss you.  We will be home in about 9 days.  Norm & Rita

Aitutaki, Cook Islands…. BEAUTIFUL!!!

Great little place in Aitutaki!

Our pool and house bar in Aitutaki! The bar was on the honor system. You just write it down whenever you help yourself to anything!

This little guy, was just hanging out along side the road. Think maybe the rope around his foot had something to do with it?

These signs are posted everywhere in Aitutaki!

Anyone interested?

This is what lines the football field a/k/a soccer field in Aitutaki.

Wonder if the outrigger comes with the beach house.

Just a lovely view!

This is a beach cottage for rent. Not sure on the price, though.

Would this be an outrigger?

Now this one has a really cool anchor!

Rita’s favorite tree on our beach in Aitutaki!

Sea cucumber in the sand.

Sea Cucumber in the water!

Typical home in Aitutaki.

Now we think this picture could win some type of award!

The beginning of a great sunset.

Just magical how the colors change.

Norm’s version.

Rita’s version.

Norm and his “Island God”

Yes, Norm made Rita take a picture with the ‘Island God” also! She is playing Vanna White!

Must be a run on “Hair Dye” LOL!

Local Store advertisements.

We loved the advertisement UNDER the pay phone!

This is the airline office!

Here are some pictures from our boat tour of the lagoon area and the outer islands.

On our way to Honeymoon Island!

We got this close to Honeymoon Island and our boat driver stopped and said we’re snorkeling here! and this is the first fish we saw!

And this is George!

Trivelli fish! This fish swam with us!! Yeah, mostly Norm, as Rita jumped back in the boat!

Snorkeling with these yellow fish.

See the blue fish here too?

Blue and green fish! We really did snorkel with red fish and blue fish!

This is a turtle we could not keep up with and we were going fast!

Getting closer to Honeymoon Island, our first stop after snorkeling!

Honeymoon Island as we are walking to it from the boat.

Little guy that can’t fly!

Maina Island, this used to be connected to Honeymoon Island, but you can still walk there. It’s only about knee deep.

These are the pictures from “Survivor Island”.  We stopped at two of these!

One of the 4 “Survivor Islands”

I’m sure the tribal council meeting was held here.

Survivor Island leftovers.

This is where one of the tribes set up camp.

These guys love our visits.

Our boat driver (Kimmy) messin’ with the native birds on survivor island.

We walked across the entire survivor island (through a walking path filled with mozzzies) and this is at the other end.

And off we go again!

One Foot Island!

Ah, yes, a closer view of One Foot Island.

What is that on the island??

Here’s Norm hanging out at the Post Office on One Foot Island…He said this one looked nothing like the one he worked at during his first job in his hometown!

They sell postcards just like this at the front office of our hotel. Humm, could be a new business venture for us!

Rarotonga, Cook Islands.. very nice despite the rain.

This is our place in Rarotonga. On the day we arrived. It was partly cloudy for about two hours.

We loved these chairs in front of our hut.

Norm, before the rain!! Not pouting here!

Even a cloudy day in paradise is better than working!!

This is a TINY crab!!

This is our view from our fist dinner at the Little Polynesian!

Our First Dinner at the Little Polynesian.

Our view the next night at dinner! with the plastic down protecting us from the rain!

Most of our days looked like this in Rarotonga. Hence why Norm was whining???

Yes, Rita drove a backwards car… well, the steering wheel felt like that on the wrong side!

Our last night in Rarotonga!

Bar Lush!

Sunset from the “Shipwreck” – supposed to be one of the top 50 beach bars in the world! This is in front of where the cat was sleeping!

First Sunset in Rarotonga.

These are flying roosters.

November 11^th – 16^th

We took a four-hour flight on Monday from Sydney to Auckland. When I checked the bags, I noticed that the airport code for Auckland was “AKL”.  You can’t get away from Andy’s influence no matter how far you travel!

During the flight, I watched the movie “42”.  The movie was the story of how and why Jackie Robinson, the first black player in major league baseball, was brought into the Brooklyn Dodgers baseball organization in 1947.  I was extremely impressed with Jackie Robinson and Branch Rickey, the owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers, and emotionally moved by the moral character of these two men. These were men who did what was right, because it was right, even though it was unpopular.  They made the “hard decisions” in life, when it would have been easy to take the easy way out.  They both had sacrifices to make for the better good.  Strangely enough, these two men and their actions reminded me of the men and women I practice law with at the firm.  For over 38 years, I have participated in, and observed, the firm’s managers and its partners make the right decisions, and many times the hard decisions, for the benefit of the greater good of the firm and its family of employees.  The managers of the firm and its partners are men and women who, unselfishly and without hesitation, put others above themselves and have made many sacrifices, which at times have gone unnoticed and unseen, so that others in the firm could be treated with dignity and respect as individuals.  I have the greatest respect for the managers of the firm and its partners for always striving to do the morally right thing.  I am also proud to be a small part of that team and wish to recognize the managers and partners of Scopelitis for the character which it has instilled in all of us to be the best, morally best, that we can be in our daily lives and with each other.  If you have not seen the movie, I would recommend it to you.

New Zealand is a country of 5 million people and 31 million sheep.  The number of sheep is down from 70 million in 1982.  Baaaa!   The New Zealander’s also invented the tear back Velcro strip, the pop lid on a self-sealing paint can, the child-proof pill bottle, and the crinkle in hair pins so that they don’t fall out.  No part of New Zealand is more than 80 miles from the sea.

The average home price in Auckland is $652,000.  The average sized home is 1700 square feet.  Home prices went up 8% last year and 13% the year before.  Most homes are sold at auction because demand has outstripped supply.  The average income in Auckland is $57,000.  A New Zealander (KIWI) with an annual income of $75,000.0 can buy a home that is priced at $800,000.00!!! Crazy how they have no loan to income ratios here.  They just changed the standard loan guidelines and now you need 20% down to buy a home. But with that… nothing else matters.

We are in New Zealand to see if we can find the vineyards of Kim Crawford where  Sauvignon Blanc wine is produced.  Kim Crawford Sauvignon Blanc is a popular white wine sold in the United States for a reasonable price.  It is great chilled.  Good with appetizers, fish and chicken.  We have drunk so much of this wine in the last few years that we thought we should go visit our money in New Zealand!  So, here we are.

On Tuesday– we got a slow start.  We walked around the harbor and took photos of the boats.  The harbor is filled with all kinds of sailboats, powerboats and racing sailboats from various years of competing in the America Cup races.  Lunch was at The Foodstore, which specializes in New Zealand fresh produce, meats, fish and cheeses.  The menus in Australia and even more so in New Zealand recognize by name the farms and fisheries where the food is sourced.  It sometimes even has explanations regarding what the cows are fed, how the fish are raised, and whether the vegetables are organic.  The Aussies and Kiwis are very interested in eating healthy foods, free from processing and locally sourced. Later in the afternoon, we planned our next three days.  I got a haircut.  Rita finished the Sydney blog and posted the photos.  We hope you enjoy the Sydney blog and photos.

On Wednesday, we took a 45-minute ferry ride to Waiheke (pronounced: “Why He Key”) Island, a beautiful island with rolling green hills, sheep, lots of contemporary homes and a lot of vineyards.  We tasted red wine and had lunch at Stoney Ridge  Vineyard, which has a uniquely island feel to it, tasted red and white wines at Mudbrick Winery, which was more traditional in style and architecture and finished with white wine at Cable Bay Winery, which was more contemporary.  We had a great time on the island.  Residents said it was a wonderful place to live, with low stress and great weather year around.  The island has about 5,000 full time residents.

On Thursday, we went to Kumeu River Valley and visited the vineyards or tasting cellars for Kim Crawford, Nobilo, Cooper Creek and Artisan wines.  We spent almost two hours at Kim Crawford and Nobilo and got a great wine education and had a lot of fun.  Kim Crawford had so many different wines to taste that are not available in the US.  So we bought a lot of wine to be shipped to us so that it will be received before Christmas.  Lunch was totally organic and was at the Artisan Winery.  We had great homemade breads, homemade olive oil, balsamic vinegar, chicken, lamb, pasta and potato salad, tomato and greens salad, red cabbage salad and a greek salad.  Did I mention we had wine for lunch?  We had a great organic Sauvignon Blanc and a Pinot Noir.  We were supposed to meet up with Rita’s work colleague, but he was a little busy as he just arrived here on Wednesday night.  As he said himself, he has kids scattered all across this country he needs to see, so we are meeting him tonight.

Tomorrow we leave for Rarotonga.  Where do you ask is Rarotonga?   Rita prepared a map for you.  Follow us to this island paradise.  Here is the link for the map.  Be sure to click on the arrow in the upper right hand corner.

http://www.goprotravelling.com/embed/0e3461c5f09479c5d6d2baf434d39dff

Miss you all.  

See you soon.  Love, Norm & Rita.

WOW!! NEW ZEALAND ROCKS!!!

New Zealand Skyline

I guess these would be lounge lizards of NZ?

Hull of the NZ America’s Cup Sailboat

Info on the above NZ Sailboat Hull

On our way to Waiheke Island!

Sailors delight!

Vodafone racing sailboat

Ahh… here we are.. sure would like to live in the house on the top of this hill.

Typical style of housing on the island.

This is how they build in NZ.

No explanation needed.

Little Palm Beach.

Summer home on Little Palm Beach.

Oneroa Bay Beach, great family beach with a park, swings, great area for kids.

Pretty views from anywhere on the island.

Here are some of the vineyard pictures.

Stoney Ridge Vineyard

Where we had a great lunch and a few tastes, of course.

Nice red flight.

Mudbrick’s Vineyard

Te Whau (pronounced “TEA FOE”)

Cable Bay Winery…

Just some other beautiful sites along the way.

You can’t see the white specs on this, but they are sheep.

These are the sheep!

Then after Cable Bay, our taxi driver said, “I’ll just drop you off here and when you are done, you can leisurely take the short 10 minute walking path back to the ferry, that way you can take your time and drink, eat and relax.”  The 10 minute walking path turned into a 30 minute HIKE!!

This is what we walked through. Can’t even tell there was a walking path anywhere in there!!

Here is our view as we left Waiheke….

This is the dock where the ferries drop us off.

Here we are at Kim Crawford, Nobilo and Coopers Creek.

Here are some other sights around the harbor in Auckland!

Notice this says “VENOM”??!!

Good Morning from Sydney! 

Yesterday we walked around the Harbor and watched the boats on the Harbor.   There are ferries taking passengers to and from the suburbs.  There are water taxis taking passengers to private destinations.  Then, there is a cruise ship in the Harbor tied up next to our hotel.  We sunned at the rooftop swimming pool and lounged around in the hot tub.  Dinner was at the Hotel.

After the Harbor, we walked to the Sydney Opera House.  A Dane designed it by the name of Jorn Utzon.  While construction began in 1957, it was not dedicated until 1973.  The building is recognized as one of the most distinctive designs of the 20^th century.  The “shells” of the building have been described as waves and sails.  See our photos and see what you think the shells look like.

 After seeing the Sydney Opera House, we walked around the Rocks, which is the oldest section of Sydney.  The original “white” settlers established their post on the Rocks.  Today we enjoyed street merchants selling food, clothes, jewelry and other arts and crafts.

 Next, we took a taxi to Bondi Beach on the Pacific Ocean.  It is about a kilometer long beach of beautiful white sand.  It may have been the first white sand beach we have seen on this entire trip.  The Beach is a surfer’s mecca.  Above the Beach is a restaurant, the Iceberg, which has a billion dollar view of the beach so we ate lunch there.  We also enjoyed the fresh Australian wine that they produce near Sydney.

BTW, the taxi driver to Bondi Beach was a hoot.  He was Lebanese, 72 and had seven sons; the youngest was only 14 years old.  His wife left him at 58, after the birth of his last son, because she wanted a girl.  She had the last son when she was 57!  He called her the “CRAZY, LAZY WOMAN”!!!  He said he did all the cooking, cleaning, and worked full time and drove a taxi part time!  All she did was have babies and complain about him not giving her a girl!  He had an IPOD and played Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Tom Jones and Elvis Presley songs, all at ear piercing decibels! 

 From Bondi Beach, we took a taxi to Watson’s Bay and drank a Margarita at Doyle’s on Watson’s Bay.  It is a bar/restaurant that has been used in the past on television in Foster Beer commercials.  Beautiful people were everywhere.  Some were in summer casuals.  Some were dressed fashionably.  There was also a wedding going on at Watson’s bay with antique cars and everyone dressed in long tuxedos!  From Watson’s Bay we caught a ferry back to Sydney Harbor to end our day.

The homes in Sydney are lovely.  Laws and regulations protect most of them so that any architectural changes have to be approved.  While in Sydney, they had an auction of homes, which is the way they sell homes here, because the demand is so high. The MEDIAN sales price was $722,718 for the 784 homes sold.  Needless to say, the standard of living in Sydney is quite high by American standards.  An article we saw on line said that Australian couples living on $150,000 a year were having a tough time making ends meet.  The average income in Australia is $72,000, but the median income falls to $57,000. 

 Tomorrow we leave for Auckland where we are looking forward to meeting up with a work colleague of Rita’s who is a Kiwi, but works for Andretti, and is in Auckland visiting family, now that the 2013 Indy Car Series is over.  Hope to get the local view of Auckland from him, although we hear Kiwi’s drink a lot, so we may never get out of the pub with him!

Love and miss you all!  We will be home soon! Norm and Rita  

Some photos of Sydney!

First view of the Sydney Opera House.

Did Norm or Rita take this one?

Skyline of Sydney across the harbor.

This is right outside our windows.

Walked around the corner and thought this ship was in the grass!

But of course, it was in the water.

Night view of the opera house from our hotel room.

Nighttime view is spectacular! Who took this picture?

View from the Opera House

Bondi Beach

Gorgeous Bondi Beach!

Iceberg’s on the edge of Bondi Beach.

Pool at Iceberg’s. The waves crash into the pool.

View of Sydney from our ferry trip.

Front on view of the Sydney Opera House.

This was in the Fosters commercials. Does it look familiar?

Watson’s Bay

These are the bridge walkers/climbers on the top. We opted to forego this exercise.

Bridge from around the corner of our hotel. Looks really big!

Japanese wedding in front of our hotel, this is part of their photo shoot. Photographer was taking their picture “showing them walking the harbor”.

It was a beautiful gown.

On our last night, they had fireworks over the opera house! Beautiful display!

Loved the fireworks out our window.

Sunrise in Sydney!

November 5th thru the 8th, 2013

We flew from Bali to Melbourne, Australia on an overnight flight.  We arrived on the 4^th and learned that apparently, the biggest horse race in the world was being held in Melbourne on the 5^th. It is called the Melbourne Cup and the date is a National Holiday.  Horses from all over the world participate.  It is very similar to the Kentucky Derby, except that the horses are weighted, so some of them have a handicap, which makes the race a bit more fascinating, as any horse can win and the entire Nation stops for 5 minutes to watch the race.  There is a big parade held in downtown Melbourne with horses, jockeys, bands, celebrities and politicians participating.  All the women are decked out in Kate Middleton look a-like hats, dresses and high heels.  The men are dressed in coats, ties and hats also.  We placed a couple of bets, sat at a bar in a casino and watched the race.  As suspected our horses did not win, one of mine, and one of Rita’s placed, but of course, since we know nothing about betting, we placed our bet wrong, so we won nothing!!!  We could have won about $2500.00, had we known… Oh well, it was exciting just to participate in the local event.   

Afterwards we hopped in a taxi and went to the suburb of St. Kilda, which is on the beach about 6 kilometers from the city center of Melbourne.  We walked the boardwalk along the Southern Ocean, enjoyed the setting sun and watched the throngs on the beach.  As you are aware, it is November in Melbourne, which is like April in Indiana.  The temperature today was 79 degrees and very sunny.  We ate a snack at a beach side bar/restaurant called the “Stoke House” and watched the beach crowd as well as the race crowd returning from the Melbourne Cup.   

Like Singapore, Melbourne has been a very pleasant surprise.  It is clean and modern.  It is located on the Yarra River.  Melbourne has developed the banks of the River and created all sorts of upscale bars, restaurants, hotels, casinos, stores and malls.  The riverbanks are crowded day and night with people enjoying the nice spring weather, strolling along the river, eating and drinking.  All these people attract artists, musicians and magicians.  One unique street entertainer had a bicycle that was designed to go the opposite direction you are steering it.  He would bet people $10 they could not ride the bike about 15 feet.  While this may not sound too difficult, we watched several people try and fail miserably.  The people we watched could not even ride the bike 3 feet!!  We could not figure out the trick bike and how it worked.   I came to Melbourne specifically to see the Apostles.  The Apostles are 12 large limestone stacks or rocks standing in the surf off the Southern coast of Australia, in the Southern Ocean, 3 hours from Melbourne, of which only 9 are left standing.  Yes, I know that there were 12 Apostles in the Bible, but there are only 9 Apostles in Australia because unfortunately three have been lost to the wave erosion.  Why did I want to see the Apostles?  Well, the spectacular beauty of the Apostles always fascinated my father Harold whenever he would see them in a photo in a magazine.  He would always show me the photos of the Apostles and tell me that if he went to Australia someday, he would want to see them.  Although my father Harold gave to me his love of travel, and traveled extensively himself, he never made it to Australia to see the Apostles.  So, here I am in Australia and yes I did see them for my father Harold.  The 9 Apostles were impressive indeed to see in person.  But, more importantly, as I stood on the cliffs overlooking the Apostles, I could feel the presence of my father Harold with me and he was pleased that I was there.   To get to the Apostles, we drove three hours on the Great Coast Highway.  Along the route we saw eucalyptus trees, wild koala bears and kangaroo crossings, but no kangaroos.  The wild koala’s eat 4 hours a day and sleep 20 hours a day.  I am sure some of you would be jealous of that schedule!! 

The countryside was beautiful, rolling green hills with lots of trees, cows, and sheep.  The farms in this area are quite large by our standards.  They run in excess of 5000 acres.      On our last day in Melbourne, we decided to take a bus tour, to see what those “hop on – hop off” bus tours were all about.  It was actually very nice to ride in the comfort of the bus and hear the commentary with the history of all the different places.  We also got to see a lot of homes along the way, as this is a very downtown residential city.  Most of the buildings are made of glass to sustain the weather here, as wood rots easily.  The glass buildings make for a wonderful city landscape.   

We wanted to see Perth, on the southwest side of Australia, as Rita’s parents lived there for about 5 or 6 years prior to coming to the United States.  Her next oldest sister, Mary, was born in Perth.  But, unfortunately, since Australia is such a large country, we could only fit in two of the cities on our list.  So, we are off to Sydney now to explore this harbor town.  Talk soon!  

Happy birthday to Martha, Mary (Rita’s sister), and Brody!! All of them celebrate their birthday on the same day!!! November 11!!  

Love and miss all of you, Norm and Rita      

Melbourne, Australia

Our first sight of the south bank in Melbourne.

Helicopter rides over the city scape!

Evening on the boardwalk!

Whoah!! Didn’t know the fire was coming out of this when we walked by! We both jumped!

Lots of black swans here.

Walked by these on our way to the mall. Love them, they are named “Venus” and “Mars”!

One of the street performers that swallows balloons!

Yes, he REALLY did it!

Looks like a great place to stop for a drink!

Looks easy, right??

Actually, NO ONE could even get it started, they didn’t even pedal once!

Found these guys in the mall! Why he kept patting Rita’s head down, we have no idea!!

St. Kilda’s Beach

The Stoke House

Beautiful artwork on the beach, with real fire!

One of the first views along the Great Ocean Road.

Stopped along the way to take a picture.

Can you see the surfers?

Yes, Stephanie, you are correct… The top ten MOST DANGEROUS snakes live in Australia!!

When we stopped to see the Koala bears, we were told to watch out for all the birds. They attack people!

As mom is taking her sons picture, a bird decided to land on her iPad!

This is a sleepy head Koala bear.

Lots of these signs along the road.

We arrived! Here are a few pictures of the 12 Apostles          (we mean 9 Apostles)

This is the story of London Bridge.  Read the sign.

Yeah, Not the whole story, here!

See this beautiful rock formation? It was once ONE piece.

The real story is…

There was a tour bus group out on these rocks and all of the tour peeps had come across the rock on the left to the rock on the right, except for two people.  Then the crossing broke, fell and the two people were stranded on the rock on the right.  Of course the news people were all there, with there helicopters, TV camera crews, etc.  Well, turns out the two people stranded were a man and a woman on holiday together as a couple!  BUT… their respective spouses had no idea!! of course, until the TV news announced it! Crazy!

This is called Loch Ard Gorge of 1878, where a ship wrecked right into the wall of the ocean.

This is along the stretch of the Great Ocean Road that is called the Shipwreck Coastline.  Over 50 ships have wrecked along this part of the ocean.  The Loch Ard hit the reef and crashed.  One man held on to the hull of the boat for 5 hours and then swam from the other side of this gorge into this little inlet.  One woman, survived by clinging to the spar of the boat.  The man came ashore first and was resting on the beach at sunrise and he heard a women yelling for help.  He then swam out again to the other side of this gorge and rescued her.  Hence this is named “Loch Ard Gorge”.

Beautiful cove.

Here comes our bus tour!

This is supposed to be a ballerina’s tutu.

Cricket Stadium

Lego Building

Appetizer at Nobu.

We could do with out the eyes on this plate.

Norm, finishing his dinner with his MANNERS! At least he didn’t put them in his nose!!

Rita making friends with an Aussie woman to get some tips on betting!

O.K. Now let’s get down to business.

YEAH!! Won a couple bucks!

November 3rd, 2013

We spent a few days in Sayan.  We learned that Cindy Crawford, John Travolta and Julia Roberts all supposedly stayed in our Villa.  But, we figure they may tell that to everyone.  Our stay in Sayan (just outside Ubud) was different than our stay in Jimbaran as the resort was very tropical and jungle like.  There was no water surrounding us, no beaches, just beautiful lush grounds with coconut trees, gardens and flowers galore!  Very peaceful and tranquil.

 Yesterday we visited Pura Ulun Danu.  The second most important temple in Bali even though it was only constructed in 1926.  It is located in Lake Bratan.  It is dedicated to Dewi Danu the goddess of lakes and rivers.  The temple has 11 tiers which is the most a temple may have.  The number of tiers indicates the importance of the temple in Hindu worship.  The tiers are made of black palm fiber and no other roof in Bali may use black palm fiber for a roof except a temple.

 After visiting the temple, we went to see the terraced rice paddies of Jatiluwih.  While beautiful to see, it was unfortunate that the rice season was such that the rice was not in standing water which makes them even more beautiful because the water reflects the colors of the plants and sky.

During our journey, we learned a lot from our driver about Hindu culture and life.  For example, the average hotel worker in Bali makes $35 a month.  All marriages are arranged by families.  After marriage, the bride moves into the groom’s home with his grandparents, parents, and brothers and their wives and children. (Our driver had 14 people living in his house.) The family lives in a compound with 4 distinct and separate areas.  One area is for the temple.  One area is to greet guests and communal activities.  Another area is devoted to cooking.   The final area is the private area where the family sleeps.  The land for a home is very expensive.  It costs $24000 for 100 square meters.  The cost to build the compound is relatively inexpensive.  It only costs $12000. The compound is built in 2 months.  As noted above, each house has a temple.  And, every day, when you leave for work and when you come home, you are supposed to make an offering of food to the gods, which is left on the temple and another offering of food or flowers for the spirits are left on the ground.  The temples are draped in colors such as white, red and yellow, which represent purity.  Sometimes the temples are draped in black and white checked cloth to show that good and evil are in balance. It is wonderful to watch the Balinese practice their Hindu religion on a daily basis. 

 We saw some interesting Bali workers along our way to visit these sites. We have posted some pictures of those on the “Photo” page. 

 Love and miss you all ! Norm and Rita 

Our second stop in Bali, Sayan, which is just outside of Ubud was so nice also!

Entrance to the resort!

This is at the end of the walkway and they host weddings here and private dining on this patio with a pond on it.

Patio at the pond

These two greeted us while playing “Mary had a little lamb”.

Bar area with a great view

See the hooka pipe at the end of the bar?

Looking down the staircase, as there are NO ELEVATORS here at all!

On our way to our villa. Such pretty grounds.

First view of our villa. Where is it?

This is our roof to our villa with a lily pond and patio with bench.

Ok, here’s how we get inside.

See?

Our garden right across from our villa.

Lovely!

This is our view beyond the coconut trees in the back of our place.

Rita got these kids to wave at us while rafting by us!

Now lets just take a walk through the place.

Here are some pictures of the Pura Ulun Danu Temple.

We should compare this to the one on the page “Where are we going?” to see if we did a good job or not on our photos.

The sidewalks around the temple had these hand made pictures inlaid.

Here are some of the “Interesting things” we saw along our way to the temple and rice patties.

Round a bouts are all over the world.

A typical Balinese home

And the rice patties were also pretty.

They do all their work by hand. Notice her tool she’s using?

One night we had a Babi Guling festive dinner night.

Decorations for the nightly dinner.

Decorations for the night of Babi Guling!

Babi Guling! Delicious!

And just a few more random pictures of our walk through Ubud.

We have only 4 weeks left so I wanted to jot down some random thoughts.

1.  Our Hindu guide in India said Hindu’s believe that from birth to age 25, you should take care of yourself.  From age 25 to 50, you should take care of your family. From 50 to 75, you should take care of your community.  And, after 75 you should prepare for your next life. I thought this was food for thought.

2.  Everywhere we have traveled, people have healthier eating habits than we do in the US.  Little things are different. Plates are smaller. Portion sizes are smaller. There are always two or three vegetables with a dinner.  Meat, pork or chicken is the smallest portion on your plate. They do not place any butter on your table for the bread. The bread is eaten without butter although you may get olive oil with it.  Salt and pepper is not usually found on your table. When requested, the saltshaker has fewer holes than the peppershaker.  American brand named foods have been altered for local tastes. For example, Heinz Ketchup is runnier and not as sweet as in America.  Coca Cola is not as sweet as it is in America.  In general, desserts are not as sweet as American desserts.

 3.  The average sized family home in Denmark is only 1100 square feet.  It costs $436,000.  The averaged size home in the US is 2438 square feet.  The average price for a home in the US is $292,000.   Wow!  What do we do with all that extra room?

4.  Modern design.  We have seen more modern designed homes, kitchens and baths on this trip than we ever see during our trips in the US.  I always wonder why do so many Americans look backwards in time to create their home, kitchen or bath?  If everyone looked backwards in time for design and wants to build or buy a home that looks like their parents home, how will this generation create its own modern design?  Doesn’t the present generation want to leave its own design legacy, and not repeat the legacy of their parents?

5.  The people we have met in the various countries and we have observed interacting with their own fellow countrymen and women are very interested in discussing their current political issues and social issues in such casual social settings.  They discuss issues, not parties.  They apply a social consciousness to the discussion.  Issues such as immigration are discussed in terms of: is it morally right?  Not in terms of jobs, education or medical care. But, what is our moral obligation. It is refreshing to listen to them discuss such issues.

 6. Thirty three percent of Europeans over the age of 15 smoke. You can’t smoke inside a restaurant, so smokers get the prime outdoor seats in the summer. When asked about the fairness of this, most people felt sorry for the smokers who could not smoke inside.  We have never heard, even one time, the words “second hand smoke” or a discussion of the impact of smoking and second hand smoke on the socialized medicine scheme of Europeans.  

 7.  Hot food.  We don’t know how they do it, but when you are served food in a restaurant, no matter what you order, it is HOT.  We have had our tongues and roofs of our mouths burned so many times by the temperature of our food.  We love that our food is served hot and not lukewarm.  We can only guess how the food is served so hot, but we think it is because each meal is prepared individually and does not sit under a warming light before being served.  

We are in Bali this week.  It is one of the Indonesian islands.  It is to the east of “Java” (which is the largest Indonesian island and the island where President Obama spent a portion of his childhood).  Unlike the rest of Indonesia, Bali is Hindu, not Muslim.  It has about 3.5 million people.  I visited Bali 13 years ago, but I hardly recognized it because of all the changes.  The people remain gracious, kind and beautiful, but development has taken its toll on the islands infrastructures.  There are too many tourists, too many hotels, too many cars, and not enough roads.  It is a shame what being ranked by some as “the best island in the world to visit” has done.  

First sight of the grounds at our place in Bali. Nice first impression!

We can wear… “Flowers in our hair”.. remember that song?

So far, we have been only in Jimbaran, Kuta, Seminyak and Denpasar. We have lounged by our pool and taken all of our meals at the resort.  We ventured out to see two Hindu temples.  On our way out to the temples, we needed to stop by an ATM machine, (now one of my favorite places to go, as I’ve never used one prior to this trip).  We were in total shock when the amounts popped up on the screen!!! $500,000.00, $1,000,000.00, and $1,500,000.00!! WOW.. what large amounts!  We decided to go for the $1,000,000.00 as we have never seen that amount of money before.  Once we received it, we discovered that it really is only about 90.00 U. S. Dollars…. It totally burst our bubble of millionaires!

 Whew…. Now back to the Temples we were on our way to visit.  One is called Tanah Lot, a 15th century temple, and is the most photographed temple on the island.  It is located on a rock formation close to Bali, but separated from Bali by high tides.  The second temple is called Pura Uluwatu.  It is an 11th century temple and is sometimes called the monkey temple because it is home to so many wild monkeys.  The monkeys steal everything they can from the tourists and them slowly trade back the items stolen for food.  There have been many stories of tourists losing cameras, iPhones, sunglasses and hats to the monkeys.  Rita was told to really be careful with her iPhone, b/c they will jump you and take it and run up a tree and then bargain with you to get it back.  I had to remove my hat before going in as hats are at a high commodity also. 

We can tell we are near the equator because the temperature and the humidity are quite high.  For example today, it is 90 degrees and 62% humidity.  Sounds like a pool day to me.

Hummmm… which pool shall it be today?  

Tomorrow we go to Ubud, where Julia Roberts went in Eat, Pray, Love to find love.  I was in Ubud 13 years ago and loved it.  I am eager to see if the movie has ruined its quaintness and agrarian base.  

 We forgot to mention on our last blog that Rita’s granddaughter, Annabelle turned 3 on the 15^th, her grandson, Owen turned 5 on the 28th, and other grandson, Brody will be 2 on Nov. 11th.  Happy birthday to all of them!! Miss them all very much!

Love you all !!! Norm and Rita

Our first stop in Bali, we stayed in Jimbaran.  Here’s a few of our first pictures upon arrival.

A few little guys greeting us as we pull up.

The Lobby

More little guys to the left.

View from the Lobby, looks like this will be a nice place.

Now let’s take a walk around the grounds and check out the place.

Pretty waterfall coming up.

Yep, waterfall is beautiful up close.

Think we should depend on this handrail?

Whew!! Finally made it to our villa.

Our first dinner at Sundara!

Our view from our dinner table.

We visited Tanah Lot.

Tanah Lot

And then on to Pura Ulawatu but we had to pass by these little guys that steal your stuff!

Pura Ulawatu Temple

The back side of Pura Ulawatu

We have concluded 4 days in Singapore.  Singapore is an island and according to an ancient legend from the 8^th century, a sea monster appeared that was half lion and half fish and made such an impression on the Malay prince that he renamed the city “Singapura” which means “Lion City”.  So the Merlion is the symbol of Singapore.  

What a pleasant place to visit!  Singapore was supposed to be a stop off destination for a few days to break up the travel time from Bangkok to Bali. But, it has turned out, as so many other unplanned places we have visited, to be a real surprise.  

We knew we were no longer in Thailand, Cambodia, Turkey or India as soon as we left the airport.  First, the official language of Singapore is English so we could read all the signs. Second, the landscaping along the streets, a six-lane tree lined esplanade was lovely and free of trash and debris. We found out later that they spend $450,000,000.00 per year on the trees and landscaping in Singapore.  There are sooo many rain trees that look like umbrellas.  The British originally brought the trees to Singapore, from India.  We also found out that if you build either commercially or residentially you must contribute 10% of the square footage of the structure to “green space” in and around your building.  Next the streets, cars, houses, buildings were all clean, well maintained and modern. Then, we saw the skyline for the city and we both thought we were in Chicago.  So many tall modern glass buildings. Rita and I looked at each other and said this was going to be an easy place to do some R&R!!

What do you know about Singapore?  It is one of only three city-states in the world, which includes the Vatican and Monaco.  It has a population of 5.5 million people, but everywhere we went the locals said the city was too small. It is the fourth largest financial city in the world behind London, New York and Hong Kong.  These are: “Just the facts, mam.  Just the facts!”

But, Singapore is so much more than the facts.  Did you know it is illegal to sell chewing gum in Singapore?  If you are convicted of littering three times, you have to clean the streets on Sunday wearing a bib that says: “I am a litterer”.  Failure to flush a public toilet after use is subject to very hefty fines.  Hooking onto an unsecured wi-fi connection is illegal and punishable with hefty fines.  Bungee jumping is illegal.  Smoking is banned in all public places.  It has the world’s tallest Ferris wheel.  Singaporeans are the “fastest” walkers in the world. It is considered pornographic, and therefore illegal, to walk around your home in the nude.  It is illegal to hug another person without his/her consent.  No guns or firecrackers are allowed. You cannot poke fun at any religion. But, it is illegal to carry a bible or to speak to anyone about Jesus Christ. How are all these laws enforced??? YOU ASK????? Well, in Singapore they use “plain clothes” policemen and women to watch out for these offenses, so …… beware!

On our first night, we ate at Indochine.  Indochine specializes in Southeast Asian food from Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and Thailand.  Our appetizers were Asian shrimps wrapped around a sugar cane stick, they were great! Rita had lamb chops “Vietnamese style” and I had truffle’d duck. All were amazing!

Rita and I are staying across from the Marina Bay Sands Hotel and Casino. 

It is a three building structure with a bar, restaurant and swimming pool on the 57th floor. We had dinner there last night at Ku De Ta, a clever play on phonetics and watched the laser light show that Marina Bay Sands puts on each evening that shows up on the waters surrounding it.  Afterwards we walked around Clarke Quay and Boat Quay, which are areas along the riverfront lined with bars, restaurants and music venues. The crowds of people were unbelievable. But, the weather here is perfect for just hanging out. The daytime high is near 90 and the evening lows are near 70.  We saw Singaporeans wearing interesting costumes although we do not know why. Maybe a bachelorette party?  Maybe they were celebrating Halloween for westerners?  We passed some twin girls and I wanted to take their picture b/c I didn’t actually know what they were dressed as, but they were really cute and had backpacks and Rita giggled loudly at the two girls because they were dressed as Fook – Yu and Fook – Me.  Of course, since I had no idea what she was giggling about when we got home she found the u-tube video from the Austin Powers movie and made me watch it!  

Singapore is a shoppers paradise with mega-malls of luxury goods on almost every corner and all the malls are connected so that you can walk from one mall to another mall without going outside.  We did do a little shopping, as Rita finally got a new pair of high heels, a kick ass pair of high heels too!  Now she’ll quit whining about not having any high-heeled shoes.  While not a shopper myself, I love to watch shoppers and I am amazed at the women who buy a Prada purse for $8,000 and get their credit card out of their $2,500 Gucci billfold from their $6,000 Louis Vuitton purse!!  Seriously, most of these women have two and three designer shopping bags on their arm!!  It is truly amazing to see such wealth in the world up close and in action after passing through such poverty stricken areas in Thailand where the minimum wage is $10 a day, and the average annual income might be $2900.

On our last morning in Singapore as we are entering the lounge for breakfast, the hostess stopped us to say that Rita is not allowed to wear “slippers” to the lounge as it is against the dress code! Seriously??????? DRESS CODE???? SHE HAS WORN THESE SAME SHOES EVERY DAY IN THIS LOUNGE along with all the other women that were wearing the same type of shoe!!!  So needless to say, I immediately spotted women in the lounge wearing so called slippers and pointed them out, but we were turned away.  Rita even explained to the gal that she did not bring anything other than her so-called slippers.  So we went back to the room, read the rules, and they say “COVERED SHOES ONLY”. O.K.  So COVERED shoes are nowhere NEAR a slipper or as we call them a slip on sandal.  So I, Rita, not Norm, put on my gold sandals that have a T-strap with a strap around the heal (hence… no slip shoe).  We went back to the Lounge and lo and behold… we passed the dress code.  Good thing because by now we were famished!!

As soon as we were seated, Norm is noticing all the women in there that have on flip-flops, sandals, EVERYTHING BUT A COVERED SHOE!!!  So NORM (THE LAWYER NORM) brought all of this to the hostess that rejected us and all she could do was shrug her shoulders and all of a sudden she doesn’t understand ENGLISH!!! WHOAH… That did it! SO… STORMIN NORMIN went to the manager of the lounge and again reiterated everything that happened, pointed out all of the NON-DRESS-CODE shoes in the lounge and told her that if you have a rule, enforce it, but do not pick and choose who you enforce it on.  She told Stormin Normin that she would look into and get back with him.  Of course, if any of you know NORM… he looks at his watch thousands of times a day, (must be from a life of keeping track of every billing minute) and we did not get a call or any response by the time we left the lounge. So of course STORMIN NORMIN KICKED IT UP A NOTCH… and complained to the General Manager of the hotel who called us back, apologized for both of them, sent us a nice apology card, chocolates and a bottle of wine.  Need a good lawyer???? Call Stormin Normin….

 After such a rough morning, we decided to go over to the Raffles Hotel to see how they treat their guests on a daily basis.  The Raffles Hotel is a historical hotel from British colonial times, which hasn’t changed much over the years.  Its claim to fame is the Singapore Sling developed by their bartender Ngiam Tong Boon sometime in the late 1800’s.  So when in Singapore do as the Singaporeans and have yourself a Singapore Sling!!! Of course we indulged in this and it was even before NOON!

It has been so long since either of us have had one that we were amazed at how good they really are when made properly!! Rita copied the recipe for all you youngin’s out there who have yet to taste the pleasure of this tropical luscious amazing drink!! They would be great to make in a large kegger that you could just hit the tap and voila … pour yourself a drink! Maybe a kegger of these by the pool in the summertime! Yes… very nice!

 This afternoon we fly to Bali. Hope our arms don’t get tired. Congratulations to Kyle and Mandy who celebrated 16 years of marriage yesterday. I am so proud of them.

Love and miss you all.  –Norm & Rita

Singapore

What a view from our room! This is Marina Bay Sands.        Ku De Ta restaurant is on the top of this.

Night photo of the Marina Bay Sands

The WORLD’S largest ferris wheel.

View from Ku De Ta.

Another view from the top.

This soccer field is suspended above the water. Guess you lose your ball if you kick it to far!

Clarke Quay

Boat Quay

Boat Quay

Anyone Hungry??

Different options for all appetites!

Sunrise in Singapore

Our rock zen garden

Poolside

You can eat dinner in these ferris wheel cars.

Famous Merlion.

October 22, 2013

We came to the beach in Kata Noi for a few days of R&R.  We have a villa, with a private plunge pool overlooking the beach. On our first morning we had breakfast in the room while we stared out at the beautiful infiniti pool and ocean.  Our fried eggs were in the shape of hearts as were our pancakes! We lazed around the pool and our cabana inside the pool most of the day.  Then, we watched about three weddings on the beach in three days, all of course happening at sunset, one of which had a baby elephant ushered down the aisle to lead the procession from the outside beach alter to the inside wedding dinner.  We got the impression very quickly that this must be a  destination-wedding site.  

On Saturday night, we went into famous (or infamous) Patong Beach, depending on who you asked, to see the night life.  It is a street about 6 blocks long, lined with bars, and filled with under 30 Aussies doing what they do best, getting drunk.  Of course, there were other nationalities represented as well as other age groups from over 30 to WAY OVER THE HILL.  And, where there are boys at play, there are lots of girls and women to watch the boys play and to help them spend their money.  Get what we mean….. Most of the street was tame, people drinking, watching soccer, listening to live music, it could have been Broadripple.  But, there was the infamous side of Patong if you looked for it, but we only stayed for about an hour, played Checkro in a bar, and had a couple of beers, figuring beers in a bottle would be the safest thing to drink.

The next morning we both felt very ill and realized that we had come down with food poisoning.  Rita came down with quite a severe dose of the food poisoning from dinner, not Patong, required a nurse and prescription drugs, and helped us appreciate why Phuket (pronounced pooh ket) might just be called “puke it or poop it”) if you know what we mean!  We decided it was from Rita’s meal that we both got the food poisoning, as she ate about half of her meal and always gives me a bite or two for a tasting.  I only had to stay in bed one day, but after two days of lying in bed and taking drugs, Rita is feeling better today and is ready to make our flight tomorrow to Singapore.  

We miss you and love you.  Hope you are still following us.  We have not had any comments to our last three blogs. Think maybe you forgot about us or you just didn’t get excited by our last several blogs and photos. We will try to do better.  You cannot always hit a home run. 

Love.  –Norm & Rita 

Phuket, Thailand (Actually, these are from Kata Noi Beach in Phuket)

First of all here are a few of our place and the view from our room!

Breakfast in our room overlooking our pool and the ocean.

Heart Shaped Eggs!

This is breakfast from the veranda.

Breakfast view!

Then here are some nightlife pictures!

It is Thursday.  We are 11hours later than Indianapolis time and a day ahead of Indianapolis.  So, when we are writing our blog, it is 5:30 PM on Thursday where we are and 6:30 AM on Wednesday in Indianapolis.  It gets so confusing trying to communicate with you at home. 
We are in Siem Reap, Cambodia.  It has a population of 162,000. They speak Cambodian. But, the money they use in Cambodia is the US dollar!  We found that to be very weird. They have their own money, but no one uses it.  All prices for hotels, restaurants, admissions, etc. are in US Dollars.  Apparently, the UN paid its peace-keeping soldiers stationed here in 1993 in US Dollars and the currency stuck.

Cambodia has had a tough history. From 1975 to 1979, it has been estimated that 1.5 to 2.5 million Cambodians were either executed or died of starvation during the Khmer Rouge era.  Since the UN’s involvement in 1993, the lot of the Cambodians has been steadily improving although their economy is not very strong. The Cambodians we have interacted with are beautiful people, hard working, gracious, smile often and laugh a lot. 

We came to Cambodia to see the temples that include Angkor Wat, considered by some to be one of the new “seven wonders of the world”.  There were originally 290 ancient temples packed into a 150-mile area surrounding Siem Reap.  Most of the temples are from the 11th to the 13th Century.  Adjacent to Angkor Wat is Angkor Thom, a 13th Century metropolis of over 1 million people at a time when London’s population was a mere 30,000.  It was the last capital of the Khmer Empire, which controlled much of Southeast Asia for over 600 years. Unfortunately, Angkor Thom no longer exists. 

Angkor Wat was originally a Hindu temple dedicated to the God Vishnu.  But, it was subsequently converted to a Buddhist temple.  It was built from 1125 to approximately 1165.  It took 20,000 workers and 40,000 elephants.  The 5.5 million tons of stone came from a quarry 25 miles away.  Angkor Wat covers a space in excess of 15 million square feet. It has 5 lotus blossom shaped towers that  symbolize Mount Meru and it’s surrounding peaks which are the center of Hindu Universe.  Stairways connect the three levels of the temple. The top level is known as “Balkan”, which represents heaven.  After Angkor Wat was converted to a Buddhist temple, the second level, the Hall is known as the hall of a Thousand Buddhas, because it contained statues of Buddhas standing guard over the temple.  Angkor Wat has carvings or bas reliefs on the temple walls that are 1800 feet long.

Rita and I visited Angkor Wat in the rain. Everything was wet, muddy, dark with mold or mildew which has grown for over 700 years, and very crowded as always. The sky was a yucky white, you know kind of like Indianapolis in March.  My camera photos were all under exposed, my fault. I did not compensate for the white sky and the black subject.  Rita’s IPhone photos were a little better.  So, I did not really consider Angkor Wat to be the “wow” sight that I thought it would be.  I was somewhat disappointed and I don’t know why. I just can’t put my finger on it.  Rita found it interesting, but she was not wowed either. She thinks maybe her expectations were too high and that she thought it was going to be so much more.  We don’t want to demean Angkor Wat in any way, it was beautiful, extraordinary, a masterpiece of engineering and construction, but we did want to share our impressions.  Take a look at our photos and give us your impressions. 

After Angkor Wat, we visited Ta Prohm, a nearby temple area that was used as a movie location for Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.  For the most part, this temple complex has been left in the state in which it was found.  In other words, the temple has not been completely cleared of the trees and vines from the forest/jungle that is in the process of reclaiming it.  We found Ta Prohm to be stunningly beautiful because of the interaction or inter connectedness of the temples and nature.  Beautiful sponge trees with elongated roots had claimed a large portion of the temples with their roots spreading out like the legs of an octopus over the temples.  Many of the temples were covered with green moss that seemed to radiate color. The temples are quite photogenic and the temples have this wonderful atmosphere even in the rain, wet, muddy, white sky, and crowded conditions.  See our photos for the results.  

We would like to say that the people here in Cambodia are very humble and inviting.  They always have a smile on their face and are more than willing to go above and beyond to help us experience their country.  They are very proud of who they are and it really shows in their actions towards us.  

There are two very important things that we wanted to add to this post, but as of right now, neither one of us can actually remember what they are.  Old age, travelers absent-mindedness, we don’t have any explanation, except we forget right now. So as soon as we remember what those two things are, we’ll post them.   

Love and miss you all, Norm and Rita

Siem Reap, Cambodia  – Here are some photos from Angkor Wat.  Angkor Wat is the largest religious edifice in the world.

This was our personal tuk tuk driver from our resort.

This is how they do it in Cambodia!

One of the fountains at the resort.

This little gal played music for everyone in the mornings as we passed by her on our way to breakfast.

Ta Prohm ( Where Lara Croft Tomb Raider was filmed)

Then we did venture out at night to check out the nightlife in Siem Reap!

I think I’ll stick to a regular pedicure, thanks…

And had to see what it also looks like by day!

October 14, 2014

Rita and I left India just in time to miss the killer cyclone Phailin hitting the east coast of India.  We were in route to Bangkok during the storm and had to deviate our flight pattern to avoid Phailin. Even then, we had a pretty bumpy ride for about 4 hours. But, we arrived safely in Bangkok on Friday night.  We are staying in the Chao Phraya a River which is known as the river of kings. It is a very busy working river with lots of barge traffic, water taxis, longboat taxis, and dinner cruise boats. The river is brown, not exceptionally clean, filled with debri, and utterly fascinating to watch. 

We took it easy the first couple of days. Rita has an upper respiratory infection, so we are nursing her along and hoping it gets better soon. On Friday, we listened to a great singer and her guitar player in our hotel lounge.  Sang for hours all the great 70s, 80s and 90s hits. Of course, everything was in English.  On Saturday, we went to this Sky Bar for drinks. It is a rooftop bar on the 63rd floor of the Lebua Hotel.  Obviously, it has great views of Bangkok. But, more importantly, it was one of the locations used in Hangover 2.  

Today we did our real sightseeing.  We started at 8 in the morning and quit at 1.  It was 95 degrees and humidity was 70%.  Everything including us was dripping!  In any event, we took a water taxi to the Wat Phra Kaew Temple, the most important temple in Thailand.  It contains the Emerald Buddha, which is actually jade. It is only two feet tall, but sits on a tall gold alter.  The Thai people are very spiritual and devote Buddhist. They pray, make offerings and tithe at some 4000 Temples in Bangkok and 44,000 a Temples nationwide. It is a joy to watch them practicing their religion.  The Emerald Temple and the surrounding Temples have the most amazing architecture consisting of colorful tile roofs, gold leaf tiles, mosaic tiles and mirrors, and broken porcelain salvaged from shipments from China.  It even has a complete replica of Angkor Wat, where we are scheduled to go next. It seems that the King if Thailand saw Angkor Wat and had his craftsman create this replica from his drawings since this was before the invention of the camera.  The Emerald Temple is located within the Grand Palace which is the official residence of the King of Thailand.  The Palace is a replica of Buckingham Palace.

From the Wat and Palace, we took a tuk tuk, a three wheeled vehicle, to a longboat taxi which took us through the canals of Bangkok to see how real Bangkok people actually live.  There are mansions interspersed with commercial buildings, shacks, and temples. Bangkok in recent years has been hit pretty hard by flooding and evidence of such flood damage was everywhere along the canals. 

The longboat taxi deposited us at the Temple of the Dawn, which is constructed of broken porcelain from China arranged in floral patterns. It is known for its central spire which towers over 200 feet in height. 

After the Temple of Dawn, we took a water taxi to the a Temple of the Reclining Buddha.  The Reclining Buddha is 45 feet in height and over 129 feet in length and covered in gold leaf. President Obama and Hillary Clinton visited the site in November 2012.  This is one big Buddha! 

Our last stop of the day was to see the Golden Buddha, which has an interesting story associated with it.  The Buddha was covered with concrete and was being moved from one temple to another on 1955 when a workman scratched the concrete by accident and discovered that the concrete was merely a cover for a solid gold Buddha!  It is the largest solid gold statue in the world.  It is 9.8 feet tall and weighs 5.5 tons.  It is estimated that the worth is over $250 million Dollars.  The origin of the statue remains unclear even today!!

After 5 hours of sightseeing in the heat and humidity, we were Buddha’d out!  We returned to the hotel for a couple of hours of swimming and a two-hour Thai massage. Tomorrow is a free day so we can catch up blogging and photos.  We leave for Siem Reap, Angkor Wat, Cambodia on Monday as we wind our way home via our circuitous route. 

We’ll post Bangkok pictures as soon as we can.  Gotta catch and early flight in the morning so need to get to bed.   

We love you and miss you. –Norm & Rita. 

Bangkok, Thailand

This is the GOLDEN BUDDHA. It is worth over 250 Million dollars.

We flew from Udaipur, to Delhi, to Varnasi and to Khajuraho our final destination on Wednesday.  Upon arrival, we drove one lane roads to our Hotel Lalith passing dogs, cows, goats, pigs and water buffalo wandering toward us at times and across our path at other times. Those animals were up and about scarring the tourists on the one lane roads and were either resting nearby the road in the shade or grazing on the garbage heaps strewn around everywhere on the ground.  Other animals wandered into shops to visit with the shopkeepers. For example, I saw a cow stick his head into a stall where food was being prepared and a goat standing on the step to a store which sold lottery tickets and potato chips. Strangely, these scenes have become very common place to Rita and me after only one week in India.  People were doing their morning bathing at the nearest water pump along the road.  Children were riding their bikes to and from school in neatly cleaned and pressed school uniforms.  If the children do not have bikes, the government will provide them so there is no excuse for not attending school. Kharjuraho is a small village of approximately 20,000.  At one time, there were 55 sandstone temples in Kharjuraho, but only a few are remaining today. People come from all over the world to see the elaborately stone carved temples from the 10th, 11th and 12th centuries. The temples were constructed by Hindu Kings, but Hindu Kings who showed a tolerance toward other religions such as Islam and Christianity. It took 20,000 workers to build the temples. 

Norm and Rita

Khajuraho, India

October 7, 2013

Today we took a 7-hour drive from Jaipur to Udaipur to stay at the Taj Lake Palace, a hotel in the middle of Lake Pichola.  Before we left, we were told that we would have to take a box lunch and that sanitary conditions would be such that there were no bathrooms on the trip. Hats off to Rita for “holding it for 7 hours”.  The driver and I made it 5 hours, before we stopped and used the bushes along the side of the road.  But, at the end of the road from Hell, there was heaven.  Even Rita agreed.  We were taken to the center of the lake by boat to an all white marble Palace to spend two days. This is our ONLY destination that was picked solely for a hotel, rather than the sights to be seen.  The hotel in the middle of the lake had always struck me as beautiful so I had to stay there.  The hotel was built in 1743 by a king.  It was his summer palace.  It really is breathtaking.  The James Bond film “Octopussy” was partially shot on the island.

We felt like movie stars today upon arrival, first because Rita was greeted at the dock with a bouquet of roses for our anniversary…. 

(Yeah, Rita’s smiling, but all she is thinking is get me to the hotel so I can PEE!) and also because all these photographers and movie cameras were set up on the hotel dock and when Rita and I arrived, we were showered with rose petals falling from the roof. We thought it was odd and we had no idea why we were the center of attraction, but everyone turned out to watch us depart the boat and get showered with rose petals. We later learned that the hotel was shooting a promotional movie today and they used our arrival to test whether the falling rose petals would work, how long they would take to fall, and where they would fall. So, instead of being movie stars we were actually guinea pigs!  

This evening we took an hour long cruise at sunset to see the hotel from the lake, the City Palace, which is the largest royal palace in Rajasthan,  and several islands that the king also owns including Jag Mantir, where his son lived for several years.  After the cruise, we watched local Indian musicians perform and sing along with local Indian dancers.  Rita and I celebrated our 8th Anniversary together tonight.  We had roses, cards and a cake which were all hidden by this beautiful umbrella.  I don’t think we will soon forget where we were on this date!!   

The chocolate cake was scrumptious!! 

Love and miss you all!  

Norm and Rita 

Udaipur, India… Took quite a long road trip to get there, but really worth it!

I think we’re going the right way.. not sure..

Looks like lunch time as we approach Udaipur.

Yep, let’s stop for bite to eat.

So far, Udaipur looks nice!

This is the drive to our hotel docking pint to catch the boat. Looking better!

This was our first view of our hotel upon arriving at the boat dock that takes you there!

This is the front of our hotel where the rose petals dropped on us from above!

This boat is for use of the hotel guests for dinners, tours, etc.

View of the City Palace, Udaipur

View of our courtyard area at the hotel.

One of the many flower arrangements hanging around the hotel! These are done daily with fresh flowers

Another clever flower arrangement! (Uh oh, are we getting OLD??? taking pictures of flowers??? BTW…. Norm took these!! LOL )

Just a cute picture and a bird hanging near the spa!

Pool area, very nice. Don’t understand how they can have a marble tile bottom and walls in the pool. Maybe b/c of the good climate?

Cows are even hanging out at the City Palace by the lake!

O.K…. now this was in OUR ROOM! How cool!

One of the gals that was in the photo shoot for the promotion. We caught her poolside here.

This is a view of the hotel with a storm brewing as we went out for our evening cruise.

This is the City Palace at night.

Jag Mantir island palace courtyard at sunset.

View of the Jag Mantir summer house for the King when he wanted to get away from the Queen.

This is the garden area.. nice place to relax, I’d say!

We thought we’d act like the Japanese tourists…. minus the peace signs! LOL!

Entrance to the City Palace of Udaipur.

The Palace is so big you can’t really get a great picture of the whole thing. This is the best we could do from the courtyard.

Another God inside the foyer of the Palace.

The Kings bedroom with mirrored walls.

The Queen’s chair/swing. She sat her and her maidens dressed her from head to toe, including jewelry!

One of the conference rooms used at the Hotel inside the Palace.

This entrance is to the side of the City Palace and is actually the entrance to where the KING currently lives.

Such a calm lake before the storm.

It was weird to see the rain and storms b/c we had sunshine at the hotel. But we loved watching them.

Dancers at our hotel.

She’s getting flexible, see her feet?

Not sure if you can see this (double click to enlarge the photo) but she is doing a backbend to pick up two rings with her EYES!

WHOAH!!! We have never seen this before!! WOW!!

October 5th and 6th, 2013

 WOW!  India continues to be fascinating. We left Agra with a guide and driver and began our 4hour drive to Jaipur which is in the state of Rajasthan.  We don’t think words can adequately explain the sights, sounds and smells of our journey. A picture is worth a thousand words so please see our photos depicting what we saw and experienced on our drive. 

When we arrived in Jaipur on Saturday, we threw our luggage in the room and headed for the City Palace where the 16-year old king of Jaipur resides. The king of Jaipur is called ” king one and a quarter”, which in Hindi is “sawai”, because a visiting emissary first called the king’s Father the number one and a quarter king to emphasize that he exceeded all other kings.  The largest silver pot in the world is in the city palace. We also visited Mantar Jantar which is an observatory built by the king to observe the heavens, track time and follow horoscopes. 

BTW… This is the biggest sundial (Samrat Yantra) in the world!  It is in the Guinness Book of Records. 

Jaipur is known as the pink city because in the old town all the buildings are painted pink. The king ordered them painted pink for a visit by Prince Albert from England. Jaipur was also the first planned city in India with streets intersecting at right angles.

In the evening, we listened to traditional Indian music and watched a traditional Indian dance performance. 

On Sunday, we visited the Amber Fort, Palace of the a Winds, Samode Palace, took an elephant ride, rode behind a camel on a cart, and saw the Jal Mahal Lake Palace.  

We opted for the cart instead of the camel, b/c it was supposed to be a 1 1/2 to 2 hour ride.  Thank  goodness it wasn’t that long at all!  The cart was bad enough!  Now we know why the guy WALKS  the camel!

We learned that Hindu’s believe in three major gods. The gods are the “generator”, who made the world, the “operator” who operates the world, and the “destroyer” who destroys evil. We also learned why the women in Rajasthan wear such brightly colored clothes.  Rajasthan is very dry and has little rain. Because there is no rain, there are no rainbows. Therefore, the women make the rainbows in Rajasthan by wearing brightly colored clothes. 

Next stop is Udaipur, a 6-hour drive from Jaipur.  Who knows what exciting things we will see on that drive!! 

 We love and miss you all. Norm & Rita. 

Jaipur, India.. also called the “Pink City”

On our way these are some of the sights we saw while driving to Jaipur.  Crazy stuff!

Just taking a walk down the road with my donkeys!

Can you believe they use bamboo for scaffolding and for support?

Yeah, Norm said this was our hotel!! Right….

They are all singing and going to temple.

See again, the women work hard!

Now this guy was coming straight at us!

This taxi has at least 35 people on it!

Again, just walking, just sayin!

Women work hard in India.

These gals kept staring at Rita, we said to the driver, it must be b/c of Rita’s blonde hair. He said, NO… it’s b/c she’s WHITE!! LOL !

Oh, Yeah.. we have to dodge Elephants too!

Fatehpur Sikri, an abandoned city near Agra we visited by tuk tuk.

Jaipur, India

Entrance Gate to the “Pink City”.

Just a couple guys hanging around inside the Pink City…

The women used to sit behind these windows and watch the action in the streets.

Jaipur City Palace

Largest silver pot in the world!

Another view of the Palace where the current king lives.

Aquarius!!

A few snake charmers.

This gal struck a pose for us! Wasn’t that nice of her? She is sweeping the palace dressed like that! Amazing!

This little guy won Rita’s heart for sure! He was singing in French, Italian, English, Spanish, and when we stopped to listen, he asked us where we were from, we said… USA… he then made up a song about us from the USA visiting his India home! HE WAS SO SPECIAL!

Photo of Elephant Ride.. We’re the ones on top waiving to you !!

This guy almost got kicked over by this animal! uh.. yeah Norm??

Bad picture b/c of the reflection of my blue pants ( Angela/Steph… blue pants??) anyway… the guy in white is a medicine man, if you have anything that pains you, he will heal it by rubbing his hand over the area and chanting. Been doing it for over 50 yrs in the same spot!

A former lake palace in Jaipur, they are turning this into a restaurant.

Samode Palace

The Samode Palace is currently used as a hotel.

This little guy does magic tricks and he should be on TV, he is soooo good!! Wish I could get him hooked up!

See… we are relaxing… Norm lost at Croquet! But we had fun!

Crazy gift from the maid! They are always monkeying around!

Yes, she is dancing and twirling all around with 6 clay pots on her head!

Rita’s favorite waiter… he has such a large… PEPPER MILL!!

October 3, 2013

We arrived in Delhi, India at 4:30 AM.  Our driver picked us up and we began our 3-hour drive to Agra to see the Taj Mahal.  The first thing the driver told us was that to drive in India all you needed was a good horn, good brakes and good luck. Before we left the airport, we understood what he meant. We were not in Kansas any longer.  First, they drive on the left side of the road, although it was clear to us that cars regularly drive on both sides of the road and drive directly at you whenever they can.  Second, the streets leading into and out of the airport were already crowded with cars, trucks, push-carts, three wheelers, and people walking in all directions.  There were traffic lanes, but they were only a suggestion. No one seemed to pay any attention to the lane markings.  Horns blared, lights flashed and cars cut you off everywhere you drove.  I looked over at Rita and she was gripping the arm rests so hard that her knuckles had turned white, her eyes were closed and her lips were quietly mouthing Hail Mary, Mother of God!  (I figured it was not a good time to interrupt her.) 

We proceeded along the streets of Delhi until we reached the new expressway to Delhi that has shortened the drive by 2 hours. As we left Delhi behind, my last memory was of the air that I could see in the street lights.  I could actually see the air because it was full of dust everywhere I looked.  The expressway was an improvement over the Delhi streets, but it was not without its dangers.  We soon began to pass many groups of Hindus parading at very high volume in one of the lanes on the expressway, chanting loudly to music being played from speakers attached to what had to be a boom box or ghetto blaster on a push-cart or sometimes a truck and at other times a tractor.  Mind you that it is still dark out.  They are walking in a lane on the expressway; and you cannot see them until you are right on top of them. The driver said that this would continue for 9 days while the Hindus would fast and go to temple everyday.  I thought, they may get to heaven faster than they will get to the temple if they keep walking on the expressway!  As we proceeded on to Agra, the sun came up.  The cityscape gave way to a countryscape, we saw people working in fields of corn rice, sugar cane and millet.  Men and women working side by side with only hand tools.  They carried sugar cane, water, sticks, everything needed for their toil on their heads.  We passed numerous smoke stacks that dotted the countryside.  Apparently, the smokestacks are part of brick manufacturing and that is very important to the local economy.  Things seemed to be going well until the brakes on the car were applied quickly, the tires screeched on the highway, and the car turned a little sideways and began to slide. We didn’t know what was going on or what to expect next, when the driver yelled “monkeys”!  Rita looked out her side of the car window and crossing in front of us on the expressway was a group of 25 monkeys playing dodge  ’em with the cars in the expressway.  The expressway soon gave way to the streets of Agra, a city of several million.  In order to appreciate what we saw in Agra, we thought we would let our photos do our talking for us.  Please see our photo section. Remember a picture is worth a thousand words. 

Even though we had an overnight flight, we checked into our hotel, the Oberoi, and headed for the Taj Mahal by 9:00 AM.  Everyone has seen pictures of the TM.  Everyone knows the love story.  But, being there and seeing it in person and hearing the story makes it all seem so intense.  First, the TM seems so much larger in person than it does in photos.  The TM is a mausoleum made of the hardest crystalline white marble.  It was started in 1632 and finished in 1648. It took 20,000 workers and over a 1000 elephants to complete the construction. It was built by Shah Jahan who was grief stricken after the death of his third wife, Mumtaz Mahal, who died giving birth to their 14th child.  Our words cannot do justice to the TM so please see our photos. 

The next day we awoke to water gushing through our toes as we walked to the window to see what the weather was like and if we could see the Taj b/c at sunrise it is supposed to be spectacular.  It rained so much the night before, that our pool at the hotel flooded as well as our room and a few others.  We called the manager and reported it and within 5 minutes they were up in our room with a wet vacuum getting it dry.  We decided to take advantage of the spa that day as the Taj was not going to give us any better pictures than the day before.  That afternoon, right after lunch we received a phone call and the General Manager decided to put us up in a Presidential Suite to make up for the inconvenience of the water in our room.  We told him it was not necessary, but he insisted.  It was about 1500 sq. ft. and whoah… it was definitely nice!

Guess we needed a dining room table???

This is our foyer! 

We will post a lot more pictures on the photo page soon, so check back to see those of our introduction to India.  

Love and miss all of you!  

Norm and Rita  

Here are some of our first views of India on our way to Agra!

Then we arrived at our hotel, which is secluded from what you see above, but yet the above is right out on the street in front of our hotel.

Our original room

View from our room

Another view from our room

Then we went right away over to see the Taj Mahal.

Main Gate entrance to Taj

This is a temple on the side of the Taj, there is an identical one on the other side also.

October 2, 2013

Yesterday was a rain day so we used our time well by blogging on Ephesus and Samos.  We also did photos of both places.  That took us from 9 to 2:30.  Our eyes were blurry from starring at the screen all day. So, in the late afternoon we walked to the Grand Bazaar after the rain had stopped. The Grand Bazaar is like a large shopping center, but in this case it has a mosque, people who live there, a school,  and it is over 500 years old.  The Grand Bazaar does not have stores per se, but rather stalls where everything from spices, rugs, and jewelry is sold. It consists of 61 covered streets, and encloses an area of 3.3 million square feet, which exceeds every mall in the US.  Everyday 30,000 traders go to work in the Grand Bazaar, at 4,500 stalls and haggle over price with some 400,000 shoppers.  The Grand Bazaar is the world’s oldest covered market.  To Rita and me, it was just “bizarre”!  

Last night Rita picked the restaurant based on its menu which was created by Nobu, where we dined in London. We went to the restaurant, called the Sunset Grill, by taxi. It took 45 minutes in bumper to bumper traffic and $25 USD to get us there, but the time and money spent was well worth it. I had great sushi and duck. Rita had monkfish in a tomato cream sauce.  Yum!  

Tonight is our first overnight flight of the trip. We leave Istanbul and travel to Agra, India to see the Taj Mahal. We have started on 15 days of malaria pills just to be safe since they are required for some areas of India we will be visiting.  We thank everyone for your thoughts and prayers for our safety while in Turkey.  But, we can honestly say that we were never in harms way and the people could not have been any kinder or warmer to us two Americans.

Love you and miss you.

Can you believe we have less than 60 days left before we return home?  What will you have to read each day when we return?  Time has gone so quickly since we gave up “Betsy”. 

Norm and Rita

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Today, we visited the Suleymaniye Mosque. This is one of the finest creations of the Ottoman Empire.  It was finished in 1557, after 5 years of construction. The blue, white and gold dome contains 200 stained glass windows. Then, we walked through the Spice Market, where they sell every spice known to man, stacked in large quantities in a triangular shape. After the Spice Market, we saw the New Mosque, which was completed in 1663, which has an interior decorated with blue tiles. This evening we went to new town or modern town in Eastern Europe Istanbul to get drinks at Mickla, on the 18th floor of the Hotel Marmara Pera.  Mickla has a beautiful view of the city particularly at sunset. 

After drinks, we had dinner at 360, a rooftop restaurant with a great view of old town Istanbul.  Of course, we spent our entire evening in the Taksim Square area of Istanbul where two months ago there were riots.  We saw only young people enjoying a great evening out on the town! 

Istanbul, Turkey

First nice view of Istanbul from our room. After the drive into Istanbul, this was very welcoming!

A look down our street !

Went to one of the top restaurants rated for its beautiful view of Istanbul at sunset. This is what we got!

The look on Norm’s face when he saw the view. He is also singing, “Why does this always happen to me?”

At least Norm got a good picture of the bridge connecting Europe with Asia.

This Topkapi Palace is behind the trees you saw in our first picture.

Eunuchs Gate at Topkapi Palace

Here are a few more of the Palace, the view from the Garden and then we saw another wedding photo shoot going on.

Here are the pictures of the Blue Mosque, had to wear a scarf over my head to go inside.  My shoulders and knees also had to be covered.

Then we went to see Haggia Sophia, it was pretty awesome.

Then this is what we found in the “underground”.. definitely not a subway!

Istanbul – September 29, 2013

Istanbul is the Golden Horn, the Marmara Sea and the Bosphorus, not to mention Byzantium, Constantinople, the marriage of east and west, Europe and Asia and the confluence of Islam and Christian Orthodox religions.  Yesterday, we experienced all of these things while our eyes, noses and mouths were stretched to the limit to receive the sensory overloads offered to us by Istanbul. 

In the morning, we visited Hagia Sofia, which has stood for over 1500 years.  Its name means Holy Wisdom.  It started as an Eastern Orthodox Cathedral, then became a Muslim Mosque, and today is a museum.  For over 700 years, it was the largest church in the world.  The columns from the Temple of Artemis, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, were removed from Ephesus and later incorporated into the interior of Hagia Sofia.  The church was built in 5 years, not by architects, but by mathematicians who used their accuracy and knowledge of Roman temples to expedite construction. The church contains Islamic elements along side Christian elements.  The church is famous for its dome, which remains one of the 5 largest church domes in the world.

 From Hagia Sophia, we moved along 1000 years in time to the Topkapi Palace, which was the palace of the Ottoman Rulers.  Topkapi means cannonball gate. The Ottomans ruled an empire which stretched to Fez in the West, Hungary in the North, Egypt in the South and the Red Sea in the East. The Treasury of Topkapi is as rich or richer with jewels and diamonds as any Treasury we have seen.  One diamond was 86 carats and is the fourth largest diamond of its kind in the world. The Sultan of Topkapi had a Queen and a harem of over 400 women living in the Palace.  The women were divided in rank from lowest to highest as concubine, favorite and consort or wife. The harem was guarded by eunuchs although it was hard to find volunteers for the job. Everyday the kitchen had to prepare over 4000 meals for the inhabitants of Topkapi. The mosaic tiles and intricate designs of such tiles were spectacular. 

 After seeing Topkapi, we viewed the Blue Mosque, which is a youngster by comparison to Hagia Sofia.  The Blue Mosque was completed in 1616. It is so named because of the blue Iznik tiles found on its interior. The blue Mosque was built opposite Hagia Sofia to show the dominance of Islam over Christian Byzantium. It has six minarets, the same number as the mosque in Mecca.

 Finally, we ended our first day of touring Istanbul with a surprise.  We visited the underground.  Of course, Rita thought we were getting tickets to ride the subway, but she was certainly surprised when she walked down the steps into the cisterns.  Apparently, to ensure a good water supply, the Turks built  a vast underground water storage cistern beneath the old city.  The ceilings of the cistern are supported by 1001 columns.  It was an amazing thing to see. 

September 28, 2013

We are on our way to Istanbul for 4 days. We are really excited to visit the city where West (Europe) meets East (Asia).  Everyone we have met on this trip has given Istanbul, and its citizens, rave reviews.  It is a city that has no “official” census, but whose population has been estimated at over 16 million people.   But wait, we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s share the amazing things we have done over the past 3 days!

After our tour of Ephesus, we had 3 open days before we had to fly from Izmir to Istanbul.  So, Rita and I decided to visit Samos, Greece, an island that is 17 miles from Turkey. So, the next morning we boarded a ferry in Kusadasi, Turkey and 90 minutes later we were in Vathi, a city on the island of Samos.  In Vathi, we rented a car and 14 kilometers later, after numerous hairpin turns over one or two mountains, we arrived in Pythagoria, another city on the island of Samos. For those of you who slept through your geometry classes, Rita claims to be one of them, Pythagoria probably does not ring any bells in your minds.  But, for the rest of you, you will remember that Pythagoras was born in Pythagoria. Pythagoras came up with his theory while sitting in one of Pythagoria’s many harbor front cafes sipping wine and observing the awesome yachts tied up dock to stern in the harbor.

The Pythagorean Theorem is that the side opposite the right angle in a triangle is equal to the sum of the SQUARES of the other two sides.  So to test the Theorem, Rita and I followed one SIDE of a triangle to the cafes, another SIDE of the triangle to the harbor and finally took the RIGHT ANGLE which lead us directly to the statue of Pythagoras, which is prominently displayed on the SQUARE, the town square that is, to the left of the town hall which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

I couldn’t believe Rita’s geometry skills, particularly since she admitted to sleeping through the class. (But, later she confessed that her geometry skills came from a tutor, a very handsome tutor, she added.)  While studying the statue of Pythagoras and the architecture of the town hall, we observed another fascinating fact.   Both the statue and the town hall had plaques honoring the benefactor that contributed the funds for the statute and for rehabilitating and improving the town hall. The benefactor in both cases was Alki Scopelitis’ Father.  This we found VERY INTERESTING so we quickly added two and two together, since addition had never been a problem for me, a Scot, and Rita, a Hungarian/German, and posed a THEOREM that Pythagoria was not only the birthplace of Pythagoras, but also the birthplace of the family lineage of Alki Scopelitis, the founder of our law firm. But, to PROVE OUR THEOREM, we needed additional axioms to prove our theory.  So, being a good lawyer, that is me, and being a good paralegal, that is Rita, we set out to deduce our theory.  What we needed was some time on a beach to think.  So, we got a hotel room and went to the beach to think, and what a lovely beach it was, our very own private beach right there in Pythagoria.

While at the beach, we noticed a “call button” on our umbrella stand so we pushed it, and lo and behold, drinks with umbrellas in them and food appeared.

Later on we wandered back into town for some dinner and after eating dinner right before we were leaving, I remembered a post card Alki had sent me over 30 years ago, it had an “x” on it with an arrow that said “this is my house”. So we walked around a few blocks, and down a narrow street and I turned and told Rita, “this is his house, I just know it, it feels right”.  We took a few pictures just to be safe, now it’s dark outside, but still, we took them.

We wondered if this could be Alki’s house.  Thus, ended our first night on Samos!!!  Lights out!

Early the next morning, through the fog of blood shot eyes, I watched the sunrise over Turkey and the first light of sunshine hit the shoreline of Samos.

As I watched the sunrise, I thought today is the day we will prove our THEOREM.  So, after breakfast, we drove into the town of Pythagoria hoping to find some support for our Theorem.  Our walk around the town led us to the Sunshine Pension, a block off the harbor, on a shady narrow street, but wide enough for one car.   The street looked familiar, like the same one from last night.  By luck, the Pension had only 7 rooms and looked like it was right out of Mama Mia, was run by a proprietress, Eva, who claimed to be the cousin of Alki.  Eva also introduced us to her daughter, Angelika.  Together, they led us down the same street (THE STREET WE WERE ON LAST NIGHT) to a three story, blue and white house a few doors away from the Pension and claimed that this was the Scopelitis house.  Rita and I just looked at each other in amazement and laughed out loud to each other!!

When we asked them to confirm it, they unlocked the blue door and showed us the kitchen and there on the walls around the room were photographs of Alki, his children, his Father, his Grandfather, and other family members!  Thus proving our THEOREM that Alki Scopelitis’ lineage came from Pythagoria, the birthplace of Pythagoras.

That night we came back and went to dinner with Eva to get to know her a little more and spend some more time with her.  She said, when we come back, “just park in front of Alki’s house”.  “Yeah, ok”… Rita hesitated, but then she parked the car there.  Don’t worry Alki, Rita didn’t break either of your beautiful flower planters with her awesome parking skills!

We thanked The Lord for helping us prove our THEOREM by praying at the Monastery before driving to the harbor at Vathi to return to Kusadasi.

This was our last view of Samos, as we drove to the ferry!  such a beautiful place!

Love and Miss you all !  Norm and Rita

Samos, Greece  – Such a joy to visit the home of Alki! Had a wonderful time meeting his cousin Eva and her daughter Angelika.

Coming in to Samos, Greece harbor.

We always rush to the window to see what kind of view the hotel gives us. Pretty nice…

And this is the view from the other patio we have! Love it!

View from Alki’s balcony! Nice…

Nice little meal we had at Four Seasons on the harbor. Don’t you love Eva’s  little flower? Green been stems, mashed potato flower with a carrot in the middle!

Pythagoria harbor at night

This view never gets old.

Love the sunrise in the early morning!

This is our view as we left Samos heading back to Kusadasi.

Off we go back to Kusadasi!! We are almost there!

September 23 and 24th, 2013

Surviving Octoberfest, Rita and I pushed on from Munich, to Istanbul and on to our final destination in Ephesus, Turkey.  We landed in Izmir, a city of 4 million people, and took a car and driver to Ephesus about an our away from the airport.  From what we saw on the drive, this part of Turkey looks a lot like Arizona, although parts of it still looks very third world like.  Low mountains rising out of nowhere, dry, pine trees and good roads. We arrived at our Hotel Nylia via a street, alley or driveway.  We have no idea what you would call it!  But, we thought we had returned to Marrakech by mistake.  We felt a little better when we entered the stone-fenced-in courtyard which had a fountain and lime trees. 

But, when we got to our room, it was definitely not up to our “lower” standards for a room.  There was no TV, no clock, no bottled water, no closet, no wash cloths, a bed like concrete and a curious note on the bathroom stool advising that “NO” paper could be placed in the bathroom stool, but must be disposed of in the waste paper basket.  Rita and I looked at each other after we read this note with a shared look on our faces that read: “we wish we had known about the note BEFORE we ate so many brats, sauerkraut and pretzels at Octoberfest.  But, it was too late for that and too late to find another hotel room, particularly since this was the second highest rated hotel in Ephesus!!! So, we dropped our things in the room and headed to dinner at our hotel’s sister hotel, because our hotel did not have a restaurant.  The sister hotel’s restaurant was on the rooftop, open air and offered cold and hot “mezzenes” or appetizers which I love.  There were lots of healthy things like tabbouleh, egg plant, chick peas, etc.  The entrees were chicken, beef, and lamb. Dinner was really quite good.  Also during dinner we heard the Islam ezan “call to prayer” by the muezzin from the minarets, high above the mosques. The call to prayer was more melodious than the ones we heard in Morocco at least that was my impression or it could have been the wine!  The now familiar to us “allahuh Akbar, allahuh Akbar” translated as “God is greatest, God is Greatest” rings out five times a day.

Neither Rita nor I slept we’ll on our concrete mattress.  So, we were up early on Tuesday to enjoy the very healthy breakfast of one slice cheese, 1/4 piece of pretzel bread, 4 sticks of carrots, two cucumber slices, one tomato slice, two skinny pieces of apple and two olives.  We also could order eggs, any way we wanted them. Not the pancakes, waffles, crepes, sausage and eggs to which one of us has become accustomed. But, nourishing just the same and fun to eat outdoors in the courtyard under the lime trees.  We actually should eat this kind of breakfast everyday, as it is much healthier than what we usually eat.  Don’t get us wrong, the hotel was pretty awesome, as its service was impeccable! The guys here waited on us hand and foot, and transported us everywhere, to Ephesus, to Mary’s house, to the ferry and back and to the airport and back.  They really did a wonderful job!

Our goal on Tuesday was to see the ancient Greco-Roman city of Ephesus. Apparently, the 6,000 passengers on each of the 8 cruise ships in the nearby harbor had the same goal.  Although Ephesus was filled with “waves” of visitors from cruise ships, Rita and I had a great tour helped along by a great local tour guide. Ephesus was very impressive.  Although much has been damaged by earthquakes, Ephesus remains a great monument to history.  The mosaics and frescoes are beautiful and well maintained.  They reminded me of Ephesians answer to carpeting and wallpaper.  The city had underground plumbing for water and sewers.  It had communal toilets for up to 50 men to share. (Don’t know what the women did.). There was an amphitheater for just under 25,000 people and was the place where Paul preached to the pagans about Jesus and a library with storage for up to 12,000 scrolls. The Temple of Artemis, which was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, was in Ephesus although there is nothing left of the Temple, but one column. But, the structures of Ephesus, as great as they are, are not the main draw for most Christians. It is the tie to biblical times and events that draws most Christians.

You see Ephesus was a city visited by the Apostle Paul.  Paul lived in Ephesus for 3 years and it is believed that he wrote the book of Acts here.  It is believed that the disciple John died in Ephesus, hence why St. John’s Basilica was built over his tomb.  And, it is so believed that a small mountain top home nearby was the home in which Mary, the Mother of Jesus, lived and ultimately died.   The first church of Mary, named after the Virgin Mary was in Ephesus, which was the first ever church dedicated to Mary, in 431.    So, after our visit to all these religious sites, Rita and I think we should get a “get out of church” free card for at least a week!

We are posting this on Friday, September 27th, and we know we are behind, but we are going to get caught up soon, we promise.  It’s just that after visiting this site all day, then later in the evening before we went to dinner, we also went to see Mary’s house and by the time we got back, we were so tired we just crashed in our concrete bed!  Plus the wifi didn’t work very well, so we thought we’d get caught up in Samos, but OH… NO…. there was a lot to do and see there also!  We’ll fill you in on that later.  Promise!

So we are back in Turkey, just for the night, to catch our flight back to Istanbul, where we will spend about 4-5 days.

Hope Steph had a great B-day, wish I could post the picture she sent me from her hotel room!  (Ben got her a night away from the kiddies and poopie diapers, etc.!)  If anyone saw “this is 40” you can imagine what the pic was????

And today is Connor’s B-day!  Hope he had a great day too!  Wow!  every one is getting older but us!

Love and miss you all.  –Norm and Rita.

Ephesus, Turkey… Amazing place to know that we walked and sat in the same place that St. Paul preached to the people of Ephesus and that this is where the christian faith started and spread throughout the Roman empire.  Both St. John the Theologian and the Virgin Mary spent their last days here.  It is believed  that Jesus told St. John to watch after his mother and it is here that St. John built the house for Mary to live in for the rest of her days. (See house at end of photos)

We were very excited to see this holy place, but the ride into Ephesus from the airport to our hotel almost made Rita turn back and say again to Norm….. “Where in the HELL are  you taking me?” Remember, our ride  to our hotel was in the dark!!  not in the daylight as these pictures depict.  So you can imagine…..

First turn to our hotel…

Then we turned down this street… Mind you it was really dark upon arriving here!

Then this is the house next door. You probably can’t see the dog sleeping next to the steps. Never barked once.

And this is opposite the house and our hotel.

Finally we arrived at our hotel… is it the white house??? and is that our balcony we paid for?

OMG!! Thank goodness we stopped short of the house. Here is our entrance to our hotel. Very nice place!

Ahhh… very deceiving welcoming to this CONCRETE bed!!! LOL !

Continuing with our tour of Ephesus… there is proof from the year 2000 BC that Ephesus was a settlement even before Androclus landed with his Ionian colonists in the 11th century BC, and Ephesus was a substantial city long before Alexander the Great arrived in 334 BC.  Ephesus is a city that in 281 BC had 300,000 inhabitants. Carrying its traffic were 27 marble streets lined with statues, although only four streets have been excavated to date.   The silver and goldsmiths who made the idols for the temple aroused the crowd and drove out St. Paul and his Christian converts.  The Cayster went on bringing the sands of Asia Minor to the shores of the Aegean, and the harbor continued to choke with silt. The sea front turned into a marshland. In the 6th century AD, an epidemic of malaria arose from the swamps killing 200,000 persons.  The temple of Artemis, which only has ONE TOWER left standing, took 120 years to build and when it was burned down by a madman, the Greeks put it up a second time. To the temple came the pilgrims of the world with their donations they made Ephesus wealthy. Indeed, the first ever letters of credit were issued by the temple — it was, in a way, the first bank in history.  We learned all this from our tour!  We hope you enjoy these pictures as much as we enjoyed Ephesus!

These types of water pipes were invented here for the first time.

This is the Odeom, it holds only 1500 people, used for musicals and plays.

Hard to believe that this only holds 1500 people. Also used for meetings of the Senate.

Overall View of Curetes Street in Ephesus as you enter.

Two columns left of the Temple of Domitian

These are the toilets for everyone to use. They are directly across from the Terrace Houses. We were told that some people would send their servants down to sit on these to warm them up prior to using them.

Not sure if you can tell, but there is drainage built into these. Amazes us since these were built in 1 A.D.!!

These writings were supposed to be in ancient greek, “but you know, the greek word came from” latin, and as you can see on these you can actually read ENGLISH words. A/K/A “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”

Harbor Street – it led to the Harbor. I like simple!

The Library of Celsus built by the Romans in 2 A.D. held an estimated 9000 to 12000 scrolls and had an underground tunnel to the brothel.

The wall on the left side is the actual Library wall, the wall on the right side was built around the entire library with this air to protect the scrolls from water, moisture, or other elements of weather. Smart builders back then… now a days we call it “Insulation”!

A side view of the Library. There is still 110 more years of excavation that needs to be done here.

This is the view of Marble Street from atop of the Terrace Houses.

Close up of Harbor Street – all streets were lined with statues and under them ran sewage canals and, above, water from fountains cascaded down the slopes continually keeping them clean. To help drainage and prevent feet or chariot wheels from slipping, the city scored and etched the marble in a way not unlike that seen on concrete roads today to prevent aquaplaning. Holes in the marble show where portable street lights were placed when it became dark, b/c Ephesus was the only city at the time to allow lights after dark, as it thrived with business at night time.

This foot is on Marble Street and tells the story to the men… Enjoy our city, and this is the way to the Brothels! If you don’t know what are in the brothels, then go to the Library!

The  Great Theatre that held 24,000 people. This is still standing after many earthquakes and only the very top section has been restored!

Amazing again, to us!

Original inscription on this part of a temple.

Temple of Hadrian, the Emperor of Rome, a very small temple for the Emperor.

Interior of one of the Terrace Houses. All the colors are pictures and are made out of mosaic tiles.

It’s like the different color of marble they used for these pictures were actually their wallpapering!

A more aerial view of the Terrace Houses

These were built in the landscape and tiered down the sides. A Cliff home resemblance !

Statue of Artemis – The fertility goddess!

The remains of the first church dedicated to Mary.

The alter in the Church of Mary.

The baptismal in the Church of Mary

After Ephesus, we stopped by the Seven Sleepers Cave and had lunch that these ladies prepared for us!

Look at how she sits with her legs out ALL DAY, preparing this Turkish bread!

The cave where seven people slept in for over 200 years.

The shrine built where the fireplace was in honor of Mary.

Side view of Mary’s house, the part in the back on the right was her bedroom.

Entrance to Mary’s house.

The outdoor sanctuary next to Mary’s house.

And here are a few pictures of where we ate while we were in Selcuck ! And our hotel the last night before flying to Istanbul!

Rooftop restaurant we ate in all three nights!

This is the cook and our dishes are in the glass case, we picked whatever we wanted! They grilled up our main course right there!

This is the other end of the restaurant where you can drink and play cards or backgammon!

OK, this place looks like a nice hotel for our last night in Selcuk!

Nice patio upstairs

Pretty entryway!

And they sent us off with a very nice HEALTHY breakfast! Norm wants this lazy susan at home… Right….

Oktoberfest!!! 9-22-2013

 (ok, so we are a little behind…) 

Last night, Rita put on her newly purchased dirndle and I put on my newly purchased lederhosen and we went to Oktoberfest 2013. 

 (Isn’t the mountain background perfect for this occasion? )

We were joined by approximately another 437,449 others who had done the same thing. Oktoberfest is a 16-day festival which originally started as a celebration for the wedding of Crown Prince Ludwig to Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen on October 17, 1810. So why is Oktoberfest held in September, you asked?  Because the weather in Munich is nicer in September than October!  Oktoberfest is known to the Germans as, “Wies’n” which is a shortening of “Theresianwiese” which means “Therese’s Meadow” where the First Oktoberfest was held.  Today, as you know, Oktoberfest is a beer festival attracting in excess of 7 million visitors a year.  It is held at the same place since 1810 and it is spread out on over 100 acres of land. 

 To get a feel for Oktoberfest, you have to picture the Indiana State Fair, Halloween, a Fall Festival and a FIJI kegger all being held at the same time in the same place.  There are carnival games and rides.  There are food booths galore selling every imaginable kind of german food, including ham hocks, red cabbage, white sausages, wienerschnitzel, fish, chicken, roast pork, dumplings, spetzl, noodles and pancakes.  There are people walking around in dirndle’s and lederhosen costumes.  Then, of course, there is lots and lots of beer. There are 14 LARGE beer tents which hold up to 8450 people that are sponsored by breweries.  Beer is served in 33 oz. mugs, about 3 beers, and must be 6% alcohol by volume. Beer consumption exceeds 1.8 million gallons during the festival.

 Rita and I had arranged 9 months ago to get tickets to a beer tent so that we would be guaranteed an assigned seat. Everyone else that goes is with general admission and fights for a seat.  Our tent was the Braurosl Tent.  It has a full band playing drinking songs and a yodeler.  The assigned seats are around the four sides on the first floor and upstairs on each end of the two sides of the tent.  The general admission seats are in the middle of the tent.  Everyone stands, sings, and drinks from 11:00 AM to 10:30 PM.  There are many people who have had way too much to drink, particularly those people under 30.  The barmaids or waitresses can carry up to 10 mugs at a time.  It is an amazing thing to see! Here’s a picture of some of our new friends we made!

We are glad we went.  It was fun to watch the Germans relaxing and enjoying themselves.  We would probably not do it again, but who knows?  The next morning right in front of our hotel there was a 2.5 hour parade of bands, horse drawn beer wagons, and 60 groups representing different areas of Bavaria and wearing their respective traditional costumes. 

 Today, we are wrapping up our trip to Europe by blogging, posting photos, shipping things home we do not need and preparing to head to Turkey, our first stop in Asia.  Please pray that Turkey will remain safe for us, and our travels.  We love you and miss you. 

 Rita and I want to send special birthday wishes to Melissa (turned 36 on 9/19) and Bob Weaver, Missy’s husband, who turns 36 TODAY!  Happy Birthday Bob!!  Wish we were there to give you a BIG HUG, OH, BUT WAIT… You have no arms and no legs!!!! 

Enjoy your B-day today. 

Norm  & Rita

Oktoberfest, what a celebration!! We had a great time!

We actually drank some of this at another venue!

Big beer wagon!

Yep! Another beer wagon!

Another area from Germany! There were 60 in all.

Every area from Germany was represented in their original costumes.

Beer wagon in parade!

And their OX!

Yes, they do love their reindeer around these parts!

Oh Deer me!!!

Another great tent!

Looks like a great spread for all of us to enjoy while we watch the parade!

Here’s David, Rita’s new friend, he’s 24 from California… just a kid, but we all got along great!

Whoah… A lot of people enjoying the day and night!

Band taking a break and drinking a beer between sets!

Get your Gingerbread heart here!

Front row seat for this little gal, in her everyday wear!

Mini Kegger purse, it actually pours out beer for people watching the parade.

This was set up on the outside of our hotel for us while we watched the parade.

More of the party people..

All the lovely people…

Better view of our tent.

One of the largest tents, holds over ten thousand people!

Nice welcome sign for all of us festival goers!

Here is our tent! Yeah we found this too with no problem!

The band is in the middle of the tent.

WOW! What a crowd, and this is going on in 14 other tents for 16 days!

PROST!

View from our table, ONCE WE FOUND OUR TABLE… LOL!

September 19, 2013

We are wrapping up our final four days in Croatia in Dubrovnik before returning to Munich for Oktoberfest.  Dubrovnik is not an island like Hvar, but is located at the southern end of the Dalmatian coast on the Adriatic Sea.  The old city of Dubrovnik is a  walled city consisting mostly of structures with red tiled roofs, green window shutters and a beautiful harbor.  It is one of the most perfectly preserved medieval cities in the Europe!!  Dubrovnik is more of a place that you se the patron saint of Dubrovnik e and experience, rather than a place to learn about history, although Dubrovnik has its fair share of history.   For example, it survived the wars by the Venetians and the Turks precisely because of the old city walls.  It also has a cathedral founded by Richard the Lionhearted and contains the skull case of St. Blaise, the patron saint of Dubrovnik, as well as one of his legs, and on of his arms,. It also displays what is claimed to be a fragment of the cross on which Jesus was crucified. But rather than dwell on the historical, take a look at our photos to get an appreciation for the sights and experiences.  Then you will appreciate why Dubrovnik has been called “The Pearl of the Adriatic” and “paradise on earth”.  

Now… on to really experiencing a city…. Oktoberfest it is!  PROHST!

Miss you all, Norm and Rita

You just have to see and feel this Pearl of the Adriatic!  Please excuse that these pictures are not in chronological order!

Little harbor in Sucuraj where we stopped to have a drink at the bar our taxi driver owned while we waited for our ferry to Drvenik.

First Buza bar we found to have a drink and watch the sunset.

Our live entertainment in the middle square of Old Town. Notice the beautiful stained glass windows that light up in St. Blaise church in the background.? (St. Blaise is the patron saint of Dubrovnik)

Dubrovnik Cathedral

Yea.. we found this place through a narrow tunnel and stairway. No food, but good drinks!

Nice pathways that lead to ????

One stairway inside the walled city

A view from our walk along the Old City walls. The walls are 20 ft thick and this wall can get as high as 72 ft! One lane only in some places!

View of Dubrovnik from above the mountaintop!

Rector’s Palace

These three guys were AWESOME!! They sang in French, German, Italian, Spanish, but mostly in English!

Nice view of our lounge to have a drink after sightseeing and watch the colors around us.

Another walkway that opens into a square.

Our best shot of Dubrovnik between the two of us! Trying to get that ONE shot that you see on all the brochures!

See the lady that lives in this apartment? She gets to watch the entertainment every day!

We would say that every view is pretty spectacular!

We ducked into the Excelsior Hotel and took this picture and a few more. They have a great view of the Old City.

Little boats in the harbor.

Different view of our Buza #1 place!

This is the new bridge into Dubrovnik. We stopped along the way into Dubrovnik to take some photos.

View of our private beach from our hotel room above. Glad they had a lift to get us down there.

Another beautiful doorway on our walk into town.

We didn’t stop here for a drink b/c we were on our way to the Old City, but this sure looks like a great place!

Stradun – pedestrian main street in Old City. Notice all the green shutters? They all MUST match and use the same shade of green.

Everyone danced in the middle of the square to the live music.

On the second night, we had only two entertainers, one from the night before with a new guy. These guys played a lot of old rock music, all of which Norm and I knew! We loved it!

Let’s see…. what am I going to have??? fish, grilled fish, or fish?? Yep, that about sums it up! They certainly like their fish here! Ok then, get me some wine… FAST!!

Pretty nighttime view of one of the towers.

This is one of our FAVORITE pictures!!! And it was one of the first we took after we got on our ferry to Drvenik!

September 15, 2013

Thursday evening late, we arrived in Hvar, the city on the island of Hvar, in Croatia from Bol, Croatia. Hvar is a short ferry ride from Hvar, but they are nothing alike. Bol has Zlatni Rat beach, 1600 people and is small, quaint and family oriented. On the other hand, Hvar has no real beaches, has 3500 people and is geared toward the mega-yachters and the partying people. The island of Hvar is the longest of the Croatian islands. It also has the sunniest weather.  Thursday evening we walked 20 minutes to town and walked around the harbor and town square.  Both are quite beautiful, full of outdoor restaurants, people and, of course, beautiful yachts from all over the world.  Most of the restaurants serve seafood, which is so fresh since it was caught the same day they serve it. YUM!

Not letting Friday the 13th slow us down any, we retraced our steps from the night before so that we could capture the sights with daylight photos. Boy, were we shocked, stunned and surprised at the sheer beauty of the color of the Adriatic Sea at Hvar, particularly the hues of greens and blues, while we have seen similar colors before, we kept thinking the blues and greens were coming from our polarized sunglasses, but when we checked, we did not even have them on!!!  After breakfast, we rented a boat and a captain for the day and headed to the Pakleni islands about twenty minutes away from Hvar. This is a chain of 16 islands, mostly uninhibited, where you can sail or motor to that have deserted beaches, no sand beaches, but only small pebble beaches. Several of the islands do have restaurants, rent sun beds and provide other facilities.  We stopped on a couple of the islands, sunned and ate our lunch at a small restaurant that had no menu.  The restaurant was just a collection of thatched roofed structure.  When we sat down at our outdoor table, we asked the waitress for a menu and she replied with “I’m the only menu” and that they only served fish, whatever fish was just caught today.  They grilled us the fresh fish of the day while we watched other diners being served in tree houses at the restaurant.  We spent 6 great hours on the water and on beaches and
had a great time!

Later in the evening, we walked to the town of Hvar for dinner.  In the harbor was a mega-yacht 90 meters in length and 5 stories high. It belonged to a billionaire from Poland.  You could rent the yacht for $1 million per week.  NOT!!  I think we will pass!!

Our last night in Hvar Saturday, September 15^th, we watched the sunset from the Hula Hula Beach Bar where Beyoncé and Jay-Z hung out a year ago while cruising the Croatian Coast.  The sunset was spectacular with colors of red and orange, while the sky overhead remained a beautiful blue.  The Hula Hula Bar was full of “young” kids drinking, dancing on tables and celebrating the sunset before they actually hit the bars in Hvar (which open at Midnight), start rocking at 2:00 AM and close around 5:00 AM.  While we would love to follow the “young” ones, it would be too late for us. So, we had a nice dinner in Hvar, and danced till midnight at the Park Café that had an international clientele of English, Americans and Brazilians.  We made the first set and part of the second set before we left.  The band had a special guest in from Sao Paulo, who came up on stage and started cranking out “Mustang Sally”, which turned out to be our favorite song of the night.  Surprisingly, all the music was in English and the crowd knew the words to most of the songs.

Today we are on our way to Dubrovnik.  Have a great Sunday.

We love and miss you.  –Norm & Rita

Hvar, Croatia and the Paklini Islands

Phoenix 2 by day!

Polish billionaire’s yacht, Phoenix 2. 5 stories high!

Watched these go by a we laid on the beach!

This is our third stop, a little beach with very clear water!

Looks like we might have run into a little traffic!

One of the smallest islands

Our fresh catch of the day!

There motto here!

Sittin in tree house…. having a drink! Looks like they were having fun!

This is where we decided to stop and eat lunch!

Here’s our beach bar… anyone thirsty?

This was our next stop, beautiful!

Pretty much what the coastline looks like!

Pull up a rock and have a seat for the day!

At first, we thought our captain dropped us off at Gilligan’s Island… but we never saw the Skipper, Mary Anne, Ginger, Gilligan or Thurston Howell III!

Our first stop on our boat day. This creature greeted us as we entered the beach area!

Pretty much what the coastline looks like!

Goofy’s in the harbor!

Town square

More of Hvar’s harbor

This is a small yacht pulling out for a cruise!

Partial view of the Hvar harbor

View from the balcony of our hotel, don’t let this fool you, the pool water was ICE cold!

When we first walked down to the harbor, this is what we saw as we rounded the corner.

September 12, 2013

Good morning. 

We are in Bol, Croatia.

A city of 1600 on the island of Brac. We leave today for Hvar, a town or village of 3500, on the island of Hvar, which is also in Croatia.  Yesterday, we spent the day on Zlatni Rat beach.  It was a beautiful day, bright sunshine, 75 degrees and a steady wind to keep us cool!  The beach is supposed to be the best in Croatia.  It was made up of small pebbles, not sand, but it was beautiful. The Adriatic Sea ranges in color from green to dark blue, really lovely.  

 Our entertainment was watching the “amateur” yachters try to anchor off the beach.  It was so funny.  They entertained EVERYONE on the beach. They would pull up their half million dollar yachts right up to the floaters separating swimming areas from yachting areas, then, snag the floaties around their props. Once they lost the use of their props, the yachts would drift in toward shore, shallow water and the waves would turn them sideways until they were almost beached!  Then, some kind people in dinghies would come to their rescue and tow them to the harbor so that they could get their props un-fouled!  It seemed that no one knew how to properly anchor a yacht.  They must have been weekend renters. Reminded me of the sail boating trips Andy and I experienced when we beached our boat on the sands in Ft. Lauderdale and people came off the beach to help us “idiots”.  It finally took the US Coast Guard to rescue Andy and me.

We last blogged from Munich.  From Munich, we flew to Split. We had planned to use Split as merely as transfer point to Bol, but it turned out to be a very pleasant small town as so many other small towns, Melk, Strausbourg, Rothenburg, Lille, have been.  As we walked through Split, we came upon Diocletian’s palace.  Diocletian was the only emperor of Rome to retire from the “job”.  After he “retired”, he went to Split and built a palace. It is the best example of Roman architecture remaining in the world.  It has temples, arches, walls, marble, columns, etc.  In the open courtyard in the evening, they have some really fine guitarists entertaining the crowd.  The courtyard has great acoustics.  And, they serve great drinks in the courtyard.  We were very impressed with the beauty of the place and enthralled with the experience.  Split also has a beautiful harbor and boardwalk or “riva” along the harbor filled with restaurants, gelato shops and palm trees.  The warmth and beauty of Split helped us ease the pain of moving from our car travels, and leaving Betsy behind, to plane and ferry travels. 

Next stop Hvar. We will let you know if we run into Brad or Beyonce.

 Love and Miss you all !  Norm and Rita

Hope you  enjoy these pictures of Split, Croatia, we sure loved our time there.  We are trying a new way of uploading and updating our web page so we’ll see if this is any better.  Let us know if this is NOT still simple to follow! THANKS!

First View of Split, Croatia from our room

Thought we’d sit here and ponder what to do the next day!

Split Promenade at night

Just a simple corner street inside the Diocletian’s Palace.

One of the entrances to the Diocletian’s Palace grounds, yes this hotel sign is inside the “grounds”.

Morning view of the Promenade

A small simple church in Split

Just in case you don’t know where Split, Croatia is, enlarge this and take a look at this map.

Just amazing to us that this is still standing and people live and work inside of these walls.

One of the Squares inside where people like to gather.

This lion is one of the two originals built in 305, amazing that it only has a crack in it after almost 2000 years old.

The middle structure you see here is the original wall, that is how thick most of the walls are.

The corner street during the day. So nice! The streets are all marble.

One of Split’s beaches

Another beach in Split, for those of you who like to be on the “Edge”!

View of Split rooftops, everyone uses the patios.

Here is where we were entertained by the two guitarists!

Pretty cool, Heh? They just sit and play to the people at night!

See how narrow the streets are?

Beautiful view of Split from the pier.

The church in the background is inside the Diocletian’s Palace.

Different view of the Promenade during the day.

YEP!!!! They have “GONE TANNING”!

Fish Market

Looks like sand, but it is tiny pebbles.

Nice restaurant!

Just loved walking this at night, cool breeze in the air….

Now here are some of Bol, Croatia!

Our first sight of Bol, Croatia after getting off the ferry.

AHH… the opposite side of the pier when pulling in off the ferry.

Took a little walk and whoah.. these people are what we call “GREEN”!

Found this nice thatched roof bar…. We definitely had some great cocktails here !

The harbor corner.

This is what we saw as we were walking to our famous Zlatni Rat beach!

Oh, yes, this is going to be my new wallpaper on my computer! Here’s our beach we’re looking for!

The very tip of Zlatni Rat beach from our angle.

This is where we landed! Took this from my beach chair! Loved watching the colors all day.

View of Bol, Croatia

Oh, my, another place to have drinks outside, and with a TV screen in the trees!

Bol street, this one is exceptionally wide!

Anyone need any doilies? table runners? tops?

Our villa, we stayed in the room just under where the towel is hanging from the top floor balcony!

This path is what we walked along to get to the beach. Very nice shaded path all the way.

Our rules just before entering the beach area!

Dummies that were trying for two hours to dock this boat with an anchor just outside our swimming area!

We weren’t the only ones that thought these guys were dumb or inexperienced!! Every one came down to take a picture, b/c they had to be towed!

This is the shaded area that has all the vendors, pretty nice place.

This is the bar that serves drinks only at the beach, the vendor behind this serves sandwiches, the vendor behind that serves french fries, and the vendor behind the french fry guy serves ice cream. But you can bring all your food here to eat under the shade trees and order drinks!

Sunday, September 8, 2013.  

Munich—Oompah-pah!!!  Oompah-pah!!!

We spent a few extra days in Prague because we could not get reservations anywhere in or near Munich.  It was okay with us, because we loved Prague.  It also gave us an extra night to have a WOW meal at the Bellevue, which started with the obligatory Cosmopolitans, followed by foie gras, Atlantic Cod, and John Dory, a great way to end our time in Prague. We finally got reservations for September 7th and 8th in Munich.  

We drove from Prague to Munich in about 4 hours.  GPS said it would take 5 hours, but GPS did not anticipate Rita driving 106 miles per hour.  Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it is a new track record!  The drive was beautiful, a bit of a blur, but nevertheless beautiful.  The Czech Republic has wonderful rolling hills, covered with pine forests.  The fields are green and brown making a patchwork quilt of colors.   Then, you enter Bavaria and the towns, church spires, cleanliness, greenery and countryside are even more spectacular.  We also drove through miles of hops fields.   They are green and appear to grow up wires strung to frames maybe 15 feet high.  Apparently, Bavaria is the largest hops producing area in the world.  We are staying at the Kempinski Hotel, which is located in old Munich making all the sights within easy walking distance.  When we arrived in Munich we learned why we could not get reservations earlier in the week.  It was because there was a soccer match involving the World Cup between Germany, Austria and I think another two countries and Munich was packed with soccer fans.  We drove by the stadium on our way into Munich and it is an awesomely modern arena.  Last night we went to the Hofbrau Haus.  It has been serving beer since 1549.  It is one of the largest, if not the largest, beer hall in the world.  Now I know where all those hops go–into German beer.  The Hofbrau Haus seats 5000 people, who sit at communal tables, eat brats, drink beer from 33-ounce mugs and sing German songs performed by an Oompah Band.  WOW!!!! The Germans sure know how to drink beer and party.  What fun people. They have to be among the happiest people in the world.  We also did a brief walkabout around Munich to see the highlights.  We saw the Marianplatz, the Frauenkirche, the Viktualien Market, and Peterskirche.  Tomorrow we turn in “Betsy”, a sad moment in our lives since we have been with her for almost 90 days.  We also leave Europe for 11 days to go to Croatia before returning to Munich for Oktoberfest. We have to leave Europe because they have a law that you cannot exceed 90 days in a six-month period.  We have been in Europe for about 85 days and we are going to return for 5 days to experience Oktoberfest. Thus, this is our reason we need to leave Europe for 11 days.  We have somewhat of a schedule for Croatia so that you can track our moves.  We are going to fly from Munich to Split and spend one night in Split.  Then, catch a ferry to Brac, an island that is suppose to have the Best Beach in Croatia.  Then, we will catch a ferry to HVAR.  HVAR is supposed to have one of the BEST Beaches in the world.  It is also a place where Brad, Angelina and Beyoncé and others have partied at the Hula Hula Beach Bar.  From Hvar, we catch another ferry to Korcula, a quieter island where we hope to briefly explore some historical sights.  Finally, we take a three-hour bus trip to Dubrovnik where we will spend the last few days before flying back to Munich.  

We love you and miss you – Norm & Rita

Just a few Munich Pictures here, as we are visiting this place again for Okctoberfest!!

Hops along our drive to Munich

Norm’s picture of hops on our 160 kph drive to Munich !! Not bad!

The Allianz FOOTBALL (Soccer) arena in Munich, ( the dome changes colors, red, blue) had playoffs for World Cups while we were here.

Our room is totally electronic… this is how you put on your “Do Not Disturb” sign. LOL!

Ok, now the shower was really cool!! Push a button and your water starts spraying!

And blue too, crazy!

Now this we HAVE NOT SEEN before!

Really?? Hot Pink shower lights while showering??

Marianplatz

Tower on New Town Hall in Marianplatz

Typical men drinking beer in the afternoon

Lovely couple walking along the streets of Munich. A LOT of them dress like this every day for no reason.

St. Peter’s church, Munich

This is a skeleton of St. Mundita, made of gold, which they have adorned with jewels.

Ahh, YES… the famous Hofbrau Haus!

Beer garden inside the 3 story Hofbrau Haus

The band was playing tunes all night and will carry on till 3 or 4 in the morning!

Main Entrance to Hafbrau Haus

Oh, yeah, we got our beer fix, for sure!

Even Rita drank the beer! Hope Owen sees this picture!

What else to get but Bratwurst and Kraut

Nice buildings in the center of another plats

Pretty flower boxes on most buildings here

We’ll be back again to sit with these folks only under a tent at Oktoberfest!