Lunch in Amsterdam

Can somebody please confirm that while we have been away, the following product has arrived and is available in Canadian stores within the GTA. What about this one?

Since neither of us can read much while in vehicles, we've been listening to a podcast series broadcast by BBC 4. It's called "A History of the World in 100 Objects". The head of the British Museum has taken 100 objects from this museum and done an excellent series about the evolution of human history and society based around them. There are interviews with artists, cooks, historians and all sorts of people, and each segment is about 15 minutes long. They are almost done the series, object #100 will be unveiled on October 22nd. There is a big mysterious box in the middle of the grand room of the library. We know this, because we were so inspired by this series (ok, we just really wanted to be in an English speaking country again, read an English newspaper, order food our food in English) that we are now in London again. And loving it! And will be here for a week. Co-incedently so is the Pope, which scuppered our plans to go to evensong at Westminster Abbey tonig

After Venice, we headed to the other side of the Mediterranian, and spent a weekend in Barcelona. Palm trees, sand, sea and lots of Gaudi architecture. Unfortunately we fell down on the picture taking here. Actually we haven't taken a picture for the last week....you'll have to use your imagination!

We finally brought ourselves to leave lovely Ljubljana and hopped on a bus that brought us to Venice. As we were wandering around lost, looking for our hotel, we noticed that a lot of people were wanding around barefoot and carrying their shoes. Turns out that it rained heavily that morning and St. Mark's square (and a few other lower lying places) were flooded. We tried to take a drier route to the hotel (now armed with a map), but still ended up a little soggy. Venice is great. It was warm and sunny while we were there (but the square still flooded the next day and we thought we were trapped inside the Doge's Palace for a while!). What can we say - canals, gondolas, bridges and boats. We did enjoy riding the "bus" around - the Vaparetto boats that sail up and down the Grand Canal. Strangely we felt right at home, especially at this table... Oh, here's one last photo from Ljubljana.

We were supposed to leave Ljubljana 2 days ago. We love it so much, we scrapped our plans and have stayed on. We `ll be here until Wednesday, then we move on to Venice.

There were over 100 booths representing several countries (we think -the only English sign was the "bubble and squeak" from London, UK). It took an average of 3 people to saute, stir and flip the potatoes and there were thousands of people packed into the street. All samples (read large scoops) of the different types of sauteed potatoes were free, and Beth bravely stood with bowl in hand to receive a sample from the many different chefs. Please note - this is not a potato festival. It is the 10th annual Sauteed Potato festival, aimed at having sauted potato and onion be recognized as a separate and traditional dish. Sauteed potatoes to the people! Katherine ate just as many potatoes as Beth, she was just the one holding the camera.

We were grateful for the English listing alonside the Slovenian. We had to buy something out of it. It was delicious.

Next week is the world white-water Kayak and Canoe championships. All over the city are these funky Kayaks - suspended above bridges, in front of churches and inside city hall. These are only a few of them. We also saw a shoe, a fountain pen (in front of the 3 Rivers Fountain, of course), an eyeball, and many, many colourfully decorated ones. Blending sport and art. While we were taking a little river cruise, we were suddenly surrounded by 50 children between the ages of 6 and about 14, who were competing in their own championship race.

This is the place we are most in danger of not ever leaving. It`s the perfect blend of recreation, art, effeciency, but with a value for leisure time used well. Over the centuries, Slovenia was occupied by both Italians and Austrians and have managed to embrace the best of both cultures, while maintaining their own identity. The city is beautiful, and beautifully laid out. There are blocks and blocks of pedestrian (and bicycle) zones in the old city core. The locals used the entire space -so we don`t feel like we`re in an artificial "tourist zone". In the main square we saw a nuit-blanche type dance performance Friday night. On Saturday morning, the same square was filled with toddler-sized tables and chairs, with little ones colouring while parents sipped coffees, and the same stage was playing toddler TV shows. The river bank is lined with trees that shelter the blocks and blocks of cafes where everyone sits and lingers over coffee, tea, drinks and conversation. Here

We decided to take the train from Split (Croatia) to Ljubljana (Slovenia). The trip from Split to Zagreb was pretty and pretty uneventful. Unlike most trains we`ve expereniced that travel along valleys, this route went over the mountains! We were so high up and the views were stunning. The train was a "tilting" train - the tracks were banked into the ground and the train could sway back and forth in order go faster. Of course it also makes for more motion sickness, so we were glad for an hour break in Zagreb. Slovenia is in the foot of the Alps, so we were looking forward to the scenery for the next leg. Then we experienced the border crossing. Slovenia is part of the European Union. Croatia is not. There was about a 40 minute delay on the Croatian side of the border while the guards checked all our passports, some passengers` luggage and escorted at least one person they didn`t want leaving the country off the train. It was a little eye-opening for us, but we were settl

Once upon a time, Roman Emperor Diocletian built a retirement palace in his native land of Croatia. He lived there for 6 years, martryed 2 bishops, excecuted a bunch of Christians, declared himself a god (Jovius, son of Jupiter) and then committed suicide. 300 years later, when the barbarians were attacking, the people moved into that palace. It was so big, the entire town could fit inside - over 300 buildings inside the palace walls. The temples and mosoleum of the mighty emperor became Christian churches. Where the family promanaded, there are shops, restaurants, cafes and laundry hung to dry. The Bishop of Nim - who had sermons preached in Croatian instead of Latin. We spent 3 days in Split - these cafes face the stunningly blue Adriatic, and we could watch the people stroll and the ferries move in and out of port. We stayed in a little studio right above one of the main squares. Because we had a full kitchen, we could shop for food at the amazing farmer`s market that happens

People, if you haven't been, this needs to be at the top of your list. Save your pennies, buy your travel book and go. We are loving Croatia. The first thing we noticed was all of the welcome signs and friendliness of the locals (in spite of the thousands of tourists that arrive everyday- many for just a few hours off the cruise ships). Three important historical things to know about Dubrovnik. #1 They were an independant republic for centuries, they abolished slavery in the 1400s and their motto has been Libertas (freedom) for centuries. #2 there was a massive earthquake in 1667 that destroyed most of the old town and remains prominent in their historical memory #3 in 1991 they were under seige for three months, with no electricity, running water, or telephone. They withstood the seige partially because they had access to water from ancient fountains and aquaduct system. We filled our water bottles daily from the water source that kept them alive for three months.

There are a ton of stray cats in Dubrovnik. At first Beth was worried that they might be hungry....

Matthew and Liz bought this house six years ago. They think it was once the bishop's house but was pretty run down when the got it. They have worked really hard over the years fixing it up and discovering more of it's history. There are parts of the house that were once part of the old city walls. Matthew has restored some of original arches that had been filled in. While we were there he was using old tiles and stones dug up from the pool area to built a new terrace floor. We really appreciated being hosted by family in the middle of our trip.

We had a welcome break of five days at Katherine's cousin's summer home in the Marche region of Italy. Our very first night we were hosted by an Italian family who also have a family home in this little village of San Pietro Castel. A bit of English, a bit of Italian, two dictionaries and an 11year old who was studying english at school (plus a lot of sign language) meant we could amost understand each other. Well, a little. The food was amazing. antipasto, lasagna with tomato, lasagna with pesto. veal stuffed with ham and mushroom, vegetable ragu, potatoe with rosemary. Fruit course. Dessert (cake and ice cream... it was Nono's 81st birthday). coffee and two kinds of liquour......none of these courses were optional. The two kids showed up the next day to bake with cousin Liz, there was way more eating of batter then baking. Seriously these kids were eating already formed, uncooked cookies from the tray! 5 min in, Liz was called away to the phone, which left

To continue with the theme of transportation. Yesterday was our big day trip out of Florence and into Siena. We chose a sunny day, made sure the museums were not closed on Mondays. Figured out the bus schedule, and headed south (in our front row seats on the coach). We are starting to worry.....is it us? While we were sitting on the side of the road in our broken down bus, we flipped to the Sienna section of our Guide Book only to read the boldly highlighted box feature on "Palio". Every August 16th for hundreds of years, Sienna has had a horse race in the central square. Each of the horses represent one of 10 neighbourhoods and they race for glory (in true medieval fashion). Thousands of people (locals, tourists, curious and party goers) flock to Siena for this event... thousands. Everything closed down early, we managed to sneak into one museum just before closing. We are sure Siena is lovely, we didn't see any of it...... did we mention thousands of people? On to Assis

little girl is gone and we are back.... Next, Flight from London to Rome. We're buckled in, pushed away from the gate, starting toward the runway when the announcement came on that there was a problem with the tire. 30 min later, problem diagnosed, the tire is flat (even though it had just been changed), they fix that tire only to discover, in intervals of every 30 minutes that the other tire was flat..... This would be frustrating except inside the cabin two Canadians had made friends with the flight attendant. Not only did she sneak two bottles of single malt scotch from First Class (with a whisper of "don't tell my boss") but she lent her cell phone so we could phone our hotel in Rome to tell them we would be two hours late. 10 minutes later the Flight Attendant came racing down the aisle holding a ringing cell phone saying "I think this is for you". We love British Airways!

This is not complaining, just sharing our experience of planes, trains and automobiles.... Let's start with the bus trips. We got a great deal - only £7 for both of us to get from Glasgow to Manchester. For the most part, the trip was great. We rode through 'fair trade' towns (whole towns that certified as Fair Trade! It's not just for coffee and chocolate anymore), stopped at an amazing local, farm fresh food rest stop (take that Tim Hortons and Wendy's) and had front row seats....that made the encounter between one of the coach drivers and the pedestrian he almost ran over near a bus terminal that much more, well, intense. If it wasn't for the other very large coach driver who was sitting in the way, we thought the cursing, swearing, creative-body-language expressing driver was going to hop out and beat the equally raging almost squished pedestrian. Up until that point, we thought this one was the nice driver...certainly less cranky than the larger driver

We titled this post "the Romans" instead of just "rome" because we needed to slip in the picture of the Romans Baths in Bath England. We were very fortunate to be able to tour the Bath's just as the sun was setting and the gas lights were coming on.... beautiful, fascinating and soooooo old. It is still keeping Beth up at night trying to figure out how the Romans managed (or Project Managed) everything. Moving on to Rome.... Ruins, the Forum, etc.

God loves Canada (rainbow over Trafalgar Square and St. Martin's in the Field) (L) one for Beth's dad... Our reflection Home cooking with family