Today is our first day out after a long day of travel yesterday. On the agenda for today is what started of as a little village in the 11th century then became a hunting lodge with a bit of forest to what today is simply know as the Palace of Versailles. When you are the […]
Our last tourist stop on this trip is the ancient village of Bagno Vignoni located in the heart of Tuscany, in the Val d’Orcia Natural Park. At the heart of the village instead of the usual piazza is the “Square of sources” – a huge hot springs pool dating back to the sixteenth-century. This spot was […]
If you have ever seen a calendar of Tuscany, postcards or even some promotional material chances are you have seen Vitality Chapel in at least one of the pictures. The chapel of Our Lady of Vitality originally built around 1590 is located on a private property on the road between Pienza to San Quirico d’Orcia and […]
This is our third visit to Siena. We always find something new to see and to do. After two hectic days of driving around and looking at towns and villages today we are taking it easy. This time around in Siena, we decided to climb the Torre del Mangia which is 88m in height – same […]
Sant’Anna in Camprena is in the heart of Tuscany – about 6km from Pienza. It is a monastery from the 15th century perched on the top of hill with spectacular views of the rolling Tuscan hills. The buildings are beautiful, the garden is huge and the food is simply amazing. Having said that this place would be nothing if it […]
Relatively speaking this is a large town compared to some of the smaller villages we visited. There are about 10K people living in Foiano della Chiana today. This is also an agricultural town which used to be surrounded by marshes on three sides, and not a hill top town like all others. If it was […]
Liciagnano is a remarkable preserved medieval walled village of about 3500 people. It’s strategic high altitude and its location on the road between Sienna and Arezzo meant that between 1200 and 1500AD it was it was continually the subject of battles between these cities, involving also Florence and Perugia. It is as beautiful as it is picturesque and it […]
Monte San Savino is a small town of about 8000 people and it is famous for two things. First, it was one of the first urban settlements in Tuscany, Italy, which originated around 1100. Second Giulio Salvadori a poet and a literary critic was born there. An interesting thing about Salvadori is that he covered to Christianity in 1885. […]
Really we are back in Arezzo for views, wine, food and of course gelato. We found an amazing wine bar with an even more amazing food. Luckily we got the second last table and had a phenomenal lunch. There must have been no less than 25 to 30 people that were simply turned away because the […]
Today is day two of – what else can we eat?!, I mean what other wonders of cultural significance can we find on a morning drive across Tuscany. First stop, Cortona. Some say the first settlement started 273 years after the great flood. The earliest recorded history is from the 7th century BC. Cortona then […]
Some of the oldest human settlements of central Italy were discovered at the base of Monte Cetona, such as the early neo-Paleolithic Gosto cave (40–80th century BC) and Lattaia cave (9–10th century BC). The town of Cetona developed around 900 AD around the fortress which to this day is privately own. Next to the Cetona is a small hill […]
Today we went for a drive. This is a typical Tuscan route very reminiscent to the Romantic Road you can take through Bavaria. Basically, you drive through one of the most stunning parts of Tuscany where each hill is doted with a typical Tuscan farmhouse, and a long driveway which in turn is occasionally lined […]
Located about 11 km from Castellini in Chianti is an even smaller village of Radda with 1700 inhabitants. It still takes about 20 min to drive here because the roads are narrow and twisty and suicidal when wet. The town is nice, the views simply spectacular and my shoes are still soaking wet, and I swear to […]
Castellini is a small village in Tuscany located between Florence and Sienna. The first settlement in the area dates back to 800BC and the current village dates back to 1100s. Perched on the top of a hill and surrounded by olive trees and vineyards this is a quaint little town with great wine, cheese and olive oils which […]
Today we are spending a simple day without a schedule. We got into the car and started driving around from one small town to the next starting with San Gimignano our favourite of Tuscan towns. We did a bit of shopping and had a great lunch and got soaked. It rained on and off all […]
Since we visited Florence before we were able to skip a lot of the major landmarks and attractions and simply concentrate on things we have not seen yet. Having said that, it is nearly impossible to be in Florence and walk by the main cathedral and ignore it – it is simply stunning and quite spectacular. […]
For all the planning in the world we did to get to Uffizi without much hassle, we almost blew it today by being late for our scheduled time. In July the line ups to get into Uffizi Gallery are up to 5 hours long. Uffizi has the usual collection of Italian and other European greats like […]
For the next 6 days this will be our home away from home. We decided to stay in one place and simply drive out to where we want to go as opposed to moving from place to place to place. It is quite lovely here. Tour of the inside maybe tomorrow. We have a busy […]
Penza is a birthplace of Aeneas Salvias Piccolomini who later became Pople Pius II. Once he became Pope, Piccolomini had the entire village of Corsignano rebuilt and renamed to become an ideal Renaissance town. The place was intended as a retreat from Rome, and it represents the first application of humanist urban planning concepts. The humanist […]
WOW, it’s been quite a while since we posed anything on here. Having said that we are back on the road again travelling a bit. Short break, nine days in total – destination Tuscany. We did what all responsible parents would naturally do, leave the kids in school and in charge of the house and […]
Today we are trying a different bread recipe made with a fresh yeast starter. Evelina is helping with the baking today and getting her hands really dirty.
Today we set off for a nice walk at Deep Cove Park with some old friends from Anna’s university years – Damian and Allisa and their children. The one hour leisurely hike up offers spectacular views of the bay and a great vista of downtown Vancouver. On the way down we stopped for some coffee and crêpes […]
Today we have our first taste of what is coming and will be here for the next 6 months – snow and frost and lots of both. Luckily it did not get too cold quite yet but we all know it is coming. Until it all melts it will be white and pretty and clean […]
Today we woke up in a frozen world. It has been quite humid and overnight we had a bit of frost. It is absolutely beautiful outside, but cold.
We are expecting some company tomorrow, so Monika offered to make a cake for tomorrow. She did not realize that this cake recipe takes 3 hours to get ready. Nonetheless this one turned out awesome and it was well worth the wait.
Today the girls came over for a coffee and dessert. Allie and Eveliana had a cappuccino whereas Gemma decided to go straight for dessert a home made Crème brûlée. Delicious.
Today is a Remembrance Day celebration at Mount Pleasant School. At the assembly the children recited poems, sang some songs and played music. There was even a representative from the airbase at the school. It was well done, that’s for sure.
Yesterday was Halloween, today is a lazy Saturday morning. While the kids were out shopping at WEM for some Christmas gifts, we made a quick stop at Audio Ark. For me going to Audio Ark is like going to a giant candy store – it is a happy place full of refined sophistication and decadence.
Today for breakfast we are trying the Liege Cakes once more time. This time a bit different recipe which has a bit less butter but instead of yeast we are using live culture. We essentially used the same recipe as last week but scaled down a bit on butter. This should have been an entire […]
A quick trip around the neighbourhood with a shield and a sword and a smile yielded some great returns. Tomorrow we are going to buy a shed for the back yard to put it all in.
Today is Halloween – it is great many things to many different people. For ghosts and goblins and witches and monsters it is time to freely roam the streets. For little Vikings at heart it is time to get out and liberate the neighbourhood of some candies and for the dentists it is time to pick up […]
It is snowing! At around 5pm today the skies opened up and it started coming down like crazy. Huge wet snow flakes everywhere. Only Evelina was happy with this turn of events, we all just looked in disbelief! I am sure this snow is not going to stick around around for long, but we all […]
Let’s call this for what it really is – it is a blog mostly about food. We are always talking about, eating too much, over eating or seeing some church. Of the last 8 posts 6 of them are about food. We had a little brunch today with Dobrescu’s. Simple brunch with little to no work. […]
What better way to spent the weekend than doing little to nothing at all. Today is one of those days, we were all waiting with anticipation for 4:30p.m. to have dinner at Thanh Thanh. This is one of two restaurants that we really missed when we were in Europe. On the agenda today is a […]
There are many different things we all miss about being on the other side of the pond. From the simple narrow and twisted cobble stone streets we walked in the old town Nuremberg to our friends and our favourite coffee shops and stores, the amazing gelato and the atmosphere of the old city, the history and […]
You will have to take my word for it, even though the pictures don’t show it, there really were 14 pizza on the dinner menu tonight – each different than the last. Twelve of them were consumed on site and two went home with us. There was also bread pudding. There was a lot of […]
Today we finally got a chance to get together with our good old neighbours we first met in our first house in Pleasantview some 15 years ago. We have been friends ever since. In his yard, Jeff built an amazing pizza oven, a project like no other! The pizza is all home made with love, […]
Perhaps one of the things that Boris and Evelina missed the most about Edmonton was their cousins. The greatest thing in their minds is the fact that our family lives close to us. On a beautiful fall day with the sun shining and leaves blowing in the wind they got on their bikes and went […]
If we are not eating, we are actively thinking about what to make and eat next. Seriously, that is what we do. Today is another lazy Thanksgiving weekend morning. On the go for breakfast are fresh, homemade Belgian waffles! Life is good.
Thanksgiving is great. Three days off, three days of eating and relaxing. It is great to be home for this one. While Christmas has its own charm, Thanksgiving is special. It is time to take pause and reflect, time to be thankful and appreciative. Time to spend with family, time to relax and appreciate everyone […]
To make a long story short – this is what our weekend is shaping up to be. We are going to be sampling four more bottles of Prosecco to see which one will be perfect to make just the right tasting Hugo. We are looking for volunteers to help us empty these four lovely bottles. […]
It is finally time to make the landing post and say goodbye to Iceland. I have been home for a couple of weeks now buried in work. Not the business work but house work. There is a seemingly endless list of house chores that need doing, some due to what appears to be plain neglect, some […]
I finally got around to getting these uploaded, converted and here they are for you to enjoy. While at Villa Medici, this was the Masters of Piano graduating class, with formalities of the evening being done, everyone was a lot more relaxed and the music they got out of that wooden box with strings and […]
Here we go. Leaving Germany.
First part of this journey home is done, that is getting on the right train with 3 suitcases and 2 bags. Next milestone will be to get off the train and switch airport terminals in Frankfurt. For now I have two solid hours to relax and do nothing.
Here we go, the last drive on a beautiful summer morning – off to the train station.
Monza is an integral part of F1. It is one of the first 7 tracks that hosted the F1 championship in 1950. Since then 64 F1 races were run in Italy and all but one were held at Monza. Monza together with Monaco, Silverstone in England, and Spa in Belgium are four of the original tracks still used today […]
It is 10:30pm. The owner of the villa is staying in the private part of this complex behind a big iron gate, in a huge manicured private garden in a smaller private villa more suitable for a family. Alexandro the caretaker and Fiona the lady who makes breakfast sleeps next to the kitchen which is […]
After last night it was slow going this morning but a race day awaits. Karen, Carlos and myself are going to carpool since they know where the good parking is but don’t feel like driving their little Lancia on the twisty Italian roads. We were informed that to have a chance of finding decent parking we […]
After my day out at Monza, I got back to the Villa Medici for the piano concert which I was invited to by Maestro Kanno. Together with a number of other guests and the owner of this fabulous place we watched 4 young musicians show off their polished skills after a week of teaching and a […]
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