travel

Malta – Valletta and the Knights of St. John

Malta – Valletta and the Knights of St. John

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

In 1530, Charles V, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, gave the Island of Malta to the Knights of St. John in exchange for a single falcon, to be paid annually to the Viceroy of Sicily. The falcon was a token. The real exchange was that the Knights would hold Malta as a strategic front against Turkish incursion into Europe. Did you know all this while growing up watching Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon? I did not.

At any rate, having nowhere else to go after their recent expulsion by the Turks from the Isle of Rhodes, the Knights settled on what they felt was a bit of a barren rock in the middle of the Mediterranean.… Read more

Malta – Hiking in Mellieha and the Aquarium

Malta – Hiking in Mellieha and the Aquarium

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

We have been looking forward to our Christmas trip in Malta for months. Things got off to a good start, everything considered. Tony and I were both so ready for a vacation that while we were waiting in line to check-in (yes, when you bring your dog on vacation, you have to check in at the airport rather than online), he confided to me that if there were a problem, he would just turn around and go home, because he didn’t have any energy to resolve problems.

Of course there was a problem. They couldn’t find our dog’s reservation (yes, when you bring your dog on vacation she needs not only a passport, but a plane ticket, complete with its own ticket number, which was missing).… Read more

Burg Cochem

Burg Cochem

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

Castles were the theme of our weekend in Germany, and my favourite castle was Burg Cochem. A beautiful drive through rolling German hills culminated in a lovely little town on the banks of the Moselle River.

Little Town

Up on the hill was a perfect little castle, surrounded by vineyards.

Another view

After climbing up the windy hill, we were ushered through a gate into an idyllic courtyard to join the guided tour through the castle.

view

Our guide was a seemingly non-nonsense German lady who secretly had a hilariously dry sense of humour.

The Guide

The castle was originally built in the 11th century, but rebuilt and filled with gorgeous artifacts from a range of different time periods eight centuries later by a businessman from Berlin, who used it as his family’s summer home.… Read more

Cologne, Germany

Cologne, Germany

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

I’ve been wanting to visit the Cologne Cathedral since I caught a glimpse of it from the train when we visited my sister-in-law Rachel in southern Germany last year. The first thing I noticed when I saw it was how black it is. In fact, I immediately contrasted it in my mind with the Duomo in Milan, which impressed me with its sheer whiteness when we visited a million years ago when Raj was just a toddler.

Raj Milan

One could draw some kind of metaphorical religious inference from the relative coloring of the two cathedrals. However, the truth has less to do with the religiosity of the respective congregations, and more with that train station next to the cathedral, and all the coal that was burned in the vicinity for a hundred years.… Read more

Heimbach, Germany

Heimbach, Germany

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

I planned our weekend in Germany around visiting the spectacular Cologne Cathedral. When I was planning the trip, I was a bit torn between staying around the corner from the Cathedral and staying about an hour away in a tiny, picturesque German town. My first and last impulse always being to have it all, I opted for the tiny little town and after we saw it, we all agreed it was the perfect choice.

I showed you our house by the evening light yesterday, but it looked, if possible, even more delightful the next morning by daylight.

House

Here’s the link if you want to stay there too.… Read more

Moyland Castle, Germany

Moyland Castle, Germany

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

We just finished up a delightful and fun-filled week and a half with Tony’s parents, aka Grammy and Pampa. The original plan had been to do an epic road tour through central Germany along the castle road to Prague, and then driving all the way back home through Germany. That plan was eventually scrapped, both because it involved too much driving (an average of at least 3-4 hours per day) and because we were in the middle of house hunting and didn’t feel like we could be gone for a week and a half.

However, our amended trip turned out to be even better.… Read more

Christmas in Spain – Sevilla

Christmas in Spain – Sevilla

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

Yes, I know it’s February. January turned out to be a bit of a crazy month, mostly because one or another of us has been sick since we got home from Spain. So here’s the long-awaited post on what we did in Sevilla on our last day in Spain.

First of all, we drove. It’s three hours from where we were staying in little Béznar to Sevilla, the longest stretch we drove during our vacation. We don’t mind driving (kind of look back on it nostalgically when we remember our time living on the West Coast), and our kids are great travelers.… Read more

Christmas in Spain – Christmas Eve

Christmas in Spain – Christmas Eve

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

It just so happened that two other families from the children’s school were also vacationing in Spain this year. For Christmas Eve, they invited us to come spend the evening in the cute little house where they were staying. The road to their house was auspiciously announced by this sign, which proclaimed it, ‘Land of Luck’.

Tierra de Suerte

We certainly thought we were lucky to be spending Christmas Eve with the Ords and the Bardsleys. The children disappeared immediately to go exploring together in the little canyon right outside the door, while the adults made sangria and Christmas Eve Chili.

Christmas Eve chili

Later Jason broke out his ukelele and we sang Christmas carols together in front of a roaring fire.… Read more

Christmas in Spain – Córdoba

Christmas in Spain – Córdoba

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

One of the disadvantages of planning as you go when it comes to travel is that the logistics don’t always end up being quite as convenient as they might have been. When I booked our cute little house near Granada, the only thing we had planned to do for sure was to visit the Alhambra. From which point of view, renting a house a half hour away made all kinds of sense. However, when you zoom out on Andalucía, you notice that Granada isn’t exactly centrally located. Córdoba, for instance, is three hours away by car. Fortunately, we like road-tripping as much as other forms of travel.… Read more

Christmas in Spain – the Sierra Nevada

Christmas in Spain – the Sierra Nevada

Sarah Bringhurst Familia

The way we ended up planning our trip was to alternate days of heavy sightseeing with more relaxing days. On one of those relaxing days involving lazy mornings and naps, we decided to take an afternoon hike in the Sierra Nevada National Park, just a few kilometres from where we were staying. A few days earlier, while on our ill-fated puke drive, I had seen a sign that said it was 19 kilometres to the Sierra Nevada National Park. I assumed that meant there would be an official entrance where we could park, and then some well-marked hiking trails and picnic areas.… Read more