Sometime in early fall of 2012 Blonde entered an online contest, sponsored by Pure Wow, for a free stay at Canyon Ranch. Both Blonde and Brunette have entered hundreds of vacation giveaways over the years never winning any and then within 6 weeks time Blonde won two - a trip to Puerto Rico and the one to Canyon Ranch. Bl and Br went to Puerto Rico in early December as that … [Read more...]
Places we’ve loved: Begur, Spain
Begur, and the surrounding area, is so charming, untouristy and beautiful that we have been hesitant to write about it. We are afraid that if we paint an accurate picture then more people like us might go there. But after the fabulous week we enjoyed in the region we reluctantly decided to be generous and let you in on what we discovered. Begur is in the heart of the Costa … [Read more...]
Places we love: Naples, Florida
Reformed Florida-basher (and now resident) Blonde and lifelong Florida-booster, Brunette, knew Naples would be featured in one of our "Places We've Loved" posts the moment we began to slobber into our bowls of smooth, creamy gelato from Barbatella's. Naples is the Kate Middleton of Florida: well-bred but not pretentious, pretty, smart and fun. Marco Island is Pippa but with … [Read more...]
Weekly Photo Challenge: Unique
This week's photo challenge was, well, challenging! How often is something truly unique? If you're pondering that question from either a scientific or intellectual viewpoint then you're reading the wrong blog. We were just trying to think of something clever to say about a photo and didn't want to enter a picture of a flower or something else lame (the way we usually do). So … [Read more...]
Should Blonde go to Marseille for her (next) 40th birthday?
Blonde enjoys turning 40 and does so repeatedly. Other than one time when she turned 40 and demanded that "attention must be paid" she really doesn't care that it's her birthday. However, as Brunette's hubby is becomingly increasingly suspicious of the "need" for us to travel together so much we are becoming more creative in our rationales. (And then, if he doesn't fall for one … [Read more...]
TTD in Florida
When we travel Brunette is often afflicted by Temporary Travel Deafness (TTD). Hers is caused by flying. The air pressure changes appear to extract the sense from her ears which leads to many humorous exchanges. Our classic favorite is from a flight to Athens. The cart for meal service was coming down the aisle and Blonde heard the flight attendants ask each passenger "chicken … [Read more...]
Sushi for (some) one in Marco Island, Florida
Many days the thought of coming up with new content for the blog is so taxing that the stress can only be alleviated by consuming chocolate and wine. Today our blog topic was figuratively dropped into our laps and literally dropped into our swimming pool. The way to recognize that good fortune turned out to also be with chocolate and wine but with a celebratory, not consoling, … [Read more...]
Turks and Caicos in the Picture the World photo project
The Departure Board has a project of compiling representative photos of all of the countries in the world. This is ours that we submitted for Turks and Caicos and it was accepted and posted today. This is an interesting project to follow. Here's the url: http://www.thedepartureboard.com/tag/picture-the-world-project Maybe you have a photo to enter for a place not yet … [Read more...]
Places We’ve Loved: Genoa
When Blonde and Brunette planned our trip to the Cinque Terre and the Italian Riviera we scheduled a stopover in Genoa. We expected Genoa to be exactly that - a stopover, not a destination. As is our habit we bumbled into town in a small car strewn about with our possessions hoping we would be able to find the Hotel Bristol Palace where we had reservations. As we were arriving … [Read more...]
Lessons in selecting a mate as learned in the Sacred Monkey Forest of Bali
When the book and then the movie Eat, Pray, Love were wildly popular desolately single women went en masse on tours to Bali. They yearned to be told their fate by Ketut Liyer, an ancient healer and lady-fate predictor, get overnight spiritual transformations and meet sensitive and adoring (yet manly) men. Men wanted to go anywhere but Bali. They (probably rightfully) … [Read more...]