4 years ago we visited St.Petersburg (our 2nd visit) but have not visited in December so it was nice to see the Hermitage and surrounding buildings looking all festive.
The view of the small canal behind the hermitage brought back memories of the trip we took through the canals of St.Petersburg back in 2016.
Tsar Peter the Great founded St Petersburg in 1703 on the marshes at the mouth of the Ne Read on...
These are two scientific names for a plant, based on Latin or Greek words. The first uses the genus name and the second uses the specific epithet. The two names together define the species and are usually written in italics or underlined
This is the second part of the scientific name. This may describe a plant characteristic, the location where it was found or the person who discovered it. This n Read on...
Leaving Auckland, we headed a couple of hours south to Matamata. Nearby, on what used to be a 506 hectare (1250 acre) sheep farm, Sir Peter Jackson found what he felt was the perfect site to locate his set for The Shire. In particular, a large tree matched a tree described in Tolkiens works. He built the set using temporary materials for the Lord of the Rings trilogy. By agreement with the landown Read on...
The neighborhood of La Boca, in the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires, is famous for two things —the football stadium La Bombonera, and El Caminito, a short pedestrian street paved with cobblestone where artists sell their wares and tango dancers prance along the sidewalk providing photo opportunities for tourists. The rainbow colored ramshackle buildings lining either side of the famous strip i Read on...
Scandinavian breakfasts and I were made for each other. It fits in with my more is more philosophy on life and gastronomy. We must hurry with reckless gluttony and eat our full Scandinavian hotel breakfast: tomato juice, muesli, cereal, pancakes, sausages, bacon, eggs (scrambled), Danishes (better than you have ever had back home), ham, terrine of ham, herring will dill and tomato. Its all so wond Read on...
What do any of us really know about the Mob here in Chicago? Yes, I watched Robert Stack (as Eliot Ness) in The Untouchables in the 60s, and it scared the cr*p out of me. Many stories exist, some true, some not. Yet, I think we all have a fascination about their fame and notorious crimes. The most famous mobster was none other than Al Capone. And his influence reached California, Florida, and Neva Read on...
Roll out on the Friday morning was even more organised than the roll in. For safety reasons was allowed to leave camp before 7am. At 2minutes past there was a steady stream heading out. Once again they had volunteer marshals at the end of each road, allowing 15 vehicles at a time to join the exiting convoy. We could not believe how quickly we were able to join in – no sooner had we got in the c Read on...
On the road again this time to another site near Rouen. We are making our way back home and cannot decide whether to get the ferry or the tunnel let alone what time we are going to cross. The journey to this campsite was a bit different as we needed to get a ferry across to Jumieges where our next site is and then found out that the height limit was 3 metres. Well our rig is 2.89 metres and then a Read on...
Well. seeing as how we had an extra night to plan for due to our cancellations at Coos Bay and Crater Lake, we decided to continue heading East today on Oregons Scenic byway called Hells Canyon. The plan was to traverse the entire 42 mile road and then proceed to LaGande, OR for the night. There is still smoke in the air out here, but is much better than previous days. We were able to enjoy the sc Read on...
Although they eat some very unusual shit in Thailand, cooking with poo is, thankfully, not literal. Its the cooking school of Poo, a lady from the Khlong Toei slum in Bangkok. Before starting her cooking school, Poo spent 14 hours a day cooking food and making money, about 200 bhat ($7usd) a day. But a bubbly personality, a pinch of tenaciousness, a dollop of help from an Australian missionary, Read on...