"I haven't been everywhere, but it's on my list."
After our North Morocco Adventure, hitting seven cities and towns in just 10 days, we really appreciated the time to see Marrakech in depth by staying in the old town and visiting lots of the historical attractions and museums. Not
The morning after our Intrepid tour, we woke up at the crack of dawn to go hot air ballooning just outside Marrakech. Due to a scheduling issue, it was already sunrise when we were approaching the takeoff point, but with
For our first eight days in Morocco, we did something a bit unusual for us; we joined a small group tour with Intrepid Travel. We were attracted by their itinerary that included all of the hotels and logistics for visiting
After our week in Tunisia, we caught an early morning flight westward, across the breadth of Algeria (the largest country in Africa), landing in Casablanca, Morocco. Casablanca has a reputation for being thin on sights. For many tourists it is
When we left Constantine, Algeria for Tunisia, annoyingly we had to fly west to Algiers then backtrack east flying directly over the city we’d just left! All because of uncertainty about being able to cross the land border. Consequently, most
We had three great days to visit two UNESCO world heritage sites (Djemila and Timgad), and Constantine (the “City of Bridges”). Constantine was also a major crossroads of the Roman empire, known as Colonia Constantiniana. Three fantastic sights in three
A peculiarity of the Air Algerie schedule is that all flights seem to have to go through Algiers, and ususally with a terrible schedule! So when we left the desert in Ghardaia, we had to fly back to Algiers before
We spent a full day seeing 3 of the 5 ksour (fortified towns) of the UNESCO-listed M’Zab Valley. An intriguing mixture of markets, medinas, and mosques that in some ways seemed to have not changed in 900 years since the
A camel looks like something put together by a committee. Attributed to T. R. Quaife in “Reader’s Digest” As we as we said in our “Will You Ride a Camel?” post before we departed on this trip, we were unsure
Our first day in the UNESCO World Heritage Site of the M’Zab Valley was split between the oasis and the Sahara. In the morning we walked through the palmerie (palm grove) of the town of Ghardaia, the largest of the
A more appropriate quote for the day would be Pepe le Pew’s “… you do not have to come weeth me to zee Casbah: we are already here!“. (See the Youtube clip below.) Our first real day in Algeria (post
We began our trip to Northern Africa and France with great expectations. One of us is a fan of the show Emily in Paris. In a Season 4 episode, there is an Air France product placement in which Emily visits
In the fall of 2025, we’ll visit Japan again and start our trip in Tokyo. On our first trip to Japan we only visited Japan’s earliest capital cities, Nara and Kyoto, and we are looking forward to visiting the current
Whenever we say that we’re going to northern Africa and visiting the Sahara Desert we frequently get asked the question “Will you ride a camel?”. Actually, we’re not sure if we’ll do the almost obligatory camel ride in the Sahara.
When we visit the Amazon rainforest in Brazil next year, we hope to reach the remote village of Loof Lirpa to visit the Home for Homeless Homing Pigeons. The Amazonian subspecies of the common homing pigeon, Columba livia amazonum, nests
When we created our trip page, Uruguay and the Amazon, we were planning to cruise the Amazon from its mouth up to Manaus, Brazil and back on a large cruise ship. We have had to pivot, and have cancelled that
The feature image above is from the CBC article “‘Elbows up’ rallying cry evokes memories of Mr. Hockey” which provides the origin story for the Elbows Up catchphrase. As mentioned on our Amazon Trip Page, we’ve cancelled our plans to
When we disembarked from the ship on Saturday morning, we had an hour or so to look around Bridgetown, the capital of Barbados. Then headed to the airport for our “on time” flight to Toronto. Not sure why we had
On our Windward Islands cruise on the Royal Clipper we visited four of the Windward Islands and three of the Leeward Islands: the countries of Barbados, St. Lucia, Dominica, Antigua and Barbuda, and St. Kitts and Nevis, and islands within
We boarded the tall ship Royal Clipper after 24 hours in Barbados, and set sail for a week in the Caribbean “Sailing, Sailing, Over the Bounding Main”. But what exactly is the “main” and why is it bounding? What better