Where's Snarky?
June 2012 Prague Copenhagen
After Iceland, Dad and Martin and I made a quick visit to Prague. At least, it would have been Prague, but due to a strike in Norway (!), we weren’t able to get to Prague. So we went to Copenhagen instead.
Alpha bravo camembert; a more conventional museum; the opposite of rainbows and unicorns; bikes everywhere.
A funny place for a bicycle race; a funny place for sandcastles; terror and eels: two great tastes that go great together; what’s red and white and has ten thousand legs and needs to pee?; a notable final dinner.
June 2012 Iceland
Dad and Martin and I were finally able to coordinate our schedules enough to take a short trip to Europe together. After much debate, we decided to split our time between Iceland (which I’d long wanted to visit) and Prague (one of Dad’s favorite cities).
On the pros and cons of travel and old age; visiting the mother country; life in high latitudes; the recreational benefits of bungled waste disposal; identifying the dirty bits; crowds are relative.
Iceland’s rich linguistic heritage; the splendors of skyr; traffic signs as a window into the soul of a nation; where continents collide and nations are born; hot and cold running water; no Pad Thai for you.
A change in plans; a comparison of backyard water features; just because you’re cute doesn’t mean you aren’t tasty; one of my many bad habits; what to do with a kajillion rocks; jökulhlaup is Icelandic for bad news; we play Titanic and win.
Tuesday: back from the suðurland
Babel in progress; Icelandic: pros and cons; a light summer snow; more waterfalls; Chicago versus Reykjavik; regarding cultural differences in locomotive priority.
Taking the long road; a romantic bathroom interlude; Icelandic cartography; a lesson in staff management; a delicious surprise; what to feed your lamb.
Thursday: off to warmer climes
Off to the airport; it’s a (sometimes too) small world after all; final thoughts.
April 2011 Costa Rica
Hot on the heels of the Vietnam excursion, Ellen and I took the boys to Costa Rica for a week. We spent the first half of the week on the coast, and the second half up in the mountains.
Life on a volcano; surprising things to do with mud; the dubious life skills of the Costa Rican possum; two’s company, three thousand’s a crowd; jumping out of a perfectly good tree. And monkeys! You want monkeys, we got monkeys!
In which your correspondent speculates idly about the nature of travel, offers up some baseless cultural commentary, goes for a swim, is stung by jellyfish, and escapes a brazen attack by pirates. On the plus side, there are baby monkeys.
