Time flies, doesn’t it? We’ve already written 399 blog posts, and in honour of the 400th we thought we’d indulge our nostalgia, reliving some of the very best – and very worst – moments of our itinerant life to date.
Flats
For the most part, we have been very lucky in accommodations. (It helps that we are not picky.) There was really only one that was sub-par, and even it was not so bad. Our flat in Istanbul was in a slightly dodgy neighbourhood, and it was noticeably under-furnished: two forks, one spoon, one knife… More significantly, though, the person managing the apartment was responsive but not particularly helpful: for example, he suggested that our bed could still be used, even after its metal frame collapsed. He put blankets and pillows underneath to prop up the frame. We’ll leave it to you to guess how well that worked.
Other than that, the flats have been great! Probably the very nicest was in Bonaire. But our kitchen in Helsinki was amazing (as was our bathroom there, for a different reason!). And our tri-corner flat in Sevilla wins ‘most memorable’, as well as most memorable bathroom view. Cabo Verde was the largest flat to date, with two big bedrooms and two bathrooms and a giant living room. (Our current flat, in Colombo, also has two bedrooms and two bathrooms.)
We’ve had some splendid views: the top two are probably Kuala Lumpur (cityscape) and Cabo Verde (green-blue ocean). And we think our very best neighbourhood was probably Grünerløkka in Oslo. Of neighbourhoods we didn’t live in, we loved Fener and Balat in Istanbul, and Triana in Seville.
And of the hotels we stayed in, we are still dreaming of the Radisson in Bratislava.
We have also had some splendid hosts. Bostjan in Kotor and Marios in Cyprus are both tied for second place, but Roberto in Rome was the one we spent the most time with; he was immensely friendly and exceptionally patient with our inferior Italian, and he guided us to all the best food markets, tea houses, and gelaterie. In fact, we’re hoping to spend a little time with him again when we next pass through Rome.
Travel
We fly a lot less than we did in our previous lives, but the locations tend to be much further away. Airline travel, alas, is not what it used to be, but most of the time we’re satisfied if we get from one place to another. Our most memorable flight (in a good way) was the one from Vancouver to Vanuatu. It was very long – 24 hours including the layover in Fiji – and we flew business class with Fiji Air. This is the life, we thought; too bad we can’t usually afford it. (This was a special deal, or, we think more likely, a mistake on the part of the airline.)
We loved riding the Flåm train; it reminded us how much we like train travel. Riding buses in the Balkans reminded us how much we don’t like bus travel. But needs must, some of the time.
We have had a few travel-related mishaps, most significantly when we messed up our arrival in Istanbul by not getting visas beforehand (reprised in Georgetown, Guyana). Both of these experiences were really, really crappy. And we think only the first one was our fault. Lesson here: check more than once about entrance visas. (Though we have also learned that even government websites aren’t always accurate…)
Food
Speaking of food, we have eaten remarkably well over the past two and a half years! It would be impossible to pick the very best food. But our favourite all-around restaurant has to be Arya in Istanbul, where we sat on the roof and looked out at the Golden Horn whilst eating the world’s largest breakfast, one delicious thing after another. We brought everyone who visited us in Istanbul there. Our best high end meal remains the one we ate at Lysverket.
We usually find a nice coffee shop for ourselves within the first week in a new place. Our favourite is Patisserie in Kotor. The wonderful Martina brightened the place immeasurably (and she made great coffee) and we met there some wonderfully interesting ex-pats from Canada, Russia, and the U.S. We sometimes even managed to get the cats off of our seats! Honourable mention goes to Craft Coffee Roasters in Dublin for its great scones and lovely proprietor (a wonderful guy transplanted from Athens).
The Esquiline Market in Rome, Stockmann’s Food Hall in Helsinki, and Granville Market in Vancouver provided the most amazing groceries we’ve ever seen.
The food we were most keen to try was Surinamese, and it didn’t disappoint. More recently, we fell in love with Malaysian cuisine. But Turkey and Italy still top the list of best all-around food countries (on this trip; Indian is also right up there…). And Sevilla is a close third, if a little too heavy on the ham.
Have we eaten anything really terrible? Aside from our experience of kava in Vanuatu, that is. But we didn’t have high expectations going in. It’s turned out to be remarkably difficult to get a good Manhattan. Most cocktail bars in the world seem to have a small list of specialty drinks and bartenders untrained in anything else. A few are willing to give it a go, so we don’t want to say anything mean about them. But those have not been the best drinks we’ve ever had. And John had a glass of wine once that was – well, we don’t actually know what it was. But it was certainly not wine. There have been some unremarkable meals, mostly grabbed on the way from one place to another. But that’s to be expected. One of our most important lessons from all this travel, in fact, is that people the world over eat better than Americans do, on a regular basis.
Activities and Experiences
Laurel really enjoyed learning to sail in Cyprus, but that’s taken second fiddle to diving in Bonaire, Vanuatu, and – soon – Sri Lanka! And the Huskitory was also fantastic – but let’s not forget about those Bonaire donkeys, either! We’ve enjoyed baths in Turkey and saunas in Finland. And we have been to dozens of museums and galleries and seen hundreds of beautiful things. Here again it’s difficult to choose. But for old favourites, we’d probably pick the Villa Borghese or the Pergamonmuseum, and for new, the National Museum in Oslo. But we paid more visits to the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin than to any other museum anywhere, and we loved taking visitors there.
As far as architecture goes, we remain enamoured of the Ottoman mosques of Sinan, Suleiman’s star architect. But we still can’t get enough of Bernini (scupltures too!). And the Alhambra is right up there in any list of spectacular building complexes.
We love gardens, and remember many of the ones we’ve spent time in: the Vatican gardens, Oslo’s Botanical Gardens, Linnaeus’ garden in Uppsala, and the Dublin memorial garden. Of public spaces we’ve hung out in, the Plaza de España in Sevilla is probably the very best.
We’re not really festival people, but the two annual events we had the most fun at were Cabo Verde’s Carnival and Dublin’s Bloomsday celebrations, both in 2023. And we’ll never forget Easter mass at the Vatican!
Places and Things We Want More Of
We’re keen to return to Helsinki. We really liked Belgrade. We’ve been enjoying Southeast Asia. We want to take more trains, and we’re always up for excellent food. So for the next 400 posts, there will be more of the wit and charm you have come to expect from us, in yet more locales across this amazing globe of ours!
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