Travel Tuesday

When Mr Z and I went to Italy in the summer, probably the best thing we did was take a cooking class. I felt very fortunate to land a place as I only emailed about a week beforehand, thanks to the craziness of my summer schedule, but luckily we managed to bag some places alongside a Canadian-Italian couple who clearly didn't need any help.

Neither did Mr Z as it turned out, because he spends a lot of time watching videos of nonnas cooking on YouTube. Who knew?

It was a very relaxed evening that began by meeting Gianna and then taking a trip to the local food market, to shop for the freshest and best ingredients with which to make our dinner.

We stopped on the way back to her kitchen for a little coffee with almond milk, which is a Leccese speciality. It's not really almond milk: it's almond syrup. I approve. 

Once we got into the kitchen we started cooking a feast. It began with making some focaccia, which involved grating a small boiled potato in with the flour and and yeast. I got to press the dough into the dish when it had risen. That was a lot of oil. No wonder it tasted so good. 

With some caramelised onions and my favourite buratta cheese. 

After that we were taught to make pasta. We made a couple of different kinds, including the local orechiette, which are meant to look like ears, and little tubes. What was leftover, we made into spaghetti. 

It was quite hot in there. 

We made a fresh tomato sauce to go with the pasta, which involved squeezing the tomatoes underwater to get rid of all the seeds - a good tip. We also wrapped chicken thighs around sun dried tomatoes and then rolled them in good bacon, and made another meat dish that I have already forgotten about...clearly I didn't take enough pictures...and Gianna made a panacotta for us to enjoy afterwards with her three home-created spirits.

These were limoncello, rhubarb and the third? I forget. They were quite strong. 

It was an excellent experience that came with plenty of wine and I really enjoyed spending some time cooking with assistance, as well as chatting to the nice couple who was there with us. Gianna had good English but her daughter, though heavily pregnant, stayed the whole time to act as translator when needed. I can definitely recommend going along to one of these sessions if you ever go to Lecce. In fact, I might go again if (when) we return to southern Italy - I'm thinking next May half term. Already queuing up next summer's holidays. 

Travel Tuesday: Pont du Gard

In the summer, Zoe and I went to Montpellier for our summer break. Zoe is a very organised tourist (even more so than me) and had found lots of things for us to do and usually the public transport to do them, so on the first day we went to the Pont du Gard. We took a train to nearby Nimes and then the bus from Nimes to the Pont.

It is a Roman era aqueduct that remains in astonishingly good condition for its age.

It was a blisteringly hot day. It's an easy walk up from the visitors centre (we booked tickets online beforehand) and then across the bridge. You can take a steep path up to an overlook so that you can see it from above, but the heat discouraged us from doing that and we went and drank Aperol Spritz in the shady cafe instead.

The river was the colour of fudge but there were any number of people enjoying water activities. These mostly consisted of canoeing, leaping off the low cliffs (we watched one little girl spend a good 5 minutes plucking up the courage to hop in) and some higher cliffs and splashing in the little shallow pools that had been roped off for youngsters to use.

Spot the jumper.

We didn't clock that such pursuits were available or we would have taken swimmers with us. The French seem to swim in all their bodies of open water - I guess it must be a Europe-wide thing. I know we don't in the UK because of Weil's disease but surely it can't be more common here than there?

Anyway, I had a splash.

My new Saltwater sandals. Worth their weight, though we walked so much (and in water a lot, too) that I ended up with a couple of wicked blisters after this, their first day of wear. 

After a good prowl around the museum, learning about the Romans in that part of the world, we caught the bus back. It was an excellent day out and I can recommend. Such an iconic piece of the ancient world, I'm pleased to say I made it there at least once. 

Travel Tuesday

It would be impossible to write a blog about the Galapagos that did it justice. I think it was my perfect holiday location. Since it's late I'm not even going to try; I'm just going to share another GoPro video, which doesn't quite have the surprise factor of last week's but is probably my favourite.

I'd swum off a bit from the crowd: every time a sea lion showed up to play, everyone crowded around trying to take a selfie with it and I was a bit bored of that by this point, so I was off exploring by myself. That meant I was the only person to see this.

The quality isn't great; there's my surprised, 'OH!' at the start when I realised what I was looking at; and you have to put up with my, 'IS THIS THING DEFINITELY ON?!!??!!' face at the end, but that is still a video of a marine iguana being harassed by a sea lion on the shore of Los Lobos island. Yes, Blue Planet, I am available for your third series.

Travel Tuesday: Bayeux

Last summer, Tutt and I had a couple of day trips to Bayeux. I was super excited to see the Tapestry. No pictures, obviously, but it was amazing to see it in the cloth, so to speak. I can't believe it has survived so well for so long. It was a bit frustrating to be herded through at someone else's pace; I would have preferred having time to pore over the most important scenes for minutes, rather than seconds, but then perhaps the summer holidays are not the best time for this.

Bayeux town was very pretty.

I had some kind of Normandy take on a croque monsieur for lunch. It included sausage and apple, and a big slice of melted cheese.

After that, we went off to the D-day museum. It was a history teachers' paradise. So much information, really well laid out and informative. After that, we had a wander around the cemetery.

I'm not that into this sort of dark tourism, but I found the memorials very moving.

An excellent day out. I'm not quite sure how I managed to fool Tutt into going to two History things on the same day, but I mark it as a triumph of 2016.

Travel Tuesday: Halong Bay

As part of our trip to Vietnam last summer, Tutt and I went on an overnight cruise around Halong Bay. I hadn't really heard of it before but Tutt, a fan of Top Gear, had seen the special where they turn their cars into watercraft and was keen to see it in person, so we included it in our itinerary.

It was a very swish boat.

We boarded around lunchtime and were swiftly whisked off into the other-worldly landscape. It is truly odd: huge limestone chunks jutting up out of emerald green water, usually with a bunch of birds sitting on them and staring. All different shapes and sizes, and seemingly at complete random. While I remember enough geology to know why they look like this, I've never really been satisfied with why it happens so randomly. Why did these chunks survive the weathering, I wonder.

Anyway.

We sat on this balcony after our multi-course fish banquet and Tutt taught me cribbage. I am a bad loser and she kept remembering rules she hadn't told me which only made me a worse loser, but we had fun and I didn't throw her overboard. The next morning, we woke up to this.

We were hustled onto little boats and taken around a floating village, wearing these hats to protect from the extremely strong sun. It was a bit like going on a camel ride in a Bedouin village - awkwardly touristy - but I loved floating around the village. What an interesting place it must be to live. Terrible wifi though, I'm sure.

Afterwards we had some beach time. Deliciously welcome after all the heat and humidity.

I can recommend going: it is something to behold. The cruise was quite touristy but my attitude to that is always - well, I am a tourist.

Travel Tuesday: the Austrian spa experience

No pictures for this one (and you'll understand why by the end).

On one day of our ski holiday in April, Zoe and I decided we would go to an Austrian spa for the day. Zoe found the most highly-recommended local one on Trip Advisor and it was just about doable by public transport, using a combination of the train and a bus, so off we went.

The one we picked was the Erlebnis-Therme Amade. It has a large complex of salt water pools of varying heats, a number of flumes and a separate sauna and wellness centre. We were also able to rent towels, so we didn't have to pinch the towels from the flat we were staying in.

There's a lot on the website about salt-enriched water and how good it is for you, but to begin with it just seemed like any other pool complex in the school holidays. There was a big pool that was mostly outdoors, with lots of jets and showery bits for lounging and chatting; a second big indoor pool with a wave machine, which we didn't try; several hot tubs of varying heats; a very plain pool for actual swimming which had springboards, and a climbing wall erected on one side (very cool and I definitely would have had a go, had there not been an enormous queue); and shedloads of seating for frazzled parents to relax in while their offspring screamed around the place.

We had a good swim and partook of most of the things on this side for about an hour, before deciding to go to the sauna and wellness centre, which made up the other half of the complex. This took some plucking up of courage, because - as the website made clear and as the receptionist stressed to us when we paid - this was a naked area. I wasn't too surprised or concerned about this because, yknow, it's Europe and they're not weird about bodies there. Also, Parpy Jo used to live in Germany and has told me before that they consider sauna-ing in swimwear to be wildly unhygienic.

Luckily we didn't have to strip off as soon as we walked through the doors, so we had a chance to look round. As you might imagine, this side was not crawling with children and was very calm. We found a hot tub, a cold plunge pool, 3 saunas of varying heats, a steam room and some showers inside. Outside was a garden with sun loungers, a sauna with a salt floor, a sauna with a view and some more showers. Best of all, there was a big pool that, like the other one, was half in and half outdoors, with lots of whirly jets and lounging space.

Deep breaths were taken and swimmers were removed. We sat in the empty first sauna for a while, watching the people sauntering around outside in the altogether. Eventually, Zoe said, 'Do you think they can see in?' and we realised that they probably could and we should stop staring.

We tried a few different places before finding a menu of sauna treatments and deciding to go for the Vitamin Bomb one in the sauna with the view. By the time we got in there, there were already about 50 people scattered around, lounging in the breeze from the open windows. Then a man in lederhosen turned up and the windows were quickly shut.

Naturally, not understanding German, I have no idea what he was chatting about, but there were lots of mmmms and nods from the crowd. Then he started ladelling water from a bucket onto the hot coals, which smelled strongly of lemon. Then - the best bit. He picked up a stick with a towel on the end of it and started wafting it around towards the ceiling, to whip down the hot, lemonny air on us, the crowd.

The Austrians approved. Lots of happy sighing. Lots of people putting their arms in the air and tipping their heads back, the better to appreciate it. I, meanwhile, nearly lost it. Avoiding eye contact with Zoe became paramount. Everyone was so earnest, but I found the whole thing so unusual that I could barely contain the giggles. Luckily, it only went on for about 10 minutes, then everyone came out and was served chunks of fruit from a tray by lederhosen man before going back in for the second round, featuring orangey air and wafting from three sizes of towel. I almost had to stop breathing.

Luckily I made it through without shaming all British people by guffawing hugely at the ritual. We made it out and jumped into the cold tub after a very brief shower; I did accidentally squeeze past an elderly man back to back at this point and then regretted it, but I was trying very hard to throw caution to the wind and live in the lemonny, naked moment. After this we went for a long swim around the outdoor pool until it was time for us to catch the bus back, which we did, sniggering to each other like children the whole way.

Shout out to the lady with the eye catching intimate piercing, and the very proud Austrian who was so very proud of himself for most of the afternoon. We found him a bit creepy, but everyone else seemed oblivious. As I'm sure they were, since this sort of thing is totally normal. They must find British people exasperating.

If you can cope with being naked in public, definitely do this. It was the perfect foil to skiing and you're never likely to see any of those people ever again. I slept like the dead that night and my skin was super smooth for days afterwards.

Travel Tuesday: Salzburg

When Zoe and I skied in April, we went to spend a day roaming Salzburg and soaking up the culture.

It's quite a compact little city with the river running alongside the old town, so we walked everywhere we wanted to go. By the time we'd managed the public transport from our ski area it was lunchtime, and pouring with rain, so we stopped in a little courtyard Italian restaurant before going on to the castle.

They are obsessed with Mozart, and ducks (there's some kind of sports team that explains the latter). So, this display of Mozart eyeing a rubber duck doppelganger of himself nervously whilst holding a selfie stick is not that odd.

The castle had the best views across the city and we enjoyed the funicular.

The cathedral was also very picturesque.

We came back to Salzburg at the end of the trip; the railway station has luggage lockers so we stashed everything and went off to see a couple of things we'd missed the first time round - namely, the bridge they used in the Sound of Music, and the Augustiner Brau, a brewery and monastery with a huge food court that came highly recommended by a fellow history teacher friend.

I gather we missed a few key things out, particularly the Sound of Music tour and some kind of local salt mine which gives the city its name. Good reasons to return.

Travel Tuesday: St Johann im Pongau

Zoe and I went skiing in St Johann im Pongau this Easter.

It's a nice little town, less than an hour on the train from Salzburg and with good transport links - buses and so on - if, like us, you're not going to bother hiring a car when you're spending most of the week on the piste.

We stayed just outside the town in a place called Alpendorf, in the very charming and very lovely Bergkristall apartments. There were epic views across the valley from our balcony and, because it was spring, we were able to spend some time sunning ourselves out there.

It was a very quiet place (I was pleased, Zoe less so) and the space was big and comfortable, with plenty of hot water and good heating. The only drawback was that it was up a long and steep hill, but there was a free ski bus down and up, which was good.

The skiing was quite good, also.

There were lots of smallish slopes that we could bash around on for most of the day and the snow was holding quite well, although best in the morning, as usual. I think my ski triumph of the week was really going for it down a black run, catching an edge, falling over and losing a ski and then skidding a further 40m or so on my back with my feet in the air. A couple of small children picked up my lost equipment and brought it down for me. Humbling. I did check my Snowtracks though and I had apparently been doing 70km/hour when I stacked it, so I am not too unhappy about being shamed by a couple of small children when I could have ended up in traction.

This ski area links up across a massive cross-valley cable car. We went over one day. It took us until lunchtime to get to the top of the opposite mountain, and then a very long time to get back, in the heavy spring snow. Zoe was a real trooper but I think I nearly broke her that day.

Still smiling here so that must have not been the day of the cross-valley cable car. Or it must have been before it. Getting down there was horrible.

This was my favourite piste, but I didn't find it until the last day. It was a black run but only little and the chairlift over the top was short, which meant I could keep going round and round. 

Happy times. Did I mention I love skiing?

I would go back to this resort, but I think it would be better earlier in the season. There's quite a lot to ski that we couldn't ski because it was so late in April and so warm. We only ended up skiing for four days out of the six (Zoe three - I toughed it out on a zero visibility day so I could ski with my former colleagues, who just happened to be there with my old school, Deirdre-Chambers-what-a-coincidence) but there were lots of other things to do locally. More on that at a later date.

Travel Tuesday: Honfleur

Tutt and I went to France last summer for a long weekend, camping. The camping part wasn't wildly successful but we both enjoyed France enough to repeat it this weekend. We stayed somewhere in southeast Normandy and visited the pretty town of Honfleur on our way back to the ferry at the end of the trip.

The tall houses by the harbour made me think of Bristol, although the awnings were in citrus brights instead of the pastels favoured in this neck of the woods.

Just there for a day, we didn't do much at all except wander around looking for a cafe that sold nice cakes. On the way back, though, I went on the big wheel, which was a great way of appreciating views over the Seine estuary.

It was also blisteringly hot, so it was nice to be on something moving at speed and mostly in the shade, because it very effectively cooled me down.