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musings & more since 2004

recipe: bacalhau à bras

Portugal, recipe, receita, bacalhau à bras, cod, bacalao

Classic recipes from any country have at least two things in common: an intensely debated origin & of course, several variations… everyone’s grandmother obviously makes the best! Since my grandmother was not Portuguese, I draw on 20 years of travel to & eating in Portugal to make their classic comfort food at home. I promise this won’t turn into a food blog, but I love to eat & cook so I wanted to share some of the dishes we regularly make.

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italy: guidebook research 2019

Italia, Italy, 2019 guidebook research, Rick Steves

The ongoing book research saga continues, but this time with an all-new destination: Italia! That’s right… a country where I don’t speak much of the language & to places I’d never visited before. Uh-oh. My mood often ran between excited & apprehensive, so to laugh about the day’s events I tweeted once daily as I tend to do. Really anything to maintain a bit of connection with the real world. Come along as I relive those crazy two & a half weeks.

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sevilla: spring blossoms

España, Sevilla, Andalucía, primavera, spring, flowers, blossoms, flores

Spring has sprung! With a mild climate for most of the year, plants love Sevilla… if they can survive the intense heat of summer. The city is filled with a huge variety of flowering plants & trees, so the winter blues disappear quickly. While this post isn’t a compendium of all we’ve got blooming now, let it inspire you to stroll the city & enjoy one of nature’s great displays.

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road trip: show me state

road trip, Missouri, Iowa, Kansas City, Jefferson City, St. Louis

My uncle passed away three months prior to this trip, so the first few days consisted of wrapping up family matters in Iowa. But we’d be close to the state border after scattering my uncle’s ashes, so why not dip down & see what Missouri has to offer? As a kid I’d always just driven through, however we discovered a ton to see, do & eat. The state lived up to its motto & showed us how great Missouri is!

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sevilla: heliópolis

España, Spain, Andalucía, Sevilla, Heliópolis

The 1929 Iberoamerican Exposition radically transformed the city of Sevilla, with major projects such a large public park (Parque María Luisa) & the creation of cortas (artificial canals) in the Guadalquivir River. Cortas served several important purposes: shortening the river’s course, providing a means for more rapid water flow & thereby reducing sediment deposit, allowing for better flood control, creating new port facilities & opening new land for development. Although plagued with constant delays, this new infrastructure turned Sevilla into a modern city.

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spain: sevilla day trips

España, Spain, Sevilla, day trips

When I moved back to Spain in 2016, I resolved to visit all places near home in Sevilla —big or small— that I’d never had time to see during a work trip. Part of this ambitious plan also included re-visiting places I knew well but felt I needed to explore more… and write trip reports for this blog. Well, that was the plan. Life has a way of making plans go astray so… no time like the present to start.

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