Barcelona, Spain

Barcelona is a beautiful city, full of architectural details that take your breath away. Nothing has been overlooked, from doorknobs to light posts. We could walk down the same street a hundred times and see something new each time. It is for the most part amazing... but sometimes interestingly odd. Antoni Gaudi is the famous architect behind most these popular sites in Barcelona. His work reminds us of something from a fairy tale. We've been doing a lot of walking, taking everything in and trying to work off all the tapas we're eating!

Riding the escalator at Parc de Montjuic. Notice the bullring in the background. Bullfighting was banned in Barcelona in 2010, so we will be skipping that experience this trip.

The Arc del Triomf, built as the grand entrance for the Universal Exposition of 1888.


La Cascada at Parc de la Ciutadella. The park was once a fortress for Madrid's soldiers during their occupation of Barcelona. Felipe V demolished around 2,000 houses to build the fortress and barracks for his soldiers. In 1868, the walls of the fortress were torn down and replaced by the garden/park. Below, A is trying to get a kiss from his big brother.


The boys rowing in the beautiful lake at Parc de la Ciutadella.


One of Gaudi's more beautiful works.


M braving the chilly Mediterranean, while A is still trying to decide if it's worth it. When M finally came out, he was numb from the cold.

Transatlantic Cruise to Europe

Well, we survived our 12 nights on the ocean! The boys had a blast and spent everyday, all day on the Flow Rider. They quickly learned how to boogie board on it and worked hard at learning how to surf. A preferred boogie boarding, since he didn't get hurt as much if he wiped out, and M loved surfing. He was a diehard, braving the chilly mornings to surf. Here's photos of both of them boogie boarding.



A turned 10 on the ship! The first thing he wanted to do was to again climb the incredibly high rock climbing wall (for the 2nd time). Having a brother can provide a great competitive drive, so both of them naturally made it to the top.



He chose to spend most of his day on the Flow Rider, but we did manage to pull him away long enough to treat him to a Ben & Jerry's ice cream. Then later long enough to clean them up a bit for dinner.



Day 9 we had our first stop in Lisbon, Portugal.



Day 10 in Cadiz, Spain.




Here the boys are picking out the ones they want to eat for lunch...



And here is a more detailed photo of lunch...snails!



Just kidding...
We arrived safely in Barcelona yesterday and have already walked more in these last two days than the entire 2 weeks beforehand on the ship. It's a beautiful city with probably the most interesting architect in all of Europe. The first thing I did when we arrived was wash clothes...I never thought I would be that happy to wash clothes, but I can honestly say that I was excited to use the washing machine and have clean clothes again! A sink on a cruise ship just doesn't cut it. It's the little things in life... More to come...

Dordogne, France

We made the decision to head southwest to the Dordogne. It is a stunning river valley filled with lush green valleys, castles and villages perched upon steep craggy cliffs. We have spent our first few days here on the east side walking, picnicking and playing in the river. We even got lucky enough to enjoy a little village party where every street corner had a different band playing music. It varied from something like a school marching band to a jazz band. After a few days, we headed on towards the west and the more spectacular side of the Dordogne. We went canoeing in the Dordogne River which was a great way to take in the views. We stopped along the way and the boys played in the river and skipped rocks. We even had the very special privilege of coming upon a swan’s nest filled with their young. It was as big as a king size bed.... amazingly huge, and filled comfortably with 6 or 7 young and their parents!





We have been very lucky with where we are staying and are able to relax a bit while we are here. We have a beautiful view from our room (the boys actually have their own room!) and we have enjoyed ‘dinner’ on our terrace in the evenings. The boys have spent a lot of time splashing around in the pool and we’ve had a nightly family ping pong competition. When we are able to drag the boys away from all the fun here, we have enjoyed walking around the gorgeous villages and sampling the local cusine. This area’s speciality is duck and foie gras (which I’m starting to think is the speciality everywhere in France!). Bart is loving it, as these are some of his favorite foods!

Route du Vins Alsace, France

We made our way to France driving from Holland via Belgium and then through Luxembourg. We’ve spent our first few days in France enjoying the Alsace region. Located close enough to Germany that it takes on a combination of the two cultures, sometimes it’s hard to remember where we are. Here, the menu’s have foie gras and sauerkraut side by side, and, seemingly, equally loved. The region is the stuff of fairy tales. Every village seems even brighter and lovelier than the next. Half timbered houses on cobblestone streets are draped in flowers and nestled in the base of green valleys. From the villages, grape vines cover the hillsides up to where ancient castles top the peaks. It’s a beautiful place to walk and take in the scenery. We’ve spent many hours walking through villages, vineyards, and hiking steep rocky crags to get to medieval castle ruins. The boys love exploring the old castle ruins and would spent hours climbing, jumping and playing, if we let them.








There are more than 400 pairs of storks living in Alsace today. That is a huge number, considering that, because of environmental changes, in the 1980’s there were only 2 pairs left. Alsace has set up breeding and research centers, which account for the increase in their population here. They spend their summers in Europe and winter in Africa living beside the elephants and lions. Storks are not only known for bringing babies, they are also believed to bring luck. It is a much beloved bird here and we spotted many nests on the tops of church steeples and rooftops. We were very excited when we spotted this family on top of the church steeple. We’ve read the book The Wheel On The School by Meindert De Jong which is a cute story about village school children in Holland trying to get storks to come back to their village to nest. That’s probably what made it so exciting for us!






There are paths for walking everywhere, which makes it easy... they just aren’t very well marked, which makes it interesting. On one our our walks through the vineyards, we found a pear tree with the most beautiful and sweet pears hanging high in it’s branches. The boys decided to conquer the challenge of picking pears for our snack. The challenge... wading through rotten pears, that had fallen on the ground and were now covered in yellow jackets. We’ll they succeeded and climbed the tree and managed to get a few pears for us to enjoy.

Nederland, continued...

We've had lots of fun and a very productive couple of weeks. We have visited Corrie ten Boom's house in Haarlem and Sint Bavo's church, where she attended services and played as a little girl. Mozart also played the organ there when he was just 10 years old. If you don't know the story of Corrie ten Boom's life, I highly recommend one of her books. 'The Hiding Place' tells the story of her life. She and her family hide Jews during WWII in their home and worked closely with the dutch underground. They were discovered by the Nazis and sent to concentration camps. Her story is one of God's provision during this incredibily trying time of their lives and forgiveness. Corrie was the only one in her family to survive the concentration camps and after her release she began an international speaking ministry at the age of 54 that lasted for over 30 years. She was a remarkable woman. It was amazing to stand in her house where so many lives have been saved and touched by the ten Boom family. Below is a photo of us in the secret hiding place which was built behind a wall and accessible by a sliding door in the bottom left hand closet. It was a very tight fit but was to hold up to 8 people. There were 6 people hiding there when the ten Boom family was taken away. They were not found by the Nazis and escaped.



The Sint Bavo church was also having an exhibition while we were there with airplanes. It was a bit strange to see airplanes in the church... but the boys were allowed to make paper airplanes and flew them a bit. The photo is them with their planes in front of the organ that Mozart played.



Our days in Amsterdam were filled with school, markets, ice cream, and walking the streets. Here the boys are enjoying a warm stroop waffel from the market. It's a warm wafer thin butter cookie filled with something like carmel. A sticky and yummy treat we can't get at home!



We've spent this last week at Bart's parent's second home on the island of Texel in the north. It's a beautiful spot of unspoiled country that we always look forward to visiting. Time seems to stand still there. It's full of green grass, cozy villages, and farms... sheep, cows, cheese, fruit, vegetables, tulip bulbs... everything you can imagine. There are little stands dotted around the island filled with fresh produce and boxes for customers to just drop their money in. Everything is on the honor system. We get our daily excerise by biking everywhere while we are there. We spent one day biking around the entire island, which was 28 miles. We made a day of it and stopped at the baker for fresh bread, had a snack in the dunes, walked around one of the villages, had a fresh fish lunch at the harbor, and ended it in 'our' village walking around the market. We've biked everyday, but because of the weather, that was our only 'big' day of biking. The weather turned quite cold (a couple of days in the 50's), spotty rain and very windy for the rest of our stay. It doesn't prevent us from enjoying ourselves though, we just throw on more clothes and keep on going! All the following photos are from Texel...

Here the boys are relaxing after a biking adventure...

Typical Texel...




There are wild horses and Scottish Highland Cows in the dunes on Texel. Here the boys are trying to sneak up on them... they didn't realize that Mommy was not being as sneaky as them while taking their picture!

We are now on our way to France and Italy for our last 2 weeks.... more to come...

The Netherlands

We've stayed busy since arriving in Holland. We've caught up on two full weeks of school and have even found a little bit of time for some fun! The house we've been staying in is in a little village and has a canal in the backyard. The boys have spent a lot of time in the rowboat. They even found some blackberry bushes that they could only get to with the boat. They perfected their teamwork skills and their balancing act and picked us enough for dessert a couple of nights! They've also eaten smoked eel and raw herring on the market. Yuck. They are braver then me! We've enjoyed our time here so far and are looking forward to spending the next two weeks in Amsterdam. It's been wonderful to spend time with family and friends and it always feels like home. For the rest, I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. Enjoy.