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UNITED KINGDOM | Tue, 23 Dec 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [22]
The Galapagos Islands is the laboratory where Charles Darwin began developing his theory of evolution in 1835 . It took him more than 20 years of mulling, prodding from geologist Charles Lyell and botanist Joseph Hooker and competition from Alfred Russel ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Sat, 20 Dec 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [23]
The English are a strange lot. They consider the Battle of Hastings one of the most famous events in English history. It was the only time that England was invaded by a foreign power, their king was slain on the battlefield and their army was soundly ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Wed, 17 Dec 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [24]
We finished our Christmas letter—even checked it twice—and (e)mailed it off to all of the good little boy and girls. If you didn’t get yours, try to be nicer next year. When we still felt that we needed a little Christmas—right ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Sat, 13 Dec 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [24]
Despite English Heritage sites going back in time from castles, priories and monasteries to Roman villas and even Neolithic sites, John’s favorite site opened for business in 1939. Its existence wasn’t known to the general public until 1970 ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Tue, 9 Dec 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [23]
Cambridge seemed like a good compromise. It’s only an hour train ride from London but not too far from East Anglia’s English Heritage sites. John picked our AirBnB, in part, for the free parking, a real luxury in this college town. It’... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Fri, 5 Dec 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [22]
You might wonder why we are visiting the Isle of Wight at this cold and dreary time of year. The short answer would be Osborne House.
Faced with a growing family and the increasing pressures of court life, Queen Victoria pined for “a place of ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Thu, 4 Dec 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [23]
ISLE OF WIGHT
Do you remember verse from the old Beatles’ song “When I’m 64”? ♫ Every summer we can rent a cottage in the Isle of Wight, if it′s not too dear ♫ Well, here we are . . . it isn’t too ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Sun, 30 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [65]
When Henry VIII wasn’t busy tearing down churches, monasteries and abbeys or doing away with excess-to-needs wives, he indulged his paranoia by building castles. Actually more like fortresses, some 30 “castles” were constructed as part ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Sat, 29 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [68]
It rained hard on Thursday and Saturday’s forecast isn’t much better. Today would be the best day for birding at Stodmarsh National Nature Reserve. It took us a half-hour for he eight-mile drive on England’s narrow, winding ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Wed, 26 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [115]
The temperature was forecast to never get much above freezing so we bundled up for the walk to Earl’s Court Underground station. Thirty minutes later we were at Russell Square with only a short walk to the British Museum.
The Museum ... Read more >
UNITED KINGDOM | Tue, 25 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [124]
The Eurostar “Chunnel” train from Paris to London may cost a bit more than flying but it is much more civilized. We cleared both EU and UK immigration at Gare du Lyon in Paris, carried our own luggage onto the train and were in London in ... Read more >
FRANCE | Sat, 22 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [66]
Connie had had a list of places in Metz that she wanted to visit, most important and—as it turned out—the most impressive Metz Cathedral and Musée de la Coeur d’Or. I picked our AirBnB less on location and price but because it ... Read more >
FRANCE | Thu, 20 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [63]
When we bade adieu to Alsace this morning and headed off for Lorraine we weren’t counting on snow! Thankfully, it didn’t stick to the roads and it did pretty-up the drive to Nancy. We had spent the night here in twenty-eleven but hadn’... Read more >
FRANCE | Wed, 19 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [66]
We considered returning to Colmar today—the sun was shining and we wanted to see our favorite town in its glory. When we realized that Colmar’s neighbor, Eguisheim, was on the list of “Les Plus Beaux Villages de France,” we re-... Read more >
FRANCE | Tue, 18 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [59]
Clement’s AirBnB has everything we need including a garage barely wide enough for our car. Rather than futzing with the car we walked the 1½ miles to old town to get reacquainted with one of our favorite cities.
We crossed the ... Read more >
FRANCE | Mon, 17 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [68]
Alsace is one of our favorite areas in France—and not only because Connie’s family has an Alsatian heritage going back to Napoleonic times. When we first visited in 2011, distant relatives, Nicole and Thaddeus, treated us to a tour of the ... Read more >
FRANCE | Sun, 16 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [62]
I had almost forgotten our 2015 “drive by” visit to Citadel in Besançon. This time we’ll stay for a few days, if only to break up the six-hour drive from Lyon to Strasbourg. Traffic and parking being what they are, we decided ... Read more >
FRANCE | Thu, 13 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [71]
Around 910, William I, Duke of Aquitaine “The Pious” founded the Benedictine Abbey of Cluny with the “no strings” donation of his hunting preserve. The monastery would be free from any future obligations to him and his ... Read more >
FRANCE | Wed, 12 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [59]
Lyon was a welcome chance to decompress after our hectic time in Bordeaux. It was also about halfway to Strasbourg where we will stay for a while. We had pretty much covered Lyon from top to bottom—literally—on our visit ten years ... Read more >
FRANCE | Sun, 9 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [61]
We didn’t realize that this was a holiday weekend, Veterans’ Day in the States. They still call it Armistice Day in France, the anniversary of the end of the “War to End All Wars.” If only!
You probably have heard ... Read more >
FRANCE | Fri, 7 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [60]
After sitting on the street for four days, our rental car is getting a workout. We packed a picnic lunch and headed north up the Medoc Peninsula to Verdon-sur-Mer, not for the wines but to visit the site of an obscure military operation from World War ... Read more >
FRANCE | Thu, 6 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [61]
Our favorite artists are the Impressionists—Monet, Renoir, Degas and that crowd—who developed a new way of not only painting, but of looking at the world. The real pioneers of art, however, were the Cro-Magnon painters whose canvases were ... Read more >
FRANCE | Wed, 5 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [75]
Bordeaux and wine have been an item since Roman times but after Bordeaux wine was served at the wedding of Henry Plantagenet, future King Henry II, and Eleanor of Aquitaine it became the plonk of royalty. When Richard the Lionhearted proclaimed it his ... Read more >
FRANCE | Mon, 3 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [67]
I guess Bordeaux could be considered part of our Grand Tour visitation with friends and family. Chris and Rose will be joining us for a week or so and they certainly qualify as friends. We met when we were all working in Uganda, we stayed at their home ... Read more >
FRANCE | Sat, 1 Nov 2025 | By graynomadsusa | Views [66]
Even with the wipers swishing on a dreary day like today, we needed a good imagination to picture Saint-Benôit-du-Sault as one of “Les Plus Beaux Villages de France.” The medieval village lies just about halfway between Saint-... Read more >