Lake Bled, Slovenia

Back in March I visited Slovenia with my friend Arlene and one of our day trips was to Lake Bled. We took the bus there and once we arrived we wondered down to the lake, it really is such a wonderful place! We decided to walk up to the castle, which was really exhausting, it is not a long walk but uphill seemed to take ages. Once up the view is stunning of the church on the island on the lake and of the mountains and surrounding area.

We had coffee and cake, not just any cake but the Bled cream cake which tasted really delicious. Then we walked back down and started to walk around the lake with a little help of the tourist train. It is 6km walk around the lake but we did not do the whole lake just a bit of it.

There is the possibility to visit the church on the island on the traditional boat called the Peltna which is only made in Bled, it takes 20 people and you are rowed there by the Pletna oarsman. We did not do this but it would have been nice to see the interesting on the island.

A visit to Lake Bled is one of the big tourist places to visit and if we had had more time, I would have like to visit Lake Bohinj.

Streetart in Ponte Deglada, Azores

During the school summer holidays Alessio and I went to The Azores and we met my dad there too. One of the many interesting things about the capital town Ponte Delgada was the street art. It was all over the town, this is just some of the photos I took. Some of the street art was part of a walk and talk art festival from 2015.

We had a map which showed where the street art was located and Alessio had great fun trying to find the right streets. There was so much street art we had to really check which pieces belonged to the festival.

I liked the last one of the whale, which is quite fitting as here was the first and only time I have actually seen a whale.

I am glad it is the weekend, after a trying week at work, this weekend will be a quite affair!

Happy weekend folks!

Photo of the Week - Garraferia do Carmo

Photo of the Week comes from the beautiful city of Porto, I cannot say enough about this city, I love Porto!

I took lots of photos so there will be some posts about this city to come, but in the meanwhile this is a lovely drinks shop I saw a few times. I have not been inside but I thought it looked nice the was they have the bottles in the windows.

I brought back two bottles of Port wine and a bottle of white wine from the Azores which I will drink when my parents visit in September.

Wishing you a good mid week!

China Gardens Zurich

The Chinagardens in Zurich is situated near the lake at Zurichhorn, easily reachable by tram numbers 2 and 4.

The gardens were a present from the Chinese partner city of Kunming, it is regarded as one of the more impressive gardens outside of China. The gardens opened in 1994 with the theme Three Friends of Winter, it was given in thanks for the help with the technical and scientific assistance in the development of the city drinking water supply and drainage in Kunming.

I went there at the beginning of August as a trip with the children from work, it did not take very long as the kids were inevitably bored! It was very peaceful and a place to reflex in quietness. The children were in fact very good and hardly made any noise, but we did not stay that long. It is not that big so it doesn`t take that long to look around, there is a small palace with two rooms and some furniture.

Once it enough to visit, this was my third and more than likely my last visit! If you have not seen these lovely gardens I would recommend to see at least once!

Pineapple Planation in the Azores!

I am back after the short blogging break from our trip to The Azores and Porto, lots of to tell about these places, but first up I will tell you about the pineapple plantation we visited.

On the island of Sao Miquel the biggest of all 9 islands there is a pineapple plantation on the outskirts of the capital town Ponte Deglada. We visited on a tour and the guides ( we went twice) were able to give us lots of information. The pineapples are cultivated in greenhouses as it is too cold to grow outdoors, from start to finish it takes 2 years to grow. Since it takes so long to grow they tend to be rather expensive, but believe you me they taste amazing!

I am not really a big fan of pineapples in general, but here they tasted so yummy! They just melted in your mouth and so sweet, really delicious! Alessio wanted to eat pineapples everyday and in fact de did, not to mention bring one back to Switzerland!

July Reading List

The reading for July was only 4 books and in fact I thought it would be even less as one book took nearly 2 weeks which is quite a lot for me!

Istanbul Passage by Joseph Kanon, this is the book which took ages! I cannot really say why it took me ages to read. I did enjoy it but it was not gripping enough though. Set in Istanbul just after WWII finished it tell the tale of espionage and murder. I have been to Istanbul so it was also interesting to read the descriptions of the city.

The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra by Vassem Khan, this book I can include into my reading challenge as it is set in India. I enjoyed this book a lot, it is quite light-hearted and easy to read. It is the first in the series and I would read some more!

Keep The Midnight Out by Alex Gray, another in the series of DCI Lormier and this time it is set in the Isle of Mull. I have now going to Isle of Mull in October when I visit my family back in Scotland so it was interesting to read about it! I like this series a lot and I read in one day!

Raw Material by JJ Marsh, DI Beatrice Stubbs again solving crime in Wales and London, this is the second book I believe and there is another out which I will read at some point in time. I also liked this novel, easy to read and not too heavy material!

I am finally going on holiday today and am very happy about it! I am really looking forward to explore The Azores, 9 islands in the Atlantic Ocean. We are going to the biggest one Sao Miguel and we will also be visiting Porto!

some travel links:

The Olympics are beginning today, no doubt that Rio de Janerio is a fantastic city here are some photos

If I could take my son to see this museum I would! Roald Dahl

Walking tours can be interesting, here are some alternative ones!

I should be reading up on this guide to Porto!

Happy Reading!

F1 German GP

This Sunday I went to the F1 German GP in Hockenheim with Niki! We drive on the day of the race as I thought it was manageable, it is but only just! We left at 9am and still only got to our seats with like 5 mins before the race begin. Hockenheim is situated between Karlsruhe and Mannheim and there was lots of traffic jams which made us late. Once we parked and managed to find our way to the venus we found out our seats were 1.5km walk so off we went rather quickly

Once seated and the race began, it was really still very loud! There were changes to the engines to make them less noisy a couple of years ago but they are still extremely loud! God only know how loud they were about 5 years ago!

It was really exciting and from our viewpoint we could see quite a lot, the winner was Lewis Hamilton. Once the race was over lots of people run over to see the prize giving, which we could see from the big screen. It was definitely worth well seeing, being there and getting the whole experience.