Hubby and I are deep into trip planning this week… and last week… and next week… and the week after that, probably. He likes to get things done and dusted early before gardening season and fishing season. And before we head out for other more local trips this summer. Did I tell you that we’re planning a trip to Spain this fall? After a week in the Azores, we’ll spend three weeks in northern Spain.
At the moment we’re researching our itinerary. We’re deciding which places we definitely want to visit and which, upon further research, can be jettisoned, how far the drive is between places, routes we want to take, and how long we’ll stay at each place. We’re sorting out where we’ll need to stay longer for a bit of a rest day, or to do laundry, or whatever, and where we can easily find self-catered accommodation. Note-taking and discussion abounds. Yesterday we sat down to list out the places and the number of days, then totalled everything. It appears at the moment that we’ll be away from home for 28 nights.
Travelling the way we like to travel takes lots of trip planning. We prefer to rent cars and drive ourselves. We like small towns and villages. Although we do visit cities, it’s not our preferred place to spend a few days. We like quirky accommodations over five-star hotels, self-catered in some places where we can find them. And we’ve been known to completely eschew “must visit” museums and renowned galleries for walkabouts in the town or a hike in the country. This might not be the kind of trip that everyone wants. But, you see, we long ago realized that we have to travel according to our own preferences. In a previous post, I called this our “travel personality.” You can read that post here if you’re interested.
All the planning and discussion we’ve been doing lately has whetted our appetite for our fall trip. But it has also stimulated many, many stories of past travels. I’ve written a lot on the blog about our past trips. France in 2015, South America in 2017, Italy in 2018, the Balkans in 2019, and Portugal in 2023. You can find these posts by clicking on the Travel category and scrolling through the posts. I haven’t written as much about my pre-blogging trips, except for a few posts based on my travel journals. The one about Ireland is my favourite. Gosh I loved Ireland. You can find that post here.
Anyway… I digress. What I really wanted to talk to you about today, besides our trip planning, is one of our all time favourite trips. Our Yukon adventure in 2006. The summer I turned fifty.
Hubby outdid himself with his trip planning that year. I was still working, so he did it all on his own. This is the summary that Hubby penned for the first page of our Yukon photo album: Depart Toronto, July 6 on the Via train to Edmonton. Pick up our rental car in Edmonton and travel 8300 kilometres along the Alaska Highway, the Top of the World Highway, the Dempster, the Klondike Highway, the Silver Trail, the Stewart-Cassiar Highway, the Yellowhead, and onto Jasper and Banff along the Icefields Parkway, before heading to the Alberta Badlands, Drumheller, and three days in Calgary before flying home on August 7. Phew.
Don’t worry, I won’t relay every moment of our trip. Just a few highlights. And maybe one or two lowlights. Which, let’s face it, make the best stories.
In that month, we covered parts of Alberta, British Columbia, lots of the Yukon, and even a bit of Alaska. Good thing that Hubby loves to drive. And doesn’t mind dirt roads, sharp turns, and steep climbs. Well… except for the infamous 120 km narrow, unpaved road along the Stikine River to Telegraph Creek, a virtual ghost town with few people but amazing scenery. When we arrived at our accommodation in a former Hudson’s Bay Company outpost, Hubby remarked to the owner that it had been a hairy drive in. The owner laughed and said: “Good thing you didn’t meet the oil truck. It comes in once a week.” And, you guessed it, that “one day” happened to be the day we were leaving. Hubby said he didn’t sleep a wink the night before we left, worrying we’d meet the oil truck the next morning. We didn’t.
We began our trip by taking the train from Toronto to Edmonton. What a thrill. We slept two nights aboard in a berth, ate delicious food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, saw the sights from the observation car, and ate and drank with some lovely, interesting people.
The only downside of the trip for me was choosing the upper berth. That was a mistake. Trains rock. And the upper berth rocks considerably more than the lower where Hubby was happily sound asleep. Me… I rocked and swayed, and almost fell asleep until we rolled and shook over the part of the track where two sections of rail connect. So my nights consisted of rock, sway, rock, eyelids droop, shugga-shugga-shugga-shugga, wake up, rock, sway, rock, eyelids droop, shugga-shugga-shugga… repeat. Two days and twelve hours later we rolled into Edmonton and I staggered off. Seriously, I staggered, my stomach lurched and roiled, and my head ached. I had had no motion sickness until I stepped off the train. Weird, eh? And once we checked into our motel, I had to go right to bed. So much for my romantic idea of sleeping on a train. Next time I get the lower berth.
Still, I wouldn’t have traded that experience. You can explore the details of that train trip here on the Via website.
From Edmonton we headed north-west, and at Dawson Creek began the long drive up the storied Alaska Highway.
We encountered some wildlife on our drive. Just so you know, we did NOT approach that buffalo who stood calmly in a meadow alongside the highway. Nor did we get out of the car to photograph the pair of young grizzlies who stopped traffic as they wandered the verge.
One night we stayed in an adorable cabin at Northern Rockies Lodge. You can see the fire in our tiny portable barbeque on the lower left of the photo. After the flames had subsided and the coals glowed, I put the chicken legs on the grill and retreated inside to prepare our salad for supper. A short time later we heard a tentative knock on our door, and a Swiss (or maybe German) lady said in heavily accented English, “Excuse me, but zee bird is eating your dinner.” Hubby lurched out the door to fight with a seagull over one of our chicken legs. Hubby won. “That’s your leg,” I said, jokingly. And after he’d washed the chicken leg, and cut off the beak marks, he ate it. I swear, that man will eat anything.
Haines Junction was one of the highlights of the trip. And Kluane National Park where we hiked. That hike was breathtaking in more ways than one. I’m sure I hyperventilated for forty-five minutes after Hubby handed me the brochure entitled “You Are in Bear Country” and which went on to describe what to do in the event of an attack by a grizzly bear. Still, the brochure advice came in handy when, a couple of years later, I was advising a newbie, soft-spoken, rather timid young teacher on how she might handle her rowdy grade nine class. “Be big, and loud, and make them think you are not prey” seemed totally appropriate, I thought.
Just outside of Haines Junction we checked into Dalton Trail Lodge for three nights. Dalton Trail is an all-inclusive resort/fishing lodge. This was our splurge for the trip. For three days we ate gourmet food, even the lunches packed into coolers by the chef were delicious. And we fished. And fished. We caught lots of fish. Catch and release only. And I caught “the big one” on our overnight expedition.
What an experience that was. I couldn’t feel my arms for a half-hour afterward. Doug, our guide, kept exhorting me to: “Keep your rod-tip up, Susan, keep your rod-tip up!” And I kept thinking, “I know, I know! I have fished before!” But boy that was hard. And afterwards when he took the fish off my hook, threw it back in, rebaited my line and handed me my rod, I said in wonderment, “What? You want me to do more fishing?”
Now, I do want to tell you a bit more about that overnight expedition. Because it leads to my night of disgrace.
The second day at Dalton Trail, we left the lodge directly after breakfast, drove with our guide for a while, put the boat in the water, and proceeded to fish for two whole days.
We stopped on a beach at noon. Doug, our guide, made a fire, and we ate our wonderful lunch. Then we fished all afternoon.
In the late afternoon, about five or six, we landed at the cabin on a small island in Aishihik Lake where we’d spend the night. Doug made us a delicious steak dinner. After dinner and a glass of wine, I was all set to relax. But nooo. This was the Yukon in July. It didn’t get dark until midnight. So we fished until late in the evening. I had never fished for ten hours in one day in my life. But okay. Hubby was loving it. I could do this.
I don’t know what time we went to bed, but I was well ready for sleep. I was bushed. The cabin was pretty basic. We snuggled into sleeping bags on wooden bunks. Doug bedded down on an air mattress by the door, fell immediately asleep, and proceeded to snore loudly, earth-shakingly, like a Mack truck without a muffler, all night. I had never heard snoring like that. Neither Hubby nor I had a wink of sleep.
At six the next morning when we headed down to the lake to wash our hands and face before breakfast, I was whimpering. “I’m soooo tired,” I moaned. We fished all day. All. Day. Then drove back to the lodge. And had less than an hour to shower and get ready for dinner. The shower helped revive me a bit. But trust me when I say that I should never have had that first glass of wine with dinner.
Of course you know where this is going. While we were eating, Wade the young guide who had taken us out the first day, stuck his head into the dining room and said, “Hey there, Sue. Make sure you and Stu stop by the bar when you’re finished dinner so we can toast your big fish!”
In the bar, we sat with a few of the guides and a lovely man who came to the lodge every year from South Africa, and who told the waitress to just keep pouring drinks and put it on his bill. So she did. After everyone toasted my fishing prowess, I forgot my fatigue and proceeded to yak and yak and get totally plastered.
Hubby and the man from South Africa were deep into fishing stories. Wade and I excitedly planned out a trip wherein I would bring my class from JMSS to the Yukon and he would take them on his snowmobile-winter-camping-survival training trip, teaching them the stuff his first-nations grandmother had taught him about foraging. “What an experience for these suburban kids,” I gushed. I don’t remember much after that. Hubby says I did not disgrace myself, except to get a bit repetitive late in the evening. I think he was being kind.
I did not make it to breakfast the next morning. Hubby says he stopped by Wade’s table and said, “I’ve come to get Susan out of whatever contract she agreed to last night.” Apparently that garnered lots of laughs from the guide’s table. Sigh.
I was prostrate in the car all that day as we drove through what was probably stunning scenery. I learned my lesson. Never, ever drink too much after two long days and and an evening of fishing and no sleep in between. In fact, don’t agree to that first glass of wine. It’s the kiss of death.
The next favourite part of our Yukon trip was visiting Dawson City. If you ever get the chance to visit the Yukon, go, and don’t miss Dawson City. It is totally unique.
The photo above was taken along the “Top of the World Highway” enroute from Alaska to Dawson City. And the one below is of the tiny ferry we took across the fast-flowing Yukon River to Dawson. The current was so strong that the ferry operator had to aim well above the landing spot, and allow the boat to be carried downstream before landing. As a former ferry operator myself, I know how hard this is. Not that I’ve ever had to do anything even remotely similar. Ha.
Dawson City is one of a kind. It was built during the gold rush of the late nineteenth century, and stories about its history are fascinating. And sad. Filled with tales of greed, hope, opportunism, deprivation, and despair. At the height of the gold rush Dawson was ten times as large as it is now. In fact, it was one of the first cities in North America to get electric light. The year we travelled to Dawson City I bought Hubby Charlotte Gray’s book Gold Diggers for Christmas. Charlotte Gray is an award-winning Canadian biographer. Gold Diggers tells the story of the Klondike gold rush, the people who got rich, and the many more who didn’t. We both highly recommend it.
Many of the 19th century buildings in Dawson still stand. The old buildings (below right and above) were built directly on the permafrost which melted from the heat of the building, causing them to eventually lean left or right. What a good idea it was, years later, to stabilize them preserving them for us to see. As you can see in the photo on the left below, much about modern Dawson remains the same, including the wooden sidewalks and dirt streets. Hubby and I have been to historic mining towns in Ontario and in New Zealand and Australia. Dawson City is one of a kind.
While in Dawson City we spent an evening at Diamond Tooth Gerties, a goldrush era throwback with gambling machines, a floor show, and dancing girls. There was even a scruffy, older man who spent most of the evening at the bar, but who during intermission ambled up to the piano, played beautifully for tips, and then ambled back to the bar. You’ll find all kinds of people in the Yukon. We met several people who said they arrived in the Yukon thirty or forty years ago, planning to stay and work for a summer, and who were still there. It’s the kind of place that lets people be who they are.
In fact I worked with a woman who had lived in Dawson City for ten years. We hired her to work as a teacher in my department at JMSS. She was a lovely person. She had a drama school background, and one summer she ended up in the Yukon dancing and singing at Diamond Tooth Gerties. She stayed for ten years. But when she had her daughter she thought it was time to leave. The Yukon, wonderful as it is, is a hard place to raise a child, she told me.
One of the best things we did while in Dawson City was to stay a night on an actual working gold mining claim. Our cabin at Hunker Creek, above, sat next to the stream from which gold was still mined. We sat on our small porch with our tea and chatted with the owner the night we stayed there. We even panned a little for gold. We did NOT strike it rich. Ha.
The cabin was outfitted with coal-oil lamps, and I was excited to dine by lamplight, until I remembered that in the Yukon in July it would still be light long after we’d gone to bed. It kind of reminded me of being a kid, and how in the summer it was still light out when my bedtime rolled around. I always hated that.
While we were in Dawson City we also spent a day on the Dempster Highway. You can drive the Dempster all 740 kilometres from Dawson City to Inuvik in the Northwest Territories. But we only had time for a taste of this beautiful part of Canada. We drove for a few hours, found a good looking trout stream, fished a bit, had our picnic lunch, and drove back to Dawson.
This is serious wilderness, my friends. As Hubby and I fished, he kept moving further and further upstream. Farther and farther away from me, and soon disappearing around a bend in the creek. I was not particularly comfortable being alone once he was out of sight. The creek rushed noisily over the rocks. The wind blew. And I did not want a bear to come upon me unawares. Always, always make bears aware of your presence; I knew that much. So I began to talk loudly, and even to sing. “I’m here, bears, I’m here.” I called. “La la la.” Hubby always laughs when I tell that story.
After Dawson City we headed south, followed the Silver Trail, visited Whitehorse, headed over to British Columbia, to Stewart-Hayder, two towns which straddle the Canadian-Alaskan border. Saw grizzly bears fishing in a river, drove up to overlook the mighty Salmon Glacier. White-knuckled that hairy highway to Telegraph Creek on the Stikine River, wended our way through Jasper and Banff, spent two days in dinosaur country in the Alberta Badlands, and finally arrived in Calgary.
That 2006 trip was a special trip. A memorable trip. The north is an amazingly special and memorable place. And we weren’t even that far north, when you consider that Canada goes all the way to the Arctic Ocean.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this country of ours, of mine, since I’ve been writing this. And how thankful I am to live here. And how proud I am to call this place home. Of course we all love our homes. For the most part. As we should. It’s just that most of the time we take what we have for granted. And maybe we shouldn’t.
So. That’s it for me tonight, my friends. Sorry this post is so long. Trip planning has me waxing lyrical about past trips and trip memories. I’m hoping that we make lots of lovely trip memories in Spain in the fall. I’m looking forward to it.
Now it’s your turn. Any thoughts on past trips or future ones you’d like to share? Any trip highlights, or lowlights, you’d like to tell us about? The lowlights make the best stories, you know. Come on… we won’t tell.
36 thoughts on “Trip Planning and Remembering”
What a wonderful sounding trip! Not sure I could cope with all that fishing though I expect my husband would kill to spend that amount of time on a river.
I really wish you would write a book about all your travels as it would be fascinating reading as your writing is so enjoyable.
Maybe one day, Kenzie. But I am not good at other people’s deadlines now that I’m retired. 🙂
I’m so happy that this post was so long!
What a trip,what a story! I’ve read Jack London novels during elementary school and imagined landscapes,cities and saloons ,but now I’m sure I could never even think about meeting bears. Or oil trucks
I second that about the book
Planning,travelling,reminiscing……it is such a joy
You’ll love Spain
Dottoressa
We visited Robert Service’s cabin when we were in Dawson. He of “The Cremation of Sam McGee” fame. He’s a famous poet in Canada. You should look him up. His ballads are well known and oft recited in Canadian elementary schools… at least when I was a kid.
That must have been a wonderful trip . Canada has so much beautiful & unspoilt countryside . You can really ‘ get away from it all ‘. And look at you , nearly twenty years & you look no older . We’ve had lots of embarrassing moments on holiday but there was once it went the other way . We were on our first foreign trip together & we were in the funicular on Capri taking us up the cliff . It was a big carriage which we had all to ourselves & Max stood at the front whilst I sat alone at the back . A couple of young American boys rushed in at the last minute to sit near me , about my age , early twenties & full of ‘exuberance’ . We were at the end of our holiday by then & I was tanned with my long dark hair fastened back like a local . They assumed I was a local & began to discuss me , all very complimentary ( I was young !) but I thought they were being abit cheeky . I said nothing but couldn’t help smiling at some of the comments . They liked that – ‘ she smiled ‘ . Max heard none of this . We reached the top , I stood up & called to Max ‘ our stop I think ‘ . Those poor boys they were so embarrassed . Perhaps I was mean but I thought they needed to learn a little lesson .
So now you are planning Spain , my very favourite European country , so unspoilt away from the Costas , full of history , amazing buildings & lovely countryside . We landed at Girona & drove west towards Bilbao but never got there – So many lovely towns on the way to explore & we didn’t have enough time . I won’t bombard you with place names but our favorite was Besalu .
Hello,
Wonderful trip. I’ve watched a few intrepid UK van owners travel to Alaska. Certainly still an adventure, even now.
We loved Northern Spain. Would recommend Bilbao actually, although a big city, it felt very different. Watch out for the number of “x’s” in a lot of the names! It’s Basque country!! You must try the Pintxos. A bit like tapas, but better (imho).
I can’t wait to try the pintxos, Fiona. I’ve been reading about them. We will be staying in Bilbao for a few days because I particularly wanted to see the Guggenheim.
Oh, I’m imaging that story as you tell it, Wendy. Hilarious. We are planning to stay in Bilbao for a few days. I want to see the Guggenheim that is there. The only other city we are stopping at is San Sebastian. Other than Porto, Portugal where we fly into from the Azores. Stu is excited because we are heading into the Pyrenees for a few days. There will be a lot of driving on this trip. We might be trying to do too much…but I guess we’ll see.
Your short respite did you good. You are back in rare form now. Wonderful post and gosh what great trips you have had…adventures really. Memory building is the best construction to engage in. You are so right in that we often don’t pause and appreciate where we come from and the beauty that surrounds us. I am hoping our weather breaks soon so I can enjoy being on our deck and a vodka and tonic outside. Winter has lingered for far too long.
Thanks, Kat. Winter is getting me down this year. It has seemed sooo long and we’ve at least another month of it.
Happy planning! Much as I sometimes grumble about trying to figure it all out, because of course everything sounds wonderful and charming, I like the challenge. It’s like a jigsaw puzzle.
We’re now in the throes of planning a 28-day trip to Japan. Never been there, don’t have any friends who have been so we’re kind of flying blind.
We spent some time in Northern Spain quite some time ago, and what stood out for us was our time in San Sebastián. We just loved that small city, stayed in an apartment near the beginning of the main beach, on the edge of town. The food, the landscape, the gorgeous Chillida sculptures……just magical.
I second your feelings about San Sebastián. It’s been a while, but magical is the word. Speaking of magic, the Azores are filled with it. Truly special islands. We were on Sao Miguel, Flores, and Pico, each uniquely beautiful. The wines, grown in volcanic soil and low to the ground to avoid the wind, are superb, and their famous cheese from very happy cows – yum. Lakes, hikes, and scenery for days. We were there in the spring, and when I described their diversity to a friend, I said, it’s like Portugal meets Hawaii, meets Iceland, meets Ireland, depending upon the island. Highly recommend! My fall trip will be from California up to the island of Vancouver, where my husband and I will travel much like Sue and hers, on the backroads. Looking forward to it.
San Sebastian is one of two cities that we’ll be visiting. We’ve read that it is lovely. If you are visiting Vancouver Island, will you make the side trip to Haida Gwaii (formerly known as the Queen Charlotte Islands)? I hear it is magical as well. Have fun on the Canadian backroads. The best kind.
A jigsaw is exactly what trip planning is, Wendy. None of our friends have been to the part of Spain we will be in, except for one couple but they were doing the pilgrimage, and did not have a good experience. So we started from scratch when we began planning. We are going to San Sebastian for three days. One of only two cities we will be hitting. We have read that it is lovely.
Love the thinking and planning part of a trip. That is always so exciting. So when you mentioned other trips I had to go and visit your blog on Portugal as we had been there in 2017 with a bus tour company and in 10 days saw so many wonderful sights. Viewing your pictures brought all those memories back. Thank you so much for cheering up my morning with all the chaos that is going on in the world. No wonder your last post made you sound depressed; we are all depressed I think and almost ‘frozen in time’. And so thank you so much for making my day!!!!!
You are most welcome, Shirley. I’m glad you enjoyed the old posts as well.
What a great post. Thank you for letting me step away from this current cruel world and into yours. That was a lot of work for you, and I am a grateful reader.
Thanks so much for saying that. 🙂
What a wonderful blog on your visit to Ireland. It made me a little home sick on reading about the great experiences you had.
It might be of interest to you to checkout the Rustica accommodations throughout Spain. I’ve stayed in a few and can recommend them. They are usually situated off the beaten track. Good planning.
Thanks, Lynne. We adored Ireland.
FMM– So well stated and I concur on all points. Sue, I enjoy all your blogs but love the travel ones. Jean
Thanks, Jean. 🙂
First thing – As a US citizen I am so sorry for the political horrors going on. I’m a 76 year old woman living in the midwest my whole life. I vote. My friends vote. We are all heart sick. Enough said.
Second thing – I’m fairly new with your blog and I love it. If I wake up during the night I check to see if it has arrived. I’m a child waiting for Santa!
Third thing – I bought the whole Shetland series by Ann Cleeves based on your love for her writing. And the Olive Kitteridge series, although I’ve read a couple in the past but I’m going to start over. Since I bought all of the books from a used book source I’m buying you some coffees. Please keep writing!
Thanks so much, Suzanne. I’m so happy you liked the Shetland series. You might also like Peter May’s Lewis trilogy. Wonderful writing and lots about the Hebridean culture.
Always nice to read your posts. My husband and I also love to travel. In 2022 we shipped our camper from Hamburg to Halifax. We drived on the Alaska Highway to Whithorse. First time in our life we saw bears-a mother with its cub……we had tears in our eyes…. We are from Switzerland; bears don‘t live in our country!
Currently we are in Spain in Barcelona…
We also prefer smaller cities, but Barcelona is always worth a trip ….
Wow, that was a trip. The north is a very special place as far as Canadians are concerned.
Sue, loved this post. I do so agree about the MUST SEE ATTRACTIONS. Sometimes all you get to see is other tourists holding their phones in the air.
We love the off the beaten track places, where you meet locals. We have been invited into peoples homes for dinner, or drinks. Now that is really special in a foreign country.
I have repaid that, I invited a stranger/visitor to our small island to my home for wine and appies once. It was a spontaneous decision. It turned out to be fun.
Ali
Like at the Trevi Fountain. Ha. A crowd of tourists eight people deep surrounded the Trevi Fountain, all waiting to get to the front for their selfie. I have a photo of four young Asian girls standing on a row, all with their backs to the circle at Stonehenge, holding their phones up for their selfie. I took their photo with Stonehenge behind them and captioned it… “Well, I guess that’s one way to see Stonehenge.” 🙂
I love this post! I think we have similar travel personalities and I look forward to reading about Spain, but it’s your trip to the Yukon that brought back memories for me. I’ve been four times, all road trips, camping along the way, but very little fishing. I first went as a teen with my parents and siblings in the late 1960s. Then, shortly after we married, my husband’s sister moved to Dawson City, married and raised her family there. Her son and our youngest are a day apart in age, so the boys celebrated their 6th and 10th birthdays together there. Our most recent trip was several years ago to celebrate that same nephew’s wedding. Dawson is like nowhere else I’ve been and, in many ways, it hasn’t changed much over the years. On one of our trips, we drove from Dawson into Alaska, through Fairbanks, south to Anchorage and then down the length of the beautiful Kenai peninsula. On another, we drove the Dempster Highway all the way to Inuvik. On the last trip, we took the Stewart Cassiar Highway on our way home to Alberta. I have photos taken in many of the same spots as yours including overlooking the Salmon Glacier.
Wow, you have driven the north, Elaine. We drove many of the same highways.
Love your post…really enjoyed reading about past trips and the memories that flood back (the lowlights are the best😊)
We’re also planning to visit northern Spain this year. We’ll be walking in the Baltic states and then heading across and meeting friends to walk the Camino del Norte. Agree with you about skipping the ‘must see’ tick offs! If the planets align and we can meet for a drink, it would be great!
Stay in touch and we’ll compare timelines. 🙂
I agree with you, Sue. The way to see and experience a
country is through traveling in that country with stops along the route. We flew to Fairbanks in 1999 in a small
experimental airplane my husband built. We flew over
the “trench”, not able to follow the Alcan highway due to
weather. We had to stay overnight in White Horse because of the weather, and
rented a car and drove down to Skagway for the day.
It was a wonderful trip. We always stayed locally
in all of our flying trips all over Mexico, the Yucatan
the Bahamas, and across the U.S. and visiting and camping in the wonderful national parks across U.S. and Canada. No resorts for us.
Wow, that must have been exciting, Joan. I’ve only flown in a small airplane once in northern Australia. We flew in a four-seater to a small island to an aboriginal resort where we stayed in permanent tents. It was amazing.
So love your northern Spain plans. We’ve spent so happy times there. The Picos de Europa are stunning – we’ve just begun to explore. Just over the border into France is St. Jean de Luz, which is a charming French Basque town – I actually like the French Basque Country a tad more than the Spanish – it’s a little more mellow and less touristic, imho. I know you’ll have an amazing trip – can’t wait to see your plans come along.
Thanks, Carol. We are staying at the edge of the Pico de Europa park for a few days. Hopefully we’ll get to do some hiking. 🙂
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