Pie de Gigante, Nicaragua

Pie de Gigante - Brochure by Mattias (photos by Mattias and Bernie)
*** click on the brochure above to view a larger image***

I Sat On A Rock

I sat on some rocks. But I would say they were a little bit above average rocks, and few of them somewhat high above the ground. Some would say that these rocks are so incredibly awesome that they should be on postcards, and some people actually DO put photos of these rocks on post cards.

I guess that now you have actually spent the time to read this far into my silly little blog post, maybe I should tell you about my experience sitting (and sometimes standing) on said rocks. My personal favourite rock that I sat on was named Preikestoln after a viking ship that had lead many successfully attacks on other viking villages. A truly devastating ship in its time. Just kidding, it actually has a boring translation which is literally means pulpit rock because it sticks out of the cliff like a pulpit in a church. Not many people hike all the way up to this rock,  just enough that even in the off season you will never be the only one on the rock, and in the summer it is so crowded that people will even line up for a turn standing on the rock.

As I said before, it is my was my favourite rock, mainly because how unlike any other rock in the world, the surface is almost completely square and flat. The views from the rock were also incredible, you could see for miles down the fjord. It even overlooked some incredible mountain farms. Though I can’t say the hike getting to Preikestoln was anything spectacular, It was actually quite a dull hike. The trail was super trashed even though it was rebuilt by Nepalese Sherpas in 2014 and you would see people’s garbage lying around every now and then. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t terrible, lots of the parts of the trail were kind of fun, there were some boardwalks over large marshes and massive bedrock flats near the top. Over all there hiking part could have been better but the actual rock that you get to sit on is truly incredible.

White Tiger

3 days ago we went to the Singapore zoo. At the zoo there were white tigers. They are one of the most endangered animals. There are less white tigers in the world than orange tigers. They were hunted for trophies originally but now they are hunted for their fur. In some countries that they have the tiger, if you are caught hunting them you can be executed. Sometimes people will sell tourists tiger meat and say that it is beef. The hide of a tiger can be sold for over a thousand dollars.

Single Male

A tiger can kill almost any species in its habitat.  Tigers will eat any animal that they have killed except for other carnivores that they may kill for less competition.  Elephants and Rhinos are the only two other animals that I know of that they won't kill unless they are injured, young, or really old.  At the zoo there was a case of a feeder who went in and put the bucket of food over his head and lay down. The Tiger killed him. It is a crazy form of suicide.

Two females

When we were watching them, I noticed that the male is bigger and stronger than the females (same as the orange tiger). I thought the white tigers were very cool and I hope everybody can help to save their habitat.

Bye,
Mattias

A Bomb

Today we went to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.  As you can guess it is here because of an atomic bomb (called an A Bomb) that hit in world war 2. Every thing was flattened in a 2 km radius . The temperature was 3,000-4,000 degrees celsius. Some people melted to death. Survivors say people were jumping in the river and after there were many dead bodies floating in the river. The US picked Hiroshima to drop the A bomb on because they had no prisoners of war.

The time the bomb exploded - August 6th, 1945

A photo of Hiroshima after the bomb (notice the dome)

The dome stands today as a reminder.

The origami crane is a symbol of peace. It originated from a girl who had cancer because of the A bomb and when she was in the hospital she made cranes for wishes for her life. Some of the cranes were so small she had to use a needle to fold them. She made over one thousand cranes. 8 months after she was in the hospital she died. Her classmates decided to make a memorial to represent all the children who died as a result of the A bomb.  I made an origami crane to put at the memorial. It was purple and white.

The dome through the Peace Arch

A monument to Sadako and all children affected by the bomb.

My crane (the purple one) amongst many.

Thanks for understanding the problems an atomic bomb can create and how two generations are affected by it.

Mattias

Racoony Bears

Yesterday we went to a Panda Breeding and Research Centre. We volunteered and helped clean up poop and their mess. The poo was very stinky and really really heavy. Did you know that only 20% of the bamboo gets digested? And they need to drink a lot of water even to get that much.

Scooping poop!

We were in charge of Ling Ling’s enclosure. Ling Ling’s poo from one day weighed 38 kilos - we scooped it all, separating it from the bamboo left over.  We had to clean up the one day old bamboo that he wouldn’t eat any more.

Their favorite foods are apples and Panda Cakes which are made out of wheat, corn rice and vitamins. We tried a little bit of one and it would be the last food option I would eat. They only get one cake about the size of a cupcake each day so they don’t get too fat.  We fed them the apples, cakes and bamboo shoots. They are very intelligent and are amazingly quick at stripping the skin of the bamboo.

Feeding Mei Lei apples

We fed one of the most famous Panda’s in the world, her name is Mei Lei. She was a very queen like panda bear and would sit with the cakes in front of her nose that we were holding while she ate her bamboo. Every now and then she would take a bite of her cake or apple. She is very lazy.

There are only 1600 pandas left in the wild in the world and they are only found in China.  Though the Chinese are trying to reintroduce them, the wild bears are stronger and will kill the reintroduced bears for food. There have been no successful reintroductions but they are making a new habitat for bears that is closer to the natural habitat - at the same altitude -  so they can hopefully have a successful reintroduction program.

The section of the center that we worked had nine bears. Three adults and six cubs two years old. One of the cubs won’t eat the healthy cake unless it is with a special formula so they have to do that so the bear gets its vitamins.  When we were feeding them the apples with special vitamins in them, the bears were so smart that they spat out the pills!

Ling Ling snacking on bamboo shoots

Panda or raccoon?

We also saw some red pandas. There are 5000 left in the world and they are found in a few countries. We didn’t clean their sanctuaries but we could observe them for an hour. They are really funny because they always lie in the trees. One time when we were watching them they were fighting for some weird reason. Our volunteer worker said that the red pandas are territorial and solitary like the giant pandas.

It was so fun I would definitely do it again if we could.

Bye Mattias

Here Kitty Kitty Kitty

Hi a lot of jealous people,
Four days ago we went to pat tigers at a place called The Tiger Kingdom. My sister and I could only pat the smallest size (3 or 4 months) because otherwise we would get eaten alive by tigers (interesting experience it would be).When Mima and I patted the small size we realised the fur is like a cheetahs and the black fur is softer than the orange fur.

"Can I get one of these?"

Mom and Dad patted the biggest type as well as the smallest one. When they patted the biggest size tiger, we sat outside and watched a tiger that was in a napping cage. Her name was Summer flower. She was a year and a half old and she kept jumping at the fence trying to eat us. Even a 3 month old was eyeing Mima. Summer Flower was watching a chubby guy in a blue shirt who was crouching down and watching her. When he got up to leave, Summer Flower was jumping at the fence with her claws out.

"Always watching"

The Tigers have a trick that they do when they hunt. They walk back and forth (pacing) as after a while as you watch them you feel queasy. Summer Flower was doing this to Mima and I and then it walked up to a different napping cage behind us and started to stalk us. CREEPY! When the tigers get to the age of two they get too aggressive and strong so they put them in a different cage and will sell them to zoos. They had one ten year old male tiger which we think they use for mating.

Just yawning - phew!

The tigers were one of my Chiang Mai highlights.

Bye, Mattias

photos coming.....

Chiang Mai

Today we are in Chiang Mai, Thailand, it is our 2nd full day here and I love it. Tomorrow we will go to pat tigers, I am very excited! 2 days ago we flew in from Luang Prabang, Laos and got a Tuk Tuk to the M.D. House which is where we are staying. The M.D.House is very fun it has a swimming pool, wifi, a gym and a computer room! We met another family from Canada staying here. They have two boys and one girl. The youngest boy is 6 and his name is Alex. The older boy is 8 and his name is Mathias (cool name!). Alex seems 8 and Mathias seems 10.  The girl is 9 and her name is Mayelle. They are from Quebec and are also traveling around the world for a year. Last night we all went to McDonalds for ice cream and I realised it was my first time ever in a McDonalds and it was on the other side of the world. We got to go to get some calcium! It is really fun to have some kids that are our age to throw balls at and to have balls thrown at by. We'll have two more days of ball throwing and fun with them.

In two days we will go on a three day trek to the jungle and the hill tribes. I am looking forward to it and can't wait to see the longneck hill tribes. My favourite part that I am most looking forward to is the bamboo rafting.

See I told you I'd write another blog soon.  Bye,

Mattias

A village by the river

Hi,
Today we are in Muang Ngoi Neua. It is a riverside village in Laos and has about 300 people. Most of the kids do not go to school they work in the fields and play games. They mostly play soccer and a game with flip flops and money. The town is only accessed by boat so there are no cars or motorbikes. The town has an elementary school, a soccer pitch it has lots of hotels and restaurants.  

Muang Ngoi Neua

We are staying in a bungalow  called Phetdavanh, they have no hot water and very little electricity but they are made completely out of bamboo and are clean.

Chillin'

It is really fun to play around here and watch the fish jump and look around the only problem is you can't go off any of the paths because of the land mines left from the war. Even some of the restaurants have bomb shells and missile points for decoration. This afternoon we are going to see a cave where people lived for 9 years during the war. We might not go in because you can't see much and they charge you to go in.

Left over from the war

We met four other travelers on our way here and we have been with them for four days. We might split up tomorrow as we will go to different places. There names are Celia from Norway, Mennow from the Netherlands, Dennie and Ben from Germany. It has been really fun traveling with other people because it is nice to talk to and get to know other people besides my family.

...2 days later-  2 days ago I played a soccer our team lost 6-1! It was laos people V.S. Foreign people. Now I am in Luang Prabang  ( still laos) Mennow stayed a day longer and ended up in the same place in luang prabang he said they played again the foreign people won 5-3.

Football!!

Bye for now I might do another one soon!  

GALOOMP GALOOMP SPLISH SPLASH

Hi everybody,
On my sister's b-day we went elephant ridding! My elephant's name was Kalamae, she was 14 and very naughty.  Dad and I rode on Kalamae. I got to ride on the bench and on her neck! When we were walking with the elephants, my elephant kept stopping and wandering away to find all the food she could.

After we did the walk we fed the elephants bananas as a treat. They were so greedy that when you gave them the banana, they would rip it right out of your hands. Did you know that the elephant has two nostrils like you and I do? Also when were feeding them, Kalamae sneezed on my leg (That's a once in a lifetime experience!). When we were feeding them you could get really close and hug their trunk and look in their mouth.  The two things that I did that were really fun when we were feeding them were touching their smooth ivory tusk and kissing the elephant.

Before we rode and fed the elephants, we helped bath them. You took a brush, went in the water with the elephant, and scratched them all over. Since the elephant is so big, they would make the elephant sit in the water and every now and then they would make the elephant lie right down under the water.  They would say, "Elephant diving elephant diving".

Bye for now
Mattias

ps. the place we went was an elephant rehabilitation centre.

South Africa - Dogs and Turtles

We are currently in Thailand but I am writing my blog about things we saw in South Africa.

In South Africa we saw a leatherback turtle in Sodwana Bay. She was very very big and was about 60 years old. They lay eggs from age 20-60. In one year one turtle will lay 100-120 eggs 10-12 times and will be lucky if 3 survive in one season. She was so big and strong that if she wanted to she could push you with her fin and you would fall over. We got to touch her shell and feel her eggs. The shell felt leathery and the egg felt hard but if you pushed it, it felt sort of like a big, heavy, soft ping pong ball. After she lays all of her eggs, she lays what are called spacer eggs. They are the unfertilized eggs so they are smaller.

In Kruger National Park we saw the big five. One time we saw the big five ALL IN ONE DAY! Also on that day we saw wild dogs. Wild dogs are very beautiful, they have white tipped tails, very round ears that can turn in all sorts of directions and their fur is white, black and orange. They have long skinny legs and very muscly bodies. They hunt in packs from 2-40 dogs. The dogs are nomadic. One day they will be in the north of Kruger and the next they will be in the south. We saw two packs of wild dogs. One pack of five and one of three. The pack of five we saw first. There was one male and four females. We followed them along the road for about 1 km. Then they went off hunting. It was cool to see what they did. It looked like they surrounded their prey because two went left, two went right and one stayed on the road. Two minutes after they were in the bush an impala came charging across the street and a dog went after it then stopped. It went back into the bush to hunt and that is where we left them.

The pack of three we saw all lying down with blood all over their faces. I couldn't catch the gender because they were lying down. They had blood all over them probably because of a kill they had eaten. We think there were more dogs in the bush eating because a pack of three is very small. They are very much like wolves.

I enjoyed seeing the two new animals in South Africa and hope I will see them again.

Bye everybuddy
Mattias

Poaching

Hi everyone
Remember in my last blog, I told you I would write a blog about poaching? Well, here it is.  Poaching usually happens to the animals considered the big 5. Rhino, elephant, leopard, cape buffalo, and lion. They are hunted for trophies. The rhino for its horn, elephant for its ivory tusk, leopard for its skin, cape buffalo for its head, and lion for its claws and teeth. They are also hunted because they are big and the most dangerous to hunt.

Rhinos and elephants are the most hunted/poached nowadays. The rhino horn is used for aphrodisiac. Since it gets turned into dust, it is easy to sneak out of the country. A few weeks ago 5 rhinos were given to Tanzania from South Africa. This was a gift and while we were on safari, one of the gifted rhinos was poached in the Serengeti. Since it is such a large area, it's almost impossible to keep it patrolled. 

In 2007, there were three men in the Ngorongoro who poached three elephants.  Eight rangers found the camp of the poachers so the poachers shot at the rangers killing 2 and injuring one of them. The rangers shot back and killed 2 of the poachers and injured one. They interviewed the one who was injured, and found out that he was from Somalia. The three poachers had disguised themselves as Masaai so that no one would suspect them.

Poaching doesn't happen very often any more, but it still happens. Some of the international laws forbidding the export of ivory has helped decrease elephant poaching. I hope everyone who wants to will do their share to help stop poaching.  There is a good kids book on this topic called Akimbo and the Elephants. Emilia and I both liked it.

Good bye for now.....

No bears, no chickens....but the big 5!

We went on a 9 day safari  from Dec’ 13 to Dec’ 21 the first day we went to Arusha National Park, it was a great starting place ‘cause you could see lots of variety of different animals and lots of them.There were lots of giraffes and we got lucky and saw a black and white Colobus monkey. They are rare to see because of how well they hide. We drove to a little view point and saw them in a tree and then when we were going back from the view point they were gone. The second day we woke up and drove to Lake Manyara National Park. Lake Manyara is famous for its tree climbing lions. The lions adapt to different habitats so this is why they climb trees in this park only.  Although we didn’t see any, we saw lots and lots of elephants. The first elephant we saw was way in the bushes and you could only just see him.  Looking contently at it, James (our amazing driver/guide) said lets skip this elephant because we will see many more up close. We drove about 2 minutes and  guess what? We saw another elephant. Not necessarily closer, but a lot easier to see. Actually, he was very hard to see at fir... let me skip the details and give you the highlights and main thoughts!

 Day 3 -we came about a metre away from a big bull elephant - he came so close we could have touched him, but instead we all jumped back. We thought we would drive away, but James just sat there while we freaked out! We asked him how do you know when an elephant is mad, he said since he is happily eating you don’t have to worry.  Phew!

Day 4 - Serengeti - James pointed out a Leopard in a tree but all we could see was its tail. He suddenly stopped, backed up and we were looking all over wondering what he saw and then he pointed in the tree about 30m away. None of us could see it, then he gave us more detail about where in the tree and we found him!
Day 4 - When we were driving in to the Serengeti, practically the first thing we saw was a cheetah lying down in the shade of a bush. Then after a few more minutes driving, we saw a lion lying down. He was hard to see unless you looked backwards and then all you could see was her paws sticking up in the air! (lions are lazy). We got a good view of the lion then as you know we saw the leopard I mentioned above.
Day 5 - We woke up early in the morning and went for a game drive before breakfast. Luck must follow us because we saw a pride of lions. There were 8 females, 3 cubs and one male. He was the dominant male ( there can be 2 or 3 males per pride). James said the pride probably had more dominant males because sometimes the males will leave the pride for a bit. We watched them for so long that we saw them move from the long grass all the way to the rock outcroppings. We watched them for a long long time and we saw something very interesting that they do to protect their cubs. They leave their cubs on a smaller rock nearby all hidden and all the other full grown ones on the big main rock. Then we went back for breakfast.
Day 6 - on Day 6 we went and saw a bunch of wildebeast and zebra on their great migration. James said there were half a million Zebra and 2 million wildebeast. Zebra and wildebeast go together because wildebeast can smell well and zebras can see very well. We drove right into the middle of the wildebeast and zebra. you could hear the zebra making their weird almost trumpeting noise. We were surrounded by them and could not see the road but James knew by heart the way to go and the wildebeast and zebra would move out of the way.
Day 7 - Day 7 was very lucky for all of our leopard sightings. We went out in the morning looking for some good game. We saw a bunch of cars parked around bad luck rock (we don’t usually see anything there, but James was determined we would so we kept going back, and that day we saw a leopard and two cubs. James said there were three cubs, but we only saw two.  Later that day, after lunch, we went for another game drive and came really close to a Leopard. You pretty much looked up and she was there sleeping in the tree. I am not joking that she was 3 metres away. After we looked at the leopard for a while I wondered, “hmmm, why doesn’t it have a kill in the tree?”  then James said “ look right behind her.” and there it was, it was a grand gazelle pretty much eaten and would last maybe for that day. She had wedged it in between two branches and stuck its horns into a branch. The Leopard’s put their prey in a tree so hyenas  (scavengers) and other cats cannot steal it. They also put it in a tree to rot for a day or two so it is more tender for eating. Their teeth aren’t strong enough for fresh kill. If it over rots they leave their kill for the vultures.

Day 8 -  Day 8 was our luckiest day. We actually saw two kills. The first was a cheetah walking around in the grass. James said he is looking for rabbits, and the next thing we knew she had a rabbit in her mouth! It wasn’t hard for the cheetah. She just had to walk and pick it up.  The second kill was the most amazing. It was five lions, one was male, attacking a heard of cape buffalo for a newborn young one. In a fight like this one, either one of the cape buffalo or one of the lions will die. After a while, some of the herd left. Only the mother and one other was left to help the calf. The lions got the calf and the mother buffalo made one last try to save her young and realised it was already gone. wah!: (

Day 9 -  On our final day we saw a mother black rhino and her young. They were very far away and very scared of vehicles. There are still poachers but not in the Ngorongoro Crater where we were. There are only 27 rhinos left in this area.  We also saw lots of Hyenas here, there are over 400 in the crater!

The safari was so amazing. I think we got really lucky on it!  Everyone we meet says that Mima and I are the luckiest because of our age already doing crazy things like this.

Bye everybody, I will do another blog shortly about poaching.

Toot is common

We went to the cairo museum and saw a tooting mask (king Tut's). It was mostly gold with beautiful rock that was green and dark and light blue. Tut's beard was long, wow! It had two serpents on the head that represent upper and lower Egypt. He was so full of himself that he decided to make a coffin around him, another around that and another around that and then a sarcophagus around that. And around the sarcophagus was a pyramid (I think I'll make a pyramid here... hmm, not big enough- make a new one!)

Animals were so important to the Egyptians they even mummified their animals. We saw a baby alligator, this big-{ }
And an adult alligator about 50 times that length. There were monkeys and Cobras. There were even the bones of a hippo! There were sarcophagi for shrews (interesting).

We saw a mummified common person which I think is crazy because everyone needed to go to the after life, well didn't need to. Some of them had real sarcophagi and some just had baskets. As you might know the king's had their brain taken out through their noses during mummification, but I don't think the common people did.

That museum was great! Sorry photos with this one, no cameras were allowed inside.

Puffies

Hello everybody,
I know that puffies sounds like Puffins again, but guess what? It means puffer fish! We are in Dahab on the coast of the Red Sea in Egypt. We are staying at a place called the Penquin ( even though there are no penguins). The whole reason we came to Dahab is for the snorkeling (pretty amazing)! We have snorkeled for three whole days and have seen maybe a hundred different kinds of very colorful fish. I wanted to rent an underwater camera so everyone can see how amazing the fish are but it was too expensive. I went snorkeling about one hour ago and knew what the puffer fish looked like, so I found one, then scared it and made it puff! I also saw an eel that was green and black and scary. I was wondering what it was until it looked at me. It looked me for quite a while, I looked at it, then it opened its mouth and showed me its sharp teeth. This usually means " don't come near me or I will eat you up" so I didn't, I swam away (scary).

There are three different places we have snorkeled in the three days and every place has been amazing mostly for the fish. But the coral reef is super colorful and fun to look at. There is a type of clam that every now and then you see in the coral. It is very beautiful and very sensitive. If you swim down near it, wave your hand in front of it, the blue and purple sucks into the clam and if you scare it a lot the clam completely closes- interesting.

We'll go snorkeling again tomorrow to hopefully see even more types of fish and maybe even a different type of clam.

Bye for now, Mattias

Ps I'll try to put on some pics later.

Tombs

Hello again every single person,

We are in Cairo with a population of 20 million plus across the Nile there are another 12 million and 4 million come into Cairo to work every day. Who can imagine how crazy it is with as many people in Canada as there are in two cities that are more like one?

Anyhow, today we went on a private tour to all the pyramids in the area and saw the Sphynx (it looks smaller in pictures than it actually is). We went in to a pyramid that everybody except for my little darn sister had to duck for. There was a sarcophagus in the pyramid bigger than the entrance. See if you can figure out how they got it in there (answer in the comment box).

We saw a statue of Ramses II and his nose was the size of my head, so you can imagine how ginourmously huge it was!

In Cairo you need to be really cautious when you cross the road because there are about three painted lanes and 12 lanes of cars. So you have to cross one car at a time and stand in the middle of the road with cars going in front of you and behind you. One nutty guy that helped us cross the street (he was a human shield) said to us "a tip to cross the street is to close your eyes and open your heart" (silly).

Bye for now, Mattias


ps... vegetarian tip - eat Koshary - it is a pasta with lots of sauces, chick peas, lentils and some other good stuff. There are fried onions. We went to a restaurant that this was their only food.

Amasya

Most o....I forgot to mention Hello everybody.
Most of the towns and places we go to are set up for tourists from the west region, but Amasya is set up so that mostly Muslims come to visit!! I think because of Ataturk's influence here many Turks come to visit (Ataturk was a Turkish leader who helped the Turks win independence- 80 years ago). Actually we are the only non Muslims that we have seen besides some loud American laughing about touching an old woman's head. Everyone else seems to be from the middle east. Don't forget to practice your Turkish charades before coming here.

There is not much to do in Amasya but we found four really interesting things to do:
- hike around in the tombs built in the side of the cliffs
- go to the castle at the top of the mountain
- go to a hamam ( a traditional Turkish bath)
- walk around the town (look at the awesome water wheel in the river)

The place we are staying is very traditional. It is an old Ottoman Empire house hanging over the river. There are lots of very Turkish things( besides the bathroom). The bathroom is definitely a WC (water closet). It is literally a closet with a shower, toilet and sink. Disturbing photo to follow, and some other pics of the place we are staying.

Saban!

Merhaba (Turkish for hi),
I thought I should catch you up on one of the places I'm staying. My favourite is the place I'm in. It is called the Saban. The reasons I like it are that breakfast and dinner are included (great food) and there are two, two week old puppies (we only see one most times). The mother was kicked out for killing 2 chickens (bad thing not roosters because they wake you up at 5:00am). They are eating a lot better than when we arrived. The Saban has hammocks, a campfire each night, comfy turkish sitting areas outside, and ping pong. It is near the beach. The next thing is we can eat oranges off the trees. And the last thing is that Mima and I get a tree house to ourselves while mom and dad are in a bungalow next door.

We all like it here so much, we stayed here two days longer than we had planned.

 What is this picture of? (above) Answer in the comment box please!

Ephesus

The day before yesterday we went to an archeological site called Ephesus!! It is the most preserved Roman site in the world! Everybody knows that Kelowna has 100 000 people, but this ancient city Ephesus had just over 200 000 people in it. Wow, that must have been big! Actually, the site was over a whole kilometre long.


We also went to the temple of Artemis. It is one of the seven great ancient wonders of the world. We have also visited two other of the great ancient wonders on the trip. The Parthenon and the site at Rhodes where the giant statue of Colossus once stood.

Yesterday we went to a beach!!!!!! I built a tunnel so I could go through it. It was very hard to go through one way, but easy to go the other way.

In Turkey there is this thing called the blue eye. When you have one and someone gives you the evil eye, it bounces back at them. I really wish I had one so my mother and father would stop looking at me in funny ways.

Bye for now, I hope your school year is going well.

Mattias

Quarterly update

Amazingly we are, to the day, three months out! This is one quarter of the way through our trip so we decided it was time to reflect on the many adventures we have had so far. We are doing this as a family, so some of the comments may include more than one response if we have differing thoughts.


Iceland
Best attraction: Minke whale, geyser, natural hotsprings
Best food: homemade soup
Biggest challenge: staying awake the first day; sleeping during daylight

England
Best attraction: salcombe sailing, Oliver, crabbing
Best food: Salcombe ice cream
Biggest challenge: Saying goodbye to the car

France
Best attraction: classic hike in Pyranees, Eiffel tower, Puy du Fou, Chateau Breze , Lascaux caves (so many...)
Best food: pan au chocolat, Camembert, mussels
Biggest challenge: finding camping in the middle of the night in Moisac(they lock the gates); kids biggest challenge was talking the parents into letting them have a pan au chocolat
every day

Spain
Best attractions: FC Barcelona museum; hiking in Picos de Europa, aqueduct in Segovia
Best food:we camped and cooked our own food mostly so we are not sure what we missed...
Biggest challenge: parking (anywhere in Spain), getting away from the cigarette smoke

Portugal
Best attractions: uncle Paddy and playing in the waves, archaeological site Citinia de Briteiros
Best food: BBQ fish, rice bowl with egg, vegetarian platter
Biggest challenge: getting info from Tourist info about anything other than the specific town we were in.

Germany
Best attraction: FC Koln game, riding Marina and Geronimo (auntie Chris' horses), hiking the steepest vineyard in Europe
Best food: pretzels, Daddy's birthday cake, Chris' pumpkin soup
Biggest challenge: beating Michy at footie (Mattias), none for the rest of us

Austria
Best attraction: Crown jewels in Vienna, meeting all the family, hike on the Hohewand with the petting zoo and zip line
Best food: sacher torte, heurigan food
Biggest challenges: getting cold milk, finding a happy Austrian in Vienna

Slovenia
Best attraction: Skojan caves, Vintgar gorge
Best food:Slovenian pub fare in Bled
Biggest Challenge: staying dry

Croatia
Best attraction: Plitvice Lakes, old city Dubrovnik
Best food: seafood risotto, ice cream/ gelato in Croatia
Biggest challenge: finding an easy route to Greece

Greece
Best attraction: black sand beach, Santorini; quads, old streets of Rhodes, Zeus' temple
Best food: halva, olives
Biggest challenge: finding fresh pita in the stores, not stepping in land mines (dog poo), finding legit TI offices

And there you have it....some of the best, not really much to complain about, and lots of yummy food.

Zoom Zoom

Today and yesterday.... well, yesterday we rented a quad for yesterday and today. (I forgot to say we are on Santorini, Greece).  The fastest speed we hit was 52km/hr. I was with the crazy driver Dad. Dad and  Mom also let me drive by myself for 5 minutes or so. We zoomed to a town called Oia  (Eeya) and watched a sunset. Today we zoomed to a red sand beach and a black sand beach.

At the red sand beach, we tried to snorkel but the water wasn't clear enough and there wasn't much to see.  Also, I tried to balance a thin rock on a thin rock, but it wasn't working for me so I put them together like a T for sitting on and then it all collapsed.

At the black sand beach we found some beach beds under umbrellas for free, that felt very tropical. I went snorkeling and saw and eel at this beach. He glared at me so I swam back and told Mima to get out of the water.

I think the place we are staying, is the best place we have stayed  so far.  It is good because it is comfy, they clean our room each day, there is a swimming pool and cake every day so I think Life Is Good!

I think that is it for this blog entry, I will get back to you as soon as I can.

Mattias

ps - don't forget to write comments.