to find a place in my budget with a view like this:

Screen Shot 2016-01-13 at 12.22.09 AM Screen Shot 2016-01-13 at 12.22.39 AM

I spent 2 DELIGHTFUL nights research AirBnbs in Paris and then realized I want a church view.

So I used Google Maps to find all the churches in the region that I wanted, and then used AirBnb “zoom in and find here” search to look at places that are as close as possible to churches.

50-60 churches later, here we are!

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I still can’t believe I just decided to book this but… Parov Stelar! In Paris! In March! (and then 4 more days of leisure AND a layover in Zurich.)

This will be FANTASTIC.

ending of spain

dumping my rough notes here, at this point its probably all i’ll write about that trip :)

Morocco and Cordoba

Sooolooks like I’m again falling s bit behind. I’m Iredell snow
theereare two days if things to write sbout,,, so let me do point form
and ill fill in later:

Morocoo is dirty poor
Many guides trying to reel us in
That street has no exit
Lack of spice pretty, abject poverty
Fast easy trip, worth it
Feels like middle east, tijuana for tim

Yikes, it is hard to retype from notes. I’m glad I took some. Ores,
because otherwise I would be super far behind on these entries. So!
Morocco, Africa. We have been officially stamped as having been on
another continent! This makes me having been in Europe, Asia (Japan),
Australia, north America and now Africa. Woot! missing is South
America which I reaaalllly hope to fill in soon. For no real reason
other than bragging rights I guess.

Getting over to Tangier was easy – a quick ferry ride, after going
through passport controls ln the boat. That was a smart idea…

The ferry holds both cars and people, so when you get out you exit
through the car loading dock. We arrived to Tangiere, and right away
as i expected we started getting hassled by a “tour guide”. This guy
kept flashing his la,inlayed card and saying he is “official guide”.
we politely rejected his advances as he continued to follow us off the
dock and down into the covered walkway that exited to generals port.
Eventually he gave up and we had a whole 3 minutes of walking alone
the next tour guide tried to pick us up. Well, we managed to get to
the cash exchange point first and alone, but after that it was only 3
minutes.

The next guy was truly persistent. We were walking along the street
that takes you out of the port. Of course right away I explain that
no, thank you, in english and French. He continues to walk 10steps
ahead of us, and doesn’t lessee us alone. He starts to point out the
old city wall as i explain, again, that no, we are not interested.
Mind you I’m king this in a friendly but clear manner. We stop for a
fake picture with some random cannon that was located along the way.
He stops and waits for us. We continue and he starts talking to us
again. As we stop and try to wait him out, ANOTHER guy starts to
explain that there’s the old wall, and here is the medina. Seriously!
I actually started laughing out loud, how ridiculous is that?
The guy kept selling himself, first claiming that we wont be able to
do it alone in the city, then saying that we are being too paranoid to
not hire him, then his pics went from 30$ for 3 hours to $20, to $10
and then finally $5. And then finally, blissfully, he left us alone as
we ventured into the city.

Cordoba
Drive
Carre four
Lste lunch
Feirst shopping trip
Second shopping trip, paseo, kids playing hide and seek, white doves,
Quick photo walk
Dinner, local awesome place

Morning
Breakfast, mesquite, massive, beautiful, before the tourist on
slaughter, quote from book

Drive to Seville, easy… Until we get into Seville and proceed to get
lost three times in a row despite gps – turns are continuously not
where you expect them to be… Finally park new bus station, taxi over
to hotel.

Hotel in a small square
Small tapas snack nearby, sweet woman who laughs when i ask for her
help in order

Shopping, siesta for tim
Shopping …. Watch, stuff
Drinks, then paseo
Neighbourhood walk around ghe barrio
Nice place for dinner and drinks

Day two Seville
Breakfast unremarkable
Everyone stylish
We walk together to shoppingd district, find nothing for Tim , he dads
back after a drink, i continuum find outlet
Outlet
Back for my siesta – relax with wine at the lounges here for 2 hours
At mafic hour walk around but no magic happens
We go for dinner, then i catch a flamenco show , tim not interested so
he was off drinking and reading
The flamenco show…
After the show I’m hyped and google another flamenco bar, go there
with dutch couple
Late night, 2am, short rain

Morning day 3 Seville
Breakfast near smoking dads and babies
Shopping with tim, sfera outlet, lost on the way there

happy valley goose bay

my first day in goose bay was full of adventure.

goose bay, actually called happy valley goose bay is a city in Labrador. it has the largest runway in north america, was an important site for fuel refueling in WW2 and is a secondary NASA landing site. current population is around 7,000 people. i’m here because of business, and due to the flight scheduling i had to arrive on sunday, giving me a full day of exploring.

flight left toronto at 7am, meaning i left home at 5:30am, meaning i woke up at 4 and got up at 4:30am. painful. the flight and the transfer on halifax were pretty uneventful, however. (one exception to that is something that i’ve noticed: small airports in canada are way more strict about security – in toronto i didn’t beep going through the metal scanner – and in halifax i did. now, the only 3 items of metal on me are my watch, my wedding ring, and 4 tiny studs in my shoes. same for the amount of scrutiny for the scanning of the luggage. line moved efficiently, but still twice as slow as pearson.)

adventure started in the airport. i walk up to the National rental counter, say my name, that i’m with (the large company i work for) and that i have a car reserved. she pulls out the reservation, and 5 minutes into filling it out turns out that i’m … too young to get it. i’m 24, and i need to be 25. now, i’ve taken trips to sudbury and thompson (manitoba) already, and rented national in both places. the girl at the check in counter in sudbury recognizes me. i haven’t had any issues, except here.

after i feel my face going red, i realize i have nothing to be worried about, and start laughing at the absurdity of the situation. i suggest she calls her manager, and if that doesn’t work out i’ll call our travel agency and have them sort it out. thankfully, 20 minutes later it turns out that [my company] is one of the 4 others in canada that has the special deal of letting underage drivers rent cars. and the woman didn’t know it because they don’t have internet in the airport yet.

after getting my car and directions around the city, i get my brief lunch (caribou burger! tasty, but nothing too different), and take a break outside with my book before going out to explore the surroundings (which are gorgeous!). i unlock the car, toss my bag in, check that the door opens and lean against it to start reading my book. 30 seconds later i hear a *click*.

the car just locked.

and the keys are inside.

the same lady who dealt with me in the airport drives up, unlocks the car without getting out of hers, we exchange a couple of friendly jokes (everyone are total sweethearts around here), and i go off on my merry way of exploring. photos later – but salient point is that after those 2 events i almost got stuck in a sand dune. that would’ve been charming…

its almost 6pm now, and i have to wake up at 5am – class is at 7am. i’m not even sure if i should go get dinner!

photos taken, pratchett book finished, i am not sure what to do next. however, good day in happy valley goose bay!