The Traveling Ridleys: Sunday Journal

In middle school and high school, I took Spanish. I loved it in middle school and took a class trip to Spain with my teacher, Madame Tessier, whom I adored. In high school, I hit my funk for schooling. I became a poor student, intentionally, for countless illogical reasons which…

With friends in town, we had the opportunity to visit another “wine hotel” in Alentejo: São Lourenço do Barrocal. Barrocais or a Barrocal is a cluster of glacier-deposited rocks that dot the landscape in this part of Alentejo in Portugal. Sitting on the plains in the shadows of the hilltop…

The Grand House in Vila Real de Santo António is an old school, fantastic, carefully restored belle epoch hotel overlooking the banks of the Guadiana River and across at Spain. Vila Real is in the far southeast corner of Portugal. We came here to begin our cross-Algarve journey four years…

More than ten years after my first attempt to ride the waves, I returned again last Sunday. Last time, we were at Waikiki Beach and my brother-in-law attempted to teach me to ride a long board. I got up, once, for about three seconds and considered it a successful venture…