A Bus Trip in the Canadian Rockies

Our bus departed Whistler to go to Sun Peaks in the Canadian Rockies. After a couple of hours travelling, the bus was positioned vertically up the side of the mountain on a two-lane road when it pulled partly off onto a shoulder. All of us passengers assumed it was for a photo-op, so we stood to take photos. We looked all around but could only see blue sky ahead of us and blue sky below us. Then we noticed our tour guide was crossing the road with his cell phone at his ear.

We watched as he walked down the road, up the road, crossed the street to our side, and then climbed the mountain.  At that point we decided he probably wanted some privacy to squat, but that didn’t make sense because there was a toilet in the bus. Meanwhile, the driver crossed the street, walked down the road, walked up the road, crossed the street back to our side, and then climbed the mountain. Maybe they were having a rendez-vous?

Finally, our guide returned. “The bus has stopped by itself!” he informed us. “It won’t restart!” There were shouts from some of the older men and hysterics from their spouses. Needless to say, we weren’t near any town and our guide didn’t know how long we’d have to wait. Unfortunately, the bus had given out in a spot that partly obstructed one lane around a curve.

Some of the younger passengers were Australian, and their attitude was, “S__t happens.” A few of them disembarked and found a tiny clearing to play “pitch penny.” One man found a soft limb (a “switch”) and began to weed-whack the area for the game.  Another man put on his earphones and entertained us dancing up the aisle.

The rest of us laughed (at the beginning), talked, and read.

Since there was a hillside path, the men could mountain-climb when they needed to pee.  Not so for the women!

With my luck, I was seated in the last row on the aisle in front of the bathroom.  The driver informed us that he couldn’t start the engine, so we couldn’t flush.  But some of the females began to get desperate.  The door knob to the toilet wouldn’t turn properly and kept getting stuck, so I used a piece of paper towel to keep the knob from turning and told the women I’d guard the door.  Since there was no power from the engine, I used my cell phone flashlight to usher them in and show them where the necessities were located, although there was no flushing, of course. After a bit, it began to get “ripe” in the bus, especially for those of us seated near the toilet.

“Could you put on the emergency lights?” I asked the driver, hoping that would provide enough power to flush. 

“I don’t really want to use up whatever power’s left,” he said. We ended up compromising with every third woman flushing. My job was to open the door, usher the ladies in with my flashlight, and designate every third person for a flush.

It was an interesting way to meet women! I was offered tips and written recommendations, should I wish to pursue this as a new career.

.........................by Eileen Watson

Notes from Morocco, June, 2019, Part III

This is the last in a series of blogs about a recent trip to Morocco. 

     After experiencing the Medina of Fez for four hours, we needed to clean up and chill out. At dinner in the Palais Faraj we enjoyed the company of a friend I'd grown up with and her granddaughter.

Marilyn, Claire, Charley, Pam

Our itineraries intersected at two locations, but their journey would end in the desert (south). Charley and I skipped the desert experience because of the heat in June.

Dinner entertainment in Fez, Morocco

     The following day we headed into the Middle Atlas Mountains. We passed orchards of cherries, nectarines, and peaches, as well as olive groves. After a couple of hours ascending two-lane winding roads with no guard rail, we encountered fog. Our driver “Bob” was not concerned and kept on till we reached the first village, where hundreds of day workers waited in the square to be picked up by orchard owners to work on the Plain of Saiss below. “We’d better turn around,” “Bob” declared, as we made a U-turn in a white-out while the temperature plummeted. In the back seat I wrapped my long wool pashmina over my shoulders and around my neck. 

     “Good idea!” Charley commented. “I was afraid to look down past the side of the car.”  We crept along the white center line down the mountain to the city.

     We drove from Fez south along the coast to Casablanca the next day, passing wide promenades above beaches filled with umbrellas or water parks. Our hotel in that city was on a street barely wide enough for one car, a refuge from the city’s 6,000,000 inhabitants. Shopping malls and condominiums were going up in every direction.

Casablanca skyline

     We made a reservation for dinner at Rick’s Café, made famous in the movie “Casablanca.” Although it was definitely a tourist attraction, the swordfish was excellent ($50 for the two of us, including a drink); we befriended a couple from Australia who owned a B&B on Bali; and we had our photo taken at the piano made famous when Bogart said, “Play it again, Sam.”

Piano in Rick's Cafe, made famous in movie "Casablanca"

   






  The next morning we visited the Hassan II Mosque in Casablanca, one of the few that non-Muslims can enter. With its mammoth interior and hanging balconies (for the women), it can hold 25,000. Another 55,000 can worship in the surrounding plazas overlooking the sea. The ceiling is nearly 200 feet high, although the roof is retractable so that the interior can be turned into a courtyard. Funded through public subscription, designed by a French architect, and built by a team of 35,000 between 1987 and 1993, it is the third-largest mosque in the world.

The many buildings of Hassan II Mosque, Casablanca, 3rd largest in world

Inside mosques, shoes must be removed. Bags are provided for tourists.

Main entrance, Hassan II Mosque, Casablanca

Main entrance, Hassan II Mosque

Balconies for women inside Hassan II Mosque. Women are not permitted to worship with the men.

     Five times a day faithful Muslims hear their call to prayer (the Muezzin) played on a CD. An estimated 99% of Moroccans are Muslim, with the king able to trace his lineage to the Prophet Mohammed. The second most practiced religion is Christianity; Jewish Moroccans remain another minority. Moroccans on the whole tend to be tolerant of other religions, interpreting Islamic laws in a less conservative way than in many Muslim countries. Modesty in women’s dress, for example, emphasizes covering the skin rather than disguising the female form. Young women around the universities wore contemporary clothing that was form-fitting but covered their limbs.

     It was a Friday, Holy Day for Muslims. After we'd visited the Hassan II Mosque, Rasheed (our guide) deposited Charley and me in a café for lunch, where we ordered sweet and savory bastillas, flaky dough with a filling of either chicken or pigeon. Rasheed excused himself to pray at a nearby mosque and was back in fifteen minutes. “If we have no time to pray, we can do so at home,” he explained. 

     In the mosques, shoes are removed upon entering. Men and women are separated, with a women-only section. On Holy Day, especially, all worshipers must purify themselves before prayer. In the Hassan II Mosque on the basement level there were round sinks of marble for worshipers to wash their hands, wrists, elbows, face, ears, ankles, and feet THREE TIMES before entering the upper sanctuary.

      Hammams were for communal bathing, used by Moroccans once a week before going to the mosque. Charley and I didn’t experience the hammam, since we had our own facilities where we were staying. Small, enclosed, dimly-lit to encourage piety and reflection, whether public or private, hammams segregated the sexes and “Salaams” eased anxiety for a tourist in semi-nudity.

Marble cleansing sinks, Hassan II Mosque, Casablanca

     During a trip to Morocco, my friend Pat followed her tour guide to the waiting bus. There were four men and seven women who had signed up for the “hammam experience” in Tangier, after two days in the desert. One of the men was Pat’s husband.

     The hammam is a bathhouse. Since the Moroccans visit the hammam just once a week, there were probably more foul-smelling Moroccans than Western travelers.

     The group drove to the Ouifak Hammam where two gorgeous ladies, Yatto (age 30) and Etoh (age 26), greeted the seven women. The men in the group expressed their disappointment that they had been greeted by a Moroccan male.

     The seven women followed Yatto and Etoh into a changing room, where a large number of women stood in nothing but their panties. Young daughters stood next to their mothers in the same state of undress. Their djellabas and hijabs (robes and headscarves) hung from pegs.

     Any female who’s tried on clothing in a communal Western dressing room can picture the scene—perky boobs still pointing at the ceiling that hadn’t nursed, saggy boobs in a race to reach the navel, and minuscule boobs that raised the question, “Male or female?”

Tile wall in cleansing area of Hassan II Mosque

      Like the others, Pat and her fellow travelers stripped to their panties. Etoh led them through two rooms of white marble to a wall, where she instructed them to sit on a colorful tile floor covered with hot water. She put a blob of dark olive oil soap in each visitor’s palm and asked them to lather themselves, except for their faces.

     SURPRISE! As in the ice bucket challenge, Pat felt the shock of a bucket of Antarctic water flung at her. The only difference was there were no ice cubes.

     Pat was first in the lineup. She heard Etoh say something and point at her. Etoh wanted her to lie on the hot, wet tiles on her back. Pat followed the gestures to the floor.

     Immediately, she felt a loofah mitt scratching her arm. It seemed like steel wool rubbing her skin off. When that arm was done, the attendant scrubbed Pat’s other arm and then her legs, ending with her stomach and chest. The attendant turned her over like a flopping fish and the torture began on her back and legs.

      “Back to the wall, please.” Pat heard and obeyed, waiting till everyone had a turn with the loofah.     

     SURPRISE AGAIN! Buckets of hot water flew through the air to wash Pat’s dead skin and soap down the drain.

     “Please stand up,” Etoh said. She led the seven Western women in a column to a cooler room, where they sat against another wall to . . . SING! The only English song Etoh knew was “Cum-bye-ah, my lord,” so that’s what they sang. Seven naked ladies sitting against a wall singing “Cum-bye-ah.”

     One by one Etoh brought Pat and her now best-buddies forward for the olive oil rub.  Up one side and down the other, but this time Pat’s beet-red skin stayed in place.

     Shampoos followed. On the wet tile floor, her back to the attendant, Pat aimed her nose to the ceiling and felt water dripping down her scalp, like a neophyte in baptism. The attendant worked olive oil shampoo into the wet strands and combed without restraint. Then more buckets of water.

     But wait . . . Pat’s feet were still unclean! A pumice stone fixed that, removing calluses that had built up hiking in the desert, as well as some live skin.

     Ninety minutes later, Pat and her best-best-friends emerged looking radiant. She didn’t tell me how much the “hammam experience” cost, but she said her husband looked like a new man, so it must have been worth it.

     From Casablanca Charley and I drove to Marrakesh and unloaded our luggage at the exquisite Villa des Orangers, an old French villa with a pool, library, game room, garden, small shop, and outdoor terraces for dining. Our room was similar to that in Riad Myra, consisting of a large bedroom with sofa and television and a tiled bathroom with walk-in shower and tub. The young woman who showed us to our room instructed us to put a fez (hat) on the outside of our door if we didn’t want to be disturbed!

     At poolside that evening we watched two wood storks nesting on electric poles behind the hotel.

Ceiling detail, Villa des Orangers, Marrakesh

Courtyard, Villa des Orangers, Marrakesh

     We avoided any drink that contained ice cubes and only drank liquid from bottles. We declined fresh-washed lettuce but ate the ripe, juicy tomatoes and cucumbers without a problem. Our “salads” were individual dishes of sautéed eggplant or cauliflower, stewed tomatoes, fava beans, or corn. For dinner I enjoyed chicken with figs and lemon and Charley devoured his beef with apricots and plums. Both meals had been slow-cooked in tangines with lids resembling circus tents.

     Since we were unaccustomed to the tipping mores, Rasheed stepped forward to tip whenever necessary: the toilet attendant, subjects of photos, etc. When we purchased souvenirs and arranged for delivery to our hotel, he called the shops to confirm delivery. He paid our entrance fees that had not been prearranged through his agency and bought us cold drinks from vending machines. For all this, we gave him $250 after our eight-day trip ended. After studying our guide book, we were able to use the local dirhams to tip.

Outside the Medina, Marrakesh

     The architecture of Marrakesh resembled the flat, adobe-style, red clay buildings of the American southwest. We relaxed in the Yves St. Laurent Museum (fashion, accessories, and culture of the Berbers) and among the bamboo and palms of Jardin Majorelle, owned by the late designer who had lived next door. However, I was most anxious to take a dromedary ride, offered outside the city in a Berber village. Charley declined, since he’d been on a camel in Egypt that had spit at him.

     Badis, a thirty-five-year-old father of two in bright blue robes, matching headpiece, with two overlapping front teeth, pushed me onto my high square seat atop “Madonna.”

     He assured me “Madonna” was a gentle soul. My thighs spread wide and my feet flopped without stirrups. I bumped up and down for about ten minutes, but soon was able to sit back with the gentle swaying rather than bounce in my seat. I became oblivious to the burning in my thighs. After twenty minutes, Badis handed me the reins. The poor dromedary merely followed his master, who walked beside her. The reins were really for photo ops, as this photo illustrates in silhouette.

     We plodded for an hour through acres of dirt and scrub palms toward his Berber village, wrapped behind high sand-colored walls that blended into the acreage. The only sign of life in the village was a baby crying. Rising beyond was a Club Med property and unfinished villas protruding under mechanical cranes. Water bottles, paper bags, and remnants of meals lay strewn across our trail of dirt, with water (sewage?) gurgling up in a pool far behind Badis’ Berber village.

     Motorcycles zoomed over a far hillside as we rounded the final turn of my ride. “That is my boss,” Badis said, pointing to one of the motorcyclists. Badis took almost fifty photos of me on “Madonna” using my cell phone, reminding me that he was a family man. At the end of the ride, I dismounted to join Charley and Rasheed in a café owned by Badis' boss. Badis followed, to collect his payment and his tip. The tents of the café were shredding, there was no food available (only drinks), the children’s carousel had been abandoned, and rest room faucets yielded no water. At least the toilets flushed! “The Berbers could make something of this for tourists, but they don’t care,” Rasheed said.

     We noticed in Casablanca and Rabat that buses and trolleys traversed those cities. Rasheed told us buses serviced the countryside, and a train ran from Tangiers south to Marrakesh. Below Marrakesh,  a bus ran into the desert. As we whizzed back to Casablanca on an eight-lane toll road, square sand-colored villages blended into the landscape, dwarfed by the backdrop of the High Atlas Mountains. 
     Rasheed and "Bob" walked us to our security screening area in the Casablanca airport.  Rasheed  transferred my carry-on bag to me, which he'd been pulling. He handed me his business card and hugged both of us. "Next time, call me direct," he said. "No fees for the agency!"


Read about our return to the island of Ischia, Italy, in my next blog.

    

    

    

    

    

Notes from Morocco, June, 2019, Part II

This is the second in a series based on recent travel to Morocco and the island of Ischia, Italy.

     On our second day in the city of Fez, Morocco, our guide led us through the four MILES of mysterious, mesmerizing, and overwhelming 8^th-century alleyways in the Medina (market in the medieval section of the city). Passing through one of the gates, we entered a time warp, despite numerous satellite dishes on the roofs. During the four hours there, we never retraced our steps! Shafts of sunlight streamed through thatched roofs of covered stalls, donkey drivers shouted “Balek!” (“Watch out!”) while pushing overloaded mules, coppersmiths hammered, and the muezzin CD called the Muslim city to prayer. 

Scene inside the Medina, Fez

     Each section of the Medina had its own specialty: fish, poultry, meats, brass (with zinc and without), woodworking, watch repair, tailoring, fruits, nuts, vegetables, spices, fresh bread, lamps, Oriental carpets, etc., etc. The strong odor of spices yielded to curing leather or fresh fish. The shops resembled caves, with sewing machines whirring at the edge of the workshop nearest pedestrians or jewelers and electricians huddling over work tables to reassemble watches and toasters. Heads of cows, goats, and camels hung outside the shops, advertising the specialties to the illiterate populace (yes, they do eat camel). Animal brains glistened before our eyes, while chickens met their demise on the pavement inside one establishment. Goat shins and hoofs lay in a pile at our feet, forcing us to step over the blood that ran into a drain in the street. Sausages rolled from a machine behind a counter, while the proprietor tied them in loops. At a “restaurant” stall, sausages and kabobs grilled on spits, choking the alley with smoke. “This is important for the customer,” said our guide, Rasheed, pointing to a goat’s hindquarters with intact testicles hanging alongside one of the stalls. “Male meat is more desirable than female meat, and the vendor proves he’s reputable by displaying them. Shoppers can see the testicles are not sewn on!”

Olives

Butchers with sausage machine

Salads

Our guide, Rasheed, buying a snack. Yes, that's a camel's head!

     Rasheed kissed the children he passed in the alleys and bought a pair of sunglasses for a four-year-old girl he’d never seen before. “She reminds me of my granddaughter,” he said. He could have been the mayor of the Medina, receiving shouts of recognition, handshakes, and hugs all along our winding path.

     “You wouldn’t dare touch a child you didn’t know in the States,” I said.  “You would be reported.”

 



   


     We were introduced to a short, rotund, balding man in one of the alleys. “A very rich man,” Rasheed said after they embraced. “He dresses in old clothes like he lives in the Medina because he doesn’t want to be recognized. He owns two shops and a large hotel.”

 







  “This man makes beautiful lamps,” Rasheed said, introducing us to a proprietor seated on a stool outside a storefront along one alley. The man jumped up, shook our hands, and led us to the interior of the building where thousands of glass teardrops in every configuration hung above our heads.

     “Did you create all these beautiful lamps?” I asked him. He nodded affirmatively.

Handmade lamps

     We followed Rasheed into another narrow “cave” where a wood oven burned in a far corner. Its smoke rose through a vent in the two-foot thick walls. “This is our local bread maker,” Rasheed said. “Each family in the Medina places an order for the week.” As we watched, the baker placed flat loaves on a pan with a long handle, similar to those used for pizza in wood ovens. He brought others out of the oven and stacked them on the cement floor.

   “May I take your photo?” I asked the baker, who shook his head affirmatively. Rasheed leaned over and gave the man a few coins, as he did whenever I asked permission for a photo. The baker’s helper, probably his son, placed a number of the hot loaves in a box and took off with the order on his bike. After thanking the baker for the photo, we followed outside and were almost run over by an elderly gentleman on a motorbike. The baker’s son juggled his box and tilted sideways against the wall of the bakery to avoid a collision. A shouting match ensued, with Charley and me in the middle.

     “Calm down,” Rasheed said in Arabic to both men, which did nothing to quell their tempers. After yelling epithets at each other, they continued on their ways. We trotted behind Rasheed like puppies on leashes.

Leather or fakes?

Figs

     I mentioned to Rasheed we were hoping to find a small Oriental carpet to ship home. He led us into a two-story establishment. “If you see something you like, begin negotiations at 50%,” he said. “This is a reputable company so they won’t cheat you. The price will include shipping and tax and another carpet of lesser quality will not be substituted.” Rasheed would receive 10%, of course.

     Charley and I settled onto sofas in the large covered atrium of the store. Along the walls, beneath our feet, thrown over furniture, and hanging from the two-story ceiling were Berbers, Kilims, Kirmans, Tabrizes, You-Name-It. In a room in front of us, two women wove knots onto the fringes of small carpets. In a room behind us, a family of Americans negotiated a price for the carpet at their feet. Rasheed introduced us to the owner’s son, Abdul, who offered mint tea or bottles of water. “You speak English very well,” I said to him.

     “I attended university in the States,” he replied. I showed Abdul a photo on my phone of the Bokhara pattern and coloration we were looking for. “Follow me into this room, please,” he said. We went into another room that was bigger than any of the others. More carpets hung from wooden frames along the walls and from the ceiling.

     We settled into another sofa. In front of us two men unrolled an 8x10’ Kirman in shades of beige and blue. Not even close to what we were looking for! Next they unrolled a 6x8’ Berber in vibrant reds. Even further off! The carpets continued to get smaller and smaller the more we shook our heads. “Abdul, please look at my photo again.” After thirty minutes of sipping water and shaking our heads, a small rust, beige, and black carpet unrolled in front of us.

     “This is the finest quality silk from Uzbekistan,” Abdul said. “The weaver signed his name in the corner.” We bent over and peered at the weaver's name. The size of the carpet was perfect but the coloration a little too dark.

     “Too dark,” I said. Two men flipped the carpet over. The colors were perfect, though the weave was much flatter. “Is this the price?” I asked, looking at the tag.

     “What would you like to pay?”

     I named a price one-quarter of the Euros on the tag. “No, I can’t do that,” Abdul said. “What would you like to pay?” he repeated.

     I named a price with a 60% discount. “This is silk of the highest quality,” Abdul reasserted. We agreed on a 50% discount. “Now I want you to put your initials on the wrong side in the corner so you will know there are no substitutes from my father’s store,” he said, handing me a magic marker with permanent black ink. We told Abdul the date we would arrive home and signed the necessary paperwork. Our purchase awaited us when we got home, with my initials on the corner. When I stood over the carpet under the lights in our home, its flaws jumped out at me. I should have been more diligent in the showroom!

     “You’ll be the only one to notice,” Charley said. “Besides, they give it character.”

Our purchase in the Medina of Fez. Lighting is distorting the evenness of the coloration.

     Having completed our purchase, we continued behind Rasheed through the Medina. “Look up at that apartment building,” he said, pointing at a four-story building the color of sand. “There was an earthquake in Agadir, southwest of Fez, in 1960 that killed 1500. UNESCO provided funds to rebuild the Medinas, but look what they did with the money!” We stared at wooden struts that buttressed the rear and underpinning of the building. “Another earthquake would be a catastrophe!” he said.

     Rasheed explained that the Berbers in the country consist of Arabs, Moors, and Africans that are direct descendants of the pre-Arabs of northern Africa. Berbers total 36 million, though the nomads of the country are not counted in the census. The southern regions, where most nomads live, have been marginalized and nomad communities can be found in their original state. “It’s a different country where they exist,” Rasheed said.

     Our final stop in the Medina of Fez was the medieval tannery. Rasheed led us into a leather shop crammed with jackets, purses, hats, gloves, and traditional slippers of every color. A shopkeeper handed us a few sprigs of fresh mint to smother the smell of decaying animal flesh from the sheep, goats, cows, and camels being processed outside. We declined his suggestions for purchase, but manipulated the soft skins that felt like butter. Giving up on a sale, he led us to wooden stairs in the back of the showroom. At the top we stepped onto a terrace (Terrasse des Tanneurs) with a spectacular view of the dyeing vats. The fresh mint beneath our noses was hardly enough to deter the fetid smell.

Bleaching and tanning vats, Fez Medina

     The shopkeeper explained that at the top right in our view the skins were piled with their furs. In succession they entered concrete vats of saline, quicklime, pigeon droppings, and any of several natural dyes: poppies for red, turmeric for yellow, saffron for orange, indigo for blue, and mint for green. Barefoot workers in shorts picked up the skins from the bottoms of the vats with their feet, and worked them manually. The job was VERY well-paid and in demand for a strong export market. 

Follow our journey in my next blog through Casablanca and Marrakesh, where I had my first camel ride.

A Trip to Mt. Dora, Florida, Part I (History)

     For our annual reunion this year, my sister drove down from Fernandina Beach and I drove up from Delray Beach to meet in Mt. Dora, Florida. Neither of us had ever been before.

   

     Mt. Dora sits 185 feet above sea level, a veritable pinnacle in a flat landscape of lakes northwest of Orlando and west of Sanford. The town was a time warp, consisting of quaint shops displaying artistic, nostalgic, or "gently used" goods, fantastic restaurants, an antiques market the size of a football field, several museums, and a large yellow historic inn that had exploded into several new buildings on the Lake.

Imported shoes, Mt. Dora, Fl.

Mt. Dora Inn, opened in 1883

     Lake Dora provided the scenery, visible around every corner, complete with sea plane and boat rides. Legend has it that the Lake was named in 1848 after Dora Drawdy, living with her family two miles south, who shared their meager supplies with the government surveyors. In actuality, the Drawdys were not in the area until around 1856, and the Lake had already been named by a surveying team.

Lake Dora, with red and white lighthouse through trees

     The original name of the town, when the Post Office was established in 1880, was Royellou, an acronym made from the names of early settler and first Postmaster Ross Tremain's three children - Roy, Ella, and Louis. In 1882-'83, the name was changed to Mt. Dora.
     When white settlers came in the third quarter of the 1800's, they found African-Americans in the area. These black settlers had a friendly relationship with the Indians who continued to travel through.
     The U.S. Census for 1890 recorded 174 people living in the Mt. Dora precinct. Access to the area was limited, via railroad (1887), wagon, or boat along the circuitous water route from Sanford. Residents raised their own livestock, grew vegetables, and supplemented their diet with fish and game from the immediate vicinity. In 1894-95, back-to-back freezes devastated the citrus crop.
     The town was incorporated as the City of Mt. Dora in 1910, with 371 people in the City proper, 42 in the surrounding precinct, and 125 automobiles (1913). The community had no paved streets, no water system, no streetlights, and no sidewalks. Things changed from 1919 until the Great Depression, when Mt. Dora experienced the same building boom as the rest of the state. It was no longer an isolated country town.

Tourists learning to use segways, 2019

To be continued.......




   

Interview with Novelist Wendy Blake Pottinger

Wendy Blake Pottinger  was born and raised in central Ohio before moving to South Florida. Her short stories have been published in several anthologies and she has written for PBG Lifestyle Magazine. Her love of travel throughout the United States was the inspiration for her novel, A GIFT OF GRACE. To  her, life is about family.

Pam: When did you discover you wanted to be a writer?

Wendy:  I have always been a writer. If you don't believe me, just ask to see the many journals tucked into the old trunk in my attic. On second thought, no one should ever read those. I had some issues in the 70's.

Pam:   How did your childhood influence your novel?

Wendy:  Growing up in a small town in central Ohio was wonderful. Life was right out of a Rockwell painting - sledding the hills, skating the ponds in winter; swimming and fishing in the spring and summer; jumping in the leaves, hayrides, and festivals in the fall. Mostly, these moments were made more magical by being surrounded by family.

Pam:  Is the story line in A GIFT OF GRACE a reflection of you or your family?

Wendy:  My novel traces a journey made by three siblings after losing their mother. Many of the stories come from actual occurrences throughout the years.

Pam:  Please explain a little how your story line evolved.

Wendy:  The inspiration for my novel came from one year when my three kids were home from college. I was sad to see how they had grown apart. They all lived within ten miles of each other, but it seemed to me in their independence in life, they had left behind these special relationships. My book is based on a mother who sends her children on a 21-day journey together across the U.S. to spread her ashes.

Pam:  What was the best writing advice you ever had?

Wendy:  In Stephen King's book, ON WRITING, he is explicit in his advice to write what you know. I have to agree. You have to love your characters and your story. If not, why tell it? I have three kids. My daughter did pee in a laundry basket, my son did sprain his glute muscle. Did they enjoy my sharing their stories? Yes, they did. They all had input and opinions through the writing process.

Pam:  So you got additional writing advice within the family!  Do you have specific rituals when you write?

Wendy:  I write daily. Usually mornings, but sometimes I have an idea and I've learned, if you think you'll remember that idea later, you're wrong! So, I may stop during the day and do a quick outline for a particular idea. Since I work on multiple books at the same time (I'm a Gemini), I need to keep the ideas filed with the correct book. I certainly don't want my time traveler to end up in my 1800's veterinarian story. While I might outline an idea, I've never outlined a book. That said, I usually know my beginning, middle, and end. But I love to see where the characters will take me.
           
Pam:  What's currently on your nightstand?

Wendy:  Another piece of advice is: to be a great writer, you need to be a great reader. I have a stack of seven books currently on my bedside table. Some of the authors I'm savoring at the moment are Lee Child, Barbara Kingsolver, David Baldacci, and Debbie Macomber. Also I have local authors' books, including your book, SURVIVING YOUR DREAM VACATION, and JM LeDuc's EVIL AWAKENED.

Pam:  Thank you for taking the time to read the rules and anecdotes in my new travel book! What are you working on at the moment?

Wendy:  My next novel, a love story with a time travel twist, will be out in January. The working title is SHADOW PEOPLE.
               In addition to writing, I love to help new authors. If your readers have any questions or comments or just want to say, "Hi," contact me at: wpottinger3@gmail.com

Pam:  Many thanks for your time, Wendy, and best of luck with the new book!

Our Guide through the Basque Country, 2018

     In "The Keys Behind Treasured Stops" (NY Times Travel Section, August 19, 2018, p.4), Elaine Glusac writes, "... a great trip should involve a journey, embody a culture, and script a story to tell later." Here is one story of our guide through the Basque Country of France and Spain.


     On a previous trip to France, we'd hired Christian Mayer to take us from Paris through Monet's Giverny and the villages of Honfleur and Bayeux (where the 230-foot-long tapestry resides depicting Norman events leading to William, Duke of Normandy's, conquest of England in 1066). Christian drove us to Deauville, with its grand casino, racetrack, and wide beach, as well as to Ste. Mere-Eglise, where paratrooper John Steele from the 82nd Airborne remained suspended when his parachute got caught in the church steeple on D-Day, 1944. Unlike the depiction in "The Longest Day," the American was taken prisoner and escaped to become a town hero. From Ste. Mere-Eglise where we stayed,  we toured the beaches, cemeteries, and museums of World War II on the Normandy coast.

Bayeux, France

Honfleur, France

Monet's Giverny Lily Pond and House (in background)

Crater Bombardment on Omaha Beach, France

Recreation of parachutist John Steele hanging from church steeple in Ste. Mere-Eglise, Fr., on D-Day

     Our guide, Christian, was an American from New Mexico who'd married a French woman and relocated outside Paris. In June, 2018, we returned to France and hired Christian to guide us from Biarritz, on the Atlantic, through the Basque country of France and Spain in the Pyrenees, close to Christian's home where he and his wife were raising their family.

Christian Mayer with Charley at Chartres Cathedral, France, 2011

     Christian's father's family was French; his mother's family was Austrian. We learned his family story during our rides through the mountains between France and Spain - one of the many personal souvenirs we've collected during our travels.
     Since the name "Mayer" sounded Jewish to the Germans during the Occupation of France, his paternal grandparents were forced to sell their mountain camp for children and relocate in Nice, where they opened a restaurant. They moved on to settle in Cap d'Antibes, where they operated a hotel. Christian's grandmother ran messages to the resistance in a pump tube on her bike. His grandfather was arrested, charged with an "act of resistance," while his granduncle was executed by the S.S. Christian's grandmother washed the linens of a Frenchman sympathetic to the Germans and got her husband released.
     "My grandmother didn't want her two sons drafted into the War," Christian told us. "My uncle Jean and my dad 'Dadou' were members of the French National ski team, so the family was able to make its way to Paris. I remember my dad telling me they heard Allied bombers overhead for an hour before they actually bombed. He described the German revolving machine guns that enforced curfews in the City.
     "A German with the code name 'Ernie Blake' had been a double agent and was rewarded by the U.S. with cheap forest land in New Mexico.There he built a ski lodge and the St. Bernard Hotel in what became Taos Ski Valley. He advertised for a ski instructor/hotel operator. 'Dadou' was the only one who answered the ad. Eventually dad was able to bring his brother Jean, also a ski instructor in France, and the rest of the family to Taos. The two brothers pooled their money and their parents added their savings to become owners of the St. Bernard Hotel. It's still there.
     "My mother was from Vienna and answered an ad for an 'au pere' in Taos, where her brother was the ski lift engineer. That's where my parents met. Eventually dad and uncle Jean split and dad bought out Jean's portion of the St. Bernard. Uncle Jean opened the Eidelweis Hotel there. The two hotels stood side-by-side.
     "My cousins and I grew up on skis and snowboards, despite the fact that snowboards were forbidden on the slopes of Taos at the time. We used to sneak down to the weekly concerts in the hotels and hung out with the musicians. I guess that's how I got started playing the sax. I formed my own band and started touring Europe."
     "How did you become enamored with the sea if you grew up in New Mexico?" I asked Christian.
     "Well, my dad was a U.S. citizen and after my parents divorced, he moved to Hawaii. I loved to surf out there."
     "Did your mother become a citizen?"
     "Well, mom was a proud Austrian. She refused to apply till after the divorce, when she had to go to work."

Travelogue, Spanish Basque Country, 2018

     After leaving France for the coast of Spain on the Basque Corniche, we checked into the Maria Cristina Hotel in San Sebastian. Built in 1912, the facade resembled a Belle Epoque palace. We were led to a sumptuous room, recently renovated in grays from slate to fog. In fact, the entire hotel had been renovated in 50 shades, from "greige" (beige with a touch of gray) to thundercloud. A plaque on the door next to us proclaimed it had been Bette Davis' suite while she was in residence. She had actually stayed there just three days before her death. Her photos remained on the walls of the bar and grill room off the lobby.

Hotel Maria Cristina, San Sesbastian, Spain

     San Sebastian is known for three things: its spectacular beaches, its Parto Vieja ("Old Part" of the city), and its food. The international jazz festival in July and international film festival in September call San Sebastian home. We walked around Monte Urgull, the hill that rises abruptly at the edge of the Old City along the peninsula's shore and used toothpicks to spear pinxtos ("haute cuisine in miniature") with olives, green or red peppers, anchovies, pork meatballs, or fried potatoes, displayed on a bar. The bartender tallied them up, along with the Rioja district wines we'd sampled, when we were ready to leave.
     The following day we shopped inside the old walled city and walked the broad promenade above Playa de la Concha, the beach closest to the city with waves less formidable than the eastern Playa de Zurriola, which attracted international surfers. On the far western end of the Gulf of Vizcaya was Playa de Ondarreta, with few amenities. For dinner (10:00 p.m. in the Parto Vieja) we wound down narrow alleys to sit against a newer version of the old city walls in a restaurant where fishermen unloaded their catch in the front and the cooks hustled the catch inside. We ordered some greens and a lobster salad to share. When the "salad" arrived, a mountain of seafood sat on a platter before us: two cooked, split lobsters; steamed mussels and clams; potatoes; tomatoes; whole onions; kernels of corn. At home in Massachusetts we called this meal a "clam boil" or a "lobster bake," depending on whether it's boiled in a steamer pot or cooked over seaweed in a pit. Somehow we managed to devour our "salad."

Views of city of  San Sebastian from amusement park atop Mt. Ulia with Pyrenees in background. Surfers' beach is around promontory to left.

    Basque poet Kirmen Uribe summed up the appeal of his native coastline between San Sebastian and Bilbao: "I'm going to stay here - between the green waves and the blue mountains." We drove west along the coast through Zarautz, a former whale-hunting town with extensive photo museum and huge surfing waves rivaled only in Mundaka, which boasted long rollers and left-curling pipeline. "Hip" sculptures lined the beach promenade in Zarautz. We followed the twisting sea road west through Zumaia, a fortified medieval town with fossils embedded in rock cliffs where artist Ignacio Zuloaga thought the light magical. Next were Ondarrao and Lekeito, the Basque Country's leading fishing ports with major tuna fleets. Finally we headed inland toward Gernika and  Bilbao.
     Picasso made the Basque village Gernika (Basque spelling) famous with his mural representing Spain in the 1937 International Exposition of Arts and Techniques in Modern Life (Paris). In April, 1937, German Luftwaffe planes terror-bombed the Basque town of Gernika at the invitation of General Francisco Franco. Why Gernika? Since medieval times, regional leaders of the Basques had gathered there beneath an ancient oak tree to govern themselves. The fierce independence of the Basques, alone in opposing Franco's bid to overthrow the elected government, offended him. His German allies killed between 200 and 2,000 citizens in the village on a market day but missed the oak.The black and white photos in newspapers reporting the bombing infuriated Picasso, so he painted the mural in stippled grays, evoking those first reports and the dark cloud of war. His mysterious images brought the cause of Spanish suffering before the world. Picasso vowed his mural would never be exhibited in Spain as long as Franco lived. It was returned to Spain from exhibition in N.Y.C.'s Museum of Modern Art following repatriation in 1981.

    

     As recently as the 1980's Bilbao was a steel and ship-building city in decline. Bilbainos thought the government crazy to court a major museum and name an architect to create another landmark (Frank Gehry). But civic audacity paid off. The Guggenheim Bilbao, an "armored beast" in metal, opened in 1997 and jump-started a transformation of the riverfront. A city of 355,000 has now become a laboratory for contemporary architecture. Cesar Pilli created a master plan of walkways, contemporary sculpture, and innovative architecture for the city. 
     The Casco Viejo or "Old Town" is a compact triangle nestled on a bend in the river. Basque identity is the subject of the Museo Vasco, while the Archeological Museum traces the human presence in the region from the arrival of Neanderthal man to the emergence of a coherent Basque region in the Middle Ages. The Museo de Bellas Artes is a gem of a conventional art museum outside Casco Viejo on the Guggenheim side of the River Bilbao..

Entrance to Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao, Spain

Jeff Koons'  3-story flower "Puppy" outside 

View of Guggenheim Museum from street

  







Three-story fabric "creature" hanging in atrium








    

     A three-story sculpture of flowers titled "Puppy" by Jeff Koons stands on the esplanade outside the Guggenheim. Three mimes' arms extend from tented blankets to perform to music along the walkway. A two-story iron taranchala titled "Maman" by Louise Bourgeois stands behind the building. 

     Walking through the building necessitates an audio tour, as the museum experience is cutting edge. One is walking through a grand sculpture, certainly with more star quality than many of the exhibits, in my opinion. The artwork is sometimes ten feet to three stories high, floating suspended or sunk in concrete, mind-boggling in conception, weight, and installation. The Chagall exhibit is the only one hanging on the walls. Signage is in Basque, Spanish, and English.

     An exhibit titled "Art and China after 1989: Theater of the World" caused me to flee. I followed Charley into the first room, dominated by two gigantic boxes on platforms. The structures were surrounded by lucite walls that rose above our heads. The contents of the two boxes looked like children's dioramas. Statues of Buddhas sat along a green hillside. Below the hillsides were openings resembling grottos. Lifelike tortoises and a yellow snake with brown markings sat motionless on the hillside beside a pool in the first eight-by-ten-foot box. I turned to the attendant standing along the wall. "Those aren't real, are they?" I said.

     "Oh yes," she answered.

     Just then the tortoise moved one leg. Then the other. Which caused the snake to raise its head and move forward an inch. I moved quickly to the next box, approximately twelve-foot square.

     When I got there, SIX snakes emerged from the opening under the diorama. The yellows, corals, greens, and browns muddled together in a tangle, as the snakes crawled over each other. I ran.