With all of the surfing, hiking and general beach-ing you’re bound to be doing in Aljezur and the surrounding area, you’re bound to work up an appetite. For the self-catering types, you can check out Aljezur’s Mercado Municipal, which is located in the square just near the bridge in town. It offers for purchase fresh fish, fruit and vegetables every day.
If you prefer to let someone else do the cooking for you, there are numerous restaurants in the area serving excellent Portuguese cuisine…

A few months after I had started in my blog in 2009, Elizabeth Montalbano contacted me because she wanted to write a guest post about a life-changing trip she took to Aljezur, Portugal, to learn how to surf. Little did she (or I) realize just how life-changing that vacation would be. Fast-forward four years later, she contacts me to let me know that she moved to the charming little town of Aljezur and would I be kind enough to let my readers know about her guesthouse, Casa Boa Vista, which she rents out. Here, she describes why Aljezur is such a special place that you should at least visit it — and possibly even move there!

Glimmingehus looks rather imposing; a big stone box just sitting on the vast fields of Skane, Sweden.Whether this well-preserved Medieval structure should be called a castle or a fortress is up for debate: it was was meant as a fortress rather than a residence, although it’s not believed that there was ever a battle there. Another source of debate is whether we should be calling the castle/fortress Swedish or Danish because this region was part of Denmark when it was built from 1499-1506. But what’s not up for debate is that how family-friendly this attraction is. In a small outer building across from the castle/fortess is a playroom full of blocks!

There are beautiful roses in Kivik, a charming fishing village located in Skane, the southernmost county in Sweden. So beautiful that they don’t even look real! That’s because Sweden can be a bit rainy and then sunny and then rainy again. You know that phrase, “If you don’t like the weather, just wait a little while”? I had had always heard that for Ithaca, NY, and Scotland, and it’s certainly true for Sweden in the summer as well. Southern Sweden is covered in lush, green rolling hills and accented with bright flowers, and I guess you just can’t get those colors without a little rain, which we experienced last July.

We have lugged our BabyBjorn Travel Crib Light everywhere: Sintra, Lisbon, Seville, Stockholm and Copenhagen. We do this despite being reassured that many of the hotels and rental apartments where we’ve stayed could supply a crib for my son — usually even for free. But could I trust those cribs to be comfortable and 100% germ-free? No, of course not! Well, I just learned about a place where I (and probably any mom suffering from First Time Mom Syndrome) would let my son use the crib: The Suite Dreams Nursery at Grosvenor House, A JW Marriott Hotel, in London.

When I first wrote about Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen, I focused on its vintage charms, manicured flower beds and fairytale vignettes. But Scandinavia’s most popular amusement park has a serious wild side as an antidote to all of that sweetness. Yes, there are major roller coasters and other scary rides that are not for the faint of heart.

Tivoli, the fairytale amusement park in the center of Copenhagen, certainly isn’t Disney World. It’s not even Disneyland Paris. It’s decidedly old fashioned and Old World. This is the Copenhagen of Hans Christian Andersen, not Arne Jacobsen. And that’s what makes it ooze with charm.

— When you drive through the Scottish Highlands, you want to stop constantly and take photos. The problem, of course, is that photos can’t really re-create the feeling of being surrounded by the magnificent scenery. But that doesn’t mean that you won’t feel the compulsive need to capture the amazing views. And now that I’m […]

Scotland is a magical place where the colors seem to pop — especially if you’re having fun with the Color Splash app on your iPad mini. But it is a place where color stands out, even without the help of technology. In the photo above, I was happy (and a bit jealous) to see this cheerful […]

There was something magical about the horse-drawn carriages of Seville, Spain. Sure, they’re just about the only thing more touristy than taking a gondola ride in Venice. And to be honest, I wasn’t even tempted by horse and buggies in Seville — probably because we had a very active 11-month-old with us when we were there […]