Category: Travel Stories

Late January, Dreamer was browsing her well-worn copy of Fodor’s Spain travel guide, looking for a weekend destination for February. She looked up the Catalan city of Sitges, thinking it might be a fun destination for Carnival, and as she read a couple pages past that entry, a tiny paragraph about the nearby town of Valls caught her eye. Three things immediately jumped out: calçotada castellers and, most relevant, last Sunday of January. “Wait,” she thought. “That’s this Sunday!” It was Wednesday. But hey, we’re used to doing things the Spanish way now, right? And we love eating onions. The dynamic duo,

After spending a couple of early December days in Figueres, hometown of Salvador Dalí, we moved on to the nearby Catalan city of Girona. Girona’s old town is beautifully preserved, and best seen while walking along the old walls. Girona’s old town includes El Call, an old Jewish quarter. A famous Jewish scholar named Nachmanides (aka Ramban) was born here. We visited the old Synagogue to understand this history better. But back to modern-day Christian traditions. While this city didn’t have a Christmas market as cute as the one in Figueres, we did spy a Tío de Nadal in the local

As winter descended upon Madrid last year, we really started to miss the Valencian Community – the weather, the food, the language, the sea. So when we came across some discount plane tickets to Mallorca in November, we decided it was finally time to visit the Balearic islands off the coast of our old home. Of course, first order of business after landing in Palma de Mallorca was to try a local delicacy: ensaïmada, a flaky pastry made with lard (saïm in the Mallorquín language), and often filled with cream or fruit. According to our research, the best ensaïmada in