Emerging Hope

The last few days here in Istria haven't been the prettiest I've experienced here. Not terrible, but not the perfect sunshiny days that happen a lot in the springtime. The weather has been off and on with a few gloomy, cloudy days sprinkled with glimmers of sunshine. The warm beautiful sunny weather of spring has …

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Picture Perfect Croatia (Reflections On a Stolen Ramble through the Countryside)

There are certain times and certain places that  everywhere you look seems to sparkle with a magical brilliance of color and light. That feeling of clarity and visual pleasure awakens a dynamic portion of your soul, and it's in this sensation you begin to feel as if you are walking through a virtual masterpiece of …

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Ringing Away The Evil Spirits

About a month ago at the Rijeka Carnival in Croatia, which now seems like a lifetime ago thanks to Covid-19, I was struck by some parade participants dressed in eery costumes that looked like they had come out of some psychedelic horror movie. Men were covered the whole lengths of their bodies by long strands of …

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Naked Germans and Such

So it seems that Germans (and Europeans in general) are more comfortable with their bodies than us Americans. I make that assumption based on the observations I've made on the beaches and surrounding waters in and around our home in Croatia. And it's not Croatians for the most part, but rather the German tourists who …

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Celebrating Birthdays and Playing Mafia

"The city is sleeping," said the young Russian boy.  We all closed our eyes. As I sat around the beach blanket with six children from Russia, Italy and Croatia still dripping from the salty Adriatic Sea and playing the card game Mafia, I wondered, how did I get here? We had just been swimming off …

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Getting out of Split: A Cautionary Tale of the Infamous Croatian Bura

It was the best of times. It was the worst of times. Yes, Dickens said it best. It started with a journey to Split in September for a charter adventure to the islands of Brač, Hvar and Vis with my husband Captain Mike, and our friends James, Carolyn and Karl. It ended with with a …

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The Journey back ….it’s the little things

Just returned from a day sailing trip to Premantura with Mike. The day has been cool and sunny but an unexpected rainstorm has us tucked inside our new boat Rita. We just got back to Croatia last Friday night from New Orleans, dropped off all but one of our suitcases and hightailed it to our …

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A Love Letter to Croatia

As a young mother you never really appreciate how much you will love your children when they are newly born and how that love will exponentially grow throughout their lives.  I remember as soon as I delivered my youngest daughter Marina, I heard her sweet cry and she sounded like a little lamb. I fell …

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The Beauty of Porec’s Euphrasian Basilica

It's not everyday that you are able to visit a church that opened in 553 AD and then, on top of that, are astounded by the artistic talent you see inside.  That's just what happened last weekend when we visited the Euphrasian Basilica (also known as the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption of Mary) in …

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