These are some of my favorite things. (Part 2)

These are some of my favorite airlines, hotels, restaurants, etc that make traveling even more enjoyable.

Favorite Museums:
As with fine dining in France, there is an abundance of excellent museums in Germany, and to select a few favorites is as difficult as trying to narrow my list of favorite meals.  However, Brücke Museum and Jüdisches (Jewish) Museum in Berlin, Germany stand out as being the most memorable.   

Located in the neighborhood of Kreuzberg, Jewish Museum is an architectural masterpiece.  Its complexity in design and the poignancy of the content makes this museum a must sees in Berlin.

The Brücke Museum, whose collection is entirely devoted to the works of Expressionists, exhibits around 400 paintings and sculptures as well as several thousand drawings, watercolors and prints from all creative periods of the Brücke artists.  Founded by renowned artists Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Fritz Bleyl, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff and Erich Heckel, the Brücke art movement demonstrates the birth of modernism in a unique way and is an important part of German history.  This movement, apart from its artistic achievements also came to express a new awareness of life and freedom from rules and oppression by bourgeois society, and it had an enormous effect worldwide. 

Housed in the former Korean Supreme Court building, Seoul Museum of Modern Art 

(서울시립미술관) is a beautiful space perched up on top of a hill behind Deoksugung Palace.  The interior space is great for contemporary exhibitions, and temporary installations include works by artists from South Korea, Asia, and beyond.  It is not only one of the most innovative museums I have been to, but also it happens to have a wonderful little cafe on the 3rd floor that has a beautiful view of the city – not to mention, a great cup of coffee as well. Favorite Architectural Wonders:

Jewish Museum, Berlin, Germany

The Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao, Spain

Favorite Outdoor Markets:
Without a doubt, Annecy is one of my favorite towns in France.  Situated about a 1½ hours outside of Geneva, Annecy and the lake that surrounds it, Lac d'Annecy, is as picturesque as they come with a breathtaking view of the lake and the French Alps. 

However, my favorite thing about Annecy is its open air market.  The Annecy (Sunday) market is located on the cobbled streets around the ancient part of the city, known as vielle ville and is spread out throughout the loveliest part of the medieval city.  Although I have been to a lot of wonderful open air markets in France, after wandering through the colorful stalls in the winding streets of this idyllic mountain town, I have to say, the market in Annecy is one of the best.

Situated in our favorite neighborhood, Prenzlauerberg in Berlin, the outdoor market on Kollwitzplatz offers some of the best delicacies and local produce from the region.  As you stroll around the leafy, cobblestoned streets, admiring the refurbished Altbauten, you can sample and purchase a great selection of seasonal fruits and vegetables, organic meats and fish, hand-made pastas and a variety of home-made oils, jams and other local specialties.

Also, Kollwitzplatz is one of the most attractive squares in Berlin, and it happens to be city’s mecca for young families.  Around the market, there are playgrounds, multitude of family-friendly cafes and restaurants, and plenty of ready-made food and drinks that will surely satisfy all foodies.

Favorite Parks:

What more can I say about Central Park that hasn’t been said.  It’s FABULOUS! Immersed in lush and wild nature with a massive skyline as a backdrop, it’s truly an urban oasis that defies all logic.

For most New Yorkers, the park is a sanctuary.  Especially for me, it was a place where I’d retreated to whenever my life in the city got too much, and I needed to regroup and recuperate. Also, some of the best and most memorable experiences I’ve had were in the park – like serendipitously meeting my husband.

It’s a place where we always go back to reminisce about our wonderful past lives in the city as well as creating beautiful new ones with our son who absolutely adores every corner of the park.

After all the places I’ve seen in NYC, I can honestly say that the Highline (from Gansevoort St to West 34th St, btw 10/11th Ave) is my favorite.  It epitomizes the city that is constantly evolving and recreating itself.  Not only the design and the atmosphere of the park unique and innovative, it has transformed a neighborhood which was formally known as the “Death Avenue” into a trendy, upscale, and more importantly, family friendly area.

As the park expands from lower Manhattan to 31th Street in Midtown, it provides some of the best views of the key monuments, the Empire State building, Chrysler Building, and on a clear day, the Statue of Liberty.

There's an eclectic mix of art installations as well as tasty food carts, art vendors and musicians, and the great thing about the Highline is that it enables you to have and enjoy an urban experience in the midst of (man-made) nature. Jardin de Luxembourg is absolutely mesmerizing, and even after all these years, it remains to be my favorite place in Paris, and each time I’m there, I'm enchanted by it as the first time I was there. La Place des Vosges is one of the loveliest outdoor spaces in Paris filled with quaint cafes, shops and galleries, and especially on Sundays, it’s one of the few places in Paris where the stores are open.

Favorite Places for Children:
San Francisco is a great city for people of all ages, but it is especially a wonderful place for children.  Mainly because throughout the years, San Francisco has managed to hold on to its small town atmosphere, and unlike other larger cities, there are relatively few tall buildings and vast number of recreation areas and parks.

Also, there are tons of activities and things to do with children, so much so that if you spent a month in San Francisco, there are enough activities to fill up each day with different things.  It's a place where you can linger for hours in a quaint neighborhood cafe surrounded by breathtaking views, kick back on one of the many picturesque parks, or hangout in a children’s museum which happens to have the best view of the city, and unlike many metropolises where children are treated like nuisance, in San Francisco, almost every activity, restaurants and even cafes are catered to the needs of families, making children feel as comfortable as the adults.

In all the years my husband and I’ve been traveling with our son, we have never been to a place like Seoul, South Korea where children are embraced and cherished by almost everyone we met.

There’s really no better way to experience the generosity and kindness of the locals first hand.  No matter how crowded the street gets, people will literally get out of your way if they see a stroller; strangers will vacate their seats for you on the subway or elders will tell the people sitting next to them to get up to make room for a child; people will offer to help you carry your shopping bags or help you carry the stroller up and down the stairs when you go through the subway station or the underground walkway. It’s a country where the people take to heart the proverbial saying that “It takes a village to raise a child.” and throughout our stay, we experienced so much kindness from everyone we'd encountered.

Also, the city is full of fun museums and activities for children, and best of all, the admission to most of these places are FREE of charge. In fact, there were so many wonderful places to see and things to do with children in Seoul that we couldn’t cover all the places that were recommended to us by friends. We’ll definitely have to return to Seoul soon to see them all.

Favorite Wine Regions:
Bask in the beauty of the Santa Ynez Valley, Foxen Canyon Road is not as well-known as Napa and Sonoma, but the scenery around it is absolutely breathtaking.  Also, nearby towns offers a great selection of restaurants and wineries, and my favorite thing to do is to stroll through the charming little town of Los Olivos, sampling wines and checking out the galleries and shops along the way.  

Every wine connoisseur is familiar with the name Saint Emilion as being a producer of some of the finest wines in the world, but I'll always remember it as being one of the loveliest towns in France where I had the pleasure of spending the day just strolling and having some of the best meals of my life.  Also, as the town itself is not well-known, my husband and I were one of the few tourists in the city, and there’s something wonderfully enchanting about being in a medieval city that is nearly deserted. 

Although there isn't a shortage of great wine wineries in France, Alsace wine route located in the far Northeastern corner of the country is one of my favorite.  This region not only produces some of the finest (white) wines in the world such as Riesling, Gewurztraminer, Pinot Gris, and Muscat, but also is home to some the most picturesque villages and scenic countryside.  You can also find charming B&Bs, often run by the vineyards themselves, excellent cuisine that is distinctive, and multitude of wine cellars offering tastings.  Alsace is, as the French say, the terre de fête, the wine-tourism hot spot, geared to serious eating, amazing drinking and good times.

I’ve been told that every village or town in Veneto, Italy has 7 churches and 7 vineyards, referring to their passion for religion and wine, and although I appreciated the beauty of the churches and their commitment to religion, I must admit, I enjoyed the wine more.

These are some of my favorite things. (Part 1)

Northern Spain, A Cultural Pilgrimage and Culinary Odyssey (Part 1)

Our 3-week trip through the Northern of Spain started near Bordeaux, one of the most gorgeous cities in France bordering the Basque region. From there, heading south along the serenely beautiful coast, bypassing stunning little cities and towns like Biarritz and Saint-Jean-de-Luz was a wonderful drive.

Biarritz

Saint-Jean-de-Luz

However, with all the beauty that surrounded us, the place that I remember most profoundly was Guernica, the city that was memorialized in Picasso’s painting by same name and best reflect the long and tumultuous history of this region.

Basque Country is a small ethnic enclave located in the heart of the Pyrenees Mountains, which divide Spain and France from one another. While falling technically into Spain, and its people have often been trapped between the powerfully warring factions of France and Spain as well as its own struggle for independence.

Pamplona

After few hours of breathtaking drive, we arrived in Pamplona, the city that’s been immortalized by the writings of Hemingway. At first, arriving in a city where I didn’t speak the language fluently proved to be more difficult than I’d anticipated. Unbeknownst to me, much of the Spanish that is being spoken in the Northern region, especially in the Basque country was quite different than Spanish I was used to speaking in Mexico, and even simple words like bathroom, el baño, was unrecognized as it's called el lavabo.

Also, I underestimated the seriousness of the siesta, a break taken during midday shortly after lunch. We had arrived in Pamplona in the afternoon and had gotten engrossed in exploring the city, and by the time we’d remembered to get some lunch in the late afternoon, we discovered that all restaurants and most of the shops including grocery stores were closed.

This of course was an unfamiliar concept to us and most of the tourists, especially those who had dared to forgo lunch, and it was next to impossible to find a restaurant that served a full meal in the evening as we'd learned that lunch was the main meal of the day ... most of the Spaniards opt to have small tapas in the evenings. After aimlessly searching through the town for about an hour, we settled on our only choice, a Chinese restaurant!

Lesson learned, we certainly adjusted our meals according to the Spanish timetable and got into the groove of things the next day. We began enjoying "menu del dia", what the Spanish offer as an alternative to the inflation, which had taken over the Euro zone, which basically is a multi-course meal offered at a reasonable price.  Wine and drinks are included as well, which makes it a really deal.

Also, as it turned out, it was perfect meal schedule for me, and of course, we began taking full advantage of siesta, which I’d vowed to incorporate into my daily life back at home!

Recommended hotel: Hotel Europa C/Espoz y Mina, 31001 Pamplona T. 948 221 800

San Sebastian

After another gorgeous drive through the Spanish Pyrenees, we arrived in the city of San Sebastian. We were a little skeptical at first, as initially, it seemed like a typical ostentatious European summer getaway town. However, we were pleasantly surprised at the warmth and the charm of the city, not to mention our delightful hotel Pension Amaiur and its hostess who was absolutely courteous and helpful.

Also, it didn’t hurt that San Sebastian happens to be the mecca of tapas bars (pintxo bars), and we were able to sample some the best … and I do mean THE BEST … tapas there. My husband and I happily spent the entire day going from one tapas bar to the another enjoying the wonderful atmosphere of the city.

We were however slightly disappointed by the beach, as it was terribly crowded, and beach towels and bodies occupied every square centimeter of what seem to be more of a strand. Nonetheless, the town itself is absolutely charming and is filled with plenty of wonderful shops and monuments, and strolling on the beautiful boardwalk along the beach turned out to be one of the most enjoyable activities during the trip … and made us wish we’d brought our roller blades.

Bilbao

The drive along the Northern coast from San Sebastian to Bilbao was amazing, filled with windy roads through the mountainous passes overlooking the gorgeous cliffs leading to the ocean.

The main reason for going to Bilbao was to see the Guggenheim Museum … and of course, the awe-inspiring buildings designed by Frank O. Gehry. It has become a personal pilgrimage of mine to visit all the Guggenheim Museums around the world … so far 4 out of 5 with the only exception being the one in Dubai … and situated along the Nervión River in the old industrial heart of the city, the museum with its distinctive titanium curves and soaring glass atrium was absolutely impressive.

I was also pleasantly surprised by Bilbao, which proved to be a delightfully cosmopolitan city, and on the contrary to the stereotype of being an sterile industrial hub, the old town was absolutely beautiful. Also, being the cultural center of Spain, the city seem to attract an interesting and diverse group of people from all over the world, and it had a unique vibe and culturally diverse atmosphere which was rarity in Europe.  It was one of the most lively towns we've been to in Europe, and we wished we'd planned a longer stay there.

Llanes

About 2 hours west of Bilbao lies a charming little fishing village of Llanes. It is bounded to the south by the high ridge of the limestone Sierra del Cuera, which rises to over 1,100 m, and Costa Verde (Green Coast) of Spain, which is known for its spectacular coastal scenery, beaches, and mountains.

We decided to base ourselves in Llanes mainly due to its ideal location in exploring Picos de Europa, known as the Yosemite of Northern Spain. However, we were pleasantly surprised by the our hotel la Posada de Babel, which turned out to be absolutely charming.

The only downside was the weather, which tends to be a bit rainy and colder than the rest of Spain, but it didn’t deter us from discovering some of the most spectacular nature in Spain.

los Picos de Europa

Home to some of the most gorgeous landscapes in Europe, los Picos de Europa (the Peaks of Europe) are the most famous and legend-riddled mountains in Spain. Rising more than 2,590m (8,500 ft.), they are not high by alpine standards, but their proximity to the sea makes their height especially awesome.

The best way to see this region is by car, and it was an amazing experience to drive through the majestic Picos de Europa, discovering secluded beaches and hidden treasures such as Pena Tu and Monastery de Covadonga, which are rarely visited by foreign tourists.

Northern Spain, A Cultural Pilgrimage and Culinary Odyssey (Part 2)