Restaurant - Italy - Gelati

One summer we traveled through Italy for a month of a three month vacation.  We were traveling on a budget that was so tight that our lunches were often gelati.  We could have a restaurant lunch or dinner, but rarely both.  We discovered that they were adequately nutritious and very inexpensive.  If you have been to Italy, I don't need to tell you how wonderful Italian ice creams and sorbets are.  That smooth melt in you mouth intense flavor is hard to forget.  Gelati doesn't contain as much air as American ice cream.  It is more dense and more smooth tasting.  In Italy it is common to have as many as three flavors in a single small cup.  

Museum Food

Discovering museum food was unintentional.  The discovery was the result of being married to an art historian for more than 30 years.  During that time we visited nearly every major museum in the world--a  couple of times.  Although I enjoy art and make it a point to fully explore museums I visit, my attention span is much shorter than my wife, Tina.  It took dozens of museum visits over several years in several countries for me to learn how to adapt to being stranded in a museum for hours at a time.  Sitting on the uncomfortable benches found in museums is only good for about a quarter hour before back muscles crave a backrest.  During my bench sitting days, I tried to occupy myself by watching people.  How much time one can watch people varies from person to person.  My tolerance is now about half an hour.  It's about the same for museum guards who watch the people watchers.  After a while they notice my looking at every attractive women passing through the gallery and assume that, just perhaps, I am not seriously interested in the art.  Walking from gallery to gallery like a retiree doing laps at malls also attracts the attention of guards after several laps.  The museum shops are fun and can burn some time, but not enough time to compensate for having a scholar as a spouse.
Over time, I found myself hanging out in museum cafeterias, cafes, and restaurants to pass the time.  Art types are allowed to take hours to consume a beverage if they are deep in thought reading or writing.  At last, I found a place to wile away the hours.  The next question was what would I do while I sat at the table.  I tried bringing books and magazines, but even they became boring after a while.  It wasn't until I was able to bring along a personal digital assistant (PDA) and a keyboard that I finally found the answer I was looking for.  Museum cafes are great places to write.  At first, I used the time to keep my travel journal up to date.  Then it occurred to me that I was sitting in a great topic, the museum cafes.
Museum food varies greatly from museum to museum.  The quality can range from completely pre-packaged mystery meat sandwiches to some of the most elegant gourmet food.  The ambience can vary from basement employee break room decor to grandly elegant.

Introduction to Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles doesn't really exist as city.  It is a decentralized accumulation of communities that seems to never stop growing.  Standing somewhere in the downtown of Los Angeles you could be more than 50 miles away from its loosely defined edges.  It is smoggy, often dirty, and its infrastructure appears to be in a state of moldering decay.  Its freeways are impossibly crowded making travel time a significant for tourists and residents.  It can be dangerous and ugly.  Most of Los Angeles is a stucco facade, not unlike a temporary movie set.  Yet, it is a wonderful mosaic of cultures, climates, and topographies unlike I have seen anywhere else in the world.
Many people in L.A. are not who they appear to be.  Everyone seems to be an undiscovered scriptwriter, actor, director, or producer who is only working as a lawyer, dentist, waiter, cop, or programmer until they break into the film industry.  
Like all large cities, L.A. is layered.  There is the layer that is myth.  All over the world, people believe that they know L.A. from what they have seen in movies, read in books, or heard about from relatives.  There is the layer that the tourist sees and there are the other many layers that residents see.  My introduction is from the perspective of an expatriate resident.
Many of L.A.'s major tourist attractions are listed on the Los Angeles Attractions page which is a subset of the Los Angeles Information page.  If you are a short-term visitor you may want to skip directly to the attractions page and see the major tourist sites.  Most of what people want to see in L.A. is widely dispersed and requires a great deal of travel time. 

Favorite L.A. Area Places

Architecture

• The Brand Library.  When I lived in Los Angeles, the Brand library had one of the best collections of photography books in the region.  Not only did I enjoy using the library, I enjoyed visiting the library.  Its Moorish/Indian architecture makes it one of the most architecturally interesting libraries I've ever visited. 
• The Gamble House. The Gamble house was built by Green & Green Architects.  It is the archetypal California Bungalow and it is one of my favorite houses.  Don't just look at the exterior of the house, take the tour.  Seeing stained glass entrance from the inside an experience you are unlikely to forget.  You may also wonder why so many modern tract houses look so awful when they could be using 90 year old designs that are superior in every way.    

Botanical Gardens

• The Mildred E. Mathias Botanical Garden at UCLA.  I had the privilege of working with Dr. Mathias on several projects and I am particularly pleased that UCLA named their botanical garden after her.  During the many years that I worked at UCLA in various departments including zoology, sub-atomic particle physics, and parasitology my labs were often below ground or windowless.  During lunch hours and breaks, I walked through the UCLA botanical garden and admired the plants and wildlife that live there.  My favorite plant is the Dawn Redwood near the bottom of the ponds.  It is said to be the tallest Dawn Redwood in North America.   

Nature

• The San Gabriel Mountains.  I lived in Azusa, CA during my high school years and every moment that I wasn't in school I was hiking in the San Gabriel Mountains.  I would walk from my home in Azusa up Highway 39.  The amount of time I had available determined where I would leave the highway and hike up a canyon.  Hitch hiking enabled me to go further into the mountains to explore the east and west forks of the San Gabriel River.  The farther into the mountain canyons I hiked, I was amazed by their beauty.
  
  A nice drive up San Gabriel Canyon might include driving to Crystal Lake, if the road is open.  On your return go east on the East Fork Road and then south on Glendora Mountain Road to Glendora California.  (MSN Maps)
  
  Today, you can't drive all the way up highway 39 to the Angeles Crest Highway at the crest of the mountains, but the drive up San Gabriel Canyon is still beautiful.  If you decided to park and walk up the west fork of the San Gabriel River, you will notice that the population density rapidly falls off as you walk farther away from the parking lots.  Be careful to look where you walk.  Rattlesnakes are abundant in southern California mountains.
  
  If you want to hike the San Gabriel Mountains I suggest visiting the Hikes in the San Gabriel Mountains and the Angeles National Forest for current hiking condition information.  My favorite hike in the San Gabriel Mountains is starts at the end of the east fork road and continues up the north fork to Iron Mountain.  The terrain is rugged, not well traveled, and can be dangerous, but its remoteness makes up for the effort of the hike. Another way to enjoy the San Gabriel Mountains is drive the Angeles Crest Highway Route 2 from La Canada to Wrightwood. (MSN Maps)  Allow half a day for the drive and plan to drive back via San Bernardino to Los Angeles on Interstates 15 and 10.  You may want to stop at the Mt. Wilson Observatory along the way.  The Angeles Crest Highway offers spectacular views of the high desert and the Los Angeles basin (when the air is clear).  Pack a picnic lunch and have your picnic from one of the hundreds of overlooks.  If you don't take a picnic take a snack and plan on having a late lunch or dinner in Wrightwood.  The Wrightwood site lists numerous restaurants.  
  
  Links to more information about the San Gabriel Mountains
  
  • American Southwest Guide to the San Gabriel Mountains. 
  • Hikes in the San Gabriel Mountains and the Angeles National Forest
  • The Natural History of the San Gabriel Mountains.

Santa Monica

• Introduction to Santa Monica, CA by Max Lent. 
• Santa Monica city page.        

Travel Tips For Mexico

Driving

Do not drive at night on Mexican highways.  Your greatest dangers driving at night are livestock, broke down vehicles, the roads, and not knowing Mexican driving customs.  You might not notice it on an air conditioned bus, but Mexican roadsides are littered with the carcasses of dead cows.  If you were in a car, especially one without air conditioning, you would smell the carcasses before you saw them, especially during the summer.  When you are next in Mexico, look closely at the bumpers on Mexican trucks.  Many of them look more like military vehicles designed to breach road blocks than commercial vehicles.  The truck bumpers are designed to impact with cows at 60+ miles per hour without damaging the trucks.  Imagine meeting two of these trucks coming at you side by side on a mountain road at night.  For some unknown reason Mexican truck drivers are always passing each other at the worst possible times and they seem to prefer to pass at night.

Health

When traveling to Mexico the most important issue is maintaining your health.  Getting traveler's diarrhea can ruin your whole trip.  Be careful of what you eat and drink. 

Insurance

If you are driving in Mexico, obtain Mexican Insurance.  If you are involved in an accident, which is more likely to happen to you in a foreign country than in the U.S., you will discover that legal systems work differently in other countries.  Sometimes the differences can become catastrophic if you aren't fully insured.  When I have traveled by car in Mexico I have used San-born Insurance and they were there when I needed them. 

Toronto, An Introduction

A biased introduction I cannot write an unbiased description of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.  I admit it, I love Toronto.  Toronto and I have been lovers for decades.  Toronto is an exciting fashionable international city.  It has all of the positive attributes of New York City without the negatives.  The people of Toronto are polite, courteous, and extremely well dressed.  A visitor might have trouble discerning Toronto fashion because it is mostly black.  Black clothing, black coats, black shoes, and black accessories.  Of course, this is an exaggeration, but there is enough black around to appear exaggerated. My wife and I think of Toronto as our eas-to-get-to international vacation city.  Even in mid-winter when the outside temperatures are in the minus numbers and snow is on the ground, we still find Toronto enjoyable.  One of our favorite Christmas holiday visits includes a stay at the Westin Harbour Castle hotel.  We spend the days shopping and visiting museums.  In the late afternoon or early evening we return to the hotel for a rest before dinner.  The Westin Harbor Castle  has an outdoor/indoor heated pool that is covered by an glass roof and walls and kept warm in the winter.  On the coldest winter day it is wonderfully enjoyable to soak the hotel's hot tub and watch snow swirling outside the the glass walls.  The pool is also used by members of a health club, so planning your soak before or after the after work rush is a good idea.  Warmed from our soak and swim we return to our room to make dinner plans.

A summer visit to Toronto would be incomplete without ferry ride to the Toronto Islands and a walk around the islands.  This ride and walk becomes a memorable romantic experience on warm summer evenings in moonlight.  Swans can be seen illuminated by the moonlight as they drift around the numerous inlets.  Even more spectacular is the view of Toronto from the islands or the ferry on the return trip.  Take a jacket, the ferry ride is often chilly even on warm summer evenings.    

Toronto an international city, which means that it is multicultural, multi ethnic, multiracial and proud of it.  The result of Toronto being multi everything is that visitors can experience foods, shopping, and art from around the world.

India in Toronto

If your interest is India, visit Gerard & Hiwatha Streets and then East along Gerard St.  Here on a warm summer day you will smell the spices of India being cooked in the numerous Indian restaurants.  As you walk along Gerard St. you will pass by Indian shops that some of the best traditional Indian clothing, such as saris, in North American.  A friend of mine's wife purchased her wedding party's saris on Gerard St.  The aroma on incense is everywhere.  If you have been to India, close your eyes for a moment and you will imagine that you are shopping in New Delhi.

Not all of the best Indian restaurants in Toronto are located on Gerard St.  You will have to do some work to find the best ones.

China in Toronto

The Chinese population of Toronto is second only to San Francisco.  Toronto's main Chinatown is located in the Dundas-Spadina area.  Dundas and Spidina you can walk East along Dundas to near Bay.  You can also walk north and south on Spadina.  If, as you walk through Toronto's main Chinatown, you notice little quarter size pieces of brown or reddish brown fruit shell scattered on the ground everywhere, you are in for a treat.  What this indicates is that Lychee nuts are in season. Nearly every street side grocer will be selling them.  They come in a couple of quality grades.  Buy the most expensive, it is worth the slight additional cost.  If you are coming from the U.S., you will not be able to take your Lychees across the boarder.  Just buy enough to last you on your walk through Chinatown.

There is more than one Chinatown in Toronto.

Parking

Parking in Toronto is expensive.  It is so expensive that the City of Toronto parking meters take credit cards.  I'm not joking.  The system works like this: You find a parking spot, which is easier than you might expect, park, go to the nearby parking kiosk, insert your credit card, select how long you want to park up to the limit allowed, press the add time button until the dollar amount is reached, press the get ticket button, take your ticket, place it on your dashboard, and you are ready to roam.  The system works well, but it is very expensive.  We typically spent $25 per day Canadian on parking meters.  What happens is that you will over compensate by adding more time to the meter than you need and then come back to your car early and leave for the next destination.  Doing this several times in a day quickly adds up.

Hotel parking routinely costs $15 per day and up.  Some hotels include parking in their packages.  However, even if you get free hotel parking the mass transportation system is also very pricy.  For a short stay, it is best to maximize your time at destinations by parking on the street near where you are going.

B&B-Britain's Star Attraction

For some the highlight is a chance to enjoy the renowned British cooked breakfast with all the trimmings and lashings of tea or coffee. To others it is the opportunity to stay in a comfortable private home, one of a select few guests and with a friendly host to greet them. There is no doubt that the British "bed and breakfast" (B&B for short) is a style of accommodation that is often imitated around the world but rarely bettered. Wherever your travels take you, from deepest Cornwall to the north of Scotland, you will find B&Bs everywhere and spoken of affectionately by visitors.

The quality of the best B&Bs has risen markedly in recent years, and national tourism agency VisitBritain has raised the game further by announcing that it now only promotes accommodation that has been inspected, checked and graded by an intrepid band of Quality Assessors. Also, the accommodation is being assessed and rated by all the main inspection bodies using a common set of criteria. This means that a B&B in say, York, will be awarded the same number of stars no matter who it is checked by, giving peace of mind to the traveller who finds it easier to compare places to stay.

VisitBritain has a team of 55 trained accommodation assessors working throughout England - and checking out B&B's is a very important part of their job. Like a secret agent of sorts, they book incognito, study all aspects of a property, including cleanliness and customer service, stay overnight and eat all meals offered, including that special cooked breakfast. Only when they have paid the bill do the assessors reveal their true identity, when they spend time pointing out to the host anything not up to scratch.

Key to their role is being able to preserve their anonymity until check-out time. They have to look like a "normal" guest and will vary their dress according to the type of accommodation visited " for example a business suit in a remote property used mainly by walkers or tourists would be a complete give-away. Only rarely are the host's suspicions aroused!

So how does a B&B vary from a hotel in an assessor's eyes? "At a B&B we put more emphasis on hospitality than attentive service " the people who run it are key to the whole thing. Taking an interest in their guests and making them feel welcome is so important. But cleanliness is paramount, just as in a hotel," says Alison Barham, Quality Manager at VisitBritain and formerly an assessor for 10 years.

Informality is part of the appeal: the owner's children taking breakfast orders would be "cute" in a B&B but not necessarily in a hotel.

The reactions from owners when assessors disclose their "true identity" range from "I thought you were an assessor but I didn"t let on," to one woman who passed out in the hallway on hearing the news. "My colleague was 6ft 7in tall, so maybe his mere presence was overpowering," says Alison.

At the end of the process the B&B will be awarded one to five Stars or Diamonds (this is a period of transition; Stars will replace Diamonds fully from 2007 and are already used exclusively in Scotland and Wales). This in turn provides visitors with the information to make an informed choice when booking their accommodation. Choose from one star/diamond for a simple, practical place with no frills; or five star/diamond for something rather special, with a degree of luxury. The more stars, the better the level of quality you can expect to find. Accommodation that has something extra special to offer gets the bonus of a Gold or Silver Award. With these, you can be sure your experience will be of the highest quality.

As with most areas of life, you get what you pay for with B&B and it is not necessarily a low-cost option. Though you will find pleasant, clean and comfortable B&Bs for as little as $22 per person per night, at some the cost heads skywards, such as at St. Ervan Manor in Cornwall, which charges from $70 to $215 per person per night. However, this is an exceptional place, the winner of a prestigious Gold Award in the Enjoy England Awards for Excellence 2006 and boasting five stylish guest rooms and a recently added garden suite. Its fine Michelin-starred restaurant serves seasonal produce in an intimate setting. In the words of VisitBritain's chief executive Tom Wright, St. Ervan "redefines the nature of the B&B."

Other B&Bs are notable for their locations or unusual architecture. At the end of a sweeping drive in St. Osyth, Essex is Park Hall Country House, a 14th century former monastery furnished with oak beams, open log fires and lounges with a grand piano and chandelier. The property was Silver winner in the Enjoy England Awards for Excellence 2006. In Central England, the five-diamond Old Lock Up near Matlock, Derbyshire is another award-winning residence, originally a small jail and a chapel. Once visited by writer D.H. Lawrence, it now boasts a double spa bath and the cell which once held convicted felons is a bar. The county of Kent " the "garden of England" -- has conical oast houses (once used for the drying of hops) converted into quirky B&Bs; while the five-diamond, silver award Beach Court on the Northumbrian coast provides superb views over a sweeping bay, and the master suite doubles as an observatory called the Crow's Nest.

At the Old Railway Station in Petworth, West Sussex, guests can re-live the golden age of rail travel " including accommodation in Pullman carriages as used on the Orient Express " albeit without going anywhere. The midweek rates are particularly attractive.

Scotland is also a good hunting ground for B&B fans: you can choose from farmhouses, cottages, city mansions and country estates, all serving a hearty Scottish breakfast (often complete with oat-cakes and porridge). At Edgertson in the Scottish Borders guests can even "go back to school". The five-star School House (built in the Victorian era, it last saw pupils in 1945) has been tastefully modified, with each room given a unique theme and set with period furnishings; breakfasts are served in a farmhouse style kitchen, plus there's a minstrel gallery dining room. All from just $26 per night.

Farmhouses are another fine source of B&B accommodation: these are often buildings full of character and it takes a lot to beat a farmhouse breakfast. Wales is a country with plenty to choose from, such as 17th century Dove Cottage (five star) at Buckley, Flintshire, which is set in over an acre of lovingly tended gardens.

For many guests, it is the B&B hosts who really make their stay. These are people who are proud of their homes and neighbourhoods, know the best local pubs and restaurants, can point you towards the most historic attractions and the prettiest beauty-spots. In short, they are walking, talking mines of information and they are determined you will have a good time.

As someone once said, B&B is a little like staying with friends but you pay for the pleasure. Equally reassuring is the fact that someone like Alison (motto: "we check it out before you check in") has been there first.

Family Fun In Britain

Author Roald Dahl (1916-1990) once told his young daughter: "Adults will try to fool you into thinking they have important things on their minds when, in fact, they are thinking about what to have for supper or when they are going to wash the car."  He might have added: "or where to go on their next holiday."
Families who choose Britain for their holiday have two wonderful new attractions to visit, adding to the long list of theme parks, steam railways, museums and so on. This is the land that brought you some of the great children's novelists, who created a host of timeless characters, from Winnie-the-Pooh and Thomas the Tank Engine to Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland and the residents of C.S. Lewis's Narnia.
Born of Norwegian parents, Dahl - author of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and many other well-loved books - spent most of his adult life in the quiet Chiltern village of Great Missenden, 32 miles north-west of London. Here, not far from his home, The Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre opened in June 2005. It's not exactly Charlie's Chocolate Factory, though it does have "chocolatey" doors and is crammed with manuscripts, letters, photographs, his Ideas Books and other treasured possessions. From the figure of the BFG (Big Friendly Giant) on the wall outside, to the bench that turns out to be a crocodile, the building is themed to his characters and stories.
Galleries tell the story of Dahl's life and work using audio-visual and touch-screen aids.  Perhaps of most interest to younger visitors are a collection of his favourite jokes and limericks - and there is a full-size replica of his writing hut and its contents, standing in an "orchard" made of giant versions of Quentin Blake's illustrations.
Dahl's fans are likely to grow in number with the new (summer 2005) movie version of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", starring Johnny Depp. Knowing his outspoken nature, what Dahl would have made of another new family attraction is anyone's guess. What is clear, though, is that Seven Stories, the Centre for Children's Books, is full of surprises: from unconventional exhibitions to entertaining activities.
The first centre of its kind in Britain, the attraction, opened in August in Newcastle upon Tyne, is the culmination of seven years of pioneering work to develop a national home for children's literature. The motivation was to treasure the original work of British authors and illustrators within the UK and preserve an important part of national heritage. As well as seeing manuscripts and original artwork, visitors can climb into the "artist's attic" (the attraction is situated in a tall building close to a Victorian mill) to meet "real" writers and illustrators and discover the art of story making.
Also here is a complete collection of Ladybird Books, which were sold at pocket-money prices for 60 years from 1940-1999; and the personal archive of the late Kaye Webb, editor of Puffin Books until the late 70s, containing many children's classics, such as, Stig of the Dump, and The Hobbit. The cafe boasts a menu inspired by children's books - so don't be surprised to find green eggs and ham as dish of the day!

While these new attractions are admirable, sometimes it is even more fun to visit the actual places linked to favourite books. The village of Hartfield in Sussex is the focal point of Winnie-the-Pooh country. The bear who has a fondness for honey and condensed milk was invented by A.A. Milne and Hartfield, on the edge of Ashdown Forest, has the Shop at Pooh Corner. It sells a map of Pooh Country, enabling you to explore the nearby footpaths to find the Five Hundred Acre Wood, the Enchanted Place and, most importantly, the Poohsticks Bridge. Playing the game of tossing sticks into the stream and seeing which one gets to the other side first is rewarding at any age.

In the elegant North Wales seaside town of Llandudno, families can dive into the "rabbit hole" to discover the magical world of Ali Life size, animated displays of the Mad Hatter, March Hare and other cameos from Lewis Carroll's classic story are enhanced by sound effects and narration in one of five languages.
Why Llandudno? This is where young Alice Liddell (the author's inspiration for the original tale, told one summer's day on the river near Oxford) came with her family in 1861 for the first of many holidays. A statue of the White Rabbit is a feature of the town.
There are relatively few authors' homes open to visitors, though one exception is the Scottish birthplace of Peter Pan creator J.M. Barrie. His modest house At 9 Brechin Road, Kirriemuir near Dundee, now looked after by the National Trust for Scotland, includes the little wash house which became his first theatre. Could it have inspired the Wendy House in Peter Pan?
It is not just tales of adventure and tomfoolery that excite children: candies and chocolate do the job equally well. Cadbury's Dairy Milk chocolate, a recipe perfected by George Cadbury, is 100 years old in 2005 and visitors to Birmingham in the Heart of England can find out all about it at the Cadbury World attraction (advance booking is advised). Set in the model village the company established at Bournville, it allows visitors to discover the story of chocolate making in a fun way. New this year is an "Aztec jungle" with boardwalks and waterfalls, an interactive "happiness dance room" and a three-dimensional cinema show.
No roundup of family attractions would be complete without mentioning the capital. There is lots for families to do, from a ride on one of the River Thames cruise boats, to a trip to a theme park. The latest new attraction is a walk-through monkey forest at the London Zoo in Regent's Park. Billed as an "urban eco-safari", visitors can stroll among a breeding group of black-capped squirrel monkeys -- in a habitat resembling the Bolivian rainforest.
At the Science Museum in South Kensington, try out technology in the interactive galleries, conduct experiments in the Launch Pad, or visit the IMAX cinema. In the East End is the Museum of Childhood at Bethnal Green: one of the largest collections of toys, games, nursery objects, dolls houses, puppets and teddy-bears - dating from the 17^th century.
South-west of London, near the orbital M25 motorway, are two of the country's favourite theme parks, Thorpe Park and Chessington World of Adventures. With white-knuckle rides and entertainment, there's enough for a full day of fun at each. Younger children will enjoy Legoland, with rides and miniature land fashioned out of thousands of Lego bricks, at Windsor (better known for its royal castle), 25 miles west of the city.