This is from a trip I took to London in the winter of 2009, partly to show how cheap it can be in the off-season… LONDON – Last time I was here it was summer and, oh, about 35 degrees Celsius. Today, when my Air Canada flight touched down after some really heavy turbulence (think monster drops that had even the flight attendants gasping for air) it was 2 degrees. With several inches of snow on the ground. I’m normally not one to go for the cold, but this town is far, far better in the snow than in the Read more
ALONG THE FRENCH RIVER IN ONTARIO – “Alex is picking some people up at Five Fingers Rapids, you should take a boat ride with him.” I had just settled in for some serious note taking on the screened in porch of my fabulous cottage at the Lodge at Pine Cove, overlooking the French River west of North Bay, near the town of Noelville. I’d only been on the property an hour or so but when the owner of a lodge suggests I take a boat ride I usually find there’s a reason. And who doesn’t love riding a boat on Read more
ZURICH – This is a town that doesn’t get enough respect. Yeah, there are banks and old hotels and stodgy folks. Same in New York and Toronto. There’s also a wild part of town, West Zurich, where they’ve taken old industrial buildings and turned them into cool nightclubs. You’ll find scantily dressed ladies parading about various parts of town trying to drum up business. On my last visit, I saw a black van that represented a clothing company and had the words “Enjoy your fucking shirt” scrawled across the back. Maybe 10 years ago, I was in town for the Read more
This is from a golf trip I took with some friends to the golfing mecca of America a couple years ago… PEBBLE BEACH, CALIFORNIA — My buddies and I had been back home for a week or so when I got an email from one of them talking about our early September trip to famed Pebble Beach. “Thanks for the trip to paradise,” he said. I couldn’t say it any better myself. I’m not one for getting nervous talking to athletes or celebrities or politicians, but I had a serious case of the knee-knocks on the first few holes at Read more
Here are a couple of blog posts from British Columbia… VANCOUVER – Downtown Vancouver’s Art Gallery is a great spot, with a big patio out front and big steps and a feel, to me, anyway, of a public square in London. The best part? Food trucks. Food trucks all over the damned place. It’s not bad enough we don’t have a public square in Toronto as nice as the one in front of the Art Gallery of Vancouver (not in my mind, anyway). No, they have to lord it over us with trucks selling the most wonderful of foods; a Read more
Here’s a post from a great trip to New Zealand a few years back. Awesome golf, great food and unforgettable scenery… NORTH ISLAND, NEW ZEALAND—You drive down a dirt road a half hour outside Kerikeri, a town of maybe 6,000 permanent residents. Suddenly there’s a plain, wooden gate that looks for all the world as if it’s meant to keep sheep off the road, which it probably is. It’s a level of modesty that befits this country that one local described to me as “second-gear.” But the golf resort that lies behind the plain fence is sheer glory. Kauri Cliffs Read more
This post is from a great visit in December, 2010… PARIS – It wasn’t what I expected. And I couldn’t have been happier. When someone from the French tourism office in Canada suggested I take in a jazz brunch on Sunday, I had pictures of a bunch of guys Woody Allen’s age bopping on the clarinet in front of a well-heeled group of visitors at a semi-swanky hotel room. Or something like that. Instead, when I arrived at a place near the Marais district called Le Reservoir, I was mildly surprised – in the best possible way – to find Read more
