Thank you, smilinize. I know good travel writing when I read it because it does two things: it transports me into the place the writer is describing, and it makes me want to experience it for myself. If my writing occasionally accomplishes either or both of those things, I feel fulfilled.

Now, off to the dentist, a place I wish I did not have to travel to and experience for myself.

I also love your writing. You make me feel like I'm there with your family.

The open market in Antibes has fresh vegetables, just removed from the earth. Some I've never heard of. Wonderful homemade tampenade. And the most beautiful flowers I've ever seen. Cheap too!

It is in the middle of the shops that sell wonderful olive oil and containers and french pottery and tablecloths. Fresh fish, chicken baking and smelling like a piece of heaven and sadly, horse meat!

One shop has a section of the floor that is glass so you can look downstairs, where they used to house the horses years ago. Now, it is a room with a kiln for his daughter to make her beautiful pottery and ceramics. I bought this darling, deep blue egg holder. It looks so cute in my fridge!

Lori,

Why do tourists not understand the term "WILD animal?"

We have seen some rediculous people up in Estes Park (have you been there? and on the contential divide?)...we call them Tour-ons (tourist morons). Forgive me. When you live in a resort town, and you see people doing dumb things around wild animals, you get kind of cynical.

We saw tourists chasing a brown bear up on the divide - and un-beknown (is this a real word?) to them, they were chasing it into another group of tourists over the hill. UGHHHHH!

Wild animals. Heavy on the WILD!

Danita

p.s. spelling, obviously isn't my strong point. LOL. Now saying that, yes I homeschool my two teenagers!

Tour-ons. I love it. The buffalo and bear stories underscore, in an outrageous way, some of what we said earlier about travel safety. When people are on vacation, many seem to let their common sense go on vacation, too. Carefree turns into careless. I feel sorry for the Estes Park bear (and the people on the other side of the hill!)

I haven't been to Estes Park but have been to Denver, Colorado Springs and up to Breckenridge. I remember driving through a tiny little town called Alma. It looked like a set for a western movie.

On our "Ribbons of Highway" journey, the kids and I stayed in Cortez in Colorado's southwest corner. We used it as a base from which to visit Mesa Verde. Cortez bloomed with banners that read, "Thank God for Firefighters!" The whole area was alive with wildfire and wildfire threat that summer of 2002, and this made for some unique experiences and encounters, which you'll read about in the book.

On the "Ribbons" journey, we crossed the Continental Divide about six times in different places and states. When we crossed it for the last time on the trip, I felt sad because I knew it meant we were pointing east toward home and the eventual end of our journey. I started feeling nostalgic for a beautiful journey that still had thousands of miles left in it. The trip was a gift in so many ways and on so many levels, and I just wanted to keep unwrapping and unwrapping and unwrapping it forever.

You don't have to have perfect spelling skills to homeschool your kids. You just have to always know where the dictionary is and point them to it. How old are your kids? Have you always homeschooled them?

I've been noodling an article idea around in my head and might shoot a query off to a homeschooling magazine: travel as an educational tool. Have you ever used travel as part of your homeschool curriculum? There are such rich opportunities to teach and learn about art, history, government, the environment, language, theology, cultures, geography, geology, and just about everything else. As homeschooling families are not bound by a set school calendar, I'd think you could scoot out for journeys of discovery -- big or little -- more frequently than families tied to a formal academic year. More chances to get out there and poke around.

Oh my goodness, Dianne. I will have to keep Dana, an extreme horse-lover, away from the Antibes market when we go. If I so much as tell her about this post, she'll find Antibes on a map of France and mark it in her mind as one of the most evil places on the planet. (I tried to put a row of snarly-faced Instant Graemlins here, but haven't reached that level of posting proficiency yet. Imagine them----)

Like you in Antibes, I had a wonderful time cruising the workshops and ateliers of artisans in many of the hill towns above Menton. Woodcarvers in Roquebrune, near Eze. Monsieur Mariani, a sculptor in Peillon, a cream-colored medieval city that hangs like a dream on the side of a mountain in the Alpes-Maritimes, had a collie who watched him work. But when the collie saw Dana, he glued himself to her side and became a kind of canine tour guide, leading us through the ancient cobbled streets, up, up to the top of the town, where he and Dana chased each other in a little church square.

Like your blue egg cup, a simple, special thing that helps color a journey.

Lori,

This is why I asked if you homeschool.

Traveling is such an awesome learning tool! We have studied certain subjects (like the Boston tea party, Williamsburg, etc) and then gone and visited them as an extension to the unit. "I" have learned sooo much through this type of learning - and my kids have as well. Everything I've learned on an educational level, I've learned through homeschooling. Ha. (we could write a book on that!)

Homeschooling has allowed us to "be on the road" more...and take off at the drop of a hat. With the lifestyle we live, it's been a blessing!

My daughter is 16, and my son is 14. I have homeschooled them from the begining. It wasn't something I intended to do, but something I was "led" to do (much to my surprise!).

The fires of 2002 were unbelievable! We lived in an area threatened by a wildfire. It was interesting watching people evacuate - and EVERYTHING they tried to take with them. I think through the years that I've realized that none of my "stuff" is so important...other then my family and my critters.

You HAVE to visit Estes Park. It is the gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park. When you are on top of the divide, it is like being on top of the world. And the town of Estes is very quaint and "homey". We lived there for 3 yrs...it is the ultimate American town. Sniffles. (now we live outside of Denver, which has its' own unique benefits) (BUT, we have a view of the mountains!) The Elk in Estes Park are more plentiful then the winter residents! They too are wild, and known to go after tour-ons. lol.

I will have to find "Alma" on the map and go check it out!

We have to get back down to the Mesa's they are so incredible. Did you get to the great sand dunes? very cool!

Thanks for sharing all of your experience!

God Bless the U.S.A.! (and the troops who have faithfully defended it!)

Danita

I think I need to homeschool myself, I've forgotten so much.

Didn't you notice the shops in Paris that sold horse meat? They always have a horse head on the building. I believe it's called Cherval? I pet horses, I don't eat them!

Lori,
I just wondered if you had ever traveled by motorcycle.
It's a lot less comfy than traveling by car, but you see things you would never see otherwise. And you meet some really neat people.
When I was younger, I traveled two or three thousand miles each summer as a passenger on a Honda 450 motorcycle. (Yes I was NUTS) We would wind our way along a lot of out of the way roads through the Rockies. We camped and had a blast. It was crazy, but fun.

Of course I was much younger. And crazier. (Well, maybe not a lot crazier, but much younger)

Sometimes I want to do it all over again.

You could write another book about that. I kept a journal and made a million memories.
smile

So many cool things to chat about -- homeschooling, book writing, the Rockies, horses' heads and motorcycle touring (and rockgarden, I haven't forgotten your questions). Back shortly to talk more.

It's Friday night, and with 13 and 16-year-olds, that means getting them to and/or from their various social obligations, so I'm in and out, but I wanted to pop into the forum and tell you about something uncanny that happened at the dentist's office today, before I forget.

My dentist's office is in a one-story ranch house in a suburban neighborhood. I opened the door, and hanging on the brass coat rack was a filthy blue windbreaker with DUCT TAPE literally holding the sleeves on. I did a double take. A windbreaker patched to the gills by duct tape! I stood there and laughed. And here's the weird part. There was no one in the office but me and the hygienist. The dentist starts his work day late, and there were no other patients in the place. Now, I know the dirty jacket didn't belong to the hygienist because she's a cute little fresh-scrubbed wisp who's, well, hygienic.

God obviously hung the duct tape windbreaker there just to give us all a laugh. Life is cool.

Smile, you aren't crazy. I have a Harley. There is nothing more freeing than riding on a motorcycle. You get the scents, and everything else. I always start singing when I'm riding. I'm a Harley Babe! I would use the other term but Dotsie would edit it but you know what I mean.