I recently had the pleasure of delivering one of my quilts to an adorable baby. I enjoyed making this for our friends. The design is called a “Disappearing Nine Patch,” because you start with nine squares sewn together, cut them up, then turn them to create this design.
Here is the new father and daughter! Congratulations Mom and Dad!
The next place we stopped in Costa Rica was the zip line. I had ridden one in Costa Rica and Thailand before, and was excited to experience the thrill of flying through the trees again!
To our surprise, we ran into some of the staff from the ship that were also going on the zip line. It was great that we ended up in the same group so we could get better acquainted. Later I was able to share photos with them, since they didn’t have cameras.
The girls had been tricked into thinking they were going to the beach, and they were dressed accordingly, which we thought was hilarious.
Their names and countries are Aleksandar (Serbia), Stanko (Serbia), Diana (Montenegro) and Lori (Croatia).
What a delight to spend this time with them, laughing, squealing, and being goofy (rather than the normal stance they would take serving on the ship)!
And — to top it off — guess who waited on us at breakfast the next morning? This is always the best part of traveling — the food AND the people we meet!
Here are the final photos of signs from our trip to northern Spain. I hope you have a feel for the culture and beauty of that country now. We certainly loved our trip there, and will certainly go back again if we get the chance.
Here are some of the signs we saw along the bike path in Spain. I know that many of you, oddly, are very fascinated with the sign pics I post from trips, so here you go! The Senda Del Oso is very well marked and easy to follow. It goes through several villages as well as into the countryside, through tunnels and along mountain streams.
Here are some of the sites along the Senda del Oso–the bike ride we took in the mountains near Oviedo, Spain.
They actually have a small zoo along the pathway featuring the type of bears that inhabit the mountains there.
We didn’t see any wild bears but I did see a wild boar in a yard. We also saw cows with bells, such as you would see in Switzerland or Germany.
The villages and houses were all so interesting to see.
This was a little picnic area with stone bike racks.
I loved these unique stone stairs, too.
We saw these friendly dogs that were out for a stroll with their family.
It was truly a beautiful and fun day!
One of our favorite activities in Spain was the bike ride we took in the mountains. The Senda del Oso runs 25 miles on an old mining rail line through the mountains above Oviedo. There are several tunnels, which I’ll feature in a later post. We had a wonderful day on rental bikes, and thoroughly enjoyed the views along the way. These are some of the many granaries we saw along the way.
The countryside was beautiful and we had great weather all day!
We came across this small church with an interesting cemetery behind it.
We stopped for lunch in a small village and found the food to be delicious.
Chris and Sarah each bought a frozen fruit bar.
Then we headed on up the path nearly to the end, when we had to return to get the rental bikes turned in.
More granaries along the way.
I’ll show more scenes from the bike ride on the next blog post.
Asturias is known for its delicious hard cider, but more famous than the cider is the way it’s served — poured in the traditional way, or escanciada. The bartender holds the bottle far above his head and, looking straight ahead, pours it directly into the glass.
We saw this (and enjoyed drinking it) everywhere we went.
The food is excellent, too.
This is the seafood dinner we enjoyed by the sea.
We all tried pouring the cider the proper way, but ended up with more on the ground than in the glass, usually.
It’s amazing how well the bartenders do.
Everything we ate was fantastic.
Breakfast was a special treat.
Most of all, we enjoyed being with Lizzie and her husband again, and I have no doubt we’ll return again sometime.
