Markets: An afternoon in the souq

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A fellow WordPress Blogger, Ailsa over at “Where’s my backpack” did it again with this week’s travel theme of Street Markets.  What a fantastic topic for who doesn’t love the vibrant colors and fragrances of a world market?  Markets are amazing as they give you such a slice of culture.  Whether it be the divine floral markets of Paris to the brilliant indigenous markets of Peru, a market always has a treasure to find.

One of my favorite markets of all is the souq.  In the spring of 2011, I spent a week volunteering in Rabat, Morocco and had a wonderful time exploring the ins and outs of a Moroccan souq.  You could truly find literally every thing for sale; pretty much whatever your heart desired.  The colors, the sounds, the people, the smells and the diverse offerings of goods made the souq one of my favorite places to wander and buy gifts for my family and friends.

Follow me through the winding paths of Rabat’s central souq….

There is always a mosque shooting up towards the sky and summoning the daily call to prayer.  The sound of the call echoes throughout the souq, bouncing off the curvy walls of the serpentine streets.  

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The Sunday Post: Doors

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Jakesprinter’s Sunday Post of the week in a wonderful topic:  Doors. Doors are fascinating. They are also quite mysterious for who knows what lies behind the doors of a place. They are the gatekeeper when closed. Yet when opened, they offer you a look into a whole new world of possibilities inside.

When I think of doors, there is one place in particular in which I was utterly blown away by the doors:  Guatemala. This colorful country had perhaps some of the most unusual and interesting doors I’d ever seen during my travels. For those of you who have been following my blog, you have already seen these photos. However, I decided to spruce them up a little by playing around with the colors.

Come, take a walk with me and admire some of my favorite doors I found…..


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The Weekly Photo Challenge: Summer

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I adore this week’s Photo Challenge topic:  Summer!  Yeah!  Who doesn’t love summer?  It is such a wonderful time of year to let your hair down and be free!  I actually already did this challenge just last week as a fellow WordPress Blogger, Where’s my backpack? came up with the idea.  I really liked the post I did so in case you haven’t seen it, click here.

For this week’s official Photo Challenge, I decided to pick one week out of the summer that has become a family tradition and truly means summer to me.  Our family vacation up north in Minnesota.

Each July we take the week off, pack up the car and head up north to the Brainerd Lakes Area where we stay at the lovely, historic Grand View Lodge.  We always rent the same cottage which is located on lovely Roy Lake.  For one week, we get as much summer as our hearts desire.  It is a great way to celebrate the meaning of summer:  Fun, sun, beach, water, swimming, hiking, family, grilling, s’mores, more swimming, ice-cream, fireworks and stopping to slow down a bit and enjoy life.  I love it and can’t wait to go back again for the 4th of July!

For this week’s challenge, I have chosen a collection of photos from our week up north which mean summer to me. Hope you enjoy!

Summer means…

Eating cold, drippy ice cream on a hot, summer day. 

Swimming!  Lakes, pools, and even our backyard kiddie pool and sprinkler. 

Hours spent on the beach playing in the sand and building sand castles. 

Letting your hair down and going a little wild and crazy. 

Painted toenails and relaxing while reading my favorite book. 

Boating of any kind.  Kayaking, canoeing, motor boats, pontoon boats.  Rafts!

Eating sweets like lollipops and popsicles till your hearts desire. Don’t tell the dentist, mom!

Enjoying fresh fruits and vegetables.  Visiting the farmers stand and picking strawberries. 

Grilling out and making s’mores over a hot summer’s fire. 

Fishing with dad or even better grandpa. 

Peace, sun and fun. 

Or being a little crazier like riding a banana boat or waterskiing. 

Admiring the pure beauty of the sun, nature and reflecting on life. 

Creating wonderful childhood and family memories together that will last a lifetime. 

And most of all, watching the sun set at past ten pm…..on the patio of our cottage, talking about life and the future…..

To read more entries for this week’s photo challenge, click here.

An unexpected surprise at the Como Zoo

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After creeping everyone out with my last post on the invasion of the caterpillars, I thought I’d share a nice and pretty post about the Twin Cities.  Overall, the comments about the tent caterpillars confirmed that there is an overall dislike for these slimy pests but I did hear some other stories from readers that were right up there with the caterpillars.

On Monday, it was a gorgeous spring day and I took Sophia to a new zoo we hadn’t been to:  The Como Zoo in St. Paul.  Minneapolis and St. Paul, otherwise known as the “Twin Cities” are actually two separate cities only a mere 9 miles apart with two distinctive personalities.  It is quite bizarre but it makes sense if you consider the history and geography.  At the time they were built, it was paramount to be near water.  The Mississippi River just happens to flow right through both cities where flour mills were built.  It is no coincidence that General Mills and Cargill are both based in Minnesota.

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Attack of the tent caterpillars

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They are literally everywhere.  These greenish brown multi-legged caterpillars are practically falling out of the sky.  They coat the sides of our creamish-white stucco house.  They invade the sidewalks in mass.  They swing from the trees on their slippery, silky slime.  They cover the sides and bottoms of the tree bark.  And I even found about a zillion of them stuck to the wheels of my garbage can!

Every day there are more and more of these creepy crawlies and the invasion isn’t over yet.  It is just beginning and pretty soon my house will be covered in them.

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Cordoba

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We left Madrid early the next morning and flew to Seville where we would pick up our car and start our driving tour of Andalusia.  When we had planned this trip, there were too many places that we wanted to see in too little time.  In retrospect, what we did in our short time was way too much and we learned a valuable lesson about traveling.  Never do too much in too little of time.  You will end up not truly enjoying your trip and you will find it very difficult to relax.

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My beautiful flowering shrubs

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In yesterday’s post, Rain and Shine, I mentioned that I was doing a two-part series about what I’d seen over the weekend. Part One described our hot steamy pre-summer day at Interstate Park along the St. Croix River which was followed by our first real sign of summer:  A loud, dark, thunderstorm.

The storm was massive, covering a huge area of our state and brining with it rain, hail and much cooler weather. We woke up Sunday morning to a forty degree temperature drop.  I was back in jeans, a long sleeve shirt and jacket and the shorts and tank top were a long forgotten memory. The day was dreary and maddening. But we used it to get things done.  Run some errands and organize the house before the wonderful sweet heat of summer makes us detest being inside.

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Rain and shine

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Two things happened over the weekend.  The mercury hit 90 degrees F, weather that we typically get in the dog days of summer, and then an enormous thunderstorm rolled into the Twin Cities on Saturday night producing heavy, damaging hail and weather that was 40 degree cooler the next day.  Talk about extremes!

The weather didn’t fit well with my son’s highly anticipated camping outing. Yet, what it did bring was the most sensational flowering scrubs I’ve ever seen in my garden.  This is a two-part post of what I saw over the weekend.

Saturday:  A Cub Scout family retreat at Interstate Park in Taylor’s Falls Minnesota.

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The Sunday Post: Pets

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I have just become a member of Jake’s Printer’s 2012 Year of the Water Dragon’s Sunday Photo Challenge.  I have loved his topics so far thus decided to jump the bandwagon and join in on the fun.  This week’s Sunday Challenge is Pets.

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Sunsational Summer

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A wonderful blog I’ve started following, Where’s my backpack, cleverly began last week’s unofficial weekly photo challenge on WordPress with the theme “Reflections”. It obviously was a huge hit with WordPress bloggers as well as myself. I loved the challenge and am becoming addicted to them as they force you to be extremely creative and reflective in a unique way with past posts and photos.

This week, Ailsa came up with another theme for a photo challenge:  Summer. It seemed like a perfect idea as it was nearing 90 degrees F (32 C) here in Minneapolis and the thunderous clouds of summer had arrived for a sneak preview of what is to come. The warm, sunny day brought back so many happy memories of my childhood and the immense freedom I felt every time summer rolled around.

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