March 17, 2018
Greetings from Brno, Czech Republic!
We’ve done tons of travelling over the last few weeks flying from Chiang Mai to Doha to Zagreb. After a weekend in Zagreb we flew to Prague, from where we took the train to Brno. This is how it all looks on a map.
Getting a FREE hotel stay in Doha
On our last Newsletter 3 months ago I mentioned that we would have 13 hours between flights in Doha. I wasn’t sure how we’d manage that, especially when told that there are NO storage facilities at Doha Airport. We have 3 computers between us and I didn’t look forward to lugging them around the city for 13 hours while sightseeing.
It was only while doing research that I found out that if you are flying Qatar Airways and have 12+ hours in transit in Doha, that you are eligible for a free hotel stay. And it’s not just any hotel, it’s a 4 or 5 star hotel.
All about the Qatar Stopover package.
We ended up staying at the 5 Star Souq Waqif Boutique Hotels. It was fantastic. It was 44C and humid when we arrived in Doha. It was midday, during Ramadan, and everything was closed. Thank god we had the hotel room. We showered, lounged in bed drinking fancy coffee and watching CNN, walked around Doha about an hour before deciding it was too hot – then went back to the room and napped for a couple of hours before going back to the airport.
The offer for a free hotel room is set to end December 31, 2018 (but they’ve said that before – it was originally due to end Dec 31, 2017. So just check before booking). But for us it was: 1) a great way to break up a long trip, 2) luxury we haven’t had in a long time, 3) a chance to see a bit of Doha. I’ll admit: Qatar Airways is not our favorite airline. But as long as they have this offer I would consider booking them to enjoy this stopover. I almost wish we had planned for another day in Doha.
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Zagreb (and an Airbnb recommendation)
From Doha we continued on to Zagreb.
We arrived at 6:30 am and got to our Airbnb apartment around 7:30 where our host was waiting for us.
We’ve had bad luck with Airbnb stays in Zagreb. I’ve previously written about one here. But this one is fantastic and I recommend it to anyone visiting Zagreb. Here’s the link.
Remember my last post on Random Acts of Kindness? We got a chance to pay some of that kindness back in Zagreb when we came across two hopelessly lost Americans trying to make their way to the Museum of Broken Relationships. We ended up walking them there, getting to know them a bit along the way. Nice people.
When people are nice to you, you want to be nice to others. That’s the way it should be.
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Zagreb to Prague to Brno (and what airlines do these days)
We had considered taking the train from Zagreb to Brno, connecting through Budapest, but it was a 12 hour trip and we just weren’t up for another long travel day.
Instead we flew Zagreb to Prague with Czech Airlines. Cost $135 Canadian each (about $105 US) which is a good fare. First time we see this: Czech Airlines charges for any checked in baggage. Have never seen that before and I didn’t want to pay.
Me: “can we just take our baggage on the plane?”
Check in: “do you have any liquids?”
Me: “No”.
Check in: “No problem”.
So between us we took 4 rather large pieces of carry on aboard the plane.
* Which is better than our recent experience flying Scoot from Singapore to Chiang Mai. Maximum weight for checked in baggage was 10 kg and between us we had to pay $80 for overweight baggage charges (both our bags were 14 kg). And although cabin sized, Scoot didn’t allow us to take our bags onboard. Who’s ever heard of a 10 KG max for checked in luggage?
Watch out, pretty soon you’ll have to pay to use the plane bathroom. And they’ll probably charge you by the weight of your discharge.
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Arriving in Prague, we bought SIM cards from Vodafone (there’s a shop in terminal 2) and then, using it, called ourselves an Uber. We took it to the train station and an hour later we were on the train to Brno (a 2 ½ train ride). By mid-afternoon we were in Brno.
Below: first thing we saw upon arrival in Prague? This huge Wolfhound. Which is so typical because we have never seen a country where you see as many dogs in social places: trams, buses, bars, restaurants…I love that about the Czech Republic.
On Brno
Brno is a pretty place and very quiet compared to Prague. We’ve been impressed by the cleanliness of the old town and, of course, the transportation system (a 10 minute tram ride gets you anywhere you need to go). I say “of course” because we’ve always loved the transportation systems in the Czech Republic.
A few photos:
I’ll have a lot more on Brno in coming weeks.
Lissette is dumping Facebook
Lissette has over 5000 Facebook friends, with 1000 waiting in queue (last I checked I have 113 friends). So what is she doing? Dumping Facebook entirely. She’s had it with all her friends the perverts sending “pokes”, calling her “baby”, sending her dick photos, or asking her to send them personal photos. Her page was supposed to be a creative outlet. She’s 51 years old. When did Facebook become a dating site? As a man I’m embarrassed for the losers out there. Get a life.
It became too much and the more friends she got on Facebook the more she felt that she was friend-less. Which is already a sore point with our full time travel lifestyles. And when Lissette isn’t happy with something she burns it down to the ground and starts over. So she’s deleted her FB account (by the way do you know that when you delete a FB account that it takes 14 days for them to actually delete it?)
Lissette takes most of the photos on this blog. She’s also a great writer. But Facebook isn’t the venue for that. Maybe it used to be but that’s no more. She might actually start her own blog and, if she ever does get a Facebook profile/page again, it will be private.
It’s funny that this all happened when I just joined Instagram. Most bloggers have an Instagram page. I felt I had to try it out. Jeez, if Facebook is vacuous then Instagram is even more so. Remember that post I wrote about the kinds of blogs I hate? Well, that’s Instagram – lots of young, good-looking people taking photos of themselves with some kind of landscape or beach in the background (is it really that important when the focus should be on them?). The first week told me all that I needed to know about Instagram – my followers exploded to 250 without me doing anything….then within days kept trickling down to the 160 or so I have now. It seems that the game on Instagram is to follow people – any people – so they follow you back. And then you unfollow them. So when you see someone with 25,000 followers who are only following 100 people then you know the game they’re playing.
There’s always ‘real’ people and ‘real’ connections. But it just feels that social media is getting more and more vacuous. Maybe it’s time to get rid of all our social media accounts?
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Plans for the coming months
We’ll be visiting a few countries that are new to us over the next few months: Poland, Ukraine, and Georgia. We’ll be spending roughly a month in each country.
The above will take us to October and Prague (where we always go back to for medical/dental czechups. Ha).
In November Lissette and I go our separate ways: she goes back to Croatia (maybe??) while I visit my mom in Mexico and my son in Montreal. He’s graduating university so I’ll be there to see the graduation ceremony.
Last year I had an exciting solo trip taking El Chepe through Copper Canyon. I’m planning another solo trip this year – and thinking of spending 3 weeks in Morocco in late Nov/early Dec. I’m envisioning some kind of hiking/adventure trip. Would love to see the mountains and desert. Anyone have any suggestions?
Lissette and I will meet back up in Europe before Christmas and we’re planning a train trip in Jan/Feb that will take us from Budapest through Serbia and Bulgaria (with some 1-2 week stops along the way) to Istanbul. But that’s a long way off…
*Note: we’re back to doing the “Schengen shuffle”, where we are allowed 90 days out of 180 days in the Schengen zone. It generally means we have to balance our time in Western and Central Europe with non-Schengen destinations in Eastern Europe or outside Europe.
Upcoming posts. And what would you like me to write about?
Our next post will be on our favorite Netflix shows. Over the last 4 years we’ve watched a lot of Netflix (in fact I can’t handle watching TV anymore. Can’t bear the commercials). We’ve also got a few more posts on our recent trip through Malaysia and Singapore before we get into our European adventures.
Somebody asked me a question when we were in Chiang Mai doing Muay Thai. “Do you ever miss working?”. I thought it was a funny question to be asked. It made me think of all those people looking to escape the daily 9-5. Or those, like some of the younger people I met, who do everything to avoid it entirely. I’ll write on that sometime soon. Coming back to Europe has also brought back thoughts on Split, our year there, and the “need” for a base sometime in the future. I’ll write about that as well.
As a reader, is there something you’d want me to write about? Something you’re curious about? I ask because when you travel as we do you assume things. Then we get hit with a question/comment like we did this week: “I’ve never travelled outside of the US and Canada. What’s it like?” (that’s kind of an open ended question. Always better to be specific) or “Why do you stay in Airbnb apartments and not hotels?”. It made me realize that people don’t live the same lifestyle and that there are many a lot of questions/issues that people have that I probably haven’t addressed. I’m always open to suggestions on future posts.
Blog makeover
After 4 years of the same theme, we’re going to have a complete makeover coming on the blog in the coming days/weeks. I’m super excited about it – the look will be slicker and photos larger. You see the large unused margins on the page right now? That will be gone. It’ll mean a lot of blog cleanup: resizing photos, cleaning up some incompatible code…so there might be a bit of disruption on the blog over the next few weeks. But the end result will be a much more visually pleasing blog.
Ok, that’s our update. Thanks for reading!
Note: I usually do one of these newsletter every 3 months or so. You’ll find them all right HERE.
You seem to fall a lot like Spanky 🙂 The difference is that you have good reflexes. Lissette would have tumbled down those stairs.
Re packing – saw a backpacker on Air Asia with a largeish bag that looked 15kgs. Normally the limit is 7kgs and size restricted. Staff didnt care. Scoot allows 10kgs carry on. With these LCCs I think the way to go is carry on bag and for food take almonds (healthy and filling) plus an empty water bottle which can be filled in boarding lounge from bubbler. They charge way too much for 20kgs checked and their meals are tiny with mostly rice so not worth buying.
You mean you got free meals?
Scoot you had to pay for ANYTHING.
Air Asia definitely the best budget airline I’ve ever flown.
A lot of footpaths in SEA are a shambles. I did find some wide ones around On Nut in Sukhumvit though. Most of the city is terrible though. PKK was a pleasure to walk for the views. In terms of walkable cities and interesting old buildings you can’t beat Europe though. History everywhere. I prefer the heat though. Happy to live in shorts and you can walk at night without being cold. Just a matter of finding the right places where there is space to walk. Some roads have no footpath at all.
Agree. My biggest peeve about SEA – can’t really walk anywhere. Saw a guy jogging on the highway in CM the day we left. How crazy is that?
Hello Frank and Lissette ~ I’m sitting in a lovely hotel room in NYC and taking the opportunity to catch up with a few of your posts. We’ve been in the city for 4 nights and we’re heading home in a couple of hours via Mega Bus. We love NYC but we always manage to wear ourselves out!
I will miss Lissette on FB. I always knew when she was catching up because I’d open my page and there’d be 30 notices from Lissette. Like you, Frank, I have a very small maybe 130 group of FB friends, and I keep my personal page just that… personal and I keep my friends setting on private and that keeps out the rift raft.
I saw that you joined IG, Frank and I was going to suggest don’t bother. It’s the worst game of follow/unfollow out there, right next to Twitter. I hate them both. But, alas, I “maintain” them for our brand. I have made a few nice connections on IG and I enjoy following those accounts, but for the most post it’s a total scam and people abuse it terribly.
Your upcoming plans all sound terrific. We’ve been busy remodeling and settling in to our nest and I have to admit it does feel good to have a base. This house fits us to a tee. It doesn’t hurt that we are just 6 miles from our son and DIL and beautiful 3-month-old grandson.
Oh, I also wanted to mention about your site redesign. We did ours at the beginning of the year and I have zero regrets. As soon as we launched I thought, why the hell did we wait so long?! You’ll be super happy, I’m certain.
Continued safe travels…
Thanks Patti. The makeover has been slow coming but I’m hoping it’ll be up this week. Time for a change.
And it sounds like you both have a lot of plans on two continents. Interested in how that’ll work out and I hope you get the best of both worlds.
I agree with you on IG, I felt I had to do it for the blog but the enthusiasm has petered pretty quick. We’ve discussed privately the better social media platforms and they’re the main focus. Sometimes good to tap into a different audience but, like you, I have very little time for most of them (especially hate twitter. That’s for assholes called Trump). You might see Lissette on IG and Pinterest though, she wants to be creative (especially with her new camera) while also helping out the blog. And hopefully she won’t be receiving dick pics or requests for personal photos.
When will you be going back to Portugal Patti? Any exciting European plans?
Oh gosh, Frank, that’s the 64 million dollar question. What I would give for a crystal ball these days. We had hoped to return to Portugal in June but couldn’t make it happen. Aiming to try again in the fall. I’m embracing living in the moment and letting life unfold as it may. As we all well-know, life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans! Right?! 😉
I thought I posted somewhere a “Kudos” for the new site design but alas, apparently, I only did so in my mind. It looks REALLY good, I love it and I’m betting you do too. It’s updated, streamlined, well-laid out, really great! KUDOS!
Thank you so much Patti! Still some things to figure out but they’re details – overall happy with the new look.
Greetings from Kraków, Poland! Nice Blog!
Thank you very much Jacek!
nice post! Im thinking a blog makeover sooner or later. although they already took my money for the next year so I think that locks me into the theme I’m in….need to check that! And a free hotel… makes it worth deliberately trying to find the longest layover when you book your flights. I’m keen to try Qatar airways they codeshare with Qantas which means I could use or earn points and they have such a good rep! 🙂
They do have a good rep. We were a bit disappointed though: legspace was very tight, service was ho hum (they do have a fixation though on always drawing that curtain between 1st class and economy) and could you believe the 7 hr flight between Chiang Mai – Doha there was no inflight entertainment system? Maybe one of their older planes…
You must have felt a bit (in Lissette’s case a lot!) nostalgic when you visited Zagrev but how fun to pay it forward and play tour guide in Zagreb, I’ll bet you had a warm and fuzzy glow afterwards and you have to know that your kindness will have made a huge impression on the two American tourists. BTW, you’re making me a bit nostalgic for Prague and the Czech Republic which absolutely blew us away when we spent a month there. Loved the question, ‘Do you miss working?’ Rolling on the floor laughing and gasping for breath! We’ve got a best thing we’ve ever done list and that has to be right at the top for us! ?
You are entirely correct Anita – getting back to Europe brought back a bit of sadness for Lissette. In SEA it was different – but here so many things remind us of our ex-home in Split. But we’re always happy to be back in the Czech Republic.
Working has been mostly good for both Lissette and I. But it’s often the people, not the work that can make it miserable…
Well that’s a surprise to read you guys are back in Europe! I thought you’d still be bouncing around SEA for a few more months yet. I just left Bratislava 10 days ago (currently on my annual 2mo cycle tour, following the Drau/Drava/lower Danube rivers to the Iron Gates in Serbia) – if I knew you were in Brno, I would have popped in for a visit. I’ve never been there but heard plenty of nice things about it. I imagine it would make a great base.
Your future travel plans are brilliant as I’ve covered much of the same ground during the last 2 years. Let me know when you want some ideas on W. Ukraine – I spent a month in Lviv…..loved it, great atmospheric place, very cheap and traveled all around Galicia, Ruthenia, Bukovina (countries that once existed in the old Habsburg Empire). Also, I spent 2 mos last fall in Georgia/Abkhazia/Armenia….. another fantastic region to explore. 12 mo visa for Georgia….finally a country that gets it right!
Sorry we couldn’t meet Don, it would have been a pleasure.
I meant to ask you by the way: I know you’re a big biker and you’ve previously mentioned the Eurovelo routes to me. I’d love to do one of them one day. Any that you strongly recommend? I know some are still in the planning/construction phase…and some I know also get a lot of people. It won’t be this year but I’d really like to do a long distance route, travelling light and stopping in little guesthouses along the way (is that even possible or does everything have to be pre-arranged in detail because of popularity?).
Your trip sounds great and I’m slightly envious 🙂
SEA was great. But you know what? We prefer Europe and are happy to be back. We always go through that in SEA: happy to be there initially but a couple of months does it for us. The heat, traffic, and lack of walking space gets old after a while.
Great to hear about Lviv because we’ll also be there a month! You’re also one of the people who convinced us to finally go to Georgia. Looking very forward to that!
I hear you re: living in SEA….. it certainly can be trying at times and it rarely meets my idea of a “high quality of life”. Sure I enjoy beIng amongst the happy Thais, the Lao and Vietnamese people, but you’re right, their living space is far from ideal for most canucks. I don’t get some of the older expats who by choice decide to live in a city like BKK or Saigon….okay, for a few days, but years? I’ll continue spending my winters there but only for 4-5 months at a time, along with the occasional trips back to LatAm and S. Italy.
Cycling…..I’ve ridden mostly on EV13 (so called Iron Curtain route), EV 6 (Danube system) and EV7 (Labe/Elba system). They are all fairly easy going, mostly paved, well marked, interesting, scenic riverside routes, lots of ridiculously cute villages along the way and frequent beer/wine gardens also.
I’ve never really thought of doing an entire EV route in one go……I usually split them into sections that interest me for doing lots of stuff. For example I might cycle 2-3 days at 70km/day and take a few days break. I’ll base myself in a small town and do day cycling (or hiking) trips unencumbered by all my gear, etc. I don’t want to kill myself, after all, I’m on semi-permanent vacation!
From Brno, you might want to check out EV13 or one of the many other regional cycling trails (along the upper Morava for instance). I’ve ridden quite a bit on the trails throughout the old Lichtenstein lands around Breclav, Valtice, etc. Fun cycling along riverine forests, past vineyards, 17thC chateaus, ornate gardens, etc. And lots of vinotekas along the way for wine tastings.
If you want you can camp along the way if that’s what you’re into, but after a days ride, I’m covered in sweaty grime and like to shower up at a nearby Gästehaus or penzion and have a good meal and a cold beer….it’s the reward thing right. With some good planning you can time it to stay in some really nice places. I’m currently in Lienz (E. Tirol) staying at a 600 year old gästehaus, wonderful family run operation, superb Austrian breakfasts and walls so thick that the WiFi signal (they call it WLAN here) won’t penetrate!
But there are dozens of national/regional bike routes that I’ve taken in many of the Central European countries. Out of the 6 countries that I’ve ridden the most in, Austria is by far the best. Fantastic cycle route network through gorgeous mountain scenery (you’ll be gob-smacked at how cliche beautiful it is here), mostly paved segregated bike trails, cyclist friendly facilities (repair shops etc), quaint villages – full of “gemütlich” and excellent places to stay. And it’s usually easy to integrate train travel to avoid the boring bits, city traffic and of course, the mountains that get in the way.
I notice the last two years that e-bikes have really taken off here. It freaks me out when I see some group of old geezers whizzing by me on their e-bikes…..that might be an option for you guys.
Agree with you about SEA Don. My mom retired at 55 and has spent the last 15 years living in Thailand or Mexico. The reason being of course finances. I think it’s probably the main reason older expats settle there (along with the girlie factor for the older guys).
I like the idea of a long distance bike ride, travelling light and overnighting in small guesthouses. Many years ago I did a ride like that around Quebec’s Gaspe peninsula (gorgeous). I’d like to do the same on day in Europe, taking a month or so to do it. I’m just wondering how popular these trails are, if accommodation has to be pre-arranged. I always prefer keeping things open and flexible.
Austria, Yes, I can believe that. And you mention Moravia – just this weekend we travelled to the Mikulov area and saw tons of bicyclists, many using the train to get there. Europeans excellent at that kind of thing…
E-bikes. I don’t call that cycling. Hey, how old do you think we are??? 🙂
Hey Frank, what do you take when you travel? I mean, what types of things? (Packing lists are boring!)
My wife Paula and I are on another European “walkabout”; right now we are in the “if this is Thursday we must be in Stockholm” phase, moving every few days, rather than staying put for a month or more. (and actually today is Tuesday, so we’ve moved on to Copenhagen…)
More to the point, since we are on a long-term trip, perhaps a year or more, we feel justified in taking more than the minimal things. Like, we need both shorts and winter coats; swimsuits and rain gear. However “justified,” we still end up hauling a lot of shit around. When we have a car it’s not so bad; and of course staying in one place for a time an extra shirt comes in handy. But now we’re on and off trains and planes each with a backpack, a laptop, and a huge roll-around suitcase. It’s a real pain!
What do you and Lissette carry for luggage, and what sort of stuff is inside? (And what does your suitcase weigh?)
Ha, you’re describing how we travelled in our 2nd year!
Our first year we had backpacks which was a real pain. 2nd year we went with big bags with rollers. Since the 3rd year we have carry-on sized suitcases (which we usually don’t check in). We’re usually all carry on now: those 2 suitcases (maybe 14 kg fully loaded) and a couple of backpacks with our computers. Pretty easy now. We can’t go back – suitcases were just too heavy and we were overweight whenever checking in (which really added up). Now we can get somewhere, hop on a tram or bus…makes life much easier.
We just brought it down to essential clothes. Maybe do more washings than before but since downsizing we’ve realized we can downsize even more.
Great tip about Doha, could’ve done with knowing that ourselves last year, though we do tend to fly KLM rather than Qatar if at all possible. Looks like an interesting city to explore for a day. I don’t blame Lissette for dumping facebook, you go girl (though since when is she 51, I’d have thought more 31 😉 ) I’ve so far avoided the dick pics, but have had a couple of marriage proposals! Creeps. They wouldn’t have enough camels to buy me! The social media scene is nothing short of ridiculous these days and I’ve taken a step back recently too, have far better things to do with my time. Was surprised to see you pop up on Instagram, I say run away, RUN AWAY, it’s not worth it. We never follow people back (unless they’re called BBQ boy) and have been on about the same ‘follower’ figure for a year. Maybe that’s coz I never post. Total waste of time. Anyway, enough of that, I’m really looking forward to hearing about Georgia, you do get to visit some fabulous places!! And you know where we are if you need any Morocco ideas (we’re back there for the 10th time in October), glad you’re finally getting there again 🙂
Thank you Heather. I was actually thinking of you and will write you personally on Morocco (10th time!? That kind of shocks me. Didn’t know it was that many times..)
I’m also planning 2 months in the UK next May and June. Partly because of Schengen (planning to do it after 2 months in France and Germany), partly because we’ve never been to the UK. I have NO idea as of now how we would break that up, what transport is like, accommodation etc. Maybe we’ll do our usual “base” thing and have a few bases to explore different areas over 2 months…maybe have to rent a car (which I usually hate)
Any ideas? My turn to be open ended…
I’ll have to do some research and will write you eventually with some suggestions!
Camels!? Ha, yes. I think I know what you’re talking about 🙂
Just a tip for train travel in the UK or, really, worldwide: the Man in Seat 61. Former exec for British Railways, now shares his extensive experience on trains all over the world. Google it and follow his advice; you may want to bookmark his site!
On our last trip we found the UK a good place to recover our Schengen time; we particularly like the city of York and the Lake District — we’ll be back to both those places this summer. We’ll also be spending 3 weeks in Scotland. Plus a month in a flat in London, which I find exciting, for some reason….
Man in Seat 61 is my bible, he’s fantastic. Thanks for mentioning him Paul.
Thank you for your feedback on the UK. Lissette has always been really excited about it (I’ve been to London once, but that was 30 years ago). I need a UK expert to help me plan out my itinerary 🙂 But good to know. I’ve heard of York as well as the Lake District. Scotland also on my list, I’m also curious about Wales.
What are your favorite activities there Paul?
I want to see some castles and do some hiking…
While I wasn’t keen on our stops in Wales, I think that was more due to travel fatigue than the place. For outdoor activities Snowdonia is fabulous; we just drove through but it could warrant a couple of days if you want to explore a bit. Wales has a great many castles: the Welch were tough, and the English were only able to subdue small areas at a time, which they did by building a network of fortified castles. (Which were very expensive, causing the king to raise taxes, leading to unrest and, ultimately, the Magna Carta — history can be interesting sometimes!)
Scotland was a different matter: like the Romans before them, the English gave up on the Scotts and left them behind Hadrian’s Wall (parts of which are still there). The Scots didn’t really get fully suppressed (brutally!) until the 18th century. The first couple seasons of Outlander (Netflix) will catch you up on that! On our first foray into Scotland we’ll spend a few days on the Isle of Skye, a couple in the Highlands around Inverness, and a week in Edinburgh. I expect we’ll want to go back…
The Lake District is gorgeous, and is all about hiking the fells (hills). The heather was in bloom last time we were there (August 2016). Oh, and it rained (plan on hiking in the rain!). We also got into stone circles, the most famous of which, Stonehenge, is much further south. But there are stones and circles all over Briton, and a very nice one near Keswick. We had a car (public transport is not great in this area), and saw some great countryside while tracking down the stones. Oh, and let’s not forget The Lakes Distillery with its very smooth gin, not far from Keswick. Another great drive with a special reward at the end!
Thank you very much for all this Paul. Lots to think about!
Welcome to Europe, Frank and Lissette!
I think your posts about Georgia will be especially interesting for me, because I have been there about 20 years ago. Is something changed there?
Really, 20 years Victor?! Do you have good memories?
People say good things these days about Georgia. They also say the wine is great. So we’re curious…
Looking forward to seeing the new design. It sounds great. I also feel my eyes getting worse. I need a checkup as soon as we get back to Valencia..yikes! I know how much Spanky loves Croatia, so l’m glad you’re back. Looking forward to reading about your new adventures. Did you check on your storage unit?
Thanks Kemkem. No, no storage unit this time but we’ll have to do it in the fall before it gets cold. Can’t go to Montreal in November without my winter jacket!
Well done again Frank. I don’t see any “large unused margins” because the page is zoomed up enough so I can read it. And please keep a little contrast between text and background. We don’t all have good eyesight…
Ha, yes. I’m in the 50+ club now too and they eyes getting weak.
I’m going to try to remember to always use black font on a post, not the dark grey.
Maybe eventually I’ll have to use a header font throughout the page as my eyesight gets even worse 🙂
Frank, lots of interesting travel plans. I will be looking forward to hear about how things develop. Social media can be frustrating, anoying and sometimes even a little scary. I try to avoid spending much time on it. We are currently in Peru and going to Mexico afterwards 🙂
Great Gilda! Look forward to hearing what you think of Peru. We haven’t been.
Where are you going in Mexico? One of my favorite countries…
It all sounds quite exciting Frank. Lissette telling Facebook to take a hike is good too. Glad I’m not on any social media (tried Twitter and dumped it after a few weeks).
The blog makeover may take longer han you think. From graphic designer’s point of view, one thing that too many are doing is putting light grey text on a white background and that is serious design no-no. Keep the text color #444 (your current color) and under (but not black), it’s much easier on the eyes.
Thanks Ted,
Actually it’s almost done and I’m getting someone who knows this stuff do it it. I’m technically incompetent 🙂
No white background, it’ll be a very light grey. Too much white a bit hard on the eyes…and with light grey on top of white I can understand your point.