Wine and Spirits Travel

It was a beautiful day in the high 70s, with the sun shining over the aqua water of the Adriatic Sea. The only thing my friend Lynn and I had to decide was what we wanted to do at the beach the next few hours. I felt like I was in a dream when I woke up in our little cottage in Bi Village. It was day four of our Share Istria adventure and we were in Fazana, Croatia, just a short walk from the Adriatic Sea. What made it even more of a dream was that we had a free morning, something I rarely got on a press trip. We could have a leisurely breakfast at the Bi Village restaurant – a nice selection of fruit, cheese, rolls, pastries, and eggs – and then enjoy the beach. I was trying to decide whether to go windsurfing or paddle boarding as we enjoyed the view on the long walkway that went along the sand on this Fazana beach. It was a little disappointing when we arrived at the watersports area and Antonio told us the conditions weren’t right for either, but he offe...

When we were heading to the Porer Lighthouse to spend the night, Goran, our Visit Istria guide had told us that the island had been rumored to be haunted. I don’t put much thought into those things, but there was a bit of doubt in logic by morning. At 12:45 am, all six of us in the lighthouse woke with a startle from the loud banging of doors and windows. At first I thought it was the wind, but then realized it was coming from two different directions. A few minutes after it stopped, an alarm started sounding. It quieted down for a bit, than the sequence started again about an hour later. The lighthouse keeper had no logical explanation except wind and, quite frankly, I was too tired from two nights of not sleeping to even care.  Lynn was ready quicky and I tried to get a little work done on my photos before we left. While I have to admit that staying in a lighthouse on a private island was intriguing, the actual place – with no air conditioning and these cre...

It’s been a hectic few weeks getting ready to participate in the next round of the Share Istria event. I had already scheduled my June with breaks to stay home and write and relax so adding 10 days of travel in has been quite a feat, but I immediately knew it was worth it when I finally arrived back in Pula – almost nine years to the day from when I left. My travel to get to Croatia was not going to be easy. The trip required leaving my house at 9:00 am C.S.T., an hour and a half flight from Bloomington, Illinois, to Atlanta, Georgia. A four hour layover in Atlanta, followed by a nine and a half hour flight to Frankfurt, Germany, a one hour flight to Zagreb, Croatia, a two and a half hour car ride to Pula, and then, finally, a boat ride to the Porec Lighthouse! The weather was beautiful when I left Champaign , Illinois, and my flight to Atlanta stayed pretty much on schedule. Delta upgraded me in one of their economy comfort seats and, despite the fact that it was a s...

It was 2006 and I was ready to take my first trip to Europe by myself. I had only been once before at that point and, as a single mom, I hadn't thought about going back. Just as my daughter was about to turn 21, the opportunity presented itself to cover a tennis tournament . I also had enough miles for a first class ticket to Europe. It didn't take me long to make the decision. The tournament was a special one. It was the Smirkva Bowl , a competition in Pula, Croatia, for 10 and under kids. They had teamed up with "Little Mo," a similar organization in the United States founded by the family of Grand Slam champion Maureen Connolly Brinker, to bring four players from the U.S. to Croatia for an exhibition event. I planned to spend time in Paris and Rome too, but it was Croatia that would take most of my time and attention. Three weeks before the trip, I developed shingles. If you've seen the television commercials for the shingles vaccine and wonder...