Over the hills, under the moon - and off the beaten path

Walking into the massive Boros bunker in Berlin’s Mitte is like walking into some ancient, alien tomb. This forbidding concrete monolith, built by the Nazis in 1942, is now the home of a rather eccentric private art collection Inside the building’s anthill-like network of corridors and small rooms, the art on display completely changes how you experience the space.  You encounter everything from strange kinetic sculptures to multimedia installations flickering in the dark. Each room opens like a window into a different creative mind, and to be honest, the story of the building itself is just as exciting as the art displayed inside it.   During the war, the bunker sheltered several thousand civilians from the nightly bombings that hit Berlin. In 1945, the Red Army used the building for prisoners of war, and it later became an East German warehouse for tropical fruit.  After the wall came down, the empty building was squatted by kids. During the nineties, it became simpl...

We started our travels in 2024 at our house in the Ardeche mountains of Southern France. And - we had four absolutely miserable weeks!!! While Northern Europe experienced a lovely spring, we stayed mostly indoors, covered in duvets, while persistent rain and even sludge beat against our windows. Well - this is now rainwater under the bridge. And plenty of it! We survived - and, eventually, we escaped - and yesterday we arrived in a sunny, warm Berlin, where our new neighbors were hangi ng out in some of Kreuzberg's many outdoor cafes. ----------------- o ----------------- Today we used a lovely Ascension day to make our own ascent onto what is probably one of the weirdest places you can visit in all of Berlin - the top of the Teufelberg mountain far out in the Grunewald forest. This rubble mountain turned Cold War listening post turned graffiti wonderland is a strange mix of the last 80 years of German turmoil and rebirth. The approach to Teufelberg is unassuming - a nondescr...

Antraigues usually looks peaceful, but this weekend the village came alive for the annual Ardèche chestnut festival, drawing people from across the mountains." Crisp autumn air and the scent of woodsmoke greeted us as we walked out from our townhouse and into the square just as the festivities were beginning.  Villagers mingled, voices rising in laughter as they awaited the evening's revelries. Tables were loaded with honeyed figs, freshly cooked chestnuts, soft cheeses and crusty bread.  The rich aroma of roasted meats drifted from fires crackling nearby, while children scampered about, their joyful shrieks echoing off the stonewalls. As darkness fell, the festival really got going  Everybody clustered together, clinking glasses of chestnut beer and warming spiced wine.  At long tables, families shared platters piled high with food. ...

It has been raining for three days in Antraigues. This is not a complaint. The oil stove is going, Rita is somewhere in the kitchen with a pot au feu that has been simmering since this morning, and I am on the sofa with a book I have been meaning to read since March. The plaster walls in this house crack a little more each winter. The light goes early. By three in the afternoon we have the lamps on. There is a particular quality to a rainy day in a village of three hundred people when you have nowhere to be. The sound of it against the terrace. The smell of woodsmoke from somewhere up the hill. The fact that the only decision of the afternoon is whether to open another bottle before or after dinner. We have been moving more or less continuously for seven months. Cities, trains, new apartments every few weeks, the low-level administration of being always somewhere temporary. This is not temporary. This house has cracking plaster and a sofa that has been worn into ...

We have a house in the Ardèche region of southern France, and on our many visits over the years, we have explored the countryside quite a lot. We have crossed its rivers, driven through the mountain passes, and visited many of the old medieval villages. We were actually beginning to feel confident that there were no major surprises left for us in the area. The other day we were proven completely wrong. A local friend told us that some hidden remnants of an ancient capital city actually lie just a few kilometers from our house. The ruins of what was once the center of the Gallo-Roman country of Helvia are more than 2000 years old. They sit atop the Jastre mountain, with no road signs or tourist brochures giving any indication that they even exist. They are completely covered by wilderness and have been lost to common memory for centuries. This was something we simply had to explore, and like two modern-day Indiana Joneses, we decided yesterday to climb the mountain and try to find this...