UPCOMING NEW ADVENTURE!

We're taking another roadtrip!

Check back soon for highlights of our travels to Alberta, Canada!

Merry Christmas 🎄

We are having fun exploring around our new hometown! Nearby is the city of Grapevine which is the "Christmas Capital of Texas! It's also known for wineries so one evening we decided to taste some wines and stroll along Grapevine's historic main street. Hope these photos put you into the Christmas spirit!

We began our visit at the Grapevine Convention & Visitors Bureau where we had free parking. Inside we enjoyed the beautiful "Hometown Christmas Exhibit" where there were many vignettes for photo ops. We also got a map, recommendations and even discount tickets for the holiday events.

We saw several families dressed in their pajamas (yes, even the adults!) to ride this local vintage train to Santa's North Pole! Plan ahead for this fun adventure.

Once the sun went down, the lights came on. So many wonderful decorations!

Caroling snowmen!

Candy Cane Lane

Colorful store windows!

Historic log cabin 

My favorite, heavenly angels!

Thank you dear friends and family for your love and support. Wishing all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy 2025!

Wendy & Penelope: The Rest of the Story

Piazzale Michelangelo

Ciao fans!

We're HIGH on Florence! What a beautiful city. See the dome of the Duomo behind us? Our peoples really know how to pick great views!

We admire great art just as much as food. Although this is a replica of Michelangelo’s “David” sculpture, we marvel at the artistry!

Michelangelo’s “David”

Wow! This tower in Pisa really does lean! When our peoples told us about a lean tower we thought it was just skinny! 

Leaning Tower of Pisa

Sometimes we just can't eat another pizza or pasta. We ate at an American style 50's diner for a nice change. It was fun and we especially loved our banana split. 😋

Banana Split

We stopped for some Bubble Tea and made friends with this panda. Now that's a GIANT PANDA! 🐼

Panda friend

Grrrr. Check-out this big lion on the grand staircase at the National Archaeological Museum in Naples. He's really OLD, probably sculpted early in the 2nd century AD.

National Archaeological Museum in Naples

While in Naples we HAD to try some of the local traditional sweets. The Rum Baba was our favorite. Could be because it was soaked in rum! Woohoo! 

Rum Baba & other goodies 

Drunk Penelope

Wow! We LOVED Sorrento and the Amalfi Coast! We're glad that Mt. Vesuvius wasn't erupting during our visit. 🌋

Sorrento & Mt. Vesuvius

We stayed in a pretty Airbnb in the historic area. We had a photo shoot on the outside steps of our Airbnb apartment. These flowers definitely are our best color!

Check out this view of Positano behind us! AMAZING!

Positano (Amalfi Coast)

We walked so much that we needed a spa day. This jacuzzi tub with Lavender and Lemon Bath Salts fit the bill. AHHHH!

We chilled in Sicily. Our peoples visited lots of cool sites but forgot to take us! So now we say arrivederci to Italy!

We flew from Palermo, Sicily to Milan and then to Malta! Malta is very close to Sicily but we didn't want to swim.

We really admired this beautiful fountain in the square at the entrance of Valletta. Our peoples took a walking tour while we relaxed here.

Triton Fountain

We visited the medieval town of Mdina in Malta. We met this Knight in the Order of St. John. He was quite friendly and didn’t mind having his picture taken with us! As a panda bear, I (Penelope) love his uniform. I wonder if I can become a knight? 🤔

We really didn’t want to leave Malta. Everyone was so nice to us. But we had to stay with our peoples, so off to London we went. Our Airbnb was really close to pubs and a tea house. We could have hung out there every day. We did join our peoples on a Thames River boat ride to Greenwich. We learned a lot about the need for maritime navigational methods to determine time using longitude and astronomy. Did you know that Captain James Cook was able to successfully test the astronomical method of finding longitude at sea during his first voyage to the Pacific Ocean (1768-71)? During his voyages he saw some unusual animals like these:

Wallabies and wombats

We made another friend. Isn't this just ducky!

"Just Ducky" 

Holiday decorations and lights were already up in London, in mid-November! Look at this beary cute nutcracker at Hamleys toy store! We have a thing for bears in uniform! 

Nutcracker at Hamleys Toy Store

We are now in the holiday spirit!

We're such lucky bears to be able to travel. Hopefully you have enjoyed our perspective during this adventure. We have visited 8 countries this year (not counting airport layovers):

Mexico, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Malta 
and England (twice)

We better get busy helping our peoples plan our next adventures!

Wendy 🐻

&

Penelope 🐼

England: London

Big Ben

I have been to London many times and I never tire of it. This was my husband's 2nd visit to London so we began with a Thames River Sightseeing boat ride to Greenwich. This is a lovely way to see many of the iconic landmarks. Plus it's highlighted by an entertaining guide from the East-end of London with lots of amusing banter!

Palace of Westminster /
Houses of Parliament 

Tower Bridge

Greenwich is full of many treasures and is an easy day trip from London. Our primary objective on this visit was to go to the Royal Observatory.

The Royal Observatory Greenwich was founded in 1675 by King Charles II for maritime purposes. In order to provide accurate navigational information it was necessary to study astronomy. John Flamsteed was appointed as the first Astronomer Royal so the gracious apartments designed by Sir Christopher Wren became known as Flamsteed House. The house and Observatory complex sits at the top of a steep hill within Greenwich Park.

View of Royal Observatory

Royal Observatory Greenwich

This is also the home of Greenwich Mean Time. Since the late 19th century, the Prime Meridian at Greenwich has divided the eastern and western hemispheres of the Earth. So we stood over the Prime Meridian Line with one foot in each of the hemispheres!

Check out this view with Canary Wharf on the Isle of Dogs in the background!

View from Royal Observatory overlooking the Queen's House and the National Maritime Museum

Our return boat ride provided us with stunning night views!

Tower Bridge

Big Ben

In one of my previous visits to London a friend and I visited Sir John Soane's Museum. There was so much to see that I wanted to return. 

Sir John Soane's Museum

Sir John Soane was a great English architect from the 1780s-1832. He specialized in the Neo-Classical style and is best known for his work

on the Bank of England. The museum was a house he built and lived in until his death in 1837. It has been kept as it was at the time and displays his vast collection of antiquities, furniture, sculptures, architectural models and paintings.

Sir John Soane's Museum

This is truly a hidden gem. Soane collected many works of art including paintings that he purposefully displayed in a Picture Room for easy viewing. He designed the room so that all works could hang by incorporating multiple door panels behind the walls! To see these, you should plan a full day for this museum. We arrived early in the morning so that we could get on the list for a free tour later in the day. So after lunch we went back to the museum for a "Drawing Office Tour".

The Drawing Office,
Sir John Soane's Museum

The Drawing Office was the creative heart of Soane’s home. Since there was no formal education for architecture when Soane began, it was important to him to teach basic architectural styles and concepts to young people. In this office his pupils would work on architectural projects and could be inspired by his collection. The office includes the original tools and casts as well as furniture. 

Autumn 🍂 is here!
Lincoln's Inn Fields

And decorations for the holidays are already on show!

Selfridges Christmas storefront

Selfridges Christmas storefront

Christmas lights

Hamleys toy store

Hamleys toy store

Paddington Bears

The Victoria and Albert Museum, a museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, was founded in 1852 and named after Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Its collection spans 5,000 years of art, from ancient history to the present day, from the cultures of Europe, North America, Asia and North Africa. 

Victoria and Albert Museum,
South Kensington

Chihuly glass installation,
Victoria and Albert Museum

I especially enjoyed their collection of jewelry. Prince Albert designed this coronet for his wife, Queen Victoria. It was one of the most important jewels worn by the young queen. 

Queen Victoria's
Sapphire and Diamond Coronet

After Albert's death in 1861, Queen Victoria was grief-stricken and for years could not face the public ordeal of the ceremonial Opening of Parliament. But in 1866 she attended the event wearing this diamond & sapphire coronet. It remains an enduring symbol of their love.

Check-out this gorgeous display of rings!

Ring display at
Victoria and Albert Museum

This extraordinary Helmet shell was probably carved in Naples, Italy. 

Carved Shell of Diana at the Hunt, about 1850

The British Museum, established in 1753, is dedicated to the story of human history, art and culture from its beginnings to the present. 

British Museum

We are finding that some of the largest museums are providing online "routes" or "trails" that offer self-guided tours virtually or on-site. These "trails" help to lead one through the museum by highlighting popular objects. 

There's no way I can capture all of the amazing items we saw. So, as a retired librarian and for my librarian friends, I have selected the following favorite to share:

Ashurbanipal's library (partial)

Ashurbanipal, the last great Assyrian king, reigned from 668 BC to about 630 BC. He wanted access to all knowledge in his palace, so he collected thousands of tablets of literary works written in Mesopotamia, writings on divination, astrology, medicine and mathematics. Basically, he created the world's first library!

Close up of some of the tablets from Ashurbanipal's library

Sadly, Ashurbanipal's library was destroyed in 612 BC. Only about 20,000 clay tablets survived the destruction. Librarians in the British Library are currently working on translations and cataloging of the remaining tablets.

Examples of cataloged tablets from Ashurbanipal's library

Our current adventure ends here in London. It's time to return home so we can plan our next adventures!

Thank you for joining us this year. We're always looking for fun things to see, even at home. So check back here from time to time to see what else we've been doing. 

Ciao, αντίο and cheerio for now! 👋