Expected to hit the maximum of grape varieties yesterday in my blog on Sardinia. But clearly had not done my research. On Corsica, there...

If you hoped that only Sicily is hanging on to its historic grapes, wait until we arrive in Sardinia. You may not have heard of...

Having talked about corks and bottles yesterday, I won’t be able to avoid the topic of wine – as you will discover, the islands and...

When sailing along the coast of Sardinia, we probably won’t see the Oak forests, which cover around 90’000 hectares of the island or 4%...

This will be my last blog about important people of the Mediterranean – I know there are many more but it is time to return to other...

Over the last 20 blogs I mentioned the name of Charles V. numerous times, often in a very specific context. Time to devote a full blog to...

Not everybody will be happy with my choice of person today: Pope Pius V. He was Pope and Bishop of Rome from 1566 – 1572 and probably one...

Most people won’t recognise the name of Piri Reis, or Captain Piri, the Turkish Admiral and cartographer to the Sultan, unless you are an...

In most of Europe and the US, Andrea Doria may not be a famous name. But in Italy it is. Who has several ships named after him? Most...

On our journey from Genoa to Sicily we will cross the path of some famous people who at one point in their life were busy in the area. Am...

`In our journey to discover the cuisines of our 2020 sailing we finally arrive in Liguria our place of departure on 11 July. With the...

Over the last two weeks, I must have talked every second day about galleys – at least. Definitely did so yesterday. Time to describe how...

Today’s blog is about Sicily’s Cuisine. As we have seen in previous blogs, the island was settled by Greek and Phoenicians about three...

In one of my 2018 blogs I talked about the logistics of feeding ancient Rome and reached the conclusion that it needed about 365’000 tons...

Ten days ago, I wrote about the Phoenician traders who ventured into the Western Mediterranean in search of silver and tin. They found it...

After yesterday’s foray to the Green Sahara, it is time to return to Berber Culture and the Tunisian Cuisine. We will return to the...

Intended to write about the Tunisian cuisine today. But given that I have not been there for 47 years, I only have a faint recollection...

When people talk about North Africa, they mostly think of it as desert, tourist resorts with sandy beaches and decade long and never...

Ended my last blog with the question why the mariners of ancient Phoenicia and Greece ventured west despite the risk of sailing into the...

Ever wondered how the Phoenicians and Greeks sailed in the 8th - 6th century BC to the western Mediterranean? We will be crossing these...