Wales loves its artists. That’s easy to say with the likes of actors Richard Burton, Anthony Hopkins and Michael Sheen all hailing from the South West Coast of Wales, near Swansea. No artist, however, commands a deeper place in a Walesian’s heart than poet and writer, Dylan Thomas.

Nena Anderson is in constant motion. She has to be. She has a garden and confesses “I like to cook out of it.” There are also two dogs, three chickens, teen-agers, a husband and five on-going, musical projects. Six, if you count her collaboration on Alex Woodard’s, For the Sender.

The Palladian Traveler heads 50m below the surface to discover well-kept Soviet art as he joins countless Muscovites as they commute via the museumesque Moscow subway system.

A Gathering of Eagles; A Pride of Lions, or a Flight of Airline Pilots; any of which might well be a description of an aviation heaven that’s about 50 miles from London, and is only 45 minutes by express train. It’s also far better known as the Imperial War Museum (IWM) Duxford.

The Palladian Traveler takes a bullet, a bullet train that is, as he rockets out of St. Petersburg and arrives in Moscow just in time to take a sunset stroll with seven very tall sisters.

Echoes of time linger over Westminster City, the stunning architecture of its historic buildings emerging above the Thames as if preserved in a time capsule. The celebrated London Marriott County Hall overlooking the south bank of the Thames with its immense palatial columns and façade give it a demeanor of both strength and influence in keeping with its role as the historic seat and stronghold of the London County Council.

The most depressing place on the planet is my hometown of Seattle in the month of January. The December holidays are over with January’s grim back-to-realty winter looking us straight in the face. In Seattle that generally means endless light showers and a sun that has completely disappeared. But leave it to the Canadians who embrace the long winter months of ice and snow with celebrations that warm both the heart and soul.

Well, it’s been a week. And once again I find myself sitting on the park bench in Vevey, Switzerland next to the statue of Charlie Chaplin, with whom I share the panorama of shimmering Lake Geneva and the pristine snowcapped Alps in the distance.

Even for those already in the climate choir, Jane Fonda’s sermon last month at the National Press Club is well worth your time to read or watch and listen to. I’ve logged loads of press club luncheon speeches over the years. This was one of the finest I’ve heard.

Its 2020, so it should be perfectly clear to you there is simply no better way to start the decade than with a new project from Sue Palmer. She continues to mine her four decade, freakishly large catalog of music in order to provide us with Gems: Volume 2.

The Palladian Traveler dusts for prints as he goes in search for the facts surrounding a whodunnit murder committed down in the bowels of an aristocratic residence along the banks of the Moica River in St. Petersburg.

Just a pleasure visiting the wayback, remembering my daughter’s first far-flung travel. And a chance to reprise it for Christmas and New Years wishes from the original Santa Claus. Many lay claim to the origins of the Santa legend, but St. Nicholas, of the ancient city of Myra in Turkey, is the real deal. Trace them back, most other countries’ Santa legends are spinoffs.

I am a hiker. But at home, no one uses a machete to blaze the trail prior to walking on it as Souza, our Amazon guide, did, creating a path in the overgrown rainforest step by step. Slicing, swatting, swooping, chopping, no branch, bush, vine or twig was safe.

To cineastes, Chaplin is more than the man who created the iconic Little Tramp, but one of the greatest filmmakers of all-time. Legendary film critic and father of American auteurism, Andrew Sarris, places Chaplin in his pantheon of the 14 most influential American film directors in his still ground breaking book, "The American Cinema: Directors and Directions 1929–1968."

There’s a word in the heavy metal music lexicon, shredding, which denotes exceptional mastery of a musical instrument. The decks of a Royal Caribbean ship are alive with the sounds of shredding on this warm February afternoon as I make my way around the 70000 Tons of Metal theme cruise that’s in full swing.

Like savoring caviar and vodka, one cannot come to Mother Russia without attending a ballet, and this is why the Palladian Traveler files his ninth dispatch from inside the ornate Hermitage Theatre as the lights dim and the curtain goes up on Swan Lake.

A warm wind blows across Lake Geneva, which I find both soothing and invigorating. Soon I’m amidst the steep terraced vineyards in the UNESCO region of Lavaux, the largest contiguous vineyard area in Switzerland. Terrace after terrace of vines surround me. It has been said that the vineyards in Switzerland's Lake Geneva region is blessed with three forms of sun...

It’s probably the most unusual, even weird, tourist attraction you’ll ever come across. The fact that the motivating force that moves it forwards and backwards is about as powerful as a “Made in the West” lawnmower is equally bizarre. Yes, its power (?) plant is a 500cc two cylinder stroke engine.

Yes, of course, the four Central European capitals we visited on our Danube River Cruise with Grand Circle – Prague, Czech Republic, Vienna, Austria, Bratislava, Slovakia and Budapest, Hungary – all wrapped in wonder, overwhelmed with their impressive history, expansive promenades and architectural grandeur. But it was an experience in Linz in Upper Austria that most impacted me.

From the shaded balcony of the elegant Coral Stone Club, the brilliant green of towering palms waving in the offshore breeze and the soothing rush of foamy sea swirling onto the shores of Seven Mile Beach form a dramatic backdrop to a preeminent Grand Cayman dining excursion.

Ask the general populace to name a famous painter, and they’d probably say Dutch painter, Vincent van Gogh. Today his paintings command staggering purchase prices, with his Portrait of Dr. Gachet, painted the last year of his life in Auvers-sur-Oise, selling for 152 million dollars in today’s currency.

On my recent visit to Castilla y Léon, Spain, my fifth to the region, I knew there were so many new things to see and do, as-well-as so many I’d done before that I wanted to do again, that I couldn’t possibly fit them all into one week.

Here are a few great items to have on your next travel adventure. When traveling, space is limited, here are a few wonderful and useful items to take with you.