I’m incredibly fortunate to work for a company that gives its employees in US a sabbatical. This means that I am eligible for an extended paid time off to get recharged for work.

Our last sabbatical was in 2004, and our family of four arranged a “something for everyone” trip. This included visits to Japan, China, Thailand, Italy, Austria, Germany, France, England and Disneyland. This combined with a solo camping trip to the Oregon Outback. It was an amazing and memorable time.

Now that our kids are adults and on to their own lives, it’s just my wife and I, and we’re being a little more focused. I call it the TIFO itinerary:

Turkey – two weeks driving around the country with my sister and her husband

Israel – a week driving around and hopefully hitting some spots in Palestine and perhaps Jordan

France – driving around some of the wine country, Rhone, Burgundy, Champagne

Orlando – to visit our daughter who will be working at Disney World

Departing mid-April. I’ll try to post things online as we go.

On our last Sabbatical, I was able to run every day with a one rest day per week. I hope to do the same this time.

I spent the majority of the last quarter of 2012 traveling, mostly business but also a little vacation. I always like to run outside when I can, even on business travel. I’ve usually been pretty good on those trips to keep to my running regimen.

But with the cold weather where I was going (Finland and Romania) and with the shear length of the travel, my coach pretty much gave up on improving my running. I concentrated instead on shorter “maintenance” runs, most often on the treadmill.

This week, back at home, I have been trying to get back into a more regular training rhythm – a 14 mile training run on Saturday and a 7.5 mile group run Tuesday up-and-down some longer hills.

• I tried to do the long run easy, and I was able to keep a reasonably good pace for most of it, even running a couple of the mile splits at a sub eight minute per mile pace. Endurance was of course the challenge, and was definitely starting to run out of gas towards the end.
• The hilly Tuesday run was more of a challenge than I thought. The faster group runners were setting a fairly steady eight-plus minute per mile pace up hill. I was seeing some definite challenge keeping up with their pace in both strength and aerobic capacity.
• On the plus side, my nagging summer injury – a sore plantar fascia – seems totally healed now. I felt absolutely no soreness, even with the long pounding downhills.

So I’m a victim of the effects of de-training. There will definitely be some serious work I will need to put in to get back leg strength and aerobic capacity. But on the good side, I’m much healthier than I was only a few months ago.

Dr. John M Stewart, 1925-2012

It might be viewed as a down note by some, my Father died at the dawn of the year. But Dad lived to a good old age and made a number of achievements in his long life. His children are accomplished and launched on their own paths and he had a tremendous impact on the world. It’s understandable to dwell on the fact that he died around Christmastime, but in fact I loved the way our family came together to celebrate his life, create a memorable photo montage, and the three of his children actually spent the evening together without our spouses to run interference, though not without a little conflict. This was quite a milestone for us, so I actually have warm memories of the end of Dad’s life. Rather than ruining the year, I think it gave the year a bittersweet start.

Our beautiful children, who are both legally adults now – are getting themselves ready to launch into the next phase of life. Although both of them are over 21 now, I can’t seem to recall where that time went. And I keep being reminded that US rental car agencies really don’t consider them to be adults until they are 24, so maybe I can consider myself a kid for a few more years.

Laura, top of the Space Needle

Laura is in her senior year of college. She is on track to finish her undergraduate degree early in 2013 and start a stint with the Disney College Program in Orlando. This is a dream internship for her and should give us a good opportunity to visit her while she is there. We’re really proud of her and the work she is doing to chart a direction for her future.

Anne’s big milestone was finishing her undergraduate degrees in English and Japanese. We’re really excited about her future as well, though she is currently seeking what her post-university work will be. Besides a great education at University of Oregon, she has terrific communication skills and has been doing work for the past three years doing tech support for the U of O Library. We’re very proud of her accomplishments and I am quite confident she will get set soon someplace exciting.

Cook Memorial, Hawaii

Deb and I had a chance to get away a couple of times this year. We had never been to Hawaii before, and we decided that with the stress around Dad’s death we should get away from Portland for an actual vacation during the springtime. Thanks to great friends, we were able to rent a condo for a discount on the big island and enjoy the sea, mountains, volcanos and coffee.

La Sagrada Familia, Barcelona

We also got to spend a week together in Barcelona. This was someplace I had wanted to go for a very long time, so this was a kind of dream come true. The architecture is a particular attraction here, and we were really entranced by La Sagrada Familia, the Gaudi cathedral under construction. This was also a great way for us to experience Spain, its food, culture and wines. We got out of the city a little to explore the sleepy Priorat wine growing region and sample a few of their premium vintages. We also got a taste of social unrest in Spain, as we saw the edges of the national labor strike on November 14.

Deb continues to amaze me and inspire me with her work with the poor and homeless. This year was a tough one in the passing of a formerly homeless friend. Deb continues to work hard with various homeless programs, groups and shelters, all volunteer. She also co-writes the Bible study curriculum for a major church study program, with a great impact on many adults. And she has helped a number of times with young kids teaching them. Deb drove some major home improvement projects in our 25 year old house as well, including a new furnace/AC and roof. Necessary things to address and I really appreciate it.

We’ve had a good time hanging out with running and walking friends, assisting again with Portland Fit which helps people train for the marathon (26.2 mile race). We got to experience a number of fun races like the Hood to Coast Relay, the Portland Marathon (which I ran with our long-time friend, Anne) and a number of shorter sessions. I still have the goal of running faster than 3:20 in the marathon; my coach Nikki helped me a lot this year and I was able to run a 3:30:04 at the Newport Marathon in June. Unfortunately an injury in the very next race knocked my training off track for the rest of the year. But hopefully will get it together in 2013.

Beaune city wall, Burgundy

Barrel tasting at Atticus

That race where I got injured is the “Fueled by Fine Wine” half marathon winding through the vineyards of the Willamette Valley and accompanied by a tasting event. So the running was crap but the wine was great. We had several other fun times tasting wine and hanging out with the region’s winemakers. The Willamette has really grown up in the time we have lived here, and the region’s careful land-use laws have protected small farms and vineyards. Oregon’s winemakers strive for quality over quantity and her Pinot Noirs truly are the best in the world. But better than the wine are the people who make them, most of whom are very interesting characters and great to get to know. We also traveled through a couple of other winemaking regions this year, from the old regions of Burgundy and Chateauneuf-du-Pape to the still developing region of Priorat in Spain.

Romanian King

I did manage to take a few trips this year for business as well. For the first time since the year 2000, I had no trips to China in 2012, so it looks like 34 visits will have to suffice. The reason for the change is that I’m now working closely with folks in Romania. This is a fascinating country, rich with history and culture, whose youth have burst out upon the world stage as they have embraced technology and social media. I look forward to many more productive visits there.

According to tripit.com, I have traveled 85,248 air miles this year, visiting 25 cities and 9 countries. That’s probably a bit higher than average for me, and I expect next year to be closer to normal. Besides Spain and Hawaii, this year was my first visit to Romania, Sweden and Finland.

I continued to write through the year, writing in my personal journal on 181 days representing about 40,700 words. I don’t have an exact count, since I write these all out longhand. They are mostly helping me grow deeper in my spiritual walk, which I consider a really needful thing. I also continued to write in this personal blog, as well as contribute to three other work blogs. I kept teaching this year, and although I don’t have an exact count, I think I taught 6 classes in US, Romania and Finland.

I have the great privilege of working with a group of incredibly sharp, fun, motivated and slightly mental co-workers. There is no doubt that life would be really horrible if I didn’t have such great people to work with. Something I am very happy about, and I know a lot of people don’t get to have that in their work lives, so I consider myself very fortunate.

So even though we had a difficult start to the year, and some hard times along the way, it was a great time to grow where we have been planted and thrive there.

More photos from the year: on my Flickr stream

My usual stereotype of French cooking is not very charitable. Formed by movies like “Ratatouille” and “Babette’s Feast”, I usually think of high cuisine in France as being overpriced, overblown, over-rich and inaccessible to a mutt like me.

What I found after my recent 9 day business trip to southern France was that you can eat well and appreciate local dishes without much of a pedigree. And not gain a hefty waistline in the process.

Not every meal was epic or memorable. Given that this was a business trip and a number of meetings with my US-based colleagues happened at dinnertime, there were more than a few takeaway Chinese meals eaten in front of my computer during a conference call. But I was able to experience a few nice meals and capture a few photos.

Most restaurants will not open until 7PM or 7:30 for dinner, and many people don’t eat dinner until 8 or 8:30. Many offer a “menu” or three-course collection of meals. A lot of the set menus, like the selection of dishes above in Montpellier, are quite hardy. Cassolette is a white bean casserole with a crispy crust and some kind of meat. This is a staple of southern France and is made many different ways. This one had a sausage and a duck leg. Many of these dishes require a lot of advanced preparation, often the day before, to achieve their flavors.

This set lunch in the wine village of Chateauneuf-du-Pape started with a warm goat cheese and pancetta salad, salmon entrée and a meringue for desert, which is a hard crust of egg and sugar with a scoop of sherbet inside. I ordered a glass of local wine and since the bottle was almost empty, they gave me the rest of it.

By the way, and this is important, I didn’t ever feel intimidated in any of the places I ate. Of course, I wasn’t eating in any places with Michelin stars. It’s possible I might have been treated with more contempt if I had been charged 100 Euros for my meal, but I wasn’t paying anywhere close to that. The restauranteurs were generally kind, often a little funny, friendly and respectful.

Down this quiet Rue de Paradis in Beaune, Burgundy is Le P’tit Paradis, another tiny place with a terrific meal. Starter was a pumpkin and chestnut soup with a twist of crispy bacon and a dollop of creme fraiche, and they had me. The lamb leg was over barley. Stunningly good.

But as I said, most of my meals were pretty pedestrian. For example, this place called “The Bagel Store” was within about a 5 minute walk from the office where I was working. This is a local Montpellier shop, and they sport a distinct New York aesthetic. Note that each of their sandwiches is named after a NYC locale, and when lined up they spell “BAGELSTORE”. But apparently they couldn’t come up with a New York location which starts with “O”. So their sliced meat, avocado, feta, tomato and lettuce bagel is called “The Obama.”

I wonder if I should tell them that he’s from Chicago, not New York.

“I’m not permitted to buy any wine on this trip,” I mumble around the rim of a glass. And it’s a very good thing.

I would be much poorer.

Near the French city of Avignon, there is a wine growing region which has benefited as much from history as from its skill in making wine. Chateauneuf-du-Pape (or “C-d-P” as it is often abbreviated) was favored by the popes who lived in France for about 70 years during the 1300s.

As a result of this papal sponsorship, you can usually identify their wine in the shop with the papal seal embossed in the bottle. Very recognizable, and great branding.

The red wine is dominated by the Grenache grape and has a very different flavor profile from either the Bordeaux blends or the northern Rhone Syrahs. I have Cuvee du Vatican in my cellar, which you can get for a fairly reasonable price in US.

A stoney C-d-P field

Supposedly the stoney fields that the grape vines are planted in create excellent growing conditions. The stones retain heat during the day and reflect it back to the vines at night.

The medieval town is crowded around a hill dominated by the chateau itself – a castle built by one of the popes. It’s a ruin now, but a nice hike up through the village to enjoy the nice views of the Rhone River valley.

I had a few hours to drive over and visit the town without much in the way of planning. There is good tasting available here, and a nice Tourist Information Center to get pointers for places to go. One of the wineries has a very nice wine museum with English captions.

There is a cluster of terrific restaurants in the old town and I picked one based on its Yelp rating. I picked the fixed menu choice and enjoyed a fantastic meal in relative calm. Then a group of 15 tourists from Malta dropped in, and I decided it was time to hit the road.

More photos from my Flickr photo stream: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davest/sets/72157632241073485/

“I heard you guys in Burgandy make wine almost as good as Oregon,” I joked good-naturedly with a winemaker. “I thought I ought to come check it out.”

Cote de Beaunes, Burgundy, France

Not all the wine made here is fine. At lunch in a little cafe, I had a glass of Savigny-les-Beaune Pinot Noir, a “village” wine, and it wasn’t much better than the cheap “Burgundy” that we used to have on spaghetti night when I was growing up. But wine drinking is pretty common here: I was in a little cafe in Nuits-saint-Georges at 11AM on a Saturday and there was a line standing at the bar drinking red wine.

The top region in Burgundy for red wine is called the Cote d’Or or “Golden Slope,” a narrow strip of land squeezed between a superhighway and a ridge. It’s only about 25 miles between Fixin and Meursault, which means dozens of appellations are crammed into a space roughly the distance between Newberg and Salem, Oregon, which is probably the best known of the Northern Willamette Valley winemaking regions.

The town center of Nuits St Georges, Burgundy, France

An Aloxe Corton family winery

Aloxe Corton

But Burgundy has it all over Oregon for cute little villages. Most of them date back many centuries. Some of them, like Aloxe-Corton, have plenty of little wineries to drop in and try their wines, allowing tasting for free. But in the traditional price-ranking of Burgundy wines, Aloxe-Corton is fairly low in the list.

Overlooking the village of Vosne Romanee

Tthe top-ranked wines come from a village called Vosne-Romanee. This little village had no place where you could taste for free without an appointment. I suspect that even getting an appointment to taste there would be nearly impossible for me coming from the US.

The main mystery here is that when you are looking at a bottle of French wine in the shops or on a menu, how in the world do you know what type of grapes make up the wine? The labeling laws in France are dictated by law, and are quite strict. But they are so unlike the practices in the rest of the world that it’s really hard to figure out unless you spend quite some time learning it.

One author I know calls this the “Davino Code.” This is because the wines are identified by the village they were made in rather than the type of grapes as they are globally. Key to cracking the code is knowing the villages. You’re supposed to just know that a “Montrachet” is a Chardonnay and a Volnay is a Pinot Noir.

This is why I wanted to come see the villages first hand. I wanted to see the places and meet the people and taste the wines. I wouldn’t mind coming back some day.

More photos available at my Flickr set: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davest/sets/72157632241073485/

This is a little French town with a cute center dating back to medieval days. Like other little towns around the world, this one has friendly people, good food, and a strong tie to agriculture.

Like many towns, this one has a secret under its streets. In this case, the secret tunnels beneath the cobbled streets of Beaune contain wine. Millions of bottles of wine.

The town of Beaune is in the area of France we call Burgundy. For many centuries, Beaune has been the center of winemaking for the region. The various winemakers who owned property in the center started tunneling under the streets and other houses until they have a vast cellar network where they stash their wine bottles.

Some of the wineries have opened these vaults for tours and tasting. For example, at Marche aux Vin and Patriarche Pere et Fils, you are given a tasting device (a tastevin, like you sometimes see around the neck of sommaliers) and are set off to wander the tunnels. These two wineries are built from old churches or monestaries, which creates the experience of wandering catecombs.

The wine tasting is self-serve from the various bottles along the way. I visited Beaune this December, and there were so few other tourists that often I would have this vast basement all to myself. Quiet, dark and a bit dusty, you wander amidst the vast stacks of bottles, tasting wine here and there. This is a totally unique experience from anything you would have in the US. In my country, you would never be allowed to pour your own taste by yourself. Wine tasting is always mediated by someone, perhaps the winemaker for a small producer, or perhaps an hourly worker at a bigger place.

At the end of the trail is always a deal closer who is ready to cash in on your experience. Both of these operations that I visited have no US-based retail distributor. Instead, they are happy to sell cases of wine and ship them directly to you.

This is a business model which seems designed to capitalize on the romantic experience you might have had as a tourist in France. As you wander amongst their cached hordes of slowing aging wine, you might become attached to them and decide to relive the experience for years to come.

Above ground, I stayed in a cozy place called the Hotel Central, which was nicely located in the center and was reasonably priced. There was also a terrific restaurant in the first floor. In the photo above, you can see grape vines crowding over the very walls of the hotel. Even in december, there were some old Pinot Noir berries still clinging to the vine.

You can see more photos of Beaune, the medieval wall and its wine on my Flickr set: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davest/sets/72157632241073485/

I had been warned that Helsinki could be a bit cold in winter. But I figured it just made the people who are there a tougher bunch.

 Well, that’s for sure.

By my standards, it’s been pretty chilly here in Helsinki. It was 18F when I got out at first, and it’s a whopping 7F right now as I am typing this. But that didn’t stop the multiple set of parents with their bundled babes in prams out and about. Or the runners I saw – yes, about a dozen or so runners brazing the cold. Even the bikers – one guy I saw on a recumbent bike with knobby tires on the evening bus I ride I took from the airport. Those are some pretty tough hombres (and chicas too).

I have heard that the Finns as a people take care of each other too. That would make sense – it’s hard enough to get by in this kind of environment. And you never know when you might need someone else’s help.

Besides marveling at the resilient Finns, I also goggled at some of the wonderful sites around town:

• The Cathedral in town is called the Uspenski. It was originally founded as a Russian Orthodox church and is now Finnish Orthodox. You can tell the Russian influence from the gold onion domes. It sits on top of a mighty bluff overlooking the center of town. Actually its on its own little island where there are a number of very cute buildings. So in a way, it kind of looks across the little canal at the center of town.

The interior of the cathedral has an amazing collection of gilded icons of Jesus and various others. The inside top of the dome is a blue expanse filled with stars as if to look up to heaven.

•  At the opposite end of the spectrum is the “Rock Church.” This is a Lutheran church which was hewn as it were out of a solid rock outcropping. The exterior looks quite modest but the interior has a roof spun out of 22km of copper wire.

One local filmmaker had remarked that he was surprised that the church authorities had allowed the church to be built in a round shape, since pre-Christian places of worship were round.

My wife’s grandfather used to say he ought to belong to the round church, “so they can’t back me into a corner.”  Be that as it may, there are plenty of churches in the round all over the world and can have meaning as strong as a square one, or have no meaning at all.

When I visited, it looked like they were getting ready to host a Christmas concert.

• Besides the churches and frozen harbor, there is starting to be a sign of Christmas in Helsinki – Christmas trees, lights were hung over the major streets and stalls were being set up in the main square for a Christmas market. I’m sure there will be more signs of Christmas as the day approaches. But I’m not sure I will be here to see any more of them.

Of course being winter, there wasn’t much sun in Helsinki. In fact, at the height of noon, the sun wasn’t much higher that it is in late afternoon where I come from. In fact, I took a photo at noon today, and the sun looked like it wasn’t going to make it very high.

More photos on my Flickr feed.

High noon in December in Helsinki. At the Cafe Ursula

 

For a runner on a business trip or vacation, the question is always something like, “To run, or not to run.” For me, it’s usually not a question. I try to run wherever I go, unless it’s just totally impractical. As a result, I have had the privilege of running in many amazing places, getting to know the places and people much better as a result.

I’m not training for some particular race at the moment. I went over my travel schedule with my coach and I think she pretty much gave up on me for a little while until I settle down again.

Barcelona has a really nice mix of running opportunities:

• Montjuic Hill was right behind the hotel we were in at the beginning of our trip. This hill is not too drastic, and offers smashing views of the city. I think the total height is maybe only a few hundred feet. I ran up through the old Olympic center with its stadium and pool. I also ran up to the very top of the hill where there is an old castle. From the top, you can access both the city as well as the docks where cruise ships dock.
• There is also plenty of super flat beach running. The beach area runs for about 5K or so and has a very nice boardwalk so you don’t need to slog through the sand.
• One of the main streets is called “Diagonal” and has a nice bike path/pedestrian path down the middle with its own separate street crossings and signals. This means you can cruise pretty much uninterrupted through major parts of the city, only diverting when you come up to a roundabout.
• Another great hill option just off of Diagonal is the Pedralbes area. This has an ancient monastery and some smashing mansions scattered around. When I was running up there, a high school gym class was also running. Feels good to keep up with the young ones!
• We moved into an apartment in the Gracia neighborhood, which was formerly a village outside of the city, but which is now part of Barcelona proper. From here there were some good city running options. One morning in the pre-dawn darkness, I ran past La Sagrada Familia, which was completely dark and not a bit spooky. There are several other options as well from here, like up the hill to Guell Park.
• I also ran down the Ramblas one morning, which isn’t a bad option before dawn. But later on you will be dodging pedestrians.

I didn’t encounter any technical running stores, but there were plenty of name brand running stores in town and there is a Barcelona Marathon, so I’m sure they are someplace.

I thought my mouth was going to explode.

I can’t say I wasn’t warned by the winemaker that this would happen, but it was still a bit of a shock.

Priorat is a winemaking region in Spain and (along with Rioja) one of the top two in the country. There are only about 100 wine producers in the region, and the vast majority are small operations who are working their family’s legacy. One of them is Marc Ripoll Sans. Marc does everything at the Cellers Ripoll Sans – grower, winemaker, sales and marketing. Like the other Priorat producers, his reds are dominated by Grenache, and he has a delightful white based on a varietal called “Escanya-Vella” with very food-friendly acid balance. Marc says Escanya-Vella in English means “choke the old woman” so I guess I will take his word for it. Marc does initial fermentation in open top oak barrels, and the smell in his winery was wonderful when we visited.

My wife and I drove roughly two hours outside of Barcelona up in the hills to explore Priorat. My initial target was to reach the main village of Falset to acquire a winery map from the tourist information office. But when we got there, the office was closed because of the November 14 national strike. So we pushed on to the little village of Gratallops.

I had wanted to visit Ripoll Sans because I had a very nice bottle of their wine before I came to Spain. It is usually a good idea to make an appointment for a place like this but Marc was very nice to let us drop in on him. I wouldn’t recommend our approach, but it turned out to be an amazing win. Marc is a young dad who inherited the business from his family and might some day hand it on to his two-year-old son.

Armed with advice from Marc, we hiked further into the village of Gratallops and found Celler Cecilio. Unlike Ripoll Sans, the level of English here is pretty much nonexistent. But here we we quite fortunate to run into a couple of authors who are writing the “first eno-tourism book on Priorat.” So we got a terrific taste of their wines as well as some of the other typical drinks of the region, straight out of the barrel. One is called “Rancit”, and it’s essentially a big barrel where new wine is added at the top and the old stuff (which is essentially “rancid”) is pulled from the bottom. This was a nice dry aperitif with a nose of sherry but without the sweetness. Then there was something called “Dulcit” which was the sweeter drink.

Then I had the mouth explosion experience. This was part of the winemaker’s 125 year old, 29% alcohol private stock that we tasted out of the barrel. Flavors of tobacco and espresso dominated, but this was like inhaling a strong cigar while gulping an triple shot of espresso. Explosive is a mild term for it.

There is terrific food in these small villages. We dropped into Restaurante Piro across the street from Celler Cecilio. Although there were several fine items on the menu, we stuck with the “special” which included white beans and spicy chorizo, a lamb shank of incredible tenderness and the “house wine.” The olive oils of Priorat are also not to be missed as well as the wines and fine food.

The other Priorat winemaking center we visited was Escaladei, named after a religious school which is now in ruins. Like Gratallops, Escaladei is a very sleepy village. In fact we were there about the time of siesta, so perhaps everyone really was asleep. For the size of the village, Escaladei is chock-a-block with wineries and fine restaurants.

Connecting these somnambulant towns are peaceful and very curvy roads, weaving between terraced grape vines and olive groves. Even if you don’t drink anything, the peaceful country drive is the perfect tonic from the flash and tension of the big city.

I loved our time there, and couldn’t have hoped for a better day, but Priorat probably deserves more time to soak in the culture and meet the farmers, producers and foodies of the region. Fortunately you will find plenty of little inns in the villages to stay for a while. But don’t expect a lot of fancy commercial operations here. A little pre-planning and some appointments would be best.