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Patrick W. O'Bryon
Writer. Traveler. Europhile, especially Italy and France. Hobbies: rescuing animals from abuse, abandonment and mistreatment, and being sous chef around the kitchen to my chef de cuisine wife.
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Corridor of Darkness, A Novel of Nazi Germany (paperback)
Category Archives: European Travel
AN ALL-TOO-BRIEF VISIT TO CARMEL-BY-THE-SEA
Carmel-by-the-Sea. Ridiculously charming. Incredibly costly (a nice 1500- square-foot bungalow might be yours for only $1,200,000, but wouldn’t you prefer a great ocean view at $5M or, hey, why not $10M?). But all so full of character it’s well worth … Continue reading
MY CAREER IN THE MILITARY: PART FOUR: Patience as its Own Reward
(For those of you who haven’t been following stories of my short-term military career in the 70’s, you may want to read the earlier postings to bring you up-to-date before tackling this one.) Now I’m sitting pretty with orders to … Continue reading
Posted in European Travel, Memoir, Travel Memoir
Tagged Army, army life, Army training, Fire Direction Control, Fort Sill, Germany, Iron Curtain, military draft, military training
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PRAGUE REDUX: How Things Have Changed
Some of you may recall an earlier travel memoir (How to Risk a Stretch in Soviet Prison under “Travel Memoirs” to the right) detailing the misadventures of leading a group of college students through the ice- and communist-bound Prague of the … Continue reading
Posted in European Travel, Travel Memoir, Uncategorized
Tagged Beer, Charles Bridge, Czech beer, Czech Republic, Europe, European travel, Hotel Leonardo, Prague, U Valsu, Vltava
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AN ITALIAN EVENING: What’s not to love?
A mild, late-September evening in Grottaferrata. From the ramparts of the great medieval abbey your eye is drawn down to the city of Rome, and it’s easy to imagine the ebb and flow of heavy traffic, motorcycles and scooters daring … Continue reading
WHY VENICE STILL CALLS OUT TO ME…
Venice, Italy…7 a.m. Children laughing on their way to school, backpacks flapping as they run across the Accademia bridge. A bakery displaying fresh wares, the narrow street still dark, the shop’s windows warmly lit and calling the passer-by in. Street … Continue reading
Posted in European Travel
Tagged Donna Leon, Espresso, Europe, European travel, Grand Canal, Inspector Brunetti, Italian travel, Italy, Venice
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HELLUVA WAY TO FIRST SEE EUROPE: The Seagoing Life’s Not for Everyone
I awakened to total silence. I had fallen asleep to the raucous laughter, boozing, amorous groping and other fulfilling activities which mark a last night at sea with a shipload of grad students, all off for a year in Europe. … Continue reading
OF COURSE IT’S SAFE TO DRINK THE WATER…An Adventure in Old Spain
The whole second half of our Spanish journey hadn’t gone exactly as planned, so why was I surprised to wake up to a smiling physician about to inject me in the butt with a huge hypodermic needle? After all, only … Continue reading
Posted in European Travel, Travel Memoir
Tagged Alcazar, Benidorm, Cadiz, Costa del Sol, European travel, flamenco, Morocco, Seville, Spain, Spanish customs, Spanish travel, trichinosis, Water poisoning
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