Meeting a Friend of Aesop

George & Yorkie love swimming, so even though they'd just swum off the ferry slides, they were keen to come with me to the official swimming beach. As it was the other side of the 'town' to the harbour, it gave us a chance to have a decent stretch of the paws, and size up the tavernas, before selecting one for our evening meal.

Just before the swimming beach we had a real treat. We came up to a small white washed church which was rather sweet in its own right. But our attention quickly shifted to the grounds of the church when we saw who was out for a post siesta stroll.

What a simply gorgeous tortoise, and what a shame it is that you don't see them very often nowadays. A veteran bear such as Ungi, can remember going over to his minder's grandma's house when his minder was a small girl and seeing a tortoise wandering in the garden. That was many years ago though, and George, Yorkie and I had never seen one before, so we were completely enthralled by the sight. 

Eventually we tore ourselves away to walk the final few yards to the swimming beach , and what a fine beach it was.

We blend in rather well with the rock but hopefully you've spotted us. It was great for drying of our fur. The water was so clear and quite warm so we didn't need our snorkels to see what was underneath us.

What with sailing, swimming and walking, we were getting quite hungry. We saw a pig being spit roasted on our return journey and decided that was the place for us to eat - but first things first, it was beer o'clock! 

Lots of love, Eddie, George & Yorkie xxx 

Small is Beautiful

By now you should have a good idea how lovely many of Menorca's sandy beaches are. However, in the case of Menorca, it is definitely the case that 'small is beautiful' and the beaches that we fell in love with were the small sandy inlets that we found on a walk close to the small town of Es Grau. We'll show you what we mean:


We've said it before, but we'll say it again, don't you just wish you were there?

Our rock was great to perch on after a swim and allowed us to dry in the sun without getting our wet fur too sandy. We don't want to think that we're fussy and fastidious, but we knew we had a lot of walking ahead of us and gritty fur can cause chafing!

Talking about swimming, we're sure we'll tempt you even more when we show you where we'd been swimming just a few moments earlier ...


Our guide book used the word 'exquisite' and we couldn't agree more. And the real bonus was that we had it all to ourselves. Mind you, had there been anybody else about we would simply have moved onto the next beach as there were more than enough to go around!

Lots of love, George & Yorkie xxx

Kings of the Castle

While the reason for us being in Poland was to see the country from two wheels, it was good, now and again, to have a break from cycling to do some sightseeing and to find out more about the history and heritage of this great country.


Quite early in the week we cycled to a castle where the Hungarian nobility used to live when the part of Poland we were passing through was part of Hungary. This was the castle of Niedzica and a very fine castle it was too.

The cannon outside the castle was a bit of a disappointment though especially to Yorkie who fancied impressing the rest of our group with his human cannonball stunt.


As you can see the barrel had been filled in with wood. We did think about burning it out so Yorkie could do his stunt but we decided that was a bit drastic and as it was a boiling hot day we simply hadn't got the energy.

As it was so hot we were able to take advantage of the fact that the castle was situated on the edge of a big reservoir and go for a swim. Although reservoir swimming is often prohibited at home, for obvious reasons, it was o.k. to swim in this Polish reservoir - we weren't breaking any rules. Mind you, our fur was so sweaty from the heat and the the 3km uphill pedal we'd just done that the water would have needed a good clean and filter once we'd been it! The cool off, though, was just what we needed and made us feel like new bears again.

Lots of love George & Yorkie xxx