Québec, capital of New France

Long before Samuel de Champlain founded Québec in 1608, Native Americans inhabited the area that was destined to become France’s toehold in the New World and, eventually, capital of New France. Among others, Algonquin, Huron and Iroquois lived in this area of eastern Canada beside the St. Lawrence since at least 5000 BC. 

When Jacques Cartier arrived three-quarters of a century before Champlain, an Iroquois village occupied the site. By...

In the shadow of Mount Etna

A few of my favorite trips to Italy have been not to the great cultural and tourist centers of Rome, Venice or Florence but to some of the small hill towns found all over Italy. Over the years, my husband, Paul, and I have compiled a list of our favorites: Volterra and Fiesole in Tuscany; Erice and Ragusa in Sicily; Todi and Gubbio in Umbria, and Positano and Ravello on the Amalfi Coast south of Naples.

On a 5-week trip to Palermo, Sicily, in April-...

Norman Palermo

(First of two parts)

Located in the Mediterranean just off the “toe” of the “boot” of Italy, Sicily has been the crossroads for traders, invaders and settlers from other lands for thousands of years. 

There were indigenous groups occupying Sicily when the Phoenicians arrived in the eighth century BC. The Phoenicians originally came from the eastern Mediterranean, from the area that is present-day Lebanon, and settled in, among...