MatthewCroucher

Dear Max and Dominic, I have been missing you boys very much and I know you have been missing me too. This week especially, when I have been thinking about you both my heart has been swelling up in my chest with a yearning to hold you in my arms. I want to hear all your stories without the barriers of distance. Justin and I are both looking forward to coming home to you and to our families and friends after this Big Adventure, and we are looking forward to Christmas at home and to a beautiful New Zealand summer together. We hope you have enjoyed reading about our travels. Ci vediamo! See you very very soon! Never forget that I love you both very much, Dad.... read more

Dear Max and Dominic, Do you recognise those names? Did you know that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were named after some of the most famous artists of the Italian Renaissance, that time 500 years or so ago when there was an explosion of creativity in just about every part of city life here in Italy? Last weekend was our second to last one together in Italy so we decided to have an Art Weekend and visit three of the most beautiful and famous art galleries in the world. They are famous because they all do a remarkable thing - they show the most stunning art from the Greek and Roman worlds of around two thousand years ago with the best that the Italian Renaissance came up with around five hundred years ago. And they do ... read more

Dear Max and Dominic, The week before last we went to a town in Spain called Seville because I was booked to go to a conference about how to help older people with brain problems to get better. Have you got the postcards I sent you yet? Seville is famous for all kinds of things but something that you see absolutely everywhere is tessellated patterns. Max knows all about tessellation and has even practised making tessellated designs with Nan and Grandad's spirograph, but you might not know what it means, Dominic. Tessellation means joining small simple shapes together to make big repeating patterns, without any gaps. It's fun! Have a look at some of the tessellations we saw. Most of these pictures are from the old royal palace in the middle of Seville. These tessellations were ... read more

Dear Max and Dominic, There's a part of northern Italy that has captured the imaginations of many people that have visited this country: Tuscany. It's a region of rolling hills going down to the sea, with beautiful villages, towns on hill-tops and green farms with lines of tall, thin cyprus trees marching up the ridges like soldiers that haven't quite realised that the Roman empire has actually ended. The most extraordinary thing happened in this part of the world between the 14th and the 16th centuries - suddenly a surprising number of clever people started making buildings, sculptures, paintings, books and laws that were different from anything that had gone before and often amazingly beautiful. It was like a supernova of human creativity. And it was all centred on a small part of northern Italy. We ... read more

Dear Max and Dominic, Last Thursday it was a public holiday in Bologna because it was "La Festa di San Petronio" so we went to explore our city a bit more. We are starting to understand better why this city is such a good place to live (although right at this exact moment, at midnight on Sunday night with pretty awful loud Italian music coming from the apartment right next door so I can't sleep, I'm not sure everything about Bologna is so perfect). Scattered through the city are lots of little places called "Piazze" or piazzas. Not "pizzas", but places like the Square used to be in Christchurch. They usually have a cafe like the one in the picture and they are surrounded by nice old buildings. The one in the picture had some very ... read more