Walking at the Beach - Redondo Beach to Santa Monica, California

This blog post comes to you from the West Coast, specifically Redondo Beach, California. The opportunity to spend a month here with my daughter while she was house-sitting was an offer too good to resist. Given my love for walking by the sea, discovering that there was a beach path all the way from Redondo to Santa Monica was an added bonus.

The Marvin Braude Bicycle Trail runs for twenty-two miles, starting two miles south of the Redondo Beach Pier and ending over two miles north of the Santa Monica Pier. As the house we were staying in was close to the Redondo pier, we made that our starting point.

Walking the South West Coastal Path - Day 6 - Lamorna Cove to Penzance

After our long and strenuous walk to Lamorna Cove the previous day, it was somewhat of a relief to know we only had 6 miles left on our walk, much of it on the flat.



But first, we had one more headland to tackle, involving rocky paths and some scrambling.

Sixty at Sixty - A Challenge

I recently celebrated my sixtieth birthday, an event which has me both wondering where the years have gone, given I still feel much like I did in my late twenties, and excited about what this next decade will bring.

I've always been a restless kind of person, eager to explore, who much prefers to be on the go than sitting still (except when I'm reading or writing!), and loves to learn. Maybe it's why I write fiction, it both fuels my desire to delve into subjects I may never otherwise have considered (forensics, criminal law) and allows me to examine alternative lives through my characters. It's also reflected in my love for travel and walking and a constant sense of wanting to challenge myself to try new activities.


So, to celebrate this big birthday I decided to create an appropriate challenge. I'm calling it Sixty at Sixty, the goal being to complete sixty different activities, big and small, before my next birthday. Hopefully, most will be activities I've never done before, but some could be revisiting those that have fallen by the wayside over the years. Some will deserve a blog post of their own, others probably just a mention but I intend to keep track of my progress on this blog.

I've already got several ideas for places I want to visit and activities I'd like to try, but I'm always open to new ideas, so if you've got any suggestions, please let me know.


Mel Parish writes contemporary fiction with a twist of mystery and suspense. Her latest novel Trust No One is now available from Amazon. 

The Joy Of Learning

The Joy of Learning

"I am always ready to learn although I do not always like being taught."

                                                                                                 - Winston Churchill

Yes, I did just use the words joy and learning in the same sentence!

 I’ve always loved learning though I have to admit school was a disappointment. Maybe it's because I like to work at my own pace, but I always found the traditional classroom setting uninspiring, which is why the quote above resonates with me. 

Walking In The City - New York City

I love walking, whether in the countryside, by the shore or even in the city. I’ve always made a point of walking instead of taking the subway whenever feasible on trips into Manhattan and I thought I’d come to know some parts of the city quite well. A couple of years ago I joined an organization called Shorewalkers which organizes walks in New York City, Down State New York and North New Jersey. What an eye-opener that has turned out to be.

Berlin - The Sweet Side

When you think of Europe and chocolate together (and who doesn’t?) which countries come to mind? Switzerland, perhaps? Or Belgium? How about Germany? Did you know that Europe’s largest chocolate store is in Berlin?

Fassbender & Rausch is family owned and has been in the business for over 150 years and is basically a chocolate-lover’s dream of a place. It claims to be the biggest chocolaterie in the world and, given its vast counters of chocolate confections of all kinds and the rows of shelves of prepackaged assortments and truffles, I’m inclined to believe the claim.

But even if you are not a chocolate lover, it is worth going into the store just to see the amazing models of some of Berlin’s more famous sights, all made out of chocolate.

There’s the Reichstag building:

Or the Brandenburg Tor:

Even the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church  - this was badly damaged during the war but the bombed-out remains have been left standing as a memorial and now has a (very) modern annex built next to it.

And when you have had enough of the chocolate sights, there’s a café on the second floor which mostly sells food involving…. You guessed it…. Chocolate!  Even the main courses have chocolate in them. We were just there for dessert and managed to find some which were not completely chocolate. My choice was the Marzipan Tortchen, which proved to be quite a challenge, but I was determined not to be defeated by a cake.

With hindsight, maybe I shouldn’t have had that AND the hot chocolate with whipped cream!  

Verdict: Well worth a visit.

Running Towards Our Challenges

Yesterday, Drew Faust, President of Harvard spoke at theBacculaureate Service for the graduating class of 2013. Invoking images of the Boston Marathon bombings where both first responders and civilians ran towards the bombings rather than away, she urged the students to run towards the challenges that they would face after college and immunize themselves from the skepticism of “what can one person do?”,  an attitude which can so easily derail good intentions.