A Pile of Rocks on the Side of the Road and Other Highlights is a travel journal of the daily adventures taken by Taco, AKA Sandy, with her husband Vidal on their two month European vacation through nine countries, that doubles as a non-traditional guidebook. Taking from her daily journal the highlights of each day, each country and each place visited, Sandy has put together a compilation of 45 humorous stories of their adventures to places such as, but not limited to: England: The pile of rocks of Stonehenge; Italy: Dragging luggage over a thousand bridges and a cheap ride on the beautiful canals in Venice, Florence- the city of David, Pompeii- the city of the dead, a long hike on the crooked path to a crooked house of a crooked ruler and the best sandwich in the world in Capri, piazzas, fountains, roaming the Roman ruins and the best restaurant in the world in Rome; Spain: Gaudí, Picasso, and whipping coins at human statues on Las Ramblas in Barcelona, racing to get to the Alhambra in Granada, around the roundabout with Clark Griswald: Hey kids, Giralda! Cathedral! and foot stomping flamenco in Seville, the candy cane arches of the Mezquita in Córdoba, fighting Don Quixote's giants in Consuegra and running with the bulls, tripping with Sandy in Pamplona; Switzerland: the ice cold lake of Ascona, the Alps with Heidi and the Cheesemaker; Amsterdam: Anne Frank, Rembrandt a Van Gogh museum not shaped like an ear and falling asleep on a canal cruise; Belgium: a beautiful square, a peeing boy and a food fest in Brussels; Denmark: a special visit to the land of Sandy's ancestors; Paris: An expensive glass of wine and a beer, Bastille Day and chaos in the streets; Vatican City: Raphael and Taco's soapbox in the Museums, the angel guide of St Peter's, when God's hands command the paintbrush - Sistine Chapel Throw in a few friends and cousins, some interesting trivia and a bit of Sandy's self-described overactive imagination and you will have quite a ride in this read!
About the Author: Sandy was born with a pad of paper in her right hand and a pen in her correct hand. If the pen and paper were missing, a book would certainly have been in its place. Growing up, she wrote stories and newsletters for her family; years later her love for writing would find its creative outlet in letters and emails. Thanks to the joys of the Internet, her emails turned into travel stories written to the masses of friends and family who were anxious to hear about her escapades in Cuba, and her fame began as a travel writer, at least within her own circle. Her friends and family encouraged her to keep the stories coming when she and her husband spent a couple of summers in the Yucatan Peninsula, where she explored the area while her husband worked. When she and her husband planned a vacation to Europe in the summer of 2004, the most important item she packed was a blank journal to document every experience to later weave into the much requested stories. Sandy is a native of Chicago, of Mexican-Danish-Lithuanian heritage; her nickname of Taco dates back to her teenage years as a result of part of her heritage and her love of the Mexican delicacy - that, and the fact that neither she nor another Sandy T. desired to be called by their given name of Sandra, and one of them would need a nickname. She began traveling at the tender age of 6 months, although her next flight would not be until her teenage years, when her mother forced her to go with her to Mexico City and Acapulco for a week, and there, her love affair with travels in Mexico began. After a decade of vacations traveling to various parts of Mexico, she finally realized her dream and moved there in 1993. Since then, her travels have extended to Mexico, Central America, Cuba and parts of Western Europe; Greece, Israel and Egypt top her list for future adventures. She and her husband Vidal reside in his hometown, the beautiful port of Zihuatanejo, Mexico. Her hobbies continue to be writing, reading, traveling, pretending she is an archaeologist, daydreaming of becoming a Pulitzer Prize winning photographer and volunteering at their church.