The distance the glacier has slipped in the last few years can be seen in a string of openings like portholes in the side of the mountain. Each one was once the entrance to a seasonal attraction, the Ice Grotto, which is re-carved out of the center of the glacier every summer. The Mer de Glace shifts up to 293 feet (90 m) per year at the center and 390 feet (120 m) at its steepest point as the ice melts and the weight of the glacier moves it along the valley. The cave itself is shifting one imperceptible centimeter per hour or 9.5 inches per day. So every year when the operators show up to where the entrance was last season, it has floated 146 feet (45 m) downhill out of reach and they start all over.

The visible evidence of this mountain of ice slipping away has added some urgency to my desire to see the Mer de Glace and the Ice Grotto while traveling in the area. This is what motivated me to get in touch with the tourist office at Chamonix to see if I could squeeze in a visit while I was a couple hours away at the La Roche Bluegrass Festival with my French friends Corinne and JB.

We were already attaching two days in Geneva to our visit to La Roche Sur Foron and had less than a day to devote to Chamonix before we needed to be back in Grenoble. That would have been ample time to visit the Mer de Glass, even in the height of summer.

The complication came when the Chamonix tourism bureau offered me a complimentary tram ticket to the Aiguille du Midi (th…

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I was hoping to get through this weekend at the La Roche Bluegrass Festival in La Roche sur Foron, France, without getting wet, but it seems to be part of the festival tradition for a few showers to put in an appearance. I’m sitting in the VIP tent listening to the French band, Lonesome Day and watching French school children dance in circles as the sky opens up. It doesn’t phase the band or the kids. Audience members pull out umbrellas and ponchos and hold their ground through the end of the set.

I’ve just wrapped up an interview with guitarist Jean-Paul Delon, guitarist for the French band, Bluegrass 43, the longest-running bluegrass band in France, and gotten a lesson in French bluegrass history. According to Delon, the music’s popularity can be traced back to Roger Mason and Steve Waring playing hootenannies at the American Center in Paris in the late 1960′s, followed by French finger picking artist Marcel Didi and the movie Deliverance.
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It’s not just French bluegrass musicians rocking the stage. According to Festival founder Christopher Howard-Williams, 12 countries are represented this year. There are American guest bands headlining, but the Czech musicians are a dominant presence on stage and in late night jam sessions that taper off toward dawn.

The American band Hickory Project, from Pennsylvania, has been here all week conducting instrument workshops for European musicians at a variety of skills levels. For the community and visitors who come in from surrounding towns and cities, it’s all about the summer fun.

“Bluegrass brings joy and good spirits to La Roche sur Foron, and you can’t help having fun when you hear the music,” says Mayor Michel Thabuis in his fo…

Things to Do on a Rainy Day in Florianopolis,
Santa Catarina, Brazil

Florianopolis Features:

• One Very Rainy Day in Florianopolis

• Caboclo Coffee Experience at Andrade Mill and Old House

Going Solo:

• Plaza Itapema Resort & Spa

If You Go:

• Florianopolis Hotels and Restaurants

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Story and photos by Kayte Deioma

Even though I write for Rainy Day Traveler, I prefer that it doesn’t rain when I’m on the road. It just makes the trip all around easier. But since I do travel for Rainy Day Traveler, I at least pack appropriate rain gear to go out and get the story. So waking up at the Majestic Palace Hotel in Florianopolis in the state of Santa Catarina, Brazil and looking out my 14th floor window at the lashing rain, I think to myself, what a perfect day for covering things to do in Florianopolis in the rain.

Despite being the state capitol, Florianopolis, or Floripa to locals, doesn’t have any large museums, usually a safe bet in inclement weather.

The Beiramar Shopping Mall is just across from the hotel, but there is no challenge in that. So I circle on my tourist map all the tiny museums and landmarks that look like they might provide at least a few moments respite from the deluge. With my heavy duty rain poncho covering both me and my backpack, and my camera in its own rain jacket, I go forth.

Under clear skies I would walk the distance to my first stop, but I am happy to have a taxi drop me off at the Sant’Anna Fort and Arms Museum, also known as the Museu da Policia Militar. The one-room fortress, with a strategic row of canons overlooking the North Bay at the foot of the Hercilio Luz Bridge manages to keep me dry for all of about 15 minutes. With a couple dozen antique weapons and a couple military uniforms on display, I am more interested in capturing the dreary view across the bay to the other side of this divided city.

The Andrade Mill and Old House is preserved as a working manioc mill, still powered by animals, as it has been since the Azoreans first began growing and grinding manioc here in 1748. The grinding of the manioc, or farinhada, is a community event that brings the whole neighborhood out to the farm to sing and dance while the animals grind the manioc into flour.

Eduardo Vieira is translating for me as we tour the mill. Claudio and Ginha speak only Portuguese, a language I haven’t yet mastered. Claudio’s ceramic sculptures and tiles are incorporated into the architecture and displayed in various nooks and crannies. Another curiosity is a collection of costumes and props from the local Boi de Mamăo folk festival.

After we’ve explored the mill, we get down to the business of coffee. The first stop is to check out the coffea plants growing in the courtyard of the Old Mill House. The plants are about 7 or 8 feet tall and loaded with berries (also called cherries) in varying stages of ripeness, but mostly pretty green.

We follow our guides to a trough filled with ripe coffee berrie…

A concerted zen mindset lets me ignore the discomfort of walking on rocks as I make my way slowly around the knee-deep loop of the meditation pool. The rounded stones are designed to massage your feet, but mine are saying ouch – in a good way. I’m not complaining. No one is forcing me to walk this watery path. I’m just doing my best to experience all that Plaza Itapema Resort and Spa has to offer.

Itapema is tucked along a stretch of Atlantic beach just off Brazil’s highway B 101 about an hour up the coast from Florianopolis, in the southern state of Santa Catarina, Brazil.

On the day of my visit, most of the guests at the resort’s Brain Spa are there for a health and fitness makeover. One couple from Argentina is on an annual pilgrimage to try to drop 10 or 20 pounds in a week. A group of young women friends are attempting a last-ditch effort to get the bride among them into a smaller wedding dress. A couple from Sao Paolo is here just to enjoy the pampering and take a brain break from stressful jobs as psychiatrist and attorney.

Unlike my fellow guests, who are here for a full week of fitness classes, health food and four spa treatments a day, I am trying to cram as much activity and pampering as possible into my last day in Brazil before my long flight back to LA.

OK, not really so much activity. I’m completely ignoring the golf course, tennis courts, volleyball nets and rope challe…

Florianopolis Flights:

Search for flights to Florianopolis from multiple carriers on Travelocity.com.

Florianopolis Hotels:

Majestic Palace Hotel
Av Beira Mar Norte 2746
Florianopólis, SC 88015-702
(48) 3231-8000
www.majesticpalace.com.br
A four star high rise in the Beira Mar area of Florianopolis overlooking the Bay.

Costao do Santinho
Est. Vereador Onildo Lemos, 2505,
Ingleses, Florianópolis, SC 88058-700
Reservations: 0800 48 1000
www.costao.com.br
Book through Travelocity.com
A mega beach resort and spa at the edge of the rainforest  on the northeast coast of Santa Catarina Island with golf course, rainforest challenge course, surf school, dune surfing, yoga and fitness classes and live shows and entertainment.

Plaza Itapema Resort and Spa
BR 101, Km 145
Itapema, SC 882200-000
(47) 3261-7000
Toll Free in Brazil: 0 800 707-5292
email: reservas.spas@plazahotels.com.br
www.plazahoteis.com.br/_english/itapema.html
Health and fitness spa and resort on the mainland, north of Florianopolis, all-inclusive rates with golf, tennis, spa treatments and more.

Florianopolis Restaurants:

Ataliba Churrascarias
Av. Gov. Irineu Bornhausen, 5050 (Beiramar Norte)
Florianopolis, SC
(48) 3333-0990
http://ataliba.com.br
A traditional Brazilian churrascaria known for their artistry with grilled meats.

Search for Florianopolis Hotels on Otel.com.

Vacation Home Rental -  2 bedroom villa just a few steps from the beach

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Kayaking on the Carson river.

Photo by Kayte Deioma

Reno Features:

• Things to Do on a Rainy Day in Reno, Nevada

Kid Stuff:

• Gaming for Kids in Reno, Nevada

Going Solo:

• Spa Bliss at the Siena in Reno

If You Go:

• Reno:  Hotels and Restaurants

For more things to do in the rain in Reno, go to Reno Rainy Day Links.

The city of Reno, Nevada, best known for casinos and quickie divorces, has been remaking itself more in keeping with its adventurous surroundings and family values. While the casinos are still there and the divorces still available, the proximity to Lake Tahoe has fostered the expansion of every kind of outdoor activity imaginable, including a whitewater park on the Truckee river right through the center of town.

“The biggest little city in the world,” as Reno calls itself, boasts 300 days of sunshine a year, perfect for such outdoor adventures, which is why people can be caught off guard when the weather decides to act up. While there is certainly more to do outdoors here than in, there are plenty of indoor options beyond the casinos to keep the whole family entertained.

The Nevada Museum of Art, founded in 1931, is one of the oldest art museums in the west. Its new home, designed by architect Will Bruder and completed in 2003, has become one of Nevada’s most important structures, and with its curved black façade and slatted windows is as much a work of art as any of its contents. The museum hosts a variety of traveling exhibits as well as rotating selections from the permanent collection of predominantly western artists. www.nevadaart.org

The National Automobile Museum (The Harrah Collection) will take you back in history to the invention of the automobile and follow its progress through time. One-of-a-kind custom creations share space with vehicles that survived exciting historic feats. Street scenes present cars of different decades parked along a typical street with fashions of the day in storefront windows. You can watch cars being restored in the working garage, or play a game of ‘pin the part on the M…