During our recent visit to Italy, my daughter Rachel and I negotiated a travel package, two days of battlefield tours in exchange for the tiny country of San Marino. Rachel has made it her mission to visit all of the countries of Europe that participate in The Games of the Small States of Europe during her four-year teaching assignment at the NATO school in the Netherlands. She has done very well so far with 9 of 10 visited to date. She is only missing the smallest, Vatican C

As part of the deal that has allowed me to explore the battlefields from Rachel’s base in Maastricht, Netherlands while she teaches at the NATO school, we have gone somewhere a bit warmer and much sunnier for Christmas. Last year we had an excellent tour of Croatia and this year we toured Malta and Sicily. Malta was my idea mostly because of its importance in WW2, and Rachel tacked on Sicily as her 2024 New Year’s Resolution was to NOT be in the Netherlands at New Year’s. Th