“We don’t have to travel to see castles,” I remind Mimi. “We have Hatley Castle in Victoria and Casa Loma in Toronto.”

“Prague Castle is older,” says Mimi, “and it’s one of the top ten things to do when you’re in Prague.”

“So?”

“So we’re in Prague,” says Mimi. “It’s going to be sunny. You should wear a hat.”

A FEW YEARS BACK, we had gone to the south of France. Uncle Leroy had sent the family a postcard from Nice, and Mimi thought we might find the Crow bundle in the Picasso Museum in Antibes, which was just up the road.

I didn’t have much hope. “The big Picasso Museum is in Barcelona,” I reminded Mimi, “and we looked there already.”

“Picasso was influenced by African art,” Mimi had countered. “Good bet he would be interested in something like the Crow bundle.”

“Picasso was in Antibes for less than a year.”

“More than enough time to talk Uncle Leroy out of the bundle.”

Of course, there was no way that this could have happened. Leroy would have been in Nice around 1904. Picasso didn’t get to Antibes until 1946. By the time the artist took up residence on the second floor of Château Grimaldi, the Indian would most likely have been dead.

But we caught the train from Nice to Antibes and spent an afternoon at the museum. Mimi liked La Joie de Vivre. I liked The Goat. We both enjoyed the view of the Mediterranean from the sculpture garden.

Afterwards, we wandered the town.

“Nikos Kazantzakis’s house is around here someplace,” Mimi told me. “Maybe we can go in, and you can channel your Greek side.”

“Kazantzakis?”

“According to the guide, Kazantzakis wrote Zorba the Greek while he was living here.”

“In Antibes?”

“And there’s a square named after him just off the Rue du Bas Castelet.”

We wandered around some more, until Mimi found the house.

“Do you feel any Greek literary zeal swelling up inside you?”

There were no signs to indicate that we could tour the place, and I was just as happy to stand outside. Mimi walked up the path to the front door and looked in a couple of windows.

“‘I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.’” Mimi took my hand, and we strolled back to the port. “That’s the epitaph on Kazantzakis’s grave in Heraklion. What do you want on yours?”

“‘Dead,’” I told Mimi.

“Bird, that doesn’t sound like an epitaph. That sounds like a complaint.”

Port Vauban in Antibes is the home of the Yacht Club d’Antibes. It’s the largest marina for luxury boats and yachts in the Mediterranean. Mimi and I took our time walking around the outer ring of the harbour.

I had Mimi stand by the seawall so I could take a photograph.

“Any one of these yachts,” she said, “could feed a small country.”