Back in the very early 60s there was an uninhabited islet off the west coast of Greece by the name of Skorpios. It was wild, with neglected olive groves, and its asking price was ...

Gstaad—Can somebody tell me when was the last time America got it right? Uncle Sam’s track record in selecting leaders in faraway places reminds me very much of my own, where ...

Gstaad—In this freewheeling Swiss village of the 1950s, the unconventional was the norm, monumental drinking commonplace, but the manners of the players were always impeccable. ...

Porto Cheli—Nothing is moving, not a twig nor a leaf, and I find myself missing the cows, the mountains, and the bad weather. The sun has become the enemy, a merciless foe who ...

Porto Cheli—I have been thinking about my children and my own strange boyhood as I gaze up at the clear blue skies of summer. Summers lasted an eternity back then, and by the ...

I am looking out my window at the green landscape and forested mountains rising beyond, as peaceful a scene as there is in this troubled world, but this is Switzerland, a country ...

One event I regretted missing on my last visit to London was a party at the Polish Club, which has been refurbished and has a new Polish prince as its president and has good Poles ...

I write this on July 14, France’s big day, and on the 25th anniversary of my father’s passing. He died at dawn, on the bicentennial of the uprising, as if he couldn’t bear ...

Island of Rhodos—When I’m on the water, I feel I was born to it. Yachting has always been a way to enjoy the sea and the nature associated with it. The motion through water, ...

To Fort Belvedere for a ball that most likely will discourage any more balls because of its brilliance and perfection. Galen and Hilary Weston, who lease the historic house, once ...

When I hear the words Sykes-Picot I more often than not feel like punching an Englishman or a Frog—any Englishman, any Frog—in the mouth, but then I think of François ...

As everyone who has ever joined a club knows, Pugs is the world’s most exclusive one, its 19 members varying from German nobility and Greek and Danish royalty to the British ...

Gstaad—A slight bump at 30,000 feet concentrates the mind, as the good Dr. Johnson said about an appointment with the gallows. Halfway over the Atlantic and lost in a fantasy, I ...

Last week in the Bagel, and then London here I come. As I write, hundreds of thousands of Jews are marching up 5th Avenue for “Salute to Israel Day.” They have been marching ...

New York—Here’s a question for you loyal readers: If a fellow asks his wife to cook him a hearty meal of goat meat and she serves lentils instead, is he within his rights to ...

So the wedding of my little girl to Andy Bancroft Cooke went off without a hitch, a wonderful ceremony in a beautiful Catholic church off Portman Square and even the weather ...