A friend of mine is writing a fictional memoir of her mother's life. It's fictious because she is imagining the specific details, but the big picture events she is writing about, for the most part, happened. One big picture event was when her mother went to Madeira on a Canary Islands cruise as the personal maid of a wealthy woman. My writing group feasts on the details.

While doing research for the flavorful details she could add in to make the story about her mother's trip more vivid and real, my friend came across information about wicker basket toboggan rides in Monte. This was a memory jog. Her mother told her about these when my friend was growing up. Even though my friend's mother may have whizzed down the streets in a basket built for two years ago, you can still do this.

It took looking at this You Tube video for me to fully get the picture. This looks like a blast and funky enough that if you go here, you just have to do it. Here's Louise Douglas's account of her Canary islands travels. In her article, "Boatgirl," she fills in details about her experiences that includes this ride.

Filed under: Arts and Culture, Learning, Stories, Europe, Spain, Video