Hola Pandas!

We’re reporting in from sunny Spain! I gotta tell you, I am so happy to be on stable ground once again. That boat ride left me overall a bit queasy!

Poor Max. He got sea sick. His face was all green the entire ride and he spent most of the time with his head over the railing, if you know what I mean…

I felt so bad! I just couldn’t take this back and forth and back and forth. Have any of you ever been on a ship before? You must know what it’s like.

Luckily you’re all better now.

Thank goodness for that.

We’re in Sevilla right now. I just have to learn how to do flamenco dancing, but first I need an outfit. I dragged Max along to go shopping with me. It was kind of funny – he sat on a bench outside of the changing rooms and then I put on a little fashion show for him. I never knew shopping with a boy could be so much fun!

It was a bit stressful for me to tell you the truth.

Okay, we’ll rest a bit after your stressful day.

Hasta luego,

Max and Ella

Hey Pandas!

We’ll go ahead and get right to the point. You remember our clue, don’t you? It’s a riddle:

To find me, look for the tower that chimes.

(Just so you know, the rest of this clue rhymes).

You could be eating some cake, some crumpets, or tea,

But don’t be surprised if you bite down on a key!

The next day, as Big Ben struck 12:00 noon, we realized that this was part of the clue! We knew we had to get to that clock as fast as we could, so we ran like the wind. Good thing I wasn’t wearing my wooden shoes from Holland!

When we got there, we saw a street vendor putting together his stand.

Max gave him a funny look.

I didn’t know what to ask him.

But it wasn’t really necessary. The street vendor knew what we were up to and addressed us himself: “Ahhh…you’re the two detective Pandas, eh? I have something for you. Hope you like it!” He gave Max a piece of chocolate cake and disappeared.

I hadn’t eaten anything all day and my stomach was grumbling like mad. The cake looked so delicious and I just had to take a bite. Right when I was about to sink my jaws in, I heard Ella yell: “Max! No! What if it’s poisoned? Don’t you know never to take food from strangers?”

But it was too late – the lovely chocolate was melting in my mouth and I felt like I was in heaven. I chewed a bit when suddenly – CRUNCH – I but down on something hard and spit it out immediately. It was a key. Ella thought it might open up the Big Ben tower, so we went over to give it a try.

We went to the tower and started climbing the stairs to the top – no easy feat! There was a locked door, so we put in the key and turned it slowly, not knowing what awaited us. The door unlatched and we went in. We entered into a giant, empty room. In the middle there was a package with a note on it: “For Max and Ella”. It was wrapped like a present. Ella’s eyes widened and she got excited: “Oh! A present! For us?”. She pulled on one end of the bow, and then POP – out jumped a clown doll with the black notebook in its hands!

That was all a bit creepy, but we were glad to have found the book. We went back to Scotland Yard to report of our success. We told them all about the clown, the key, the cake, and the clues. They said that the thief was a well-known riddler that liked to cause people problems and send them around all of London looking for clues. The man to whom the notebook belonged was overjoyed: “Thank you two so much! The secret address of my daughter is in this book! She lives in Mexico and I would not be able to contact her without it. Hey…aren’t you two going on a trip around the world right now? If you happen to end up in Mexico, could you give this letter to my daughter? I don’t want to send it in the mail – that’s too dangerous. I trust you two. She’s a rather messy-looking girl who goes around all day eating chilied grasshoppers.”

Of course we took the letter and agreed to fulfill our duty. We hadn’t planned to go to Mexico, but I’m sure it’s nice there. As long as we don’t drink the water.

First we’ll travel to Spain to work on our Spanish a bit. We’re going by boat, so it might take a while.

Have you found the postcard from England yet? Hint: Look in the foliage.

Be good Pandas,

Max and Ella

Hello Pandas!

We read your comments and appreciate all your help trying to figure out the clue that we were given. It helped us out a lot!

Max proved himself to be a real detective. He donned his detective hat, took out his magnifying glass, lit his bubble pipe and went off to investigate the streets of London. But he didn’t seem to find a thing. Not one clue.

We were searching high and low and finally came to cross Tower Bridge. Have any of you been there? The bright blue bridge in the middle of the city. Anyway, a wave of people suddenly came towards us and we had to do our best to fight against the crowd. This wasn’t easy for Max, who still had his snout to the ground with a magnifying glass.

Then we heard a man’s voice from the crowd: “This Big Ben sure does make a lot of noise!”. Big Ben? That had to be from the clue!

Max stood straight up on the bridge in order to get a good look at Big Ben. That’s the tower with the giant clock.

Right at that moment the clock was ringing 12:00 noon. We read the clue again:

To find me, look for the tower that chimes.

(Just so you know, the rest of this clue rhymes).

You could be eating some cake, some crumpets or tea,

But don’t be surprised if you bite down on a key!

We knew then that we had to get to Big Ben right that second!

Phew, I have to breath deeply to calm myself down. I just get so excited thinking about it again. We’ll tell you on Wednesday how the rest of the story goes!

Be good Pandas,

Max and Ella

Dear Pandas,

As you may or may not know, Max simply cannot get enough of detective stories. That being said, we just had to go to Scotland Yard. Ever heard of it?

I thought that maybe they could use a hobby detective such as myself. After all, I am pretty much the Sherlock Holmes of Panfu.

Don’t get ahead of yourself now, Sherlock. We don’t know how this’ll turn out.

We’ll find the thief. I just know it!

Okay, let me back up and tell you Pandas what we’re talking about.

Yesterday, while we were at Scotland Yard, a very mysterious man came down the stairs. He wore dark glasses, a hat that covered half of his face, and a black trench coat. He looked our way and seemed to recognize us immediately: “You’re Max and Ella from Panfu?” he asked. “Good that you showed up – I could really use your help. I’m looking for a thief. A small, black journal was taken from my desk. The notes that I put in that book are very important. The thief left the following letter behind.” He pulled out a piece of paper and we read the following:

To find me, look for the tower that chimes.

(Just so you know, the rest of this clue rhymes).

You could be eating some cake, some crumpets or tea,

But don’t be surprised if you bite down on a key!

What? Can you Pandas figure that out?

The man in Scotland Yard didn’t know anything else and said: “I’ll leave this in your hands. Please find this journal or else…I don’t want to think about what will happen.”

Okay, let’s think about what this cryptic letter could mean. We’ll get back to you Pandas on Monday. Maybe we’ll have figured it out by then.

Be good Pandas,

Max and Ella

Good morning Pandas!

We’ve been in London the past few days and it’s been jolly good fun. I always wanted to see the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. Do you know what that is? It’s basically a shift change for the guards there. They change out regularly so no one gets too tired. Protecting the queen must be an exhausting job!

Yeah, I didn’t expect her to have so many guards. They came in a big troop with drums and trumpets! And then they wore these big, fluffy hats. They looked pretty funny.

There were a lot of tourists there along with us that wanted to watch. At one point, I lost Max in all of the hubbub. As all of the tourists were leaving, I found him once more and do you know what he was doing? He was standing in front of one of the armed guards making faces!

Hey, I heard that they weren’t allowed to react at all to it. I just wanted to try it out. While I was sticking my tongue out at him, his eyes suddenly traveled over to mine and gave me a horrifying look. I got really scared and decided to go find Ella…

We were looking for each other and then BAM, I ran into something. It was Ella and we had both fallen hard. I think the guard must have been pretty amused by it all.

I wouldn’t be surprised! Tomorrow we’re going to Scotland Yard. We’ll tell you soon how it turned out!

Be good Pandas,

Ella and Max

Hello Pandas!

Yesterday we went to the Louvre! Do you know what that is? It’s the most popular museum in all of Paris, maybe even in the whole world. We just had to go, but we didn’t expect it to be so huge. It’s massive.

After a few minutes Max seemed a little bored from looking at all the art and shuffled his feet from one painting to the next. He was so exhausted from the whole ordeal that his eyes slowly began to shut and the next thing you knew, he was sleeping – while standing up! I watched him from afar and noticed that he swayed a bit from side to side. He finally grasped out for something to lean on and brushed against the wall, but as soon as he started leaning on it a loud ring filled the entire hallway. He had set the alarm off!

Just because I wanted to lean on a wall. Since when is that a crime? I didn’t even do anything. The guards came up to me and started shaking their fingers and telling me something in French that I didn’t understand. I tried to respond back in English, but they just kept yelling at me in French. I felt kind of bad, so I didn’t touch the walls the rest of the day and avoided eye contact with the guards.

But you sure were awake after that! Especially after you saw that one painting…what was it?

The Mona Lisa! It’s basically a duplicate of the Panda Lisa. I guess the painter of the Mona Lisa must have been in Panfu at sometime and liked the picture quite a bit. With a face like this, how could you not?

That’s the one. Max just stood there, staring at the painting with eyes wide open, mouth a bit parted, a bit of drool glistening from the corner of his mouth. I think I heard him mutter the words “She’s so beautiful” to himself. He just couldn’t stop staring – it was as if he was hypnotized. I don’t really think she’s that pretty.

You jealous, Ella?

What?! Me?! Jealous?! Never.

I’m not so sure. What do you Pandas think?

Let’s just change the subject. Have you received our postcard from France yet? It should be there by now. Have you found it?

Tomorrow we’re going to England! We’ll tell you about it on Friday.

Be good Pandas,

Max and Ella

Bonjour Pandas!

We finally got to Paris and it is so beautiful here! The City of Love! (sigh)

Yeah, Ella’s been walking around this whole time as if she were dreaming. Her eyes are big and bright and she’s always smiling.

It’s always been my dream to go to Paris and now I’m finally here! (sigh)

Ella, stop sighing. Did you already forget how stressful it was to get to the top of the Eiffel Tower?

Yeah, I agree, I had some problems. But I just had to wear my wooden shoes from Holland, no matter how much they hurt! We are in one of the most fashionable places on earth and I didn’t want to be stared at. I mean, really Max, think of how ridiculous I would have looked if I were a regular Panda NOT wearing wooden, painted clogs!

Well I think you got stared at anyway as you climbed the stairs. You had to take such wide steps so your shoes didn’t fall off. That was pretty funny to watch, actually.

We eventually ended up walking on all fours because we were so exhausted. We didn’t think there would be soooo many stairs. We were almost there when Ella suddenly began to shake. Her knees turned to jelly and she refused to look anywhere besides her own feet. “C’mon, Ella, let’s enjoy the view!” I shouted. But Ella kept looking down and stuttered, “I…I…Max, I don’t know why, but I…I…just can’t look!” I couldn’t believe it. Ella was afraid of heights!

I was never so high before and didn’t know it’d feel like that. Do any of you Pandas know what I am talking about? When you’re suddenly really high up and then get scared?

We went down a bit later, but this time with the elevator. We’ve been careful to avoid places high in altitude ever since. Ella’s still on cloud nine, however, and is totally happy to be here.

(sigh)

…and sighs every five minutes.

We’ll be staying here a bit longer. Tomorrow we’re going to the Louvre to see the Mona Lisa! I can’t wait!

Be good Pandas,

Max and Ella