Hit the Ground Walking
 The first thing I like to do when I arrive in a new place, after securing a place to safely lay my head, is to head out and walk. No map, no destination, no expectations—just walk. On the functional side of things, it really connects with and orients me to the area. But it also serves to help me truly be in a place, rather than experience it through the lens of whatever guidebook, website, or friend's recommendations I have gotten. Just walking allows me to follow whatever minor whims occur at the moment and see where they take me. There's always time at the end to visit any highlights just walking might have missed.
Take Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, my current whereabouts, for example. Today, my first day here, I must have walked at least 8 miles, and I saw a lot. Of the "you should see this" list, I happened upon the presidential palace, Independence Park*, the malecon*, and the Columbus Lighthouse*. But I also happened on all sorts of other cool stuff, like this crazy Ricola statue* and this amazing fort/castle, places I probably would not have found if I was on a mission to any place in particular. I had lunch at a place that's never been mentioned in a guide book* and got lost resulting in the opportunity to practice my Spanish in asking for directions home. And I earned the 3 ice creams I stumbled upon. Yep, this hit-the-ground-walking routine really works for me. My feet my be tired and my socks more pungent than normal, but I wouldn't have it any other way. |
| Wednesday December 10 2014 | File under: travel, Dominican Republic |
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Sony Pictures Studio Tour
 When you are in the LA area, it's kind of a rule that you've gotta do something Hollywood-y. If you're in town to do a taping of Wheel of Fortune, it only makes sense to have your Hollywood-y thing be a tour of the Sony Picture Studios in beautiful(?) Culver City.
While the price tag on the tour was a little steep, I justified it as a way to get a little more comfortable with all things Lights Camera Action, before I had my big day. But it was really just an excuse to do something that I knew would be really cool, and it totally was. The coolness fell into two different categories. First, there was the "I've always wondered how they did that". One example of that was the sound effects room, a room filled with all sorts of crap with piecemeal flooring, where they record everything but the dialog. Super interesting. Or the sound mixing room. Or sound stages with sets*, green rooms, etc. The other coolness category was the "I know that thing/place from TV/movies!". There were old movie props, building facades, and more. It was neat to see how often a certain building would be reused for different shows, scenes, etc. But really, the crowning glory of the tour was being able to see the sound stage where the Jeopardy! set was set up. There was a neat museum documenting memorable moments, history, etc. There were replica lecterns*, rows and rows of Emmys, and a life size reproduction of the Man himself. I was in hog heaven. Someday I will be back here as a contestant. But until that day, this tour was good times! Seeing how movies and TV are made is fun! Rubbing elbows with the stars...' assistants' valets, so much history, and lots of behind the scenes anecdotes made the Sony Picture Studios tour a great way to spend an afternoon! Plus it took my mind ever so slightly off my big day of taping the following day. Yikes! I mean, Yeehaw! |
| Monday July 14 2014 | File under: travel, USA |
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Standby
| Killing time in an airport isn't the worst way to spend an afternoon. It isn't the best, but it isn't the worst. And I seem to be doing that a lot recently. Not because I've been travelling more, but because of how I've been traveling. Through the generosity of a friend, I'm in the in-crowd, able to hop on flights for free or little money (provided it's the right airline) without jumping through the hoops of time-sensitive fares, blackout dates, etc. Yes, I'm a travel companion!
The upsides of this arrangement are many. There's the whole cheap cheap travel, of course. And then there's the way the airline folks treat one of their own. I've had so many great experiences, esp. with the ticketing and gate people. And maybe they're this nice to everyone. If so, I didn't notice until now. And with the cost of travel a non-issue, freedom of travel increases. Hop to San Francisco for an evening? Why not? Weekend trip to Hawaii? Alhoa! But as with anything, there are downsides. The two biggest for my situation are this: the airline I get to go free on has a business model that isn't conducive to flexible travel. They serve small airports via hubs and don't do any connecting flights. This works great if I'm just going Bellingham to Vegas or LA, but doesn't work well if I want to head to the east coast. It can be done, but it involves overnight layovers and transfers in obscure midwest locations. But the biggest downside is what has me killing full afternoons in airports unexpectedly: I only fly standby. It seems when I was flying via traditional paying means, none of the flights I ended up on were fully booked. There was always one seat to be had somewhere. But now, a full 25% of my flights have been booked to the point of leaving me waving to them from the airport while they taxi away. It's not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but it can sure throw a wrench in one's planning*. So here I continue to sit, poaching free wifi and counting heads as the waiting room fills up, hoping there will be one measly seat for little old me. |
| Sunday February 23 2014 | File under: travel |
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A Brief Visit to Madison
 The happy coincidence of having family in the same city as a well known juggling festival led me to hop on a plane and bounce on over to Madison WI for the weekend, a place I've always wanted to check out anyway. The verdict: pretty dang neat.
Seeing the midwestern version of a juggling festival was interesting. Madfest, now in it's 47th year is pretty big as far as juggling festivals go. Lots of people, lots of talent, and lots of age diversity, which was really nice to see*. And while between the awesome show and all the happenings in the gym, there was plenty of great stuff to watch, the overall vibe was a bit cliquey. I mostly juggled by myself* and am looking forward to getting back to the awesome Bellingham club meeting to get my fill of high level passing. Aside from the juggling festival, there was lots to do and see in Madison, and I had a great tour guide and host. We walked the city in freshly falling snow, sampled a bit of the local cuisine, got a geocache(!), saw Cora's school, and much much more. It was the perfect taste of the place and it has me looking forward to coming back someday. In short, my time in Madison was awesome. Getting there and back, however, there were a few more ins and outs. But that'll have to wait for another post. |
| Monday January 20 2014 | File under: travel, USA |
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Panama Pictures
Here are my leftover, didn't-make-the-blog-elsewhere-but-are-still-neat-and-I-want-to-share-them pictures. I attempted a creative way of showing them, like I have before (here, here, and here), but I'm afraid this country silhouette collage method falls a little short. So instead, why not go ahead and click on any tiny picture below (or here) and scroll through them using the good old fashion lightbox slideshow. Included is a little blurb about each picture. You could even think about it like 13 instagram posts in one! Enjoy!              |
| Sunday December 15 2013 | File under: travel, Panama |
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Chronicling Travel
| When one returns from a wonderful trip, there are lots of memories that will stay for a life time. Then there are the other memories, the stories that get lost when recounting the adventure for family and friends, and after telling more or less the same account of the adventure, get lost even to yourself. So has been so many of my adventures; if it didn't make it to the blog*, it sometimes just slips away.
Since travelling with Della, she's instituted a great new travelling habit, one that I plan to implement on whatever adventure I am on from here on out: chronicling. At the end of each day, we record what we did that day. It's amazing how even little notes about the day can remind you of some story or adventure that didn't make it from short term memory to long term. Here's a couple examples from this latest Panama trip (augmented with photos of course): Day 8: Wednesday 20th
- pancakes - awesome bike adventure, "¡somos los batidos!" - geocache, binocs, Trump tower, threw pennies in fountain - empenadas - taxi to parque metripolitano (opted out of paying, walked short trail then into long walk home) - long walk home (jugglers, Della's scary neighborhood, turned down ride from cops, cheap taxi home) - Batidos! and park - Dinner @ Mac n Cheese place (Tapas) Fue delicioso - Evening walk through pleasant neighborhoods Day 6: Monday 18th
- Eaten by bugs, poor sleep, hot, buggy, kind of miserable, full of bites - We like fry bread! - Ate ceviche in grass...Della tried it! - Our dude rode us across in his boat - Bussed to Porobello (tiny internet place) - Bussed to Colon (walked to train station, didn't get shot :)!) - Train w/ 27 Frenchies...oui oui! - Della saw a crocodile (or 2!) - Awesome train ride - Haggled w/ cab driver - Found awesome hostel (Luna Castle) - Crazy ass rain shower - Cheap ass dinner - Wren snored As you can see, it pretty much covers the bases, sometimes a little too much. But having this record will be great in 25 years when we head down to Panama again. After all, it will be very important to remember "Somos los Batidos!" (Note: Della has been doing her own blogging about our trip and it is totally worth checking out. But please pretend all the photos for this post weren't stolen from there. Thanks!) |
| Saturday December 7 2013 | File under: travel, Panama |
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Tropical Waters Trifecta
 While I'm not a beach person the way some people are beach people, I've been known to enjoy a good beach every now and again (as testified to in these previous posts: A Day at the Beach, My Kind of Beach, and Beach life (is the life)*). And since it seems somewhat of a sin to go to the tropics and not enjoy the beaches, I made it my goal to complete the Tropical Waters Trifecta*: Gulf of Mexcio, Caribbean, and the Pacific.
First stop, Venice Beach, Venice, Florida*. While initially reluctant to get in due to the overcast skies, I instead busied myself with searching for shells, walking the beach, and lounging. But just as we were starting to pack up, I felt inspired and dove in*. I'm so glad I did. Bobbing in the waves (and rinsing away 2 days of travel grime) was a great start to the trifecta. Next, 1225 miles SSE, I tested out to the waters of Isla Grande, just east of Colon, Panama. The warmer water made entry much easier, but the best beach on the island charged a day rate we weren't into paying, so we grabbed a quick dip on various other corners of the island. On the plus side, while the beaches weren't great, we did manage to find a mini-beach all to ourselves at a closed down resort (which required crossing the island by foot through some pretty neat rain forest jungle). And since a deserted beach tops a beautiful beach for me most days, I greatly enjoyed phase 2 of the trifecta. A quick hop across the isthmus, the last stop on my tropical waters trifecta was Isla Taboga, Island of the Flowers. We came to this island just to get a final day of beaching in and we weren't let down. Although I had to stay huddled in a tiny shade patch, I often popped down to the water for a quick soak. And since my shade patch was hammock ready*, my lazy beach day was perfect. While none of the beaches I visited would be mistaken for the best each area has to offer, they were definitely good enough for me. Now just to figure out where the next beach trifecta will be... |
| Sunday November 24 2013 | File under: travel, Panama |
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Coast to Coast By Train
 Sometimes, when traveling, there are things that cost more than you want to spend but something tells you to just go for it. The trans-isthmus Panama Canal Railway definitely fell into this category for me. Although the cost was about 10 times what a bus to travel the same route would have been, I love riding on trains. So with the coaxing help of Ms. Della, we decided to do it....and boy was it awesome!
While the route doesn't exactly parallel the canal, as one might assume from the name, it goes through jungle, over swamp, and along the canal for a stint. We saw a crocodile(/alligator?), jumping fish, wild banana and other fruit trees, and some of the coolest terrain I've seen in a long time. We were constantly running from one side of the train to the other to take it all in. And speaking of the train, it was gorgeous. With exotic wood paneling and dark stylish lighting in the passenger cars and a dome topped viewing/cafe car, it was meant to mimic the experience of riding the trains of yore, when train travel was more than just a means of transportation. Although a picture doesn't do it justice in the least, we tried. But despite the lavishness, Della and I mostly hung out outside to take all the scenery in. When train travel combines with awesome scenery and some wicked interesting history, it makes for something really remarkable, something that's worth the extra money. Finding gems like these is a big part of what travel is all about. |
| Wednesday November 20 2013 | File under: travel, Panama |
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Oops We Did It Again
 Oops, we did it again. We went on another international, dirt cheap, one-way cruise. Two cruises in 6 months seems like it is setting a bit of a bad precedent. But what can I say? They are good fun and a good value.
This cruise was a 3-day Miami to Colon, Panama. Three days is hardly enough to even find your groove in the ships routine, but did our best. We ate good, watched some shows*, and generally had a great time. Second time around, cruising lost a little of it's magic. Or perhaps it was just this cruise: the food wasn't as great, the shows weren't as fun, and the ship wasn't as awesome. But the second go also afforded some great chances for comparison* and also a head start on knowing the ropes* But just because some of the magic was gone doesn't by any means mean that I didn't enjoy myself...because I totally did. Highlights included watching "Wizard of Oz" on a giant outdoor screen while in the hot tub, seeing Cuba off the starboard bow, watching the pilot disembark in high seas, and shuffleboard! And, to top it all off, I'm in Panama! (more on that soon) |
| Monday November 18 2013 | File under: travel, cruise |
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Travel Lists
| I'm a bit of a list keeper, as anyone who has spent any time on my blog knows. I have a list of books I've read, of places I've slept, of states and countries I've geocached in, and more. So it's only natural that I keep travel lists. I was prompted the other day to review a few of my travel lists and I thought they might be fun to share here.
First off, my countries/territories visited. Why "countries/territories"? Well, it's a funny thing. Should Tahiti be the same thing as France? Or how about Hong Kong and China? Political designations are complicated. So instead of categorizing them myself, I'm using a list from the Travelers Century Club, a group dedicated to this kind of thing, of which I hope to someday be a member. While I may not agree with 100% of territory distinctions (Turkey in Europe vs. Turkey in Asia, e.g.), it is a somewhat official and current list that is easy. My current count is 47, which ain't bad if I do say so myself. I look forward to seeing it continue to go up over the years. Maybe when I hit 100, I'll have a party!
The other travel list that I very much enjoy keeping is one I've posted about before. It's Hillman's Top 100 Wonders of the World, a list of some dude's best places in the world. The list includes most of what you would expect from a "wonders" list: pyramids, Great Wall of China, Taj Mahal, etc. There are also some lesser knowns. I check out this list before I go anywhere just to make sure I'm not missing anything. My count of Hillman's wonders is at 39, having added only 13 in the 6.5 years since I last posted about it. I guess I'll have to step up pursuit of that one, a challenge that I'm happy to pursue. Anyway, here's my list. As with last post, feel free to post your list/numbers in the comments below.
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| Saturday November 2 2013 | File under: travel |
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