From the Washington Post: Across the country, pollen season is starting earlier and intensifying because of rising global temperatures and carbon dioxide concentrations. Previous research showed that pollen season lengthened by 20 days over the past three decades across North America, while pollen concentrations increased by 21 percent. The most affected places were the U.S. Southeast and Midwest. Read on...
Our first visit to Cambridge. We travelled by train from Peterborough, collected a map when we arrived and settled down at Cafe. Euro for a delicious coffee while we planned what to do. We decided on a Hop on Hop off tour which would help us get an overview of the city. £13.50 each and we were on our way. We travelled about half way passing the Fitzwilliam Museum, Jesus College, the Cambridge Uni Read on...
The other day, I came across a statistic that shocked me: Maturin, in Venezuela, is the 5th most dangerous city on earth with a recorded annual 86.45 homicides per 100,000 residents. Caracas, also in Venezuela, leads the field with 119.87. According to United Nations data, a staggering one third of global homicides occur in Latin America even though the just 8% of the worlds population.
There wer Read on...
We were eating breakfast at the very earliest hour of 6:30 am yesterday, but sure werent the only ones. Folks get up early here because the sun does too! We were picked up by van to go to the cloud forest walk.
And what did we learn? That a cloud forest is different from a rainforest – because its where the weather from the Atlantic and Pacific crash into each other. The cloud forest is filled Read on...
Heading down to UCLA for a basketball game is normally a big deal. The Bruins play in Pauley Pavilion, and have won eleven NCAA National Championships, mostly under legendary Coach John Wooden. It was dedicated in 1965, named for UC Regent Edwin Pauley, who matched alumni contributions. It was renovated in Attending a game there, despite the teams modest success of late, is still quite magical. I Read on...
I decided to spend my last full day in UAE visiting Abu Dhabi. It is about a 1.5 hour drive from Dubai. The roads were great and the traffic was pretty light. Abu Dhabi is the political capital and makes up 87% of the land area of UAE. Their population is 2.2 million. No surprise that oil is over 50% of their GDP followed by construction.
Our first stop was the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque.The mosqu Read on...
During all of our travels over the last 20 years, we have always strived to do more than sightsee, and truly experience the culture of the places we are visiting. What better way to fully emersed in the local culture than by the food they eat? Today, was a day devoted to total emersion in the food of Mexico.
But first, alarms went off at 5:30, sounds early, but I had the best night of sleep since Read on...
WED, 03 AUG 2022 – Day 4: An Irish Fjord, Connemara National Park and picturesque Westport - We will ‘arise and go now through Yeats country before heading for Westport, nestled between the Carrowbeg river and in the shadow of Croagh Patrick. Connemara National Park is calling and The Lost Valley, a deserted famine village where the road literally runs out. As we plough through rugged Connemar Read on...
Well the storm forecast kept changing and making the storm later, so maybe we could of walked today and got to another hotel for the storm to in overnight, but, then we would have missed out on the amazingly special day we ended up having with Pedro and the restaurant hotel staff.
Catching the bus with Pedro to the capital Jaca, he then showed us round the city including the fort, massive cathedr Read on...
I read an interesting article this morning about tourist trap restaurants. I think we have all had some experience with such a place. Anytime the chef is more famous than his food, I begin to worry and will not eat there. Places like Wolfgang Puck, Moritmoto, Bobby Flay, Paul Prudhomme, Alain Ducasse. I prefer the places, the authentic recipes. old fashioned style cooking. So, what should the war Read on...