Eerie underwater sculpture finished in Caribbean

by Sean McLachlan on


If you go diving off Isla Mujeres near Cancun, Mexico, you’ll see more than the usual coral reefs and colorful tropical fish. You’ll see a ghostly crowd of people standing on the bottom of the sea.

Silent Evolution is the creation of Jason de Caires Taylor, who specializes in underwater sculptures cast from real people. Taylor uses inert, PH-neutral concrete that doesn’t pollute the water. The figures attract sea life and become platforms for coral and other marine creatures. With coral reefs on the decline around the world, a little extra help from artists can come in handy. Check out the gallery below to see how life begins to grow on the figures, transforming them from realistic replicas of living people into something alien and a bit spooky.

Taylor took eight months to install the sculptures in a big crowd of talking, walking, and thinking people. The exhibition encourages repeat visits to see how “sea change” transforms the art into a living ecozone.

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The other Florida

by Gadling Staff on

Most people visit Florida for its theme parks and party beaches, but there is another side. The state is a place of incredible natural beauty and home to some of the most powerful and influential people of the 20th Century. If you’re looking for something beyond the “usual Florida vacation,” keep reading for some of our favorite outdoor spaces and hidden cultural treasures.

John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park
The Florida Keys have always been one of our favorite places, and John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park is one of the reasons. The coral reef encompasses 70 nautical square miles off the coast of Key Largo, and the park includes mangrove forests, tropical hammocks and numerous beach habitats. 100-feet offshore from Cannon Beach there are remnants of an early Spanish shipwreck, and with sailing, diving and snorkeling tours leaving several times a day, it is a great place to experience the magic of the Keys.

St. George Island State Park
In a state known for its white sand beaches, St. George Island State Park is one of the most pristine. A long barrier island between Apalachicola Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, St. George is a place of sand dunes, sea oats and sunsets. It is tranquil and unspoiled. There’s also no shortage of activities, with boating, fishing, swimming and all the things you want from a beach minus the crowds and high-rise condominiums.

Keep reading below for three more Florida favorites…

Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park
It would be a shame not to see manatees while in Florida. The Homosassa Springs have always attracted them, and today the park is a key part of the state’s manatee rehabilitation program.

In addition, the park has many of Florida’s other native wildlife species. The rangers offer wildlife encounters and presentations throughout the day, and the freshwater springs and cypress swamps offer a beautiful environment for kayaking.

Edison & Ford Winter Estates
Located in Fort Myers, the Edison & Ford Winter Estates were the winter quarters of Thomas Edison and Henry Ford. The grounds, gardens and houses, including Edison’s workshop, are open to the public. This is a chance to go back in time and see how two influential men lived a simple yet elegant lifestyle in the days before air-conditioning.

The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art
Situated on the shores of Sarasota Bay, the grounds of this unique Florida attraction is much more than a circus sideshow. Though John Ringling was one of the seven siblings who created the Ringling Brothers Circus, his former Florida estate includes lavish gardens, an art museum with several large paintings by Rubens and yes, even a circus museum. Ringling had an opulent lifestyle. From the imported marble floors to the exquisite furnishings, this is the place to see just what money could buy.

From lavish estates and art to beautiful natural scenery, Florida has lots to offer the visitor sick of roller coasters and mouse ears. Chart a course for the “other Florida” on your next visit.

Somaliland: the other Somalia

by Sean McLachlan on

There are some places you just can’t consider for a vacation. While even Iraq has recently opened up to carefully handled tours, Somalia remains out of bounds. What with an Islamist movement proudly proclaiming its ties to Al-Qaeda, and a decades-long civil war between rival clans, there’s no chance of exploring the Somali culture and landscape, right?

Actually, that’s only half true.

The Republic of Somaliland is the northern third of what most maps show as Somalia. Anyone paying attention to the news knows that Somalia hasn’t been a unified nation for quite some time, but this one region, a little larger than England and home to 3.5 million, has managed to bring stability and a developing democracy to its people. Born out of the colony of British Somaliland, it gained independence in 1960 and immediately joined former Italian Somaliland to create what we now know as Somalia. A brutal dictatorship and a civil war later, it declared independence in 1991 and has quietly built a nation as the rest of Somalia disintegrated into chaos.

But no other country recognizes Somaliland as an independent state, which makes it very hard to get international investment and attention. Now Somaliland officials are hoping an increase in tourism will help to literally put their country on the map. It already has regular contact with its neighbors Ethiopia and Djibouti, and has representatives in several major capitals. The Tourism Ministry is busy making plans and there’s a good website highlighting Somali Heritage and Archaeology.

%Gallery-84671%With a countryside only thinly populated by nomads, Somaliland has good potential for safaris. Lions, cheetahs, zebras, antelope, and other animals are easily spotted. Even more stunning are the well-preserved paintings at Laas Geel, believed to be some of the oldest in Africa. They’re located near the capital Hargeysa and remained unreported until 2002. Colorful paintings of hunters and animals date back an estimated 9,000 years.

Other towns to check out are Barbera and Zeila, two ports with excellent coral reefs as well as old colonial buildings from British and Ottoman times. More important than bricks and mortar, though, is the chance to interact with a culture that has had comparatively little contact with the outside world. This is a rare chance to see a country unaccustomed to tourism, where there are no “tourist sites” and “local hangouts”. For the adventure traveler, it’s still pretty much uncharted territory.

After almost 20 years of independence, Somaliland is beginning to get some recognition from adventure travelers. The most recent edition of Lonely Planet Ethiopia has a short section on the country, and three young backpackers recently posted a video of their trip there on YouTube. A reporter from the Pulitzer Center has also covered the country on an online video. Somaliland could become the adventure travel destination of the new decade.

While Somaliland has some good potential, travelers should take care. Government bodyguards are required (costing $10 a day each) and there are few facilities for visitors. The country has also attracted the ire of Al-Shabab, an Islamist group with ties to Al-Qaeda that wants to take over the Horn of Africa. In 2008 a series of deadly car bombings blamed on Al-Shabab left two dozen dead in Hargeysa. Also, the countryside is not yet safe enough for foreigners to travel overland from Ethiopia on public transport. There are regular flights to Hargeysa from Addis Ababa and other regional capitals. The office for Somaliland in Addis Ababa (which is not recognized as an embassy by the government of Ethiopia) can issue visas and give advice. If you do decide to go, it’s best to plan well in advance and talk to the government as soon as possible.

Underwater sculpture garden helps save Cancun’s coral reefs

by Sean McLachlan on

Cancun’s famous coral reefs have been hit hard lately by storms and pollution, and the Mexican government has come up with an interesting way to let the reefs heal while still attracting visitors. They’re creating an underwater sculpture garden that will bring back the tourists and encourage growth of new coral.

It’s the brainchild of the Mexican government and artist Jason de Caires Taylor, who specializes in the beautiful if rather rare art of underwater sculpture. Most of his figures are human forms cast from real people. They’re made of inert, PH-neutral concrete. This concrete doesn’t pollute the water and attracts sea life. The figures then become platforms for coral and various other marine life, making a strange mixture of the natural and man-made.

Mexican park officials hope the sculptures will draw snorkelers and scuba divers away from the coral reefs, allowing the reefs time to heal. Judging from the photos in this gallery, divers won’t want to miss it. The scenes Mr. de Caires Taylor creates are spooky yet strangely alluring, like the plaster casts of Pompeii victims.

It takes only a couple of weeks for green algae to form on the surface of the sculptures, and coral and other sea creatures will start growing within a couple of months. So not only will the original coral reefs be allowed to regrow, but a new one will also start growing to add to the biodiversity on the sea floor.

Like his previous works in Granada, Chepstow and Canterbury (UK), the sculpture garden in Cancun is located in clear, shallow waters to allow easy viewing, although scuba divers will have the best view because they’ll be able to swim around the art at leisure. The first figures have already been put into place off the shores of Cancun. Hundreds more are planned.

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Don’t mess with Hawaii’s coral reefs

by Brenda Yun on

Did you know that Hawaii is home to over 3/4 of America’s coral reef? It’s not that surprising considering the heaps of divers that make the trek across the Pacific every year to experience the state’s special marine life. Hawaii’s unique ecosystem is its main draw for tourists, and since the reef is just that precious the state has begun to tighten the reigns and give out hefty fines to those who are not responsible underwater.

According to a recent article in the New York Times, “Ruining Coral Draws Fines in Hawaii,” fines of over $100,000 are being given to anyone who causes damage to Hawaii’s reefs. There are also no exceptions to this new rule. The state plans to sue even the U.S. Navy over coral that was ruined when a guided missile cruiser ran aground near Pearl Harbor earlier this year. Another example: a Maui tour company is paying the state nearly $400,000 in fines for damaging more than 1,200 coral colonies when one of its boats sank at Molokini, one of the islands’ most pristine reefs and most popular diving spots.

Experts say coral reefs in the marine national monument, a conservation area in the greater Hawaiian islands that is one of the biggest in the world, are in good shape. However, reef that is closer to Hawaii’s eight major islands centers have experienced severe overfishing and sediment runoff. Careless ocean users, who can kill a 500-year-old coral in just five minutes, are another real and difficultly controlled danger to the reef as well.

[via NatGeo Adventure Travel]