There’s a fine story from last year that I can’t remember if I blogged about about taking a trip in Tanzania by bike. This is a nicely done, pretty unconventional piece with some superb visual elements including a photo gallery and audio slide show. The rider deals with lousy roads and legions of bugs, but there’s no question that the trip is worth it. Locals gawked at the author and his friend as they rode by random villages on their tandem bike. Pretty neat. There is nothing quite like seeing another country at 15 mph.
Music and Travel
Man, it was some time ago that I featured here a list of songs I most enjoy listening to while traveling. The list was partly based on some personal experiences with music while I was on the road in various places. That is, years ago I did the five day trek up the Inca Trail. I was drained and tired and beat. Even for a guy who’s pretty fit, the Inca Trail has got some tough spots. Anyway, I put the headphones on and heard Willy Nelson sing Peter Gabriel’s Don’t Give Up, and immediately quickened my step and pushed on. It wasn’t the title of the song, or the words…it was just the sound of Willy’s doleful tenor, some mix of his voice and the incredible surroundings that just clicked and created a moment of immense and meaningful beauty. Music and travel mix like that.
And then later that year, I was standing alone on a cliff over-looking the crashing waves on the Valdez Peninsula in Argentina, miles away from anywhere or anyone, and I head Pearl Jam’s Off He Goes, and well, my spirits soared, my chest puffed out, and my head whirled with the most wonderful feeling of freedom.
I guess the point of all this is that music and travel can create an intoxicating mix. Music adds a dimension to your experience in the moment that can lift your spirits and fill you with a sense of joy that is really incomparable. I was reminded of all this when reading this piece in the SF Chronicle about exactly that: music and travel. The writers sense of music and travel differs slightly from my own, but it is a toic worth thinking about as you load up your ipod for your next adventure.
Photo of the Day (9/2/06)
Looking at a photo like this one might imagine that the large group of villagers dressed in their everyday attire have come together to watch a wrestling match or two goats brutally head-butt each other, but in this case both guesses would be so wrong. This shot of on-lookers was captured by teokaye at a Tajik wedding. The children look on so intensely it really makes you wonder. He notes that 85% of everyone doesn’t participate and isn’t even invited at most Tajik village weddings. In Tajik culture it’s pretty much a given that they’ll show up. Only family and friends dance. Now that’s how you crash a wedding party!
Speaking at Budget Travel Blogger Gig
Don’t know how many gadling readers will be around in the next two weeks or so, but the good folks over at Budget Travel have invited me to be a panelist for an upcoming round table they are hosting about blogging and travel. Called How Have Bloggers Changed the Travel Landscape? the event will coincide (not coincidentally, I might add) with the first anniversary of Budget Travel online, the sleek and informative companion to the travel-focused glossy.
Featured bloggers are yours truly, Mark G. Johnson of HotelChatter, Randy Petersen of InsideFlyer, and Joshua David Stein of Gridskipper.
What are we going to talk about? Why, blogging of course, and how bloggers have pretty much altered the course of history, how we have saved millions of lives, cured cancer and established an intergalactic system of peace and justice. And don’t get me started about the work I’ve done with Poincaré’s conjecture. I mean, I knocked that thing out of the park one day hungover at breakfast. Wrote it down on the back of a bagel…which I then ate. Yum.
Anyway, are you interested? Then come check it out. The event takes place on on Wednesday, September 13, 2006 at Tribeca Cinemas in New York City.
Tom Haines in New England
The Boston Globe’s Tom Haines has gotten to do some pretty fancy stuff. A few years ago he set out with a Globe photographer to write about the changes being wrought where cultures collide.
Called Crossing Divides, I blogged about the series with pronounced relish (and a dollop of mayonnaise). I thought it was superb. Well, this time Haines is heading out again, but sticking closer to home. His recent expedition takes him to his home turf: New England. Haines hits the road for a five day journey exploring the Northeastern states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut, Rhode Island and…well, it looks like he may have just passed through Massachusetts. As he made his way along, he apparently took readers’ advice on what to see and do, a potentially dangerous proposition. Judging by this picture, the trip also included either a) drinking from large bottles or B) with small people…perhaps from Rhode Island, since that is the smallest state, after all. (ahem)
Per usual, though, it’s good stuff. Haines remains one of our favorite writers and this series doesn’t disappoint.