Traveling Syria

by Erik Olsen on

Syria never made the famous axis of evil, but I’d read way back when that Bush and company have long held deep suspicions of Syria. Perhaps for good reason, but let’s not get into politics here. Suffice it to say, Syria would be an interesting place to visit. If you need mer convincing of that fact, take a look at this piece on traveling Syria.

Outside Magazine’s Patrick Symms take a long gander at the country and finds it a fascinating place filled with deep religiosity and not just a few historically significant places. It is also a place that plays prominently into the current conflict in Iraq, Symms calls it “a kind of small-scale Cambodia to Iraq’s Vietnam”. The article does a fine job revealing the complexities of the country and is very much worth a read.

Watch: Mind of a Demon with Fabien Cousteau

by Erik Olsen on

Folks here may remember that we did a podcast a while ago with one Fabien Cousteau, the grandson of epically famous ocean explorer Jacques Cousteau. Fabien is a big-time explorer and adventurer in his own right and several years ago he undertook an amazing project. He decided that he wanted to dive with sharks in their own habitat and to do so in a novel way: enclosed within a shark-shaped submarine. The idea was that the way we study sharks now — using chum and cages and such — is artificial. We introduce these foreign stimuli into their environments and believe we are seeing the way they really behave.

Well, Fabien’s shark sub, which we talked about at some length in our podcast, was meant to dispense with all that artificiality. Sounds pretty cool, right? Well, since Fabien is a Cousteau, he of course had the sense to bring along a camera to shoot everything he was doing, and the product of that effort will broadcast on CBS on Wednesday, June 28th at 8pm. The program is called Mind of a Demon, and having seen some of the footage myself, I highly suggest you watch it.

So get the Tivo remote out and program this baby in. You won’t be sorry.

WorldHum Top 30 Travel Books

by Erik Olsen on


I’ve been wanting to do a top travel books post for a long time, but each time I start to compile a list, I am overcome with profound self-loathing over how few of the supposed “great” travel books I’ve actually read. Sure, sure, I’ve read most of the biggies, the Therouxs, the Chatwins, the Brysons, I even picked up and savored a St. Exupery recently. But taking a look at the list of Top 30 Travel Books over at Worldhum, I realized that my travel reading repertoire is pathetically anemic. Their number one pick, for example, is the book “Arabian Sands” by Wilfred Thesiger, which I have never read. No. 2 is “The Road to Oxiana” by Robert Byron. Ditto. Not until we get to Theroux’s Great Railway Bazaar at number three do we get to a book I’ve read. And thereafter there are a smattering of others I’ve read — Pico Iyer, Bryson, Mark Twain, Matthiessen — but still many others I have not. Oh well. Let’s just say that we can be thankful to folks like Worldhum to help us improve our libraries as we move swiftly into summer and the reading season.

Santa Monica Pier

by Erik Olsen on

Having spent a few years of my days living the good life in California, I couldn’t help but call out this nice little ditty on the Santa Monica Pier. The pier, lets face it, is a cheesy, cheesy place. A tourist destination that has gone to seed, but it’s still got some appeal. It’s as fine a place as any to take a sunset stroll and check out the surfers and the various goofy folk who come over from Venice Beach.

The pier was built in 1912, and is pretty much the last of the many amusement parks that once lined this waterfront. There’s skeeball and arcade games and also an historic carousel that is nice if you’ve just made a purchase up in Humboldt County (you know who you are). There’s also a “kid-friendly” roller coaster, and a couple of nice little restaurants still around. I’m not saying to spend all your time here, but it’s a good place to check out if you’re making a trip to la-la land.

Devil’s Tower 100 Years Old

by Erik Olsen on

OK, it’s actually much much older than that, but the National Monument that became a symbol of how, or rather where, we might communicate with extraterrestrials is turning 100. Cue the Close Encounters music. No, you won’t likely run into Richard Dreyfuss there or need to learn the hand signals for talking to ET, but you can still get in some fine hiking, mountain biking and general photography.