Keeping tabs on our man in the sky Steve Fossett, we’ve
been following the
adventure closely, and figured we’d give an update abot his progress. As of late yesterday Fossett had reached Japan,
said to be the midway point for his epic and world-record setting flight around the world in 80 hours. The trip has not
been without it’s turbulence….literally. His experimental extremely light-weight plane hit a patch of rough air over
India, but he kept on pushing through and is said to be riding the Western Pacific jet streams as I write this. He has
had some other fuel issues, including a supposed leak at takeoff, but his team says that he would have 500 pounds
to 1,000 pounds of fuel remaining when he lands at cape Canaveral, um, I mean the Kennedy Space Center on Wednesday.
Very cool. You go, Steve! By the way, I’d like to add, that I actually met Fossett a year and a half ago at the
Explorer’s Club dinner. A very nice gentleman.
Delta to South Africa
A quick bit of news that might be
of interest to folks out there…and I post this partly, too, because a buddy of mine is headed to South Africa,
literally, today. Delta Airlines is proposing a new service from Atlanta to Africa, with routes to Dakar, Senegal, and
Johannesburg, South Africa. They still need approval from the Department of Transportation, but if they get it then
Delta would thus be the only mainstream U.S. carrier with scheduled service between the United States and the African
continent. As someone who as ALWAYS wanted to go to South Africa, I see this as bright news from an industry that has
not had a great deal of bright news lately.
Africa Travel: Congo
The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and the Republic of Congo are two separate neighboring countries with several similarities. For one, these two Africa lands have long been under civil unrest for many years, unstable, dark and as wild as ever. Situations in the Republic of Congo are said to have improved while the DRC is a still a huge recommended hands-off zone. Neither country is experiencing the joys from herds of tourists and probably won’t for some years to come unless the armed militias and government troops both lay down their weapons.
To examine the countries differences and commonalities further, the DRC sits in Central Africa northeast of Angola and the Republic of Congo in Western Africa, bordering the South Atlantic Ocean between Angola and Gabon. French is the official language of both with several local langs and dialects throughout the countries. Instead of trying to navigate our way into the country by way of Orbitz or Expedia, lets play it safe and stick to a virtual tour of the Congo. Here are a few web resources to hold you over until things simmer down, but if you’re a real rebel and wish to lend your hand into making the Congo a more peaceful place check out some of the sites below and take action!
- If you were to look Congo up in a dictionary Jane Goodall would probably be seen next to it. While I haven’t personally followed her work or the institutes projects in Africa, she has long been associated with the sanctuary of wildlife, such as chimpanzees. Explore more about the Ngamba Island Sanctuary and Tchimpounga Reserve here.
- Read rockers of Sum 41’s account in the northeastern Congolese town of Bukavu in the DRC when they experience first-hand what the violence between rebels and government troops is like during their stay when they had to flee the country themselves.
- Amel Larrieux, one of my favorite singers had a track titled “Congo” on her latest record reflecting on the country from which so much history rests and how through it all they still find time to sing and play a song in Congo. Click here to hear the track.
- See how Amnesty International is doing its part and how you can too, to protect human rights in Kinshasa, DRC.
IMAX on Mars
Last night I watched for the second time
the film Contact, with Jodie Foster. This is a superb film…well, at least the first hour and a half is excellent. The
last bit about her meeting her dad in the worm-hole netherworld leaves me cold. What a dumb way to end it (I haven’t
read Sgan’s book, so I don’t know if this is how he ended it…but still, dumb).
But the point, I suppose,
is that interstellar travel is something that, lets face it, every sentient being with a gram of adventure in your
bones wants to travel into space. I mean, tell me that wouldn’t be cool. But for now, such trips are available only to
Shuttle astronauts and the perversely wealthy.
So we here on earth have to content ourselves with watching
films like the new IMAX documentary Roving Mars, which
takes a closer look at the Red Planet, as viewed on the journeys of Spirit and Opportunity. I don’t recall news of the
rovers have those massive IMAX cameras on them, so we’ll have to see where the footage actually comes from, but
this is a film I’ll likely be seeing.
Africa Travel: Comoros
Instead of trying to find one event or activity to focus on in the Comorian archipelago why not try island hopping and experiencing all four? Created as the result of volcanic activity, the islands are situated in the western Indian Ocean not too far from Madagascar. The four major islands are Ngazidja (Grande Comore), Mwali (Moheli), Nzwani (Anjouan) and Maore (Mayotte). Of the four, Maore or Mayotte is the oldest island, the only one belonging to the French and said to have one of the biggest lagoons of the planet with a surface of more than 1000 sq. kilometer, protected by a barrier reef of over 160 km long. So for those of you fancying lagoons you may have already found your stop in Comoros, but don’t look pass the others.
Ngazidja is closest to Africa and is the home of Karthala, a very active volcano with the largest crater in the world. In addition to the crater a site worth making note of is the Friday Mosque which the surrounding area (if I’m not mistaken) has culture mixed with Arab and African influence and architecture to eye for days. Comoros, in short has a good variety of things to do and see, but I urge you to explore all four islands more by visiting this well put together site at K-State.edu. I’ve still got a lot to learn about this one myself. For additional island images click here.