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This week I head slowly to New York City by Amtrak. In Life, Phase 3, you don’t have to rush or be perturbed by inevitable delays. Each night I’ll be in a hotel rather than a train, which gives me a chance to go walkabout in Chicago and Cleveland. My partner will join my in…
Continue reading Iron Road to GothamA family sits around a breakfast table in a Cleveland Holiday Inn Express talking about family things. The teenager shrugs as Mom announces she’s going to redecorate his bedroom. The conversation pauses for a basketball segment on the local Fox affiliate. A rack of USA Todays announces the next war. I can’t say Americans are…
Continue reading Breakfast RoomsThis week I ride the rails south from New York City towards an America that is, in some ways, a foreign country to me. Each night I’ll sleep in a hotel, pausing in Washington, DC, and Charleston, SC. In Savannah, GA, a friend will join me for a couple days. This will be the first…
Continue reading Iron Road to Dixie Woolworth’s lunch counter (Smithsonian) I tried to build a coherent picture of my seatmate as I rode Amtrak from Cleveland to New York. The obvious stuff: 40-ish, black, heavyset, financially on the edge. I got the financial bit as he talked on the phone about his imminent move to a smaller apartment. He clicked away at…
Continue reading The OtherTomorrow I leave Savannah for Miami, the end of the line on Amtrak. A journey from a world constrained by history to a place that is still inventing itself. For tourists, Charleston and Savannah are about colonial times and early independence through the end of the civil war. A white history with selective amnesia. Miami…
Continue reading Iron Road to the Capital of Latin AmericaI don’t do water activities. I’ll dangle my feet over the edge of the shallow end of a hotel swimming pool while sipping something with a little cocktail umbrella poking out. Preferably a beer. But that is as far as I go. My partner, Dwight, does do water activities, including SCUBA. I’ll never do that,…
Continue reading Why I Like SCUBA DivingMy urban hiking this weekend in Naples, Florida, included quiet side streets lined with posh homes. As I walked, I thought about the logistics of maintaining multiple homes, and the burden of mortgages. When hiking through farmland I avoid getting between cow and calves. In this spirit, I was walking on the street so I…
Continue reading Pleading the Fifth in Naples, FloridaIt’s time to leave a world of beaches for travel with a bit of fiber in it. This weekend, in Naples, Florida, I got reunited with my hiking boots and walking shoes and mailed the lesser stuff back home. I’m on my way to Kirishima, southern Japan. I’ll connect to a flight in Houston Tuesday…
Continue reading From Beaches to VolcanoesWell, I didn’t get too far today. The plan was to get from Fort Lauderdale to Kirishima, southern Japan. Instead I got as far as Houston. My United flight from Houston to Tokyo was repeatedly delayed: something about a problem under the floor, eventually traced to a cargo door.I retreated to the KLM club where…
Continue reading An Unplanned Night in HoustonAfter being in Airport World for five days, it was good to spend today, Saturday, hiking in Kagoshima and the surrounding hills. When you hike on a Saturday you get to see the locals enjoying their place. Early in the hike I was the audience for a group of taiko drummers, practicing their art. I could feel…
Continue reading Saturday Hike in KagoshimaYesterday I was in such an intense conversation with Iris, thirtyish, from Switzerland, we almost missed the only bus from the trailhead that day. I get to meet fine people when hiking. These are people who put some effort into their travels. They discover and research trails, they put one foot in front of another…
Continue reading It Takes a VillageMount Ebinodake and Onami Pond. From where I’m sitting in my hotel room, I see steam vents, and can smell their sulfurous fumes. Further in the distance, over 20 miles further in the haze, is the unmistakable cone of Sakurajima, the massive, active volcano across the bay from Kagoshima, southern Japan. At night, I see the…
Continue reading Kirishima-Kinkowan National ParkPainting of Buddhist hell, Daihonzan Naritasan Temple, Kurume, Japan. The things you learn when you travel. I had no idea there was a Buddhist hell. I first caught a whiff of it this week in Unzenonsen, Kyushu, Japan. Hydrogen sulphide, boiling water bubbling out the ground, steam. It was Buddhist monks, back in 701 AD, who…
Continue reading Animatronic Hell
Mile zero of 2,700 Amtrak miles. Posted about the first leg of the journey.
A contrite email: “We overbooked, we pay for a 4-star hotel.” (My hotel tonight: Chicago’s Palmer House Hilton, $0.00.)
Explored Tiffany art glass, including this dome at a Chicago Macy’s. (I’m looking up, 6 floors below the dome.)
Posted from this downtown Cleveland Holiday Inn Express. Breakfast, war, and rock and roll.
View from my Midtown Manhattan room. Arrived at Penn Station this evening, almost 1,400 miles into my train journey.
Gasped at the “chocolat” prices, then headed over to Macy’s for American chocolates. My Valentine flies in today.
Our chilly walk around Harlem took us past this sacred spot. Ella won amateur night here in 1934.
Walked around a model of Grand Central Terminal in Grand Central Terminal.
We walked on fresh, melting snow in Central Park, then learned about Cosmic Slop at MoMA.
Posted Iron Road to Dixie.
Walked through corridors of power.
The plan was to mail my winter jacket home before boarding the train in Washington DC’s Union Station. I think not.
Walked the streets of Charleston past 18th century homes.
Mailed my down jacket home: I plan not to wear it again until November. Wandered around Charleston in shirtsleeves.
In Savannah, walked through twenty four squares and an old graveyard.
Our dinner scenery in Savannah included allusions to Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.
Posted Iron Road to the Capital of Latin America.
Two of Savannah’s dolphin downspouts on a rainy day: a day for museums and laundry.
Grabbed dinner and beer, and found myself on reality TV: Barmaggedon. If the cap fits, etc.
It’s worth getting up crazy early to catch a train to Miami.
Walked South Beach: the beach, then the art deco district. It’s more corporate, less edgy, less gay than I remember.
We walked past South Beach lifeguard stands.
No immigration lines: we and 5 others got off the plane in Aruba. The flight then continued to Paramaribo, Suriname.
On our walk today, paused to observe the wildlife.
Hiked Arikok National Park.
Posted Why I Like SCUBA Diving.
On our barefoot walk: perched pelicans.
AUA/MIA, Air Surinam, then rental car to Marco Island. Lowered median age at hotspot, Snook Inn, closing at 10:00 pm.
Today: saltwater marshes and soggy hiking paths.
Marco Island: walked miles on a crunchy (shells) beach.
Cycled through the Everglades past apparently somnolent alligators and elegant long legged birds.
Key Largo, peaceful evening before Spring Break: tomorrow our energetic nephews + parents + mother-out-law fly in.
Ripped, untimely, from their Minnesota beds this morning, our nephews burned off energy in the Gulf at Key Largo.
We searched for geckos, then manatees.
Explored the Keys on a bicycle with a cupholder.
Wacky water games at the kids pool.
It rained while I did laundry.
Florida Keys: we walked across the sea on a bridge that originally carried a railroad.
Saturday, I drop Dwight off at MIA for his flight to MSP. I’ll spend the weekend with friends in their Naples condo.
Police stopped me twice in posh Naples, FL. Apparently I resemble a similarly scruffy, but demented lost husband.
Posted Pleading the Fifth in Naples, Florida.
Fort Lauderdale, final Florida beach on this trip. Enjoyed fish and chips: a nod to my heritage, a seaside tradition.
Overheard an airline customer service agent in the hotel bar. Her colleagues call the Jerry Springer Show “church.”
Posted From Beaches to Volcanoes (Southern Japan).
At Houston, IAH, burning frequent flyer miles. (Actually, frequent new credit card application bonus miles.)
Posted An Unplanned Night in Houston, and lovely airline people.
View from an airport hotel room. Marriott, Houston IAH, Wednesday morning.
Day 3, 4 of Airport World: San Francisco to Tokyo Haneda. Depart SFO Wednesday night, arrive HND late Thursday night.
Airport World, day 4 of 5. At Tokyo International HND took subway 2 stops to third airport hotel this week.
Airport World, day 5. HND Airport conveniences. Toilet: child restraint. Check-in area: scales, special needs lounge.
Took a 787 Dreamliner from Tokyo to Kagoshima, then walked out of Airport World, into the sun and unfiltered air.
Posted Saturday Hike in Kagoshima.
From Kagoshima took a jetfoil to the island of Yakushima.
Exhausting day exploring ancient cedar forests on Yakushima. Knotted ropes were helpful in the steep bits.
Unashamed touristy photo at Ohko-no-taki waterfall, Yakushima, before hopping on a country bus to a trailhead.
Posted It Takes a Village (and the miracle of the lady with the beer).
Miyanoura, Yakushima Island, about to board jetfoil.
Now in the mountains north of Kagoshima.
Posted about a hike today in Kirishima-Kingowan National Park.
Pulled back the drapes this morning and saw this mushroom cloud. Sakurajima, 20 miles away, was active.
Kirishima … National Park. Ridge trail, then climb (Mt. Takachiho, 5,160 ft.). Most of the trail was 2011 ash.
Walked around Senganen Garden, Kagoshima, created 1658. It uses the bay and Sakurajima volcano as “borrowed scenery.”
First bullet train ride on this trip. I’ve died and gone to heaven, or, Kumamoto. An official gave me some stickers.
Blossoms are at their peak around Kumamoto Castle.
Today I go to the mountains of Unzen: bus from Kumamoto, ferry, then another bus.
Unzen: my view and room. Monks came in 701 AD to reflect on the 84,000 tortures awaiting wrongdoers in the afterlife.
Unzen-Amakusa National Park. Every time I saw a sign pointing to a peak, I climbed the peak.
Posted Channeling Eva Gabor. Karaoke and worse.
Dejima, Nagasaki: tulips, representing the strong Dutch connection with Nagasaki, brighten up a rainy day.
The rain was bouncing off the platform and I could hear thunder. I abandoned my hike and took the next train back.
Hiked into the clouds to the top of Yufusan, northern Kyushu. A good day.
Posted World-class style in a small-town train station.
Beppu, northeastern Kyushu, giving thanks for the hot springs.
Fukuoka, my base for the next 4 nights. It’s a good center: I can catch trains going north, south, east, or west.
Drippy day. Took train to Dazaifu, established 1,300 years ago, ruled Kyushu for about 500 years.
My hike today, on the way to Mount Kaya, on the coast, west of Fukuoka.
Fukuoka from Aburayama.Plan: 4-hour hike.Actual: 7 hours.Reason: I had to backtrack.I climbed each peak twice!
Fukuoka from Aburayama. Plan: 4-hour hike. Actual: 7 hours. Reason: I had to backtrack. I climbed each peak twice!
Dep. Fukuoka Thurs. 7:15aArr. Chicago Thurs. 8:25aANA: FUK-NRT-ORDUnited: ORD-MSP35K United FF miles, FUK-MSP.
Posted Behind the Steel Door.
This week (thanks to the date line) I get two Thursday mornings. Thursday morning #1: Bloody Mary, Tokyo Narita.
Thursday morning #2: Bloody Mary, Chicago, O’Hare. It’s rather thundery out there.
Thunderstorms, flight canceled. App makes it easy to rebook. If the new flight is canceled, I’ll check in to a hotel.
Home after two months: wonderful to be met by Dwight at MSP. Waited all day at ORD for the weather to improve.
