Adventure is our state of mind
On the ferries to Princes’ Islands, I would always drink copious amounts of tea. Waiters with dangling trays roamed up and down the decks touting chai for less than a dollar, delivering a tear-drop Turkish tea cup on a little glass saucer, complete … [Read more...]
From my vantage point in the field below, the structure rising from the riverbed looks like a bridge—a magnificent one, certainly, with graceful 200-year-old stone and iron arches. But wait a minute and an incongruous sight appears: A boat slowly … [Read more...]
The wind whipped the sort of ripping chill that makes you wish had another coat to go on top of the one you’re wearing. I was standing on the bow of a dinner boat in the Moscow River in the middle of winter. The water had long since iced over, but … [Read more...]
The greatest New York City sightseeing trip you could imagine is absolutely free: the Staten Island ferry. The views of the city’s skyline and East River bridges, the Statue of Liberty, and blazing sunsets are as enchanting as any on a paid cruise … [Read more...]
The Grand Canal’s two-and-a-half-mile S-curve through the heart of Venice takes it from the city’s two most common approaches – Piazzale Roma and Santa Lucia rail station -- to Piazza San Marco, the historic and touristic heart. Along its … [Read more...]
"Whose idea was this?" I demand. There is an inch of snow on the ground, the temperature is in the teens, the weather forecast is for more snow, and the living room floor is covered with ski clothes, hats, socks, gloves, long underwear and anything … [Read more...]
"Look! It's happening! Wait, watch for it!" The excitement on the catamaran is palpable, and we strain our eyes to the horizon where the last tiny pinpoint of an orange sun is just about to dip below the horizon. We are hoping to see the legendary … [Read more...]
I feel as if I am looking at a scene in the cartoon of Jack and the Beanstalk. The tree trunk is a good three meters wide, and as I look up, I see that the tree divides into three immensely thick branches that reach high into the sky, as if they are … [Read more...]
Talk about Continental Drift: I am floating -- literally -- between Asia and Europe. To my left is familiarity, reassuring names like Paris and Venice, Vienna and Madrid. To my right are places like Kazakhstan and Urumqi: the exotic lands of western … [Read more...]
The adventure began with free-diving to the sea’s bottom to spot a mermaid and ended with a hot bubble bath strewn with red tropical flower petals in our villa. In between there were swimming pigs, grape-eating endangered dinosaur descendants, a … [Read more...]
