2/16/2016

Istanbul is such a huge city – two days in we really hadn’t seen many of the tourist sites (mostly just the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque), having mostly seen a few small neighborhoods. There were still dozens of places to see. This day, our third in a city and a Tuesday, we planned to fix that, visiting the archaeology museum, a good source of near Eastern and Greek archaeology, see the spice market, and also step into a few of the smaller (though still huge) mosques that dot the city.

First stop: the archaeology museum. This lies in a large historic complex that also includes Topkapı Palace, the Hagia Irene, and Gülhane Park. The whole area is surrounded with medieval walls and adjacent alleys; it was busy on each side, but on the West side it felt mostly Turkish, while on the East side, near the Hagia Sophia, it was more tourist.

You might wonder what kind of archaeology you’d find in Turkey, but there’s an immense amount of history in the country, and I was sad to see that the Archaeology Museum felt a little under-funded (though there were still extensive renovations ongoing). One section of the museum is devoted to a history of the city from Byzantium through Constantinople; another to the historic cultures of the Anatolian peninsula. There were also sections devoted to the ancient Near East and Mesopotamia, and to the Ionic coast, one nexus of ancient Greek civilization (home of Troy, Herodotus, and many pre-Socratic philosophers).

It’s a huge museum, really more than you can absorb in a day. Some of my favorite parts were seeing part of the Ishtar Gate (a really striking gate from the Babylonian walls; I’d seen the bulk of it in Berlin at the Pergamon Museum). I also really enjoyed seeing a lot of the Greek relics, especially some immense sarcophagi with stunning bas relief sculpture.

But the highlight for me was presented in such a forgettable way that it understated the significance: several links from the great chain that stretched across the harbor during the siege of Constantinople. The whole history of the siege is extraordinarily dramatic and heroic. Seeing a well-known relic from this siege, which changed world history, was really awe-inspiring. If you’d like to read an account of the sieve I’d highly recommend 1453.

Outside the museum there were seats and shut-down food stand. We had some snack and watched the cats in the garden. There were some really beautiful animals navigating the maze of numbered Greek capstones and sculptures.

Entering on the East side, we proceeded the visit the other sites in the main square, near the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque. This was the site of the ancient Hippodrome, home of chariot races. chariot races were undoubtedly more popular in Constantinople than gladiator matches, and there were several riots based on chariot races & teams that threatened to overthrow the city. To put down one such riot, almost 30k people were killed in the Hippodrome. More recently, a remaining obelisk from the Hippodrome was the site of an ISIS bombing that killed several tourists, so needless to say I was on edge, and we didn’t spend as much time there as I would have liked.

It was getting dark as we revisited the area near the Grand Bazaar. This area, broadly speaking, was my favorite part of the city – it felt so alive and intimate. It was the main shopping district in this area of the city. As darkness unrolled above us, the alleys seemed to grow closer, the lights on either side of the streets more inviting. It was a lot of fun seeing everyone shopping and the shopkeepers sipping tea, and after getting lost we found ourselves in the Spice Market.

This was a bit flashy and touristy, but the structure itself is mostly an old warehouse, and the spices are presented in an appealing way. I enjoyed seeing the different food on offer. We bought a small sampler of baklava and Turkish delight, though we bought a much larger, cheaper bag of Turkish delight a bit outside the market.

By the time we left it was dark. The entrance to one of the major mosques was directly adjacent to the exit of the spice market, and we hung out in the ‘lobby’ of this mosque for a while. It was quiet, though there was a steady stream of people hurrying in and out from conducting their evening prayers. I wasn’t aware this was part of worshiping at a mosque, but there was a series of faucets for washing feet. I guess I should have known – it was something my co-workers did when I worked at an Indian restaurant. I guess it just took me by surprise.

We crossed back into Galata to drop our snacks and bags off at the apartment, then headed out to smoke some hookah. I really enjoyed smoking hookah – after a bit of practice I learned when to stop smoking and slow down, lest I get sick. Earlier in our stay we’d smoked in what I could only describe as a ‘hookah den’, but this time I found a very nice hookah cafe high over the city, with a view of the harbor where we could see ferries criss-crossing into Asia.

The next day we’d both set foot in Asia for the first time, which I was excited to see – but for now it was nice to relax with good company.

9/5/2015-9/6/2015

We had two more lazy days in Port Townsend, though six months later, I don’t quite remember the chronology.

Just outside town (within walking distance), is a small state park – Fort Worden. There’s a pricey artillery museum, some hiking trails, some bunkers, and also a marine wildlife museum. I’d been to the park quite a few times, but never to the wildlife museum. It’s pretty conspicuous and was composed of two buildings: a traditional sort of museum, and then an aquarium built on top of a pier that pumped up water from the Puget sound. The museum was a little dull, and was basically just a huge Orca skeleton – though that was interesting after seeing a real wild orca a few days previous.

The aquarium was actually really cool, though. There were a variety of sea stars and anemones, including some you could touch, and a lot of tiny fish, kelp forests, and so on. We got to talk to some very dedicated volunteers about the tanks and just had a good time.

Another morning we woke up early and stopped by the farmer’s market. There’s two each week, I think, right outside the community center (where Alex demonstrated her Zumba skills as the star of the Zumba class). We tried orange raspberries and a fancy soft cheese, all local to Jefferson county in Washington. The prices were surprisingly reasonable.

Pretty much the whole time we were on the peninsula, we ate at the local Thai takeout restaurant, 1-2-3 Thai. Alongside Indian, I absolutely love Thai, so I’ve eaten at quite a few places. I have to say there’s something about this particular restaurant – it’s hands-down my favorite Thai food.

We puttered around town for a few days, mostly taking it easy. We walked around town our final night, and I didn’t want to go home – it was an art walk, lots of local galleries open to visitors and lots of free wine and snacks. But nonetheless… we had a long trip home. I think this was the first time Alex and I calculated the number of ‘hops’ a trip would take. It was pretty epic: car (rental) -> ferry -> car (dropoff rental) -> Lyft to airport -> Flight to Dallas -> Airport transit between terminals -> Flight to La Guardia -> Taxi to Penn Station -> PATH train to Jersey -> walk to apartment! That’s 10 hops and 5 forms of transit… but we were home.

9/4/2015

After a few days in Port Townsend, we wanted to get outside. On the recommendation of a friend, we went to Dungeness Spit, near Sequim, Washington, a town known mostly for its lavender farms and retirement homes.

A spit is a sand promontory that extends off the coast. Sand is blown along a beach and deposits at the end. This process, continuing over decades, can form a spit. So basically its a beach with no inland area, and the Dungeness Spit is the largest of these in the US.

But we didn’t start there. Sequim has the single best pancake place I’ve ever been to, Oak Table Cafe. They serve German apple pancakes, which are voluminous and gooey. I’d been here before but didn’t properly remember just how enormous they were. Alex and I ordered both a pancake and an eggs benedict.

Needless to say, we left with our plates empty and our bellies aching. If we were to survive, the hike would be a necessity.

Luckily, it was just down the street (a street named “Kitchen-Dick Road,” for the record), as part of a national wildlife refuge.

We hiked out the spit and back, and let’s just that 5.5 miles on the sand is longer than it looks like – we only made it halfway, and because the spit curves we looked no closer to the lighthouse that terminates the spit at the end of the hike, than at the start. Luckily, the weather was beautiful, warm with clear skies.

As a huge extended beach, one of the defining features is the extensive amount of driftwood of innumerable forms.

Eventually we had to call it quits – we had an appointment back in Port Townsend for mid-afternoon and couldn’t spend the whole day, but we both had a good time.

We’ll have to reach the lighthouse next time.

On the way in and out from the parking lot, there’s a short 15-minute hike in a stunning Pacific Northwest forest, the kind where the air itself feels green.

We had big plans for our third day in Chicago, Memorial Day Monday, including a much-deferred boat cruise and a trip the renowned Chicago Museum of Science and Industry. We’d gotten recommendations for this museum from a bunch of Chicago natives. Normally I’d be reticent to visit a science museum. Lots of trivial children’s toys, simple experiments, and so on. But it had such good recommendations (and it was totally worth it)!

At the museum, we:

Watched an egg transform into a chicken…

Watched a human being transform into a clown…

Saw a cow about to go for a moooonwalk…

Walked around the only U-Boat in the United States…

and through an amazing old train…

And caught a glimpse of Godzilla (or something near enough like it).

But for me, the highlight of the trip was seeing an actual Mercury spacecraft. One that had been in SPACE. This particular craft had an interesting story. It was piloted by Scott Carpenter, who saw the same “fireflies” as John Glenn, and was able to identify them as ice particles released off the spacecraft (he hit the wall of the spacecraft with his hand and knocked some loose). Nonetheless, he was distracted and as a result splashed down 250 miles off from where he should have; he never returned to space. But, he did became an aquanaut (!), and worked on Sealab.

After a full day in the Science museum, we got a few drinks, and then went on a boat cruise – there’s a number of them in Chicago and this one went along the river and then way out on the lake. It was a perfect night, warm, clear, not too hot, and the views were great.

When we headed out, there was still a lot of light, but we got to see the sun set while still out on the water, and then saw the city at night.

We also swung in close, and got a look over Millenium Park.

After getting off the cruise, we headed back to our apartment for an early night.

(The Chicago city flag is amazing and everywhere, and here’s a great TED talk about city flags in general, because they’re so interesting).

We flew back to NYC early on Monday, before the work day, and got a great view of the city before touching down and returning to the daily grind.

Just an administrative note: I realized that some trips may be tough to track, so I’ve set up trip pages that have interactive maps linking to all the related blog posts. Check out the Cross-Country Road Trip.

(Or just take a look at the map here…)

[nwm_map id=”1″ zoom=”3″]

9/21/2013-9/23/2013

After Colorado, my next scheduled stop was Rocky Mountain National Park and Denver. But there was a problem. Actually – a few problems. I was pretty tired and increasingly leery of city driving at this point. The mountain driving in Colorado was a lot steeper than I anticipated. And finally, there had been record-breaking amounts of rain that washed out roads. Most of the route to Rocky Mountain National Park was unavailable.

I stopped, high up in the mountains, to determine my plans. It really felt like I was on top of the world. But I had to make a decision, and what I ultimately decided was to continue through Colorado and back to Wyoming, to see a family friend. I slept in a Wal-Mart parking lot in the Rockies – I think it was ‘Eagle, Colorado’. And then the next day I continued on. Passing around the corner near Denver, I considered stopping in Fort Collins, but decided to press on, before stopping in Cheyenne, Wyoming.

I was there to see a family friend (hi Nancy!) – and also because I was curious about the area. After all, Cheyenne is still in the sphere of Denver’s influence, swatch of suburbia that extends through Boulder, Longmont, Fort Collins, and which ends in Cheyenne.

Denver’s a strange place – it’s considered a mountain city, but in fact it’s located at the very end of the great plains: to the east it looks like Kansas, and to the west, it’s tall mountains. It makes for some striking views.

I also liked Cheyenne. It’s a small city, about 60,000 people. But the parks are beautiful, there’s a local airport and college, and it seemed like a nice place to live. It helped that I got a tour of the town.

The next day, Nancy and I went to a nearby recreation area – Vedauwoo. It’s a big pile of boulders, off-road trails, and campgrounds. It’s also just in the middle of nowhere – flat plains as far as the eye can see. It was getting cold now, in mid-September (Wyoming has extensive and brutal winters). But still, we saw a lot of climbers, and apparently it’s well known for the bouldering opportunities.

After seeing Cheyenne, it was time for me to head East: a few days of sustained driving through the states of Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri and Arkansas.

Alex and I headed upstate last weekend to visit family; we spent a few hours biking the loop at Saratoga National Battlefield (it was Alex’s longest bike ride to date). I put together a short timelapse video of the ride). Apologies in advance – it’s a little choppy, and also my first GoPro video. But you gotta start somewhere, right?

Having visited Boston and DC in 2014, Alex and I wanted to continue visiting East-coast cities, and our next stop was Philadelphia.

During college, I’d spent a lot of time in Philadelphia as part of the crew team. And growing up, I had family nearby. But, neither brought me into the city center with any frequency. In fact, the last time I think I was actually in Philly proper was ’96… almost two decades ago.

There’s a lot to see in Philly, starting with the American revolution sights. I say that, because that’s where we started – at an unexpected Megabus stop right in front of Independence Hall.

We started off in the Independence Hall area. To tour the hall, you need to stop by the visitor center for a free ticket at an appointed time. Arriving at 10, our ticket was scheduled for 2:30. We wandered around the nearby historic sights: the Liberty Bell, Carpenter Hall, etc etc.

Right across the street was the Chemical Heritage Museum, a free museum dedicated to the history of chemistry. The highlight here was suprisingly a touchscreen display that showed illustrative videos of each element.

We also stopped at the tiny Thaddeus Kosciuszko National Historic Site, the smallest national site in the country. Kosciuszko was a Polish freedom fighter who made a name for himself during the revolution. There’s two bridges dedicated to him in upstate NY, which nobody can pronounce. So we call them the twin bridges.

Independence Hall was a lot of fun, but the rangers giving the tours were peculiar and disengaged – repeating themselves. Nonetheless, we saw the first congress rooms (from when Philadelphia was the provisional national capitol), as well as the famous Independence Hall. They’re all smaller than you’d expect.

A few blocks away there’s a great traditional soda fountain. We got huge ice cream sundaes… they were enormous. I got a ‘Mt Vesuvius’ (chocolate ice cream with brownie chunks, hot fudge, malt powder and whipped cream), while Alex got a ‘Lightning Rod’ (chocolate brownie pieces with coffee ice cream, covered in espresso, espresso beans, white chocolate, with a hard pretzel). Yeah – ridiculous.

We took a quick stop at Elfreth’s Alley, a short street that’s considered the oldest continuously-inhabited residential street in the country. Then we walked to the north-center of the city, Chinatown, to check into our hotel – cheap, but centrally located. Plus we got to wander around the nearby grocery stores.

Dropping off our bags, we left to check out the Wanamaker Organ, an enormous organ located in a majestic open space at the center of Wanamaker’s department store (now owned by Macy’s). An organist performs twice a week and we were lucky enough to arrive just in time.

Hungry, we turned the corner to visit Reading Terminal Market – but unfortunately, it was just closing up. It’s a sort of cafeteria/farmers market, and we walked past numerous booths being closed for the day. All filled with tasty food we couldn’t eat.

The rest of the night was spent at the hotel and a nearby bar, where we watched the March Madness semifinals (Wisconsin upsetting Kentucky) and drank local beer.

The next morning, we walked through Chinatown to our first stop at Poe House, another small national historic site. This may have been the most depressing historical site I’ve been to, but maybe also authentic (it was in a state of unabashed disrepair). It doesn’t take very long to visit – only really recommended for Poe enthusiasts.

The major stop of the day was Eastern State Penitentiary. on the western side of the central city. Along the way, we got a look at some great murals and brownstones, as well as the Thaddeus Stevens School, a striking Gothic building.

Philadelphia’s Mural Arts Program is an expansive program that gives the city a lot of color. The goal, when the program was instituted, was to discourage graffiti. It looks like it worked, and the murals are both interesting and beautiful.

Eastern State was a prison that operated from 1829 through the 1970s, before falling into disrepair.

Admission gets you an audio tour guided by none other than Steve Buscemi. It’s a remarkable site and the highlight of the trip for me. The prison went through a lot of phases: the initial goal was the keep prisoners in complete silence for their (relatively short) sentences. Guards and prisoners didn’t wear shoes, and prisoners were kept in solitary confinement. This was an improvement from earlier prisons that kept all the prisoners together, but was obviously inhumane by modern standards.

Eventually it became a more conventional prison before being shut down after operating for almost 150 years.

There were a lot of escape attempts from Eastern State, some successful – the remains of some are still visible. Also interesting was the initial design of the prison, which was something of a panopticon: the prison had a single central point, with cellblocks radiating out in a circular pattern. A single guard standing at the center point could look down every hallway in the prison.

As the prison grew, this was abandoned: the spokes of the wheels were filled in, additional floors were built, and so on.

Nowadays, the prison is open for tours. It hosts haunted houses at Halloween, and some cells have artwork. I really enjoyed the artwork actually – it gave some perspective. One piece replicated a Gitmo cell inside the jail cell: the Gitmo cells are chainlink and much smaller than these stone cells dating from 1829. Another looked to shift the perspective from prisoners to their victims by painting all the victims and hanging the paintings from the ceiling of a cell.

Also interesting were a set of TVs showing clips from famous prison movies, situated in an appropriate setting: the shower scene from Shawshank in an actual prison shower, for instance. Maybe my favorite was an entire knit cell, which took months to complete. The knitting represents the expansive amount of time prisoners spent in cells. Very clever.

Oh yeah, Al Capone was housed in the prison for a while. He had a comfortable cell, outside the normal prisoner area – right near the guards; he also had his own radio.

Leaving the penitentiary, we meandered to the Schuylkill river, past boathouse row, and down along the Rocky steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Then we cut in to Rittenhouse Square for lunch.

The last walk of the day was along the main street. Lots of modern art and civic buildings (such as Claes Oldenburg pieces), fountains, memorial sculptures, etc.

It was Easter, so of course had to celebrate.

Eventually we ended up waiting in line behind the train station for the Megabus to bring us back to NY. All in all, it was an enjoyable weekend that gave me a new perspective on Philadelphia.

Life intervened, so posts about the remainder of this trip are delayed indefinitely. Will update when I can find the time.

Zion Canyon – ‘Court of the Patriarchs’

I visited all five of the major national parks in Utah when I was a kid, and I remember enjoying them more than any other parks I’d seen. As many of the parks I visited bore little relation to fainy childhood memories, I was curious to see how they’d stack up.

The first park on the agenda was Zion, and here I found my evaluation stymied by continuing bad weather. I’d been pursued by rain through Southern California and Arizona, and it was as bad in Utah as it had been in Sedona. I stayed at Zion two days, and it rained intermittently both days. The weather could change within an hour or two, making predictions difficult. Should I hike or not? Tough to tell in advance.

I entered the park from the east entrance. Here the landscape was more astonishing than anything I’ve seen so far. Big swooping sandstone hills, ‘checkerboard mesa,’ it felt like a Doctor Seuss landscape. This section of the park is separated from the far more popular Zion Canyon by an impressive 1.1 mile tunnel, excavated in the 1930s. I passed through this section in clouds and vowed to take some pictures in what would presumably be better weather a few days later. But it was not to be: floods damaged this part of the road and I could not return, having to leave from the south entrance.

View of the canyon during rare sunlight

When I visited in the late 90s, these parks in Utah were considered hidden gems, but they’re secret no longer. The main road in this park is closed to cars and only accessible by shuttle buses, which arrive at every stop in 7-10 minute intervals on an 80-minute route. As you can imagine, this is a pretty substantial system, and many of the buses were nearly full. This in September. According to statistics I looked up, in 1996 there were 2.5 million visitors to Zion. In 2012, this had increased to 3 million, and it’s basically a linear increase. It will only get worse.

Angel’s Landing is at the top of this peak

After grabbing what was one of the last remaining campsites I hopped on the shuttle. I wanted to hike the famous Angel’s Landing trail, and took the long way past the ‘Emerald Pools,’ but the clouds began to darken and a light rain began to fall. I decided to turn back after hiking 4 miles here. It was a good decision – as I later found out, there were sections of the trail narrow enough that a chain is attached to the cliff on one side to provide a handhold. Not something I wanted to face on slick rock!

Dark clouds, about to pummel the campground

I returned to the campground and read for a little while, but the clouds were growing increasingly ominous. I’ve never seen clouds so dark. I was very happy that I was able to sleep in the van – I finished setting up my curtains and rearranging the junk inside just as the rain began to fall. It poured heavily for half an hour, and then continued to rain for another few hours until I fell asleep.

The next morning I wanted to do a strenuous hike, and chose the ‘Observation Point,’ which I believe is the highest accessible point in the park. A 2000 foot climb over 6 miles, I was able to climb steadily, but it was certainly exhausting. Many of these parks in Utah and Arizona are at deceptive elevations: as a ‘baseline,’ both Zion and Grand Canyon are 7000 feet, and here I climbed over 8500. I can definitely feel the difference in elevation.

Narrow slot canyon, 700 feet above the main Zion floor

This trail began with some rather dull switchbacks, but quickly entered a beautiful slot canyon, with a small stream. Crossing the stream, climibing continues around some mountains. Here, the fog began to close in, though it wasn’t yet raining. The last 400 feet of climbing are along a bare cliff edge, by far the most harrowing I’ve seen on my trip so far. The path is about 4 feet wide, with a 100+ foot drop to one side and a vertical cliff to the other. I took it carefully: at some places a slip or collapse of the rain-soaked ground could have been very dangerous.

“View” from Observation Point

Finally a reached the summit and the observation point – but I’d climbed through the fog and there was nothing to observe! The other neary peaks were visible, rising like islands about the clouds, and it seemed like maybe the fog would be lifting: tendrils wound their way around these mountains, sticking close to the rock. The fog moved with surprising rapidity, but seemed to have an endless stock. It just kept coming, and soon I was completely enclosed in fog, with visibility cut down to 20-30 feet. Regretfully I began my return journey.

Fog heading down from Observation Point. 20 feet of visibility, with a drop of hundreds of feet to the right

Soon enough, the rain began, and it really poured. Little streams appeared on the bare rock, and turned into waterfalls, some cascading over the path. I took shelter under one rock overhang with a few other people. Our concern was the flooding across the stream we’d crossed below.

Finally I headed out from safety, the rain just pouring down. The stream was higher than before, but I was able to cross without problems. It was all for naught, though, as rounding the corner there was an enormous waterfall pouring across the path – probably dropping 50 feet before it hit. I hesitated to cross, and when I did I could feel it pushing me. When I took my boots off later, I could literally pour water out.

A typical look at the trail

It cleared up when I finished this hike, but I decided to stay inside; the fog never lifted. Later in the afternoon, and through the night, the rain continued. This was my Zion experience.