Arctic Traveler

2010-11-13T12:37:00.005+02:00

London Nov. 2009

2009-12-06T14:21:00.007+02:00

Stockholm, 2009

2009-11-08T12:57:00.005+02:00

Vilnius, Lithuania

2009-11-07T15:29:00.006+02:00

Vienna 2009

2009-11-07T14:57:00.003+02:00

Dinner with Madeleine

2008-06-13T09:59:00.004+03:00

London Calling...

2008-04-24T05:06:00.006+03:00

The Van Goph

2008-03-23T07:17:00.001+02:00

Lake Como

2008-02-04T00:46:00.001+02:00

Best Safari Photo I've seen...

2008-01-05T06:28:00.000+02:00

This photo was taken by a friend of mine. It is awesome. You don't get this kind of photo with a point and shoot digital pocket camera. In addition, you need to take 600 photos to get 30 good ones, 10 great ones and 1 awesome photo.

Chateau de Versailles

2007-12-31T03:51:00.000+02:00

Brugge

2007-10-30T01:34:00.000+02:00

Budapest

2007-10-25T05:02:00.001+03:00

Every year on August 20th, Hungary celebrates St. Stephen's Day with a parade and a small yet much loved relic. Clutching precious jewels, the hand is still defiant, albeit shrunken and yellowed. The withered mummified right hand of St. Stephen resides in an ornate golden reliquary shaped like Matthias Church in the Basilica of St. Stephen. It is known as "The Holy Right".

Prague, CZ

2007-10-18T04:42:00.000+03:00

More photos from Africa (Tanzania)

2007-10-10T01:48:00.000+03:00

Wow, internet is awesome here in the US. It's so fast compared to where I've been living. More photos will be posted while I'm in the US than any other place!

Finally... Greenland, how I love snow!!

2007-10-10T01:18:00.000+03:00

Я люблю снег!

As I always say, "I love cold weather." Where else would one go to escape the warm tropical winter of Belarus? I was living and working there at the time... It was early February and I could not decide where to go on vacation. It was a toss up between Jamacia, renting a villa on the ocean or somewhere cold. I picked someplace cold. I have always wanted to go to Iceland thinking it would be a cold place. So I got on the internet and started my research. Someone mentioned these new age ice hotels. That sounded cool. (sorry, bad pun intended) I stumbled accross the web site of a hotel in some far off place called Disco Bay. Where in the heck was that? Well it was Greenland and the rest is history!

After some research on the Greenland Tourist Board site I sent of a few inquiries. Not really knowing what I was getting my self into I was only going to do a one night dog sled trip with other sightseeing activities added on. I had what sounded like a great trip worked out with a travel agency out of Denmark. (All flights to Greenland originated in Denmark at that time) Everything was a go until the requested a bank transfer to pay for the trip. I prefer to use my credit card. That way if something goes wrong you have some recourse. So it was on to travel agency number two...

Agency number two was connected with work so I knew I'b be safe. They allowed me to use my credit card to book the trip. The Greenland Travel company changed as did the intinerary and the cities. Now, I was in for three and a half day Arctic Ice adventure. 200 kilometers over three days with no promise of a roof over my head at night. (what had I gotten myself into?)

As it turned out it was the best trip I had ever taken. Wow, what an experience. 4 tourists, 4 guides and about 64 Greenland hounds pulling our sleds arcoss the Arctic ice. I can't wait to go again in a year or two. I'm already planning it.

Flip Out of Africa...

2007-07-17T08:55:00.000+03:00

Well, I'm sitting in my house with two suitcases full of my belongings. Every thing else was packed up last week. My things will go into storage for one year as I travel about getting ready for my next overseas assignment. I will spend approx. one year in the U.S. getting ready for my next overseas adventure.

Pictured above is Geoffrey, the gardener with Flip. Flip is my brother's brass dolphin. It was packed up when I left Michigan in 2002 and has been traveling the world with me ever since. Currently he is in a crate headed for Antwerp, Belgium where he will spend a year in isolation. In 2008 I plan to take him all over Europe for photo opportunities...

Geoffrey (Housekeeper/Gardener) and John (Chef)
Both are extremely professional, commited to thier families
and wonderful to work with.

2007-07-08T15:43:00.000+03:00

What I did while I should have been packing...

Photos, photos, and more photos was the packing avoidance culprit today. I felt as if it was a noble task to take photos of all of my things incase the ship goes down while crossing the ocean. Now this sort of thing doesn't much happen but it was my excuse today for not focusing on the move.

This little perfume bottle was purchased in Cape Town, South Africa from a glass artist. I have three of his works. Shown below.

Wow, just had a thought cross my mind... logging on to my computer and writing this post is yet another way of avoiding the fact that the movers come tomorrow at 9am.

Another European Adventure...

2007-04-08T17:48:00.000+03:00

I saw SNOW!

Wow, back again from another trip. Someone recently asked me, “So do you really have a job or what?” I admit that I travel more than my fair share. I take up too much of the allotted travel time the world has to offer. I love to fly. I love visiting new places. I love to be above the clouds where the sun always shines! There is never a dull cloudy day at 30,000 feet.

It’s really hot here in Tanzania and my sanity needs frequent Cold Weather Therapy Treatments. Maybe I can write these trips off my taxes as un-reimbursed medical expenses… The first day I was in Paris in rained, hailed, snowed and the sun came out. How's that for the all around experiece. It had been 2 1/2 years since I had seen snow. I wish it has snowed a foot!

My last trip was for three and a half weeks to Europe. Prague, Budapest, Paris, London, Brugge and Amsterdam. My favorite part of the whole trip was the chance to test my Canon Rebel digital camera with a new lens I borrowed from a friend here in Tanzania. Check out my photos of paintings at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. It was cool that they let you take photos (without a flash). I love the Impresionist artists the best. this museum delivers on that!

Thatched Cottages at Cordeville
Oil on canvas72.0 x 91.0 cm.Auvers-sur-Oise: June, 1890

Marguerite Gachet in the Garden
Oil on canvas46.0 x 55.0 cm.Auvers-sur-Oise: June, 1890

Noon: Rest from Work (after Millet)
Oil on canvas73.0 x 91.0 cm.Saint-Rémy: January, 1890

Terrace of a Cafe on Montmartre (La Guinguette)
Oil on canvas49.0 x 64.0 cm.Paris: October, 1886

Cape of Good Hope

2006-11-12T16:54:00.000+02:00

Well, I'm getting closer to the south pole. I just returned from Cape Town, South Africa. All I can say is WOW. What a place. Sooooo much to do. And the food was awesome.

I stayed in the Victoria wharf area of Cape Town. The hotel was nice, not great, but really nice. From the view of my room I could see the entire wharf area with all its ships, boats and tons of seals swimming around the harbor.

I didn't take my digital camera. It was too much to carry on this mostly business trip. I did end up buying two disposable cameras. I'll work on getting those developed and edit this with some photos.

More later...

Lago di Como

2006-10-14T23:55:00.000+03:00

Where does one go when you want to get away from it all? Well for me, last weekend was spent in the lakes district north of Milan. I hopped a flight via Amsterdam to Milan and caught a bus up to Lake Como. From there it was a 2.5 hour boat ride up to a small village on the edge of the lake.

Varrena with a population of 800 is the perfect jumping off point for lake excursions.

I climbed up the mountain to the castle located above the village. The local map shows what appears to be a small road leading from a monastery up to the castle. Actually it was a dirt trail. At times it was only 10 or so inches wide and required you to push through a row of bushes to continue on. If you are up for the hike it will be a challenge just to find this trail. There are two ways to reach the castle from opposite ends of the village.
The first path I refer to as the 17th century way to get to the castle. The path I took was the 14th century way to storm a castle!

The castle below is where they filmed the end to one of the Star Wars movies. I also saw the house used in Ocean's 13. No picture of that... too far away.

The End of Winter? aka The Start of Fried Egg Season

2006-09-25T21:26:00.000+03:00

So, I have not seen snow for one and a half years! I'm going into serious withdrawal. Before I came to Dar es Salaam I wondered if they had an ice rink for hockey or something. No such luck. I would have paid someone to let me lie on the ice for an hour.

We are coming to the end of winter in Tanzania. I dread the change just around the corner. This is the first time in my life that I've lived somewhere without snow. Everyother place I've lived I've seen snow for six months each year. Most folks I know try and escape the winter cold. Me, I like it. Or at least I used to... I hope living down here for a year or two doesn't ruin my love of snow. If I go back up north and hate snowy cold weather, someone owes me big time.

If I'm lucky, I've got about nine more months to go here. All of the places I'm looking to move have snow at some point during the year. The next nine months take me right through the hottest part of the year in southern Africa. December and January were just plain HOT! It was the WOW kind of hot, like you never want to go out hot. Hot so hot I could cook a eight course breakfast on the tiles of my roof top patio. (definitely egg frying hot) Note to self: January 1, 2007 - fry egg on roof just to prove a point.

Organizing your computer and all its hardware...

2006-08-13T20:26:00.000+03:00

Well a techy I'm not. I've had my ipod mini for a couple of years now and one would think I could find all the wires / cables that came with the thing to begin with. Well after my move from Minsk to Dar es Salaam I lost the usb cable. What does this mean... All the music that I've updated on my computer since the move can not be put onto the ipod! In a country where good music is hard to come by on the radio, I've become dependent on my ipod as the only source of music while I drive around Tanzania.

I was on Amazon.com today and pulled the trigger on ordering a replacement cord. I searched and search for the damn thing and gave up all hope of ever seeing it again. I'm cheap by nature, so the thought of shell'n out $19 bucks for a new cord didn't sit well.

I'm an Amazon.com Prime junky. If what I'm looking at doesn't get shipped for free with my Prime membership I won't order it. Sooooooooo.... I was surfing for the cord and found it on Amazon. I quickly dropped it in my cart and headed for the checkout. Clicked past the details and had it on its way. Boom, that was fast. WAIT A MINUTE! What did I see as the confirmation blew past my eyes at 100 mph as I hit the "proceed to checkout" button??? It took a few seconds to register and I had already hit the button. I noticed however, that I got nicked for about $5 of shipping on a $19 item. Man that burns me up! Well, now I had to cancel the order before it shipped. ABORT MISSION, REPEAT ABORT MISSION!

Just then, my mind clicked into hyper mode and I thought, "just check one more place." Well what'ya know, there was the cable. Right where I left it six months ago. On the bottom shelf of a bookcase with three unhung pictures stacked up in front of it. I've been looking weeks for that thing!

Chapter One

2006-07-30T11:26:00.000+03:00

Well, its no secret that I LOVE cold weather! Anyone who knows me, even just a little, will tell you I hate hot temperatures and warm climates.

So you must be asking yourself how did this guy end up living in Africa.. I've been asking myself that vary same question ever since I got here.

Actually, this time of year is not all that bad. The evenings are cool and I get a really nice breeze off the ocean at night. I'm one year into my two year stay. So far not all that bad. I've never lived anywhere that it has not snowed at least five months out of the year. This tropical thing better not stick. If I go back up north and all of a sudden hate cold weather, somebody is gonna get hurt!!

One might think that with a blog title of "Arctic Traveler" you would see the first photo with some snow in it. Well, all my snow photos are packed away at the moment. I had to download them to an external hard drive. I'll hook it up later and load some snowy photos from my Arctic Adventure to Greenland from 2005. Wow what a trip that was... More to come on that note. Now, its hot weather and ocean breezes. Here is one of my favorite pics from this past year.
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One of the things I do to take up my time here is alter photos that I've taken over the years. Here is one that I've spent a lot of time on. The first is the original photo and then what I've done to it...
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