crosbyreport

[crosbyreport]

San Juan, Puerto Rico: Where so many speak Spanish, you think you’re in California. We spent a week in the not-so-exotic — but still technically foreign — Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

Planning a vacation in a foreign land can really be a pain, what with finding lost passports, figuring out currency exchange rates, and overcoming language problems (mostly ours). Frankly, it sometimes makes sense to not even bother. That's how we ended up spending a week in the U.S. Commonwealth of San Juan Puerto Rico. Seven days in San Juan Puerto Rico. One of Puerto Rico’s glorious beaches. We thought going to a U.S. Commonwealth like Puerto Rico would make for an easy, relaxing getaway—like going to Puerto Valharta—but apparently United Airlines didn’t get the memo. After our red-eye to Washington/Dulles touched down, we were cheerfully informed that “the local time was 7:30 am.” Tired and bleary-eyed from trying to sleep in legroom-free Economy Class seating, we changed the timezone on our watches in accordance and listened for our departing gate which they said was D2. While relaxing at Gate D2, it slowly dawned on us that something was wrong. As it turned out, two things were wrong — the time and our gate number. The flight to Puerto Rico had left an hour earlier from a different gate. Our connecting flight to San Juan left without us. Nooooooo, wait! At the United Airlines customer service desk, a very pleasant agent assured us, quite happily, that she could book us both through Atlanta on an American flight later that day—a fine plan, it seemed, until she added, “...for $500 a piece.” I went whiter than I already was (if that’s even imaginable). And what followed could best be described as anguished wailing and gnashing of teeth. It wasn’t pretty, but it got the attention of the customer service manager—a man who appeared to us from out of a blindingly luminous white light, amongst the fluttering release of white doves and a chorus of singing angels. A United Airlines service manager saves the day. Crazy, right? Upon hearing our desperate plight, Saint Vincent spake saying: “Verily, thee shall bed in Puerto Rico anon! Let’s get thee kind folks to yon destination o’er night!” or words to that effect—I was pretty hysterical by then. A few hours later, we arrived at our hotel having spent a full 24 hours en route. From this point, we felt, things could only improve. San Juan is the capital of Puerto Rico, or is it vice versa? The name “Puerto Rico” is Spanish for “Rich Port,” but it wasn’t the original name for this island—the original name for the island was “San Juan.” Regrettably, a British map-maker switched the name of the port with the name of the island, and no one ever caught the error. As a result, the entire island is named after its port. Thanks, Britannia! Our first day in San Juan Puerto Rico started out a bit late. After a noon Starbucks run, we drove our tiny Hyundai Brio rental car to Old San Juan and followed a walking tour of the town from a guidebook we’d brought along. Starting from the pier/cruise-ship port on the North East side of the island, we followed the guide’s directions past a tourist-friendly collection of t-shirt and tchotchke shops interspersed between a variety of American chain restaurants. Outside the walls of Puerto Rico’s Fort Morro. San Juan’s Fort Morro protects this rich port. Yeah, those are 15-foot thick walls Walking clockwise around the island, we immediately approached Fort Morro, an imposing protective military structure along the exposed Eastern coast of the island. Originally built in the 1500s by Spain, the fort's walls are 15-feet thick in parts and extend nearly around the entire island country. The ancient stone complex has stood mostly intact despite 500 years of near-constant invasions from the Spanish, British and Dutch, and ultimately the Americans. Outside the walls of Fort Morro. Much of the wall still stands tall, silently mocking Puerto Rico’s less timeless structures such as the crumbling hotel/resort in which we stayed. Strategically, Puerto Rico is poised at the Eastern entrance of the Caribbean trade routes, and was a primary battlefront for warring nations.

Spain wanted Puerto Rico for its access to Mexico and South America’s rare spices and minerals. America, conversely, wanted access to its valuable unsigned professional baseball players and good-looking pop-music entertainers. Puerto Rico’s coveted beachfront cemetery. A final resting place with a view. Continuing around the island, we came upon a cemetery located on some primo beach-front property just outside the fort walls. Certainly, the plots had a view anyone would die for. Ba-da-bing! Thank you, don’t forget to tip the wait staff... Past the cemetery, there were a number of weather-beaten houses with the same stunning views of the azure water and sunny skies. Houses that would no doubt be in better repair and prohibitively pricey were they not outside the Great Wall and nakedly exposed to invading forces, hurricanes, and probably pirates, too. That’s a lot of dead people. By the time we reached a smaller fort closer to the center of Old San Juan, the sun was baking us like sweet, gooey plantains. So we ducked into the Berlin Café for a raspberry frappé, a tuna fish sandwich and their apparently nuclear-powered central air-conditioning. Once we had hypothermia at bay, we walked around Old San Juan some more to take in its old-world charm. Trust me, the street stones are blue. The picturesque painted streets of Old San Juan Puerto Rico. Walking Old San Juan. Old San Juan’s colorfully painted narrow houses and even narrower streets reminded us a lot of many European cities that we had visited in the past. Even the streets themselves were charming — many made from beautiful blue stones originally used as ballast on visiting ships. And around every corner we found interesting shopping, decent restaurants and quaint cafés tucked away. One of many, charming blue-stoned streets of Old San Juan. If you dropped a Frenchman here, he might understandably believe he was in France. (Of course, if you dropped him from high enough, he might believe he was Napoleon, too. Just food for thought.) Though our hotel was right on the beach at Isle Verde, we found that the pool bar served beer, so we spent more time there. Unfortunately, so did a lot of fat, sweaty Americans — primarily from the Tri-State area — and their loutish kids. One of many, charming blue-stoned streets of Old San Juan. Still, the 80F+ climate made it hard to be bothered by anything or anyone. Unlike the harsh, stabbing sun of the South West and Pacific Coast states, the Caribbean sun is soft and welcoming, like the embrace of a beautiful Puerto Rican woman, just one that doesn’t yell quite as much. We wanted to get a true sense of the Puerto Rican lifestyle and culture, so we drove to Plaza Las Americas, a shopping mall that was popular with the locals and so enormous we were surprised by how hard it was to find. Driving around San Juan is no pleasure cruise. Hyundai Brio, c. 2007 Despite being a US commonwealth, the country's Spanish-language signage made the roads a little tough to navigate at times. Plus, the local driving style didn’t help either. Unlike American highways, the flow of traffic in Puerto Rico rarely exceeded 60mph. Yet people still somehow managed to drive aggressively at the same time. They took insane risks, such as crossing into your lane without signaling. Driving on the highway shoulder. And worse, letting tourists drive Hyundai Brios on highways. Whenever I drive in a different country, I am constantly impressed with man’s endless capacity to needlessly endanger his own life and the lives of others. If you need evidence that mankind wasn’t Intelligently Designed, just drive in a different country than your own. The beach at Isla Verde, Candado in the distance. Dinner on the beach. Pamela's restaurant beats the crap out of the sucky Ajili-Mójili restaurant. We made it back to the hotel—barely—and made reservations at Pamela's for dinner that night. Hidden away behind gates in the posh residential Ocean Park area, Pamela’s was by far the best restaurant we visited in San Juan Puerto Rico.

After a delicious meal on the beach, we tried to walk off our lamb sirloin and chocolate crème brûlée but, frankly, the beach wasn’t that long. So we went home to sleep instead. Did you know that San Juan Puerto Rico has a rain forest? We didn’t. Me, in front of a tall, rain forest waterfall at El Yonque. It was days later, and we still couldn’t seem to wake up before noon, but did manage to drive out Route 3 to El Yonque, the island’s rain forest. Forty minutes into the trip, we passed the turn-off and had to double back to find the barely marked Route 191. The road meandered up into the mountains to an architecturally impressive Visitor’s Center with soaring white buttresses overgrown with lush foliage. Inside the modern, open-air structure, we viewed a movie about the rain forest narrated by Jimmy Smits, a local PR boy made good. Let’s just say the movie’s plot was thin and predictable and the character development, non-existent. It was not, to be blunt, his best work. Rainforest waterfall. Venturing further up the mountain, we stopped at a tall, stone tower for a panoramic view of El Yonque. We fully intended to hike up to a second, even higher tower beyond where the road finally ended, but an exhausted couple coming back down informed us that the hike took an hour each way. With rain clouds looming, we decided instead to drive back down to the Mina falls. We parked and stumbled down the long, rocky steps into the deep forest. Twenty minutes later, we were staring up at an 80-ft high waterfall. It was hardly Niagara, mind you, but it made the nearby La Coco falls look like a kid peeing. San Juan has a number of beach towns. Back on Route 3, we turned Estes (or East) towards Loquillo Beach, supposedly one of the prettiest beaches in the area. The town itself was a small beach community cluttered with brightly colored, but shanty-esque houses. The streets angled and twisted in ways too difficult for me to fathom, but we eventually found the beach...accidentally. It didn’t seem all that much nicer than the one at Isla Verde or Condado, but it was more deserted; not surprising, since the water at Loquillo was nigh impossible to find without a divining rod. People don’t go to San Juan Puerto Rico for the snow skiing. We hung out a while, but hunger soon got the better of us, so we went looking for a local dive. For some reason, nothing was open at 3pm. So we headed back out to Route 3 and ate the only place open: the descriptively named Taco Maker fast food chain. Loquillo seemed much like the surfer communities in the US, where the quality of the cuisine comes in a distant second to that of the surf. Be careful where you eat in San Juan Puerto Rico. The remains of the day were spent poolside making plans to make up for not having lunch plans. So we got reservations for an “authentic” Puerto Rican dinner at the oft-recommended and highly rated restaurant, Ajili-Mójili. And it sucked—spectacularly so. For starters, the menu had advertisements in it. Yes, I said advertisements. Yes, on the menu. In a “fine dining” establishment. That is correct. But what’s worse, the waiters’ shirts had Coca-Cola logos on them. Call me crazy, but I believe a restaurant should live or die on the quality of its food and not the effectiveness of its ad sales manager. And this “restaurant” doesn’t deserve to live. Yet, after reading a few ads, we decided on a sampling of supposedly local dishes, and judging from the resulting fare, the locals must eat a lot of TV dinners. The “food” arrived instantaneously and simultaneously, literally swamping our small table with greasy fare. The salad was acceptable, but in no way interesting, unique, or probably even authentic. The cod was quite nasty. And the fritters were deep-fried disasters. At least I think the items were salad, cod, and fritters. But I couldn’t be sure, as the impatient waiter never bothered to explain which of the unidentifiable dishes was which. So it may have been the fritters that were nasty and the cod that was a deep-fried disaster.

Either way, it wasn’t good. Wisely, the waiter rushed us through the meal — probably, so we wouldn’t have time to realize how bad the food tasted — but more likely, because it was 9:30pm and the restaurant closed at ten (permanently, I hoped). Do yourself a favor and go to Pamela’s instead. Twice. Puerto Rico’s famous Camuy Caves. Puerto Rico’s famous Camuy Caves. The very bat-filled Camuy Caves. Since we bore easily, we packed up our little Hyundai Brio the next day and drove I-22 Oestre (West) into the middle of Puerto Rico to the Camuy Caves. In addition to this natural wonder, we hoped to have time to see a man-made wonder as well; namely, the world’s largest radio telescope. The journey to the caves took a little under two hours, but then we had to wait another hour for the tram to take us down into the center of the earth and to what was surely the dank denizen of the Morlocks. Actually, a 5-story deep, 100-meter diameter sinkhole which is the entrance to the Camuy Caves. Inside the Camuy Sinkhole. Inside the enormous, all-encompassing darkness of the Underworld, it was refreshingly cool and damp. The only illumination came from electric lighting installed when it became a tourist attraction in the 90s. In the 1960s, an American couple had visited the site and lobbied unsuccessfully to get the government to turn the area into a national preserve. Instead of giving up, they bought the land themselves and, some 30 years later, sold it to the government who had, by then, wised up to the cave’s potential for attracting the bat-loving and/or light-sensitive tourist crowd. Going to see San Juan’s radio telescope. Me, listening for extraterrestrials From Camuy, we piloted the wheezing Brio up yet another, seemingly endless, mountain road to the Arecibo Observatory, operated for by Cornell University. (You may remember this famous radio telescope from such films as “Contact” starring Jodie Foster, and “Goldeneye,” starring Pierce Brosnan.) Thanks to huge, natural gaping holes in their mountainside, local scientists were able to stretch metal reflecting panels across a 300-meter cavity and let the whole assemblage sag into a parabolic dish shape, perfect for concentrating and magnifying any radio signals from outer space. Epic in scale and scope, this monstrous dish represents Man's best hope of receiving messages and television sitcoms from other galaxies. Sadly, it’s being decommissioned. By the time we got back to Isla Verde, we’d had our fill of pseudo-authentic Puerto Rican food and just wanted something normal. We finally found some Italian food at Café Tuscany, a restaurant inside the Condado Marriott. It wasn’t great by any means, but the menu offered several non-meat based entrées, and for that, our colons were grateful. View from pool-side. Chilling by the pool. The rest of the trip consisted of varying combinations of sun, sand, food and, of course, drink. And during these sunnier, essentially motionless hours, I had time to think about this commonwealth. Certainly, the island has a lot going for it — great weather, a rich history and Medallion Beer. But it has a lot going against it, too — U.S. fast-food chains, shopping malls and Ricky Martin. So in the end, it’s a wash. And we didn’t learn enough about the political climate there to know if statehood would be good or bad for Puerto Ricans. But we did learn that if you’re a lazy American looking for a tropical getaway, you could do a lot worse than Puerto Rico. Fort Lauderdale, for example.

[crosbyreport]

Morocco’s Atlas Mountains aren’t the world’s tallest, but at least they’re not more @#$%ing desert. Morocco’s local mountain range is nothing to sneeze at.

On a continent where deserts like the Kalahar, Namib, and Sahara routinely scorch roughly one-fourth of its total land, Africa’s Atlas Mountains—with their higher altitudes and cooler temperatures—are a welcome respite from the continent’s usual blast-furnace-based climate. We didn’t expect the range to be much more than a nice change of scenery, but damned if that adorable cordillera didn’t charm our pants off. Look at that crazy mountain shit, bro. Wait, where are the Atlas Mountains again? Map of Morocco, Atlas Mountains in red. The Atlas Mountains basically cut a horizontal East/West swath through the middle of Morocco (see photo), a country situated in the top-left tip of the African Continent. To the northwest of the mountains, along the Atlantic Ocean and Alboran Sea, lay most of Morocco’s major cities (including Marrakech, Tangier, and Chefchaouen), as well as towns, factories, and farmland. To the southeast of the mountains, there’s...well, sand. Just sand. How much sand? Like, tons of it. If I had to guess how much, I’d say enough to cover half of Montana. That’s probably more desert than Moroccans really wanted when desert was first doled out by the Zoning Gods, but what are they going to do about it now? Ask for a variance? Yeah, I wish ’em good luck with that. The Atlas Mountains are kinda like a lot of other ranges. As a couple of fairly avid travelers, my wife and I have already been to a number of mountain ranges, including the Andes, the Adirondacks, the Sierra Nevadas, the Alaskas, the Rockies, and even China’s Yan, so we somewhat understand the appeal of living life at a 45° angle, far from fanatical flatlanders. Morocco’s N13 highway cuts right through the Atlas Mountains. One might assume, therefore, that if you've seen one mountain range, you’ve seen them all. But that’s the type of narrow-minded, judgmental arrogance that only reinforces the Atlas Mountains’ negative body-image and exacerbates its self-esteem issues. Inanimate geological formations have feelings, too, you know. Be honest, you’d totally do that mountain range. When the Atlas Mountains were formed some 300 million years ago during the Paleozoic Era—back when North America, Europe, and Africa got all drunk and hooked up—the Atlas mountains rivaled today’s Himalayas in size and so, not surprisingly, it got laid constantly. This was common knowledge back then because the Atlas chain would never shut up about it. I want my Morrissey CDs back, Europe! But, over the eons, the three continents began bickering a lot, finally breaking up and moving far away from each other. That left the Atlas Mountains sad and alone. A mere shadow of its former continental self, quietly sobbing over old photos, love letters, and the remains of its once-respectable CD collection. After the trauma of being rejected and abandoned like that, developing an inferiority complex would be more than understandable. Morocco’s tallest mountain is, frankly, not all that tall. Today, the Atlas Mountains are all but neglected by both suitors and the record books. At an almost embarrassing peak-height of just 13,671-feet, its Toubkal Ridge outside of Marrakesh is now barely half the height of the tectonic titans on the world’s “Top 100 Tallest Mountains” list—a precipitous fall from grace for this once-dominant stack of stones. The Andes is the longest range at 4,000+ miles and has the second-highest peak at 22,838 feet.—its parents must be very proud To minimize further parental disappointment, however, the Atlas Mountains wisely opted to refocus its energies on length instead of height, a criterion for which the range comports itself far better. Not only does the Atlas Mountains make the Top 100 list, it even makes the Top 10 in the length category (right up there alongside John Holmes). Size isn’t everything, but it’s certainly not nothing. Morocco’s N13 highway. As the world’s ninth-longest range, the Atlas Mountains measure a respectable 1,600

miles from end to end, about the distance from NYC to Houston, London to Kyiv, Ukraine, or Karachi, Pakistan to Bangladesh. It would take you over 540 hours to walk the whole stretch, assuming you couldn’t get an Uber® (which you can’t because the car-sharing service is currently only available in Casablanca). That makes sense, right? Okay, sure. Over that vast expanse of rocky real estate, the Atlas chain is artificially divided into three sections. To the West, there’s the Lesser-Atlas Mountains. To the East, there’s the Middle-Atlas Mountains. And between the two are...uh, the High-Atlas Mountains...kinda jammed in the...um, middle...you know, between the Lesser and...uh, the Middle. Get it? Cool, now you can explain it to me. The Atlas Mountains still have it going on...and on, and on. More mountain roads you could die on. When it comes to looks, the Atlas Mountains are nothing to sneeze at. Though, why you’d “sneeze” at something instead of maybe “sneering” at it, is beyond me—I feel like that phrase got “grape-vined” at some point. Or maybe not. Regardless, the range is an impressive sight any way you look at it (I recommend using your eyes). Around each snaking bend is yet another mesmerizing mountain vista, uncorrupted by shopping malls, iPhone factories, housing developments, or almost any other sign of civilization (so bring a large empty Gatorade® bottle along in case you need to pee). Like switchbacks? Then you'll like the Atlas Mountains. Instead, there’s a never-ending rock rainbow of every color and hue imaginable, though there’s a definite emphasis on earth tones. Trying to take in the full width and breadth of the Atlas Mountains is challenging, as it will eventually exhaust your eye’s cones and rods. Staring at the landscape for too long can be visually painful and—if you’re driving at the time—potentially fatal because highways like Morocco’s N13 have a ton of sudden switchbacks and a disconcerting lack of metal guardrails (see video below). https://youtu.be/2JyRyQS8b5c We drove the same twisting Moroccan road that Cadillac used to shoot this car commercial. The Ziz River is important to locals because you can’t farm rock. People live in the hills and farm in the valley. The denizens of the High Atlas range don’t build their homes nestled up amongst the valley’s angled mountainsides just for the spectacular views or to defend themselves against encroaching hordes of marauding flatlanders. No, they build homes up there because land at the base of the mountains is better used for other purposes. With precipitation rates that rarely exceed ten or eleven inches a year(!), Moroccans have to farm where the water is and, in the High Atlas Mountains, that’s on the valley floor along the twisting banks of the temperamental Ziz River. Guess where the Ziz River flows? Did you guess? Tiny streams flowing from higher mountain springs come together to create this vital waterway that runs through the entire Atlas valley all the way to the Sahara Desert some 200 miles away. The river fuels almost all the farms in the High Atlas Mountains, powers a hydroelectric dam, and attracts tourists looking to take stark and powerful landscape photos like the ones you see on this page (contact me for licensing terms). Morocco’s lush green Ziz River valley. While most of the surrounding area is composed of bedrock, brush, and beer cans, the Ziz River gorges veritably explode with vibrant greenery against the otherwise beige sand-scape. This path of lush foliage is the only visible sign of the almond trees, olive trees, date palms, cereals, alfalfa fields, and other cash crops that grow along the Ziz River’s shore. With hardly anything else visible for miles around, these narrow, meandering groves seem almost illicit, like the secret marijuana farms of Humboldt County, or the alien clone farms of Area 51. The remoteness of these Ziz River farms made me wonder if they were being run illegally under the jackbooted cruelty of Morocco’s merciless Alfalfa Mafia.

And, to be honest, I have no proof that they’re not. Why you’ve never heard of this Moroccan mountain range before. Look at that crazy mountain shit, bro. The Atlas Mountains aren’t as well-known to the general public—and by that, I mean, Americans—as the Himalayas, Appalachians, or Andes, mostly because the range rarely makes the news in the US. Maybe if more American tourists died after climbing it, getting lost on it, or crashing a small plane into it, the chain would be a more popular tourist destination. Yet, even though they clearly don’t have a great PR agency, the Atlas Mountains are nonetheless worth visiting or at least knowing about for no other reason than winning the Jeopardy® game show by confidently stating, “I’ll take Lesser Known Mountain Ranges for 400, Alex.” That would be totally worth it, in my opinion.

[crosbyreport]

Venice Italy: See this unforgettable city before it sinks and is forgotten. It’s not Atlantis, not yet any way.

We almost missed our train to Venice Italy, but fortunately, it was running 10 minutes late. Watching the destination board update itself was like gambling. “Come on, Venezia! Daddy needs an on-time departure!” Learning from our previous experience with EuroStar, we upgraded to first-class for this leg of our European vacation (a mere $20 extra), trying to avoid the unwashed masses and get a bit of legroom. Venice Italy has to be seen to be believed. The view of Venice from the tower at St. Mark’s Square. We arrived in the train station at Santa Lucia around 2pm and took the No. 52 water bus to the back side of Venice where our hotel, Alloggi Barbaria, was located about as far away from everything as you could get without being in France. Still, the tiny hotel had been renovated in the last six-months, and it showed. The place was in perfect condition compared with our previous hotels. It even had fixtures and amenities built within the last epoch! St. Mark's Piazza. It's frickin’ huge. After unpacking, we trekked across the city to find AE Oche, a pizzeria in Venice Italy that Fodor’s had enthusiastically recommended, only to find that it, like every other restaurant in Italy, was closed between 3pm and 7pm. Starving and irked, we went to a deli and got some cheese, salami with fennel and a Coca-Cola Light to eat while we sat watching workers hose off the floor of the local fish market. That’s an appetizing smell. Seeing St. Mark’s Square (when it’s dry). Venice has some seriously thin roads. Energized by caffeine and calories, we then headed to St. Mark’s Square, the center of Venice Italy. The piazza there is enormous, comprising several acres of Corinthian columns and Roman arches stretching around the place as far as you could see. The church of St. Marco is every bit as overwrought as Italy’s other Catholic scare-palaces; it is carved with intricate designs based on crucifixions, beheadings and the like. The world’s largest oil painting (on the back wall). Once an open market for simple Italian farmers to ply their crops and wares, St. Mark’s is now an upscale outdoor shopping center complete with dueling classical quartets and cafe seating. Most of the shops in Venice Italy boast names and price tags too rich for anyone but the Donald Trump set. The cobblestone piazza butts up to the Canal Grande, where empty gondolas sit being gently rocked by the waves of passing ferries. We sat on the water’s edge for a while, soaking in the sun and licking Gelato, possibly the best dessert ever. (Mmmm, Pistachio.) Venice Italy has both churches and museums. The Grande Canal is wider than the less grand canals, FYI. The next day we headed to St. Mark’s church and found a line outside longer than the one at the Duomo in Florence. Rather than waste 4 hours, we opted instead to hit the Museo (US$22). We saw the World's Largest Oil Painting and the Bridge of Sighs — a final view of Venice (and freedom) for prisoners before their ultimate, extended incarceration. We also saw an impressive government building decorated during the time when Venice Italy was the wealthiest city in the known world. Very swanky. One of the less grand canals, but still not too shabby. We spent the remainder of our time on the island-city window shopping and getting lost a lot. Finding your way around Venice is harder than finding a quiet picnic spot in Rome. Venice Italy is a veritable maze until you stop trying to follow the useless Italian maps and let the small signs posted at alley intersections be your guide. A sketch of Amy. By the time we were about to leave Italy, we finally opted to “do as the Romans did when in Rome, er…Venice” and we slept from 3pm-7pm. Refreshed and bored, we went shopping again, and then on to the Dorsoduro neighborhood of Venice for dinner at L’ Incontro where we had horse-meat and goat. Mmm, meaty. And, of course, a liter of entirely passable house wine for 8 Euros. Sailing Venice’s Grande Canal on a budget.

Another view from the top of the tower We got an early start thanks to a 4am attack of mosquitos through our open window. Catching the $7.50 slow water bus (No. 1) that runs the Canal Grande, we avoided paying the exorbitant $100 Gondola ride rate (Sure, the water bus was hardly romantic, but we’ve been married for 7 years and that Gondola has already sailed). Viewing St. Mark’s tower from Venice’s insanely narrow alleyways. Back at St. Mark’s, where the “bus” dropped us off, we had gelato again and went up the bell-tower for an aerial view of the city. Amazingly, the buildings were so close together that you couldn’t even see the canals. By the time we came down, the line at the church had thinned, so we went and saw all the crazy gold mosaics and different artistic styles, all mashed together in a patchwork of religious fervor, gaudiness and lack of restraint. Venice Italy was very hard to leave. Painterly reflections and stuff. Back in our room, we packed to leave, dragged our bags out to the water bus stop and waited for our ride back to the train station. The first “bus” was so crowded we literally couldn’t get on. (Compared to water buses, sardine cans are really under-utilized). The next one was every bit as crowded, maybe more-so, but we couldn’t wait any longer, so we barged on crushing two old ladies underfoot. I barely made it on before the conductor closed the gate with my luggage actually sitting on the outside edge of the boat. The poles that closed the sliding gate pushed through between my legs. Viewpoint from the docks off St. Mark's Square. Amy in the square in front of St. Mark’s tower. Until the next water but stop, I was hanging onto our luggage for dear life, trying to avoid dumping all our worldly belongings into the Mediterranean Sea—it was a tad nerve-wracking. After a few more locals piled on at the next two stops (other people got off simultaneously, thankfully), we made it to Saint Lucia Stazione with all of our belongings somehow still dry. With time to spare, we stopped for a quick bite to eat and hastily wrote postcards to family and friends back home. Taking the train from Venice Italy to Paris France. Our train from Venice Italy to Paris was a sleeper car which had space for four adults to lie down, sort of. Taking the sleeper car, we figured, would let us sleep the eleven-hour trip from Venice to Paris, while avoiding a hotel stay. The only snag in the plan was the French couple we ended up traveling with. A dude painting in St. Mark’s. Neither of them knew a lick of English and neither of us knew a lick of French. What followed was several awkward hours of hand gestures and facial expressions one step above that of chimpanzees. Amy spent the next few hours brushing up on her High School French. Later that evening, we surrendered our passports to the conductor who came around (so they wouldn't have to wake us when they went through French customs at 3am). Around 10:30pm, we went to get a drink in the restaurant car and when we returned, the French couple had set-up the beds and were trying to sleep. It seemed early to us, but we later found out why they were so interested in sleep; at 5am, they got off the train. A few hours later we were woken up by the conductor returning our passports and informing us that we were pulling into Paris. Or so we gathered as he spoke only French. ROMA FIRENZE VENICE PARIS LONDON

[crosbyreport]

Athens, Greece: The birthplace of democracy, drama, and doric columns. After art college, I was psyched when friends invited us to visit their relatives in Greece.

Ever since I was an art student in college, I’d really only wanted to visit four exotic places: Egypt, Rome, the Playboy Mansion, and Athens, Greece. Naturally, I was psyched when some friends of ours invited us to go along on their trip to visit relatives in Athens, Greece. Athens Greece was on my must-see list. This was an especially rare opportunity since one of them actually spoke Greek. In hindsight, had we gone to Rome with someone who spoke Italian, we might still be welcome there today. So without hesitation, we took them up on their invitation and, before we knew it, we were on our way. Thirteen uncomfortable hours later, we stumbled out of the airplane, and into the past. Athens Greece is a very big city. Overlooking Athens, Greece. Athens, the capital city of Greece, reminded me a lot of Los Angeles in that it’s a huge metropolis, spread out over a large area with cab drivers who don't speak English. It’s also a lot like Rome in that the city’s infrastructure is — and I say this without the slightest hyperbole — freaking ancient. Greek dudes hanging out. Still, there’s a real discontinuity between the ancient and the modern here. For example, while Genetically Modified Organisms (or GMOs) are strictly forbidden, almost everyone smokes. Not only that, but cars and mopeds pump out more deadly toxins than Keith Richards during a blood transfusion. In fact, fruit from the city's citrus trees is so polluted you’d be better off eating a chunk of sidewalk. The Acropolis at night. Athens is a very old city, too. But the key point to remember is that Athens, Greece has been a major city slightly longer than LA has—about 3000 years longer. So you have to cut Athens some slack in certain areas — like indoor plumbing. Thanks to pipes that predate the wheel, you can’t flush toilet paper without backing up the sewer system for two city blocks. Instead, you simply put your used TP in a little covered garbage can. Yes, really. Getting around in Athens can be a challenge. And Athens’ advanced age also makes trying to find your way around by car an act of futility, and very possibly, insanity. Roads constantly change direction or name or both, without any advance warning. Street signs are infrequent at best, and misleading at worst. They either preempt intersections by such a large margin that you turn too soon. Or there’s no sign at all and you miss the turn entirely. My dream car (I should probably have bigger dreams). Luckily, you can get around Athens, Greece without a car; most of the sights the average tourist wants to see are conveniently located within a few city blocks. But walking around Greece isn’t as healthy as it sounds. Tiny cars, mopeds and bicycles are everywhere, tearing through streets, alleyways, even driving on sidewalks. I almost got hit by a Smart Car coming off an elevator. Despite their small size, European cars are just as dangerous as big cars, maybe more so, because big cars, you can see coming from a mile away. Whereas tiny cars look like they’re farther away than they really are. Stay on your toes, or you’ll get ‘em run over. Frankly, when you combine Athens’ civil engineering schizophrenia with a citywide disregard for traffic law, you’ve got a powerful argument for public transportation. Comparatively speaking, the Athens Metro rail system was the epitome of order and tranquility. It took us to all the major sights, restaurants and everywhere else we wanted to go, with a minimum of hassle, waiting or urine smell. Greek people eat a lot of the same foods that I do. Outside many of the archaeological sights we visited, we browsed thousands of restaurants. To choose among them, our friends got restaurant recommendations from the locals wherever they could. And from those meals, we were able to make a few observations about Greek cuisine. Olive trees are really old, and olive-y. As the world’s largest producer of olives, it’s no surprise that the olive oil figures heavily in Greek dishes.

And I do mean heavily — we sucked up more oil in those two weeks than the EPA did cleaning up after the Exxon Valdez spill. But olive oil wasn’t the only thing flowing freely at meals. The Greeks don’t skimp on the Ouzo, either. An anise-flavored liquor that supposedly dates back to ancient times, Ouzo is Greece’s National drink, and they have it with every meal except breakfast when they have beer. That's one big, old city. Much to our surprise, Greek restaurants served, almost exclusively, foods grown and produced within their own borders. And while that assures that you get fresh ingredients, it also assures that you can’t get a decent burrito. Like In ‘N Out Burger, the Greeks stick to what they do best. Menus consisted of pretty much the same 20 traditional items. Dishes like Moussaka, Souvlaki, Pastitsio, giant beans, feta salad, fried potatoes, and fried cheese, for example. All delicious, certainly, but if you want Szechuan or sushi, you’re SOL. The changing of the guard, Greek-style. Nice dress, soldier. We first visited the Parliament building to see the changing of the guards. This periodic ritual is reminiscent of London’s changing of the palace guards, only with fewer guards and much smaller hats. In the Greek version, two guards do a slow-motion, goose-step towards their replacements, extending their fluffy, pom-pom-toed shoes high for all to see. On the surface, we weren’t sure how all this pomp and circumstance provided any real security for government officials, nor how the 13-million surrounding pigeons figured into the ceremony. But then, Greece is full of unexplainable attractions. Another such mystery we experienced was the “Lake of the Cave Valley,” a weird natural spring surrounded on three sides by a sheer rock cliff 50 meters high. The water is believed to have the power to rejuvenate the old, the infirmed and, judging from the elderly patrons, the obese, too. There is a roped-off swimming area, but no one really swims as much as they just soak and get all wrinkly. Okay, even more wrinkly, if that’s possible. Truly, the Greeks do things in their own unique way. The Acropolis is still incredible. The Acropolis of Athens After a good night’s rest, we made a beeline to the Acropolis the next morning. “Acropolis” in Greek means “high city,��� and it’s where we got the term, Acrophobia, which means the fear of heights. Considering that the Acropolis rises 500-feet above sea-level and is visible from nearly anywhere in Athens, the term was well-chosen. The Acropolis is, more importantly, where you’ll find the world-famous Parthenon — considered “the most perfect Doric temple ever built.” Completed in 432 BC and dedicated to the Goddess Athena, this epic temple was converted over the centuries into, among other things, a Christian church, a Latin church, a Muslim mosque, a Turkish ammo dump and, ultimately, a tourist attraction. Sadly, this once-impressive marble marvel is no longer the testament to an advanced civilization that it once was. Mostly intact until a dynamite mishap by occupying Turkish forces, the Parthenon is now a mere shadow of its former glory. Its few remaining upright columns hint at an architectural genius and aesthetic style rivaled only by Las Vegas casinos. Hate crowds? You’re not going to like the Agora. Those ladies have strong spines. From the Acropolis, we could see the nearby public square known as the Roman Agora. This public plaza provided citizens with a wide open space where crowds could gather to discuss issues of the day, such as what to call people who had a phobia about the Agora. Of course, there’s more to Athens than the many structures surrounding the Acropolis. To take in more of this timeless city, we hopped onto a Hop-on/Hop-off city bus and hopped off at a few other sights such as the National Archaeological Museum. This comprehensive museum was overrun with significant sculptured figures, busts, vases, adornments, and tools from antiquity.

Carved of everything from marble to gold. The art was more amazing when you consider that none of it was done with 3-D modeling software. We could have spent a lot more time exploring this amazing city, but we didn’t want to blow our whole vacation learning. Athens is super old. In the final analysis, Athens, Greece is pretty great. We had a great time in Greece. The country was beautiful. The food was delicious. The weather was close to ideal. And the people couldn’t have been nicer (we asked). Probably swearing or gang symbols… Sure, there were similarities between Greece and other European countries we’ve visited — their ancient culture; their tiny cars; and their obsession with the World Cup — but language isn’t one of them. While Italian can be deciphered through a cursory knowledge of Spanish or French (and vice versa), Greek requires a working knowledge of the Enigma decoding machine. Regardless, Greece is its own country, rich with its own unique heritage, architecture, art and language. So it’s easy to see why they’d be reluctant to forfeit all that in the name of tourism. Sure, there are easier European cities to visit, but certainly none more worthy of visiting than Athens. Although, Santorini and Crete are worth a look, too.

[crosbyreport]

The Northern Lights would be better if you didn’t have to visit the damn Arctic Circle to see them. They’re a phenomenon that’s dazzled Iceland’s insomniacs for millennia.

The Northern Lights—long regarded as the Holy Grail of nighttime skywatching—are an atmospheric phenomenon that happens all the time. Yet, this natural wonder isn’t easy to see because you need to be at the right place, at the right time. One of those right places is Iceland, and one of those right times is winter. Despite those deal-breaking impediments, some friends coerced us into going anyway. A professional shot of the Northern Lights by @S. E. Liland Iceland puts the north in the Northern Lights. Another good photo @T. Bjørkli Nobody goes to Iceland during the winter—Iceland’s coldest and snowiest season—unless they’re going to see the Northern Lights. I mean, you’d have to be out of your mind to fly almost to the damn Arctic Circle just for a few Icelandic hot dogs (although, they are pretty amazing). Instead, almost everybody heads out into the freezing Icelandic tundra to wait around for hours, hoping to witness Earth’s most-impressive late-night cosmic light-show. All so they can brag about it to friends, just like I’m doing right now. Frankly, it disgusts me. What to do during Iceland’s near total daytime darkness. The roads in town were plowed. Rather than trying to drive around Iceland’s icy roads in the dark and dead of winter, we booked a bus tour that guaranteed we’d see the northern lights. If we didn’t see the lights on this tour, they claimed, we could go on a tour again the next night. In fact, we could keep going until we either saw the lights, we flew home, or the company went broke—it was a ballsy business model, to say the least. We scheduled the tour for our first night in Iceland figuring, if it was too cloudy to see anything, we’d be able to try again a few more times. This was a tip we learned on YouTube, and it turned out to be prescient. While we waited for night to fall—at all of 3:30pm—we did a number of Things To Do in Reykjavík. Our first Northern Lights attempt wasn’t stellar. At the scheduled time, we arrived at our pick-up spot on Reykjavík’s main street and waited for the tour bus. It was yet another freezing night but, anticipating these conditions, we’d worn heavy clothes. Unfortunately, we’d arrived a bit early, and the bus showed up a bit late. Very late, in fact—like 45 minutes late. So we were standing out in the bitter cold for over an hour.  Where TF are we? Oh, right, black beach. Better yet, when our bus finally did arrive, its heat was out. Eshewing this necessary component of comfort, our driver pressed on. He drove out to a part of Iceland so dark and remote that I half expected him to rob and abandon us there. Luckily, Icelanders are too nice to do that, or even think of doing that. They’re almost Canadian in that regard. In regard to bus maintenance, evidently, they’re more Italian. Does that road look icy? Seeing the Northern Lights is always a crap shoot. The fv%&ing heat in our bus didn’t work. Our driver eventually pulled off the road and stopped in a snowy, unplowed parking lot. He opened the door and hopped outside, looking skyward for any sign of the northern lights. Meanwhile, we sat inside the unheated bus—with its door wide open—slowly lapsing into hypothermia. The cloud cover never cleared, so the driver finally gave up and drove us back to the city to lick our wounds and thaw our extremities. Through chattering teeth, we made plans to return the following night to try again. Ideally, on a bus with a functioning HVAC system. A representative image of our second, full-size tour bus. Attempt number two went somewhat better. Our second bus was far more comfortable. We got lucky the second night when a full-size tour bus showed up for us. (Late again, naturally.) Its more comfortable seats and heated interior made the long drive out of town a lot more bearable. The night was again cloudy, but our new guide assured us that he “knew a place.” Surely, this time, we thought, he would rob and abandon us. Photo @Sasha Pshenkov After a period of time, the driver turned off the highway and drove up an icy side-road.

We proceeded up a gradual, icy hill until it became apparent that the bus didn’t have enough traction to make it all the way to the top. He would have to turn around.  Ahead of us, the road split into two, providing enough pavement for the driver to attempt a three-point turn. After a few failed attempts, the driver realized turning the enormous vehicle was three-pointless. With no other recourse, he decided to back the bus down the side-road. Our bus drove us up an icy, uphill road. It did not go well. That’s right. Our bus full of foreign tourists on a dark, icy road in the hinterlands of Iceland began backing down a road into oncoming traffic. Is cannibalism so wrong? It was the cliché beginning of a horrific book (and then a horrific movie starring Timothée Chalamet) about how all the passengers resorted to cannibalism to survive. But, just as we were all mentally determining who to eat first, a passenger cried out, “I can see them! I can see the Northern Lights!” And so it was decided—we would kill that guy last. We finally get to see those much-lauded lights. Photo @Public Domain Pictures Ignoring our hunger pangs, we exited the bus en masse and stood in awe of nature’s majesty and grandeur for a hot second. Then everyone whipped out their iPhones to capture the scene for social media “likes.” My DSRL, circa 2011. Ever the artiste, I hastily set up my trusty Nikon D90 and tripod in a snow bank and proceeded to capture numerous high-resolution, long-exposures that were—to an image—painfully out of focus. I’d schlepped all my camera gear all the way to the Arctic Circle and had come away with nothing usable to show for it. Swipe through my shame-gallery below: My wife, on the other hand, used her iPhone 14’s automatic mode to capture the tightly focused, perfectly exposed image you see below, forever preserving the experience for posterity and bragging rights. Photo @Amy (My wife’s stupid in-focus shot.) Regardless of who took “better” photos—it wasn’t a competition, Amy!—the Northern Lights were a far sight better than any other Earth-bound light show I’d ever seen, either drunk or sober. And so it became immediately apparent why early humans were so confused and confounded by these dark displays. Ancient peoples were either very imaginative. Or very dumb. Valkyrie image @Emil Doepler During our long bus ride to nowhere, our guide tried to entertain us. He told us that, according to Old Norse legend, the aurora borealis was actually female Valkyries guiding the souls of the dead to Valhalla. (Valhalla is a majestic hall located in Asgard, presided over by the Norse god, Odin—aka, Anthony Hopkins with an eye-patch.) The Ancient Romans, by comparison, thought this celestial spectacle was the appearance of Aurora, goddess of the dawn. She reportedly traveled from east to west every day, announcing the arrival of the sun. Unfortunately, during a global recession (aka, the Dark Ages), Aurora was laid off and her job was outsourced to cheaper roosters. Huldufólk @Tú Nguyễn Of course, most modern Icelanders believe the Northern Lights are caused by the Huldufólk (or “hidden folk”), supernatural beings who live in a parallel universe. And the aurora borealis is just them urinating all over the sky in our universe. The Huldufólk are, apparently, a-holes. Coronal mass ejection @NASA | CC-BY 2.0 The Northern Lights are evidence of the Sun’s ongoing war against Earth. “I will destroy all those free-loading planets using my gravity without paying!” More recently, scientists developed a less myth-based explanation for the appearance of the aurora borealis. The Northern Lights, they discovered, are actually our bastard Sun’s covert attempt to murder our planet, and every living creature on it—including us! Photo of the Sun @Pixabay The Northern Lights result from the Sun’s frequent and violent ejection of its magnetic field and accompanying plasma mass. Basically, the sun is firing energized particles towards Earth at speeds of up to 45 million miles per hour.

That’s faster than bullets or ICBMs, and more deadly than both, combined.  Luckily, our planet’s magnetic field protects us from the sun’s unceasing solar onslaught. By diverting the Sun’s deadly ejaculates away toward Earth’s northern and southern magnetic poles, all life on Earth is spared from annihilation—well, so far, at least. Like the rockets’ red glare, the Northern Lights gave proof through the night that humanity was still there. Disastrously, Earth’s magnetic field is weakening 10X faster now, so you might want to see the Northern Lights before the increasing levels of ultraviolet radiation give you keratinocyte cancer as a souvenir. The Northern Lights have been dazzling Iceland’s insomniacs for millennia. Trippy @Cottonbro Studio Despite my well-documented disdain for cold climates, seeing the Northern Lights was nonetheless a real thrill. Those dancing ribbons of light were a pretty wild phenomenon that, much like the phallic terrain of Cappadocia, would look even more mind-blowing on hallucinogenics. (I mean, I assume—I don’t do drugs, myself.) Even unintoxicated, however, the Northern Lights are worth the cold and cost. But just barely.

[crosbyreport]

Budapest Hungary: The place to party in 2896 (mark your calendar now). When a nation spends almost its entire GNP on a single soiree, you really want to get on that invitation list.

I don’t know a lot about the history of my own people let alone the history of pre-Medieval, Uralic-speaking tribes of Central Europe, but I do know a country of serious partiers when I see them. And when a city like Budapest Hungary spends almost its entire GNP on a single soirée, you totally want to stay friends with them. The decorations are still up from Budapest Hungary’s last party. Part of Budapest’s 9th Century renovation efforts. A hundred years ago or so, a bored Hungarian realized that the 1,000th anniversary of the Maygar’s conquest over homelessness was coming up. Then someone suggested that a celebration was in order and everyone heartily agreed. The Hungarian government spent the next decade or so “gussying up” the city of Budapest (pronounced “Boo-da-peshk”) to host it. Budapest has pretty streets. Okay, maybe “gussying up” is understating it a bit. Or  understating it a lot, actually. The late 1800s was the country’s Golden Age, so the government acted like they had been chosen to host the Olympics. Flush with cash from somewhere, they basically “green lit” every crazy construction project that came across their desks. And then some (see also, City Park). The famous ‘Chain Bridge’ at night. Budapest Hungary was the “Las Vegas” of Central Europe. Starting around the 1870s, Budapest went on a construction spree that makes the one in modern-day China look like a worker’s strike.  Among tons of other structures and parks, the Hungarian’s erected the Parliament Building, St. Stephen’s Basilica, Heroes’ Square, and even Europe’s first metro — it was nothing less than the total renovation of Hungary’s biggest and best-known city. And their creations weren’t boring concrete boxes or soul-crushing pavement parks (those would come later with the Commies), these buildings were works of art. Budapest has a huge Ferris Wheel, too. As we heard the story, the government insisted that 20% of every new construction budget had to go towards dressing up the building’s facade, and it looks like it. Architects went nuts with Art Nouveau, Baroque, Classical, Gothic Revival, Neo-Classical, Romanesque, Surrealism, or absolutely anything else their Pálinka-addled minds could think of. Now, Budapest really looks old, but not old in the “falling apart” sense, old in the “waaaaay overly ornate” sense. Where we had Lángos (“lang-goshe”): fried dough, cheese, sour cream, and garlic. Everywhere you look in Budapest Hungary, the buildings seem to be trying to out-fancify each other. And, considering that pyrotechnics and laser light-shows hadn’t been invented yet, the architects nevertheless did a bang up job of showing off — clearly the Hungarian government wanted to make Budapest the “Las Vegas” of its time, and they succeeded in spades. Yeah, but is Central Europe really proper Europe? Váci Utca has Europe-ocity. As a result of their decades-long millennium building bender, Budapest is today visually thick with “Europe-ocity.” Only the city of Porto crams more Europe-ocity into their city limits. In fact, the city is so European-looking that, if you kidnapped an American — even someone from say, Mississippi where no one apparently ever leaves the country — and air-dropped them into the middle of Budapest, they would, without any assistance from anyone, most likely be able to guess that they were “somewhere in Epcot Center.” (Yeah, it’s that realistic.) Our Danube-view hotel room every morning. Even though it’s literally located within Europe and part of the European Union, Hungary is nonetheless situated waaaaaay out on the fringe of what I generally consider “real” Europe. So I was skeptical that Budapest actually possessed the qualities that I feel make a city seem truly European — that indefinable “joie de vivre” which I believe translates roughly into “smug superiority and condescension.” Disappointingly, Budapest Hungary didn’t really have it. Instead, people were extremely nice and helpful which, frankly, took some getting used to.

A peaceful park in the middle of Budapest. When we flew into Budapest, for example, we were driven to our hotel by a large, congenial Hungarian who proudly told us about all the Hollywood movies that were shot in Budapest. Over the course of our ride, he basically gave us a free Hungarian history lesson (none of which we can remember now), and frequently apologized for his “broken English” even though he spoke it better than the average American teen. The driver was so nice I got the feeling that he would’ve let us live with his family if we’d asked. Luckily for him, we’d already booked a hotel room. Budapest Hungary is bisected by binary banks. The Brown Danube and the boat-based Vén Hajó Restaurant Instead, the gregarious driver dropped us off at the very nice Budapest Intercontinental Hotel — if you have to stay at a 4-star hotel in Budapest, the Intercontinental is surely one of them. It’s ideally located in “Pest V” (or District 5) right across the road from the famous Széchenyi Lánchíd or “Chain Bridge.” Our tour company managed to get us a Danube-view room, so we got a beautiful vista of Buda and the Bridge every morning which didn’t suck very much at all. The city of Budapest in Hungary was officially formed in 1873 by connecting “Buda” and “Pest” — two independent cities built on either side of the River Danube — via the Chain Bridge. The Chain Bridge is famous for its chaininess. Chain Bridge and Castle Hill, Buda The bridge was the first permanent “link” (get it?) between the hilly, residential area on the western bank (Buda), and the flat, commercial area on the eastern bank (Pest). Prior to the bridge’s construction, the two peoples believed the other side of the river was just a mirage and never interacted with each other. Since the two cities were joined, its approximately 1.8 million citizens wisely ordered the construction of four more bridges to prevent what would surely have been the world’s most epic rush-hour traffic jam. That’s “Buda” up there on the hill. The four other bridges were: The Margaret Bridge, the Elizabeth Bridge, the Liberty (or Francis Joseph) Bridge, and the most recently constructed Megyeri Bridge. The Megyeri Bridge is known for being the longest bridge in Budapest but it’s more famous for almost being named after Stephen Colbert. (So close, so close.) The pretty, but historically insignificant Elizabeth Bridge. The River Danube (or, as normal people call it, the Danube River) is the 2nd longest river in Europe. Originating in Germany’s Black Forest, the river cuts through 10 cities, four capitals, and was memorialized in Johann Strauss II’s famous “Blue Danube Waltz” (see also, 2001: A Space Odyssey).  This popular composition is proof that Strauss II either had horrible eyesight or a serious Pálinka-drinking problem because the River Danube has never been blue. Ever. Like ever. Seriously. You want to see blue water, try Bora Bora. What we did in Buda (and/or Pest). The Buda side of the River Danube where cyclists almost hit us a lot. Immediately after unpacking, we left our hotel on foot and walked across the Chain Bridge to get some exercise after our 14-hour airborne sit-fest. Since it was summer, Budapest was hot and humid even at night. So we thought better of climbing the hills of Buda and dying of heat prostration on our first day of vacation. Instead, we just walked along the River Danube and dodged fast-moving cyclists in the darkness instead. The Széchenyi Lánchíd or “Chain Bridge” at night. While trying to find a way back over to the Pest side via the Elizabeth Bridge, we met a similarly confused, young British history professor. At first, we talked about unclear pedestrian signage, insufficient road lighting, fast-moving cars, and Hungarian emergency medical services. Later chatting about places we’d been, he recommended we visit Poland and its insane “Wieliczka” salt caves. We assured him that it “sounded great” and then ran away the first opportunity we got.

Might be the ‘Stephen Colbert’ bridge? Back on the Pest side of the Danube, we went looking for an authentic Hungarian meal. Luckily, a few semi-permanent restaurants were conveniently moored to the river docks right outside of our hotel. So after reading a few good reviews for Vén Hajó Restaurant, we went in and polished off an order of Hungarian goulash, a goose liver trio, as well as a surprisingly good bottle of Hungarian white wine. Everybody loves Budapest! (Unfortunately.) Budapest’s Great Synagogue. Budapest is an incredible and beautiful city. So great that, at one time or another, pretty much everyone has taken a liking to the place: the Celts, Romans, Hungarians, Mongols, Ottomans, Austrians, Habsburgs, Romanians, Nazis, and the Soviets (twice!). Every neighboring country that visited Budapest seemingly said, “Hey, it’s really nice here, we should totally invade this place!” and then called in the tanks. The Jewish Tree Of Life. Hungarian Jews, in particular, had a rough go of all these “transitions.” The Hungarian government — initially on the Axis (bad) side during WWII — eventually saw the error of their way and tried to switch sides only to see the Nazis invade and get to work murdering about 600,000 Jews. The House Of Terror Museum which we didn’t go into. We toured the Raoul Wallenberg Memorial Park which commemorates those who protected many of Budapest’s Jews from deportation to extermination camps . For more depressing facts, read about the Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem. The “Shoes on the Danube Bank” is a haunting memorial placed along the bank of the Danube where Nazi-wannabes, the Arrow Cross militiamen, would line up Jews and gun them down (see also, The Jewish Museum, House of Terror Museum, and the Great Synagogue). On a cheerier note, the Soviets caught and tried the Arrow Cross as war criminals…so there’s that. Budapest Hungary is more than just a castle, zoo, thermal spas, and a pond. Just part of City Park. Central Budapest has a wacky 300-acre area creatively titled, “City Park,” which is, as the name pretty obviously implies, a city park. It too, like everything else in Budapest, was built for the 1896 Millennium Celebration. But this city park isn’t just a bunch of wide grassy areas and shady trees — no, it’s a Michael Jackson wet dream. The famous Széchenyi (pronounced “say-cheney”) Medicinal Baths are inside. The cornerstone highlight of the area is the Széchenyi (pronounced “say-cheney”) Medicinal Baths. The baths are really more like pools, only without any bacteria-killing chlorine. Europe’s largest and hottest, these baths promise health-giving properties if you drink it (they even have it in a vending machine). Yet, being infused with compounds like sulphate, calcium, magnesium, bicarbonate, fluoride and metabolic acids, the water really only guarantees you severe intestinal distress. Every architectural style you can imagine! Another odd addition to the park is the bizarre Vajdahunyad Castle. Constructed for the Millennium Celebration out of cardboard (yes, cardboard), the castle was a jumble of different  architectural styles, each intended to represent a different century. The cardboard version proved so popular that it was eventually rebuilt out of brick, so it wouldn’t keep melting every time it rained. Well, why wouldn’t you put in a pond? City Park also has a good-sized pond in the center — well, they call it a pond. During the summer months, people can rent boats and paddle around it, assuming it’s not dried up. It’s a bit like Central Park in New York City, only a lot weirder. During the winter months, it becomes Central Europe’s largest outdoor ice rink where people can skate around on it, assuming it’s not dried up. Apparently, the city government of Budapest Hungary have trouble keeping water in the pond, so it may be more accurate to call it a crater. Quick, rent a boat before the pond dries up! Since no city park would be complete without

an amusement park, Budapest has “one of the world’s oldest roller coasters” (which sounds preferable to calling it the “world’s deadliest,” I guess). The park in Budapest Hungary also has a zoo, a zoological garden, and a transport museum full of planes, trains, and even a space capsule — who knew they had space travel back in 1896?! Very impressive. Ronald Reagan, because he ended the Cold War, right? Like most city parks in the rest of the world, this city park had a lot of statues, too. But the one that stood out most to me was the full-size, bronze likeness of Hungary’s biggest hero, Ronald Reagan. Yes, that Ronald Reagan. The American actor who called his wife, “Mommy.” The dottering idiot who almost single-handedly ruined the United States. Yes, that guy. They chose him not because of his fine and extensive acting career, but because he personally and single-handedly ended the Cold War. Clearly, without Mr. Reagan’s bombastic speech, the Hungarians would’ve had to rely on the Soviet Union’s crumbling economic and political structures to do the job. Is there a “Cowards’ Square” anywhere? The curved Colonnade behind “Heroes’ Square.” As a World Heritage Site, “Heroes’ Square” is one of the world’s oldest and largest flat, paved surfaces. But instead of using it as a mall parking lot, the Hungarians classed it up with a number of oxidizing statues and phallic-looking monuments to commemorate — you guessed it — the Millennium Celebrations. Museum Of Fine Arts across from Freedom Square. Judging from what we’d seen in Budapest Hungary, 1896 must have been the last time the Hungarians did any new construction there. Across the street from Heroes’ Square, they erected the imposingly neoclassical Museum Of Fine Arts. Its prime location adjacent to the Square soon proved so popular that the museum attracted competitors including the conniving Budapest Palace Of Art with whom the Museum has a fierce rivalry to this very day — but don’t Google that “fact.” Hungarians don’t put a lot of effort into naming their stuff. Budapestians annoyingly name people using “directory style” (i.e., last name first, first name last). That means people like “Franz Ferdinand” are actually named Ferdinand Franz. I mean, what the hell? Right?! Come on! Now, sure, this could be a “lost in translation” thing, but it seems to me that the Hungarians name things rather willy-nilly. For example, at the top of Buda there’s an area named “Castle Hill” because — and I’m only guessing here — it’s a hill with castles on it (“So what are we naming today? A castle on a hill? Let’s call it ‘Castle Hill.’ Everybody cool with that? Okay...NEEEEXXTT!”). They should really try a little harder in the future. The people of Budapest Hungary realized hills were easier to defend. Looking down at Pest from the tram track on Castle Hill. The Fisherman’s Bastion is looney. In the 13th Century, the local people moved up the hill to cut down on being murdered so much by marauding Mongols. Presumably living longer as a result, the Budapestians went about building elaborate castles in Buda like…um, Buda Castle. (See what I’m saying about naming things…?) Over the centuries, Buda Castle was involved in a lot of battles and went through a lot of renovations, sometimes even by choice. The Vienna Gate. Another easily identifiable landmark in the heart of Buda’s Castle District is the attractive St. Mattias Church, or The Church of Our Lady. First constructed in 1255, it got blowed up and rebuilt a lot, as well. Behind the St. Mattias Church is the more elaborate “Fisherman’s Bastion,” so named because…sigh...a bunch of fishermen successfully defended the place in the Middle Ages. Additional sights in the Castle District include the wordy Tower of the Church of Mary Magdalene, and the symbolically guarded Vienna Gate whose rigid guards you can totally sneak past. Curiously, a number of buildings in the area were badly shot up during World War II, but the Hungarians

purposely didn’t repair the bullet holes to always, and constantly, remind themselves and future generations that bullets can really mess up your walls. The Pest side of Budapest has its charms, too. The spiky Parliament took 1,000 people to build and its architect went blind before its completion. Closer to sea level in Pest, the locals built a bunch of nice looking places, too. One of the more flagrant examples of excess is the stunning Parliament Building. With ten courtyards, 691 rooms, and 65,616 feet of staircases, it’s not just the largest parliamentary building in the world, it’s also the pointiest. At night, it resembles the evil lair of an all-powerful super-villian who’s mired in red tape and bureaucracy. The Opera Building where Liszt hung out. Another building worth seeing is the gold-plated, Neo-Renaissance State Opera House. It was commissioned by the Austria-Hungarian Emperor, Franz Joseph I, solely for the purpose of making Paris’ and Vienna’s opera houses look like disease-infested brothels.  The Hungarian Opera House took a decade to complete and is today considered amongst the finest in the world. First King of Hungary, St. Steven’s Basilica. Its beauty and acoustics were so good that composer Franz Ritter von Liszt hung out there all the time. They eventually had to build a statue of him in one of the outside walls to get him to go home. A building maybe not worth seeing is St. Steven’s Basilica. Built in 1851, it’s very pretty and all, but its claim to fame isn’t its architecture. It’s that St. Steven’s severed and mummified right hand is kept there, locked inside in a gold box that visitors can view. As my friends know, I’m not normally one to judge, but if you ask me, that’s pretty damn freaky. So, would I recommend going to Budapest Hungary? If you’re looking for a European vacation, but you’re tired of being told that you’re “murdering the French language” or that you should “stop eating with your hands,” then Budapest Hungary may be a good choice for you, too. It has all the things most people like about Europe — culture, art, and food — without any of the snooty condescension. Highly recommended. Click here to see more of Peter Crosby’s photography, including pics from his trip to Budapest, Hungary.

[crosbyreport]

Jordan’s Wadi Rum is like visiting Mars without being the billionaire CEO of a rocket company. Why visit the Red Planet when you can experience all its inhospitality and desolation right here on Earth?

The world’s richest men clearly don’t know about Wadi Rum Reserve in Jordan. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be dropping billions to send humans to the Red Planet. Yet, while building rockets may be a better use of their unparalleled wealth than feeding the world’s poor, it does beg the question: “Why go to Mars when you can experience all its inhospitality and desolation right here on Earth?” One of the rare occurrences of shade in Wadi Rum Reserve. Wadi Rum Reserve looks like a dumping ground for Jordan’s surplus sand, rocks, and mountains. Wadi Rum Reserve’s red-rock wilderness is an extraordinary patch of desert biome. It’s a protected area in the southern part of Jordan, known for its stunning desert landscape, its historical significance, and its complete lack of a Starbucks. Covering some 280 square miles, Wadi Rum Reserve is the largest wadi (or “valley”) in the country of Jordan. Its name, Wadi Rum, means “Valley of the Moon,” most likely, because Ancient Jordanians hadn’t seen high-resolution photos of Mars yet. That’s the problem with naming places before the telescope was invented. Mars by @NASA | CC-BY 2.0 Martian camel? The visual similarity between Wadi Rum Reserve and any recent rover photos of Mars is uncanny. Aside from the blue sky and occasional camel, you’d be hard-pressed to tell the difference between the two locations. Of course, just because NASA hasn’t seen camels on Mars yet doesn’t mean they don’t exist there. It could just mean that Martian Camels are smart enough not to be caught on camera. They could be hiding in caves, buried in sand, or behind telephone polls when the Perseverance rover passes by. After all, the last thing these distant dromedaries need is a bunch of terrestrial tourists ruining a good thing. Wadi Rum is Hollywood’s go-to film location for alien worlds. Wadi Rum’s desert landscape provides a badass backdrop for fantasy and sci-fi films, as well as anything set in the Middle East. Here’s just a partial list of famous movies that were shot in Wadi Rum. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) Red Planet (2000) Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009) Prometheus (2012) The Last Days on Mars (2013) The Martian (2015) Rogue One: Star Wars (2016) Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker (2019) There’s a lot of nothing out there. Our journey didn’t take seven months or require a pricey spacecraft. Atlas V @NASA Goddard | CC-BY 2.0 Instead of riding an Atlas V-541 rocket to Jordan’s Wadi Rum Reserve, as we’d expected, our tourist foursome was driven there in the flatbed of a sketchy, ’90s-era Toyota pickup truck. A truck whose air filter was clearly choked with sand, judging from the difficulty its owner had keeping it running. We were “seated” on one of two wooden benches placed opposite each other within either side of the truck bed. This arrangement positioned us dangerously high in the back of a moving vehicle. And, I’m not even sure the seats were bolted down. This enormous OSHA-violation of a seating configuration nonetheless exposed our eyes to a spectacular panorama of the reserve’s sandy scenery. At the same time, it exposed our eyes, noses, and teeth to an astonishing plethora of flying insects. In my experience, there’s far too much life on Mars. Martian fly. With Martian camels, you have to expect Martian flies, and there were a lot of them. Unlike Earth flies, however, Martian flies are aggressive and fearless. They’re not put off by half-assed swatting, flailing your arms around, or cursing loudly at them. You need to make actual, physical contact before they’ll fly away. You need to punch them in the face. But, even then, they’ll just buzz, “That all you got, bitch?!?” Wadi Rum’s bastard mosquitos are just as bad, so pack Sawyer Insect Repellent. Sitting seatbelt-less in the back of a rusty pickup truck, before going off-roading. Life on Mars is hard. On your ass, too. A cavalcade of pickup trucks! Surprisingly, the ride itself wasn’t too bad as long as we stayed on the road, but we didn’t stay there for long.

At the edge of town, the pavement ended, and our 12-year-old driver steered his wheezing pickup truck straight out into the desert valley. The second we turned off-road, our previously tolerable transportation went all “Mad Max, Thunder Road” on us. The rocky, uneven ground beat on the truck’s suspension, and those damn wooden benches pounded our asses like we were pledging a fraternity. We were more than relieved to dismount the craft when our driver finally stopped at the bottom of a huge, orange sand dune that looked straight outta the Sahara. This dune gets its Red Planet look from all the iron in the sand. Thankfully, Wadi Rum Reserve isn’t all mountains. Because it was there. Hollywood movies gave me the impression that deserts, like the Sahara, were entirely made of smooth, sandy dunes. But, in reality, much of them are vast expanses of sandy or rocky terrain, sparse vegetation, and often phallic geological formations. But the spot we stopped was where the wind had whipped the area’s lightweight sand into a cliff-corner, like dust bunnies accumulating under your couch. Except, the end result wouldn’t easily get sucked up by a Dyson® vacuum. This mammoth sand dune rose about four stories behind the cliff. We hiked up to the top for no good reason other than, “It was there,” and “We’d paid good money for this tour.” We slid back down after the requisite selfies, and then climbed around on the surrounding rocks until it was time to learn. People have been making rock art in Wadi Rum ever since there were people. See? Your kid could do that crap. Wadi Rum Reserve is home to some of the oldest rock art in the world, but not like the psychedelic cover art for “Yes” albums. I mean, bad art. Barely art. Stuff your kid could do if you gave him a Dremel tool and let him loose on a neighbor’s boulder. Called petroglyphs, these rock inscriptions were carved by prehistoric civilizations in the cliffs all around Wadi Rum. They offer a rare window into humanity’s earliest attempts at defacing the side of cliffs. For later, and better, wall carvings, see Petra. Over 20,000 petroglyphs and inscriptions have been documented in Wadi Rum, tracing human existence here back some 12,000 years. This rock art, which dates back to around 10,000 BCE, often depicts animals, hunting scenes, and human figures asking for directions out of the desert. The set for Matt Damon’s movie, “The Martian.” Also, “Star Wars,” I think. Wadi Rum Reserve is home to both celebrities, and real stars. Milky Way @NASA Goddard | CC-BY 2.0 Due to its remote location and lack of light pollution (i.e., civilization), Wadi Rum Reserve has one of the clearest and darkest night skies in the world. Not surprisingly, it’s home to a number of astronomy observatories, though visitors can see the Milky Way just fine with the naked eye. Of course, prospective stargazers should take precautions before venturing out. For example, you should make peace with being alone in 280 miles of pitch-black desert with a high likelihood of getting lost and slowly freezing to death. Maybe make peace with your god(s), while you’re at it. Everyone should visit Wadi Rum, and probably soon. @RDNE Stock Project If you’re not a multi-billionaire looking for a “Planet B” to inhabit once your “carbon footprint” stomps out all human life on Planet A, Wadi Rum Reserve could be the closest you’ll ever get to visiting another world. But is leaving Earth something you really want? I only ask, because I was a real space-nerd as a kid (space ladies are hot). @RDNE Stock Project Yet, after visiting Wadi Rum, I no longer want to leave Earth—like, ever. I just can’t imagine living on a planet this hostile without electricity, Internet, or my absolute minimum happiness requirement: breathable air. If nothing else, visiting Wadi Rum could help convince people to save this planet before mankind has to go venturing out to less welcoming ones. Yeah, I’m looking at you, Alpha Centauri.

[crosbyreport]

Quito Ecuador: The world’s second-highest capital city (and not because they legalized drugs). Though merely the second capital of the Inca Empire, Quito was, and still is, first in “cities surrounded on all sides by active volcanoes.”

Though Quito Ecuador was merely the country’s second-highest capital city, and only the second capital of the Inca Empire, it still was, and still is, first in “cities surrounded on all sides by volcanoes.” Whoever built this incredible city in this dangerous location must have had a real gambling problem. Quito Ecuador is, for now, located in the Andes Mountains. El Panecillo, a 200-meter volcanic hill with Volcano #4 in the background. The city of Quito’s precarious position—between multiple lava-spewing earth-acne pimples—makes for spectacular city views (and a highly profitable insurance industry, no doubt). Yet we weren’t there for the views, culture, or cuisine. Instead, we were there just to rest after seeing Machu Picchu, and kill time until flying to the Galápagos. Still, we looked around a bit. As a comparable major city in the Southern Hemisphere, Quito seemed far more modern than Lima, Peru (though Lima’s smog could’ve obscured hipster clothing stores and alternative coffee shops for all we know). Quito’s dazzlingly bright sun and clean, fresh air really made the place sparkle. Virgen de Quito, by Agustín de la Herrán Matorras. Quito Ecuador is a city built on more faith than the Vatican. The Ecuadorian capital city of San Francisco de Quito (or just “Quito” to its close friends) is located over 9,000 feet above sea level in the Andes Mountains. And, much like Cusco in Peru, the altitude takes a bit of getting used to. But what makes this metropolis unique in South America—and everywhere else on the planet, for that matter—is that the city was built within a valley surrounded by — wait for it — six volcanoes, one of which is still “very much active” and last erupted as recently as 1999. Yes, you read that correctly: A city with over 2 million residents was built between SIX volcanoes. Living on an earthquake fault in San Francisco seems sane by comparison. Looking up towards the church from Quito’s Old Town. Clearly, South Americans are insane. A city surrounded by six active volcanoes is about as bright as a city surrounded by multiple earthquake fault lines. And nobody in North America would be stupid enough to do that (I mean other than San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, New York, Memphis, Juno, etc). Crazier still, Quito Ecuador is located one degree south of the freaking equator (hence the name Ecuador), making it the skin cancer capital of South America. Yet even though the sun shines down on you like Inti’s blowtorch, the city’s elevation and freezing air temperature mostly prevents spontaneous human combustion as long as you’re wearing SPF. Quito Ecuador was the first city to be named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1978 thanks to the pristine condition of its Historic Center. Quito’s Old Town is in remarkable condition for being so old. The plaza in front of the Church of San Francisco. What’s now called “The Old Town” is one of the largest, least-altered and best-preserved historic centers in the Americas. Visiting that area of Quito is like stepping back in time. Specifically to the 1500s, when the Spanish Conquistadors invaded and forced the Incas to construct a new European-style city center directly over top the Inca city center that used to be there. Virgen de Quito, by Agustín de la Herrán Matorras. Not that the Incas themselves were a bunch of sweethearts — they weren’t. The Incas used “peaceful assimilation” to build their empire in the Andean region, but when that approach didn’t work, they had a Plan B. The native Quitu tribe, who lived in Quito Ecuador before the Incas, got “assimilated” right into extinction. So, when Francisco Pizarro invaded the place, you could argue that the Incas had it coming to them. Quito Ecuador never saw it coming. Looking up towards the church from Quito’s Old Town. By the 1500s, the Spanish had imperialism down to an art form. Still, Francisco Pizarro’s soldiers must have thought they’d died and gone to heaven when they landed in South America.

Basilica del Voto Nacional is the most important neo-Gothic architecture in Ecuador. Imagine finding a native populace whose warriors wore loin cloths and who’s land veritably vomited gold and silver. It must have been like facing a horde of angry teddy bears. Armed with horses and rifles — weapons the Incas had never seen before — the Spanish only needed 400 soldiers and a few weeks to take over their entire empire. Over a hundred years of Inca culture and civilization were wiped out in a matter of a few short years, all in the service of finding and extracting all of South America’s gold. Peru took the brunt of the invasion as, by the time Pizarro got up to Quito, the local Incas had had enough to time to move their gold over the Andes into the Amazon basin (where it’s still believed to be hidden). Failing utterly in his quest, Pizarro died looking for El Dorado, or “The Golden City,” and it serves the prick right. Pizarro wasn’t just a greedy a-hole, he was also a hardcore Catholic. Looking down the Calle de Siete Cruces, or Street of Seven Churches at night. Pizarro was, however, more successful in forcibly converting the Incas to Catholicism en masse. His approach was as simple and elegant as it was violent and destructive: If something seemed Incan, they had it destroyed and replaced with a cross, or seven. On the main drag through town, there had to be seven Incan temples. How do I know? Because now there are seven churches there. The Spanish conquerors built or “renovated” so many temples, they named the street to make sure people got the idea: Calle de Siete Cruces, or Street of Seven Churches. It was a super subtle “FU” to the Incan religion. But the last laugh is ultimately on the Spanish. Another one of those former Incan temples on Church Street. The Incas used an architectural innovation that placed huge, carefully carved rocks as a foundation with progressively smaller flat-carved wall rocks as the structure rose in height. The net effect of this approach was that the foundation stones were nigh indestructible. Hilariously, the Incas built their sandstone temples so durably that no matter how hard the Spanish tried, they couldn’t tear them down. So after countless attempts, the Spanish finally gave up and just built on top of the Incan foundations, which still remain as a testament to the Incas. Employment in Quito spiked thanks to Pizarro and friends. State signifies Ecuador’s (the bird) liberation from Spain (the lion). The Spanish were “job creators” because the huge Catholic churches that desecrated the Incas own religion didn’t build themselves. As victors, the Spanish made the Incas construct the new Catholic churches as well as create the interior artwork. The Spanish taught/forced numerous Incan artists to work in the approved current style of the European Renaissance. A famous hotel just off Independence Square This must have been a difficult transition for the Inca artists, since they’d never seen realistic paintings before (or any paintings, for that matter). The Incas typically made sculptures and functional pieces of art such as jewelry, vases, bowls and the like. Yet it was this primitive Incan art that inspired Pizarro to invade Quito Ecuador in the first place — most of their art was covered with gold! That gleaming yellow metal was more common in South America than malaria, so the Incas didn’t value it as a precious commodity, only as religious decoration. No doubt we’d be equally surprised if aliens from space invaded Earth to steal all our chrome. The Spanish valued gold as a reason to bash in Incan skulls. The Metropolitan Cathedral on Independence Square has free wifi! Pizarro melted down and made off with every nugget he could find, but “allowed” the Incas to use gold leaf. Artistic mash-ups of the European style and Incan gold embellishments created garish monuments to Catholic Imperialism, forced culture change, and good old over-the-top excessiveness, Not a single surface inside the churches in Old Town appear un-“bedazzled.

” So while Quito is today bereft of gold, it’s still rich in historical oppression. We got to see Ecuador’s President! That’s him waving from Carondelet Palace. Outside the Old Town, Quito is a thriving, modern metropolis. Every day at 1pm, this guy dresses up like this. The horse doesn’t judge. Possibly the reason Quito feels more modern than Lima or Cusco is because, in addition to tourism, Ecuador is the world’s top exporter of yellow gold: That’s right, bananas — almost a US$1B worth every year. No one produces more bananas than Ecuador. People walking back to town from that Opera restaurant. Oh, and did I mention the black gold? Yeah, Ecuador produces around 500,000 barrels a day, making it the 30th largest oil producing country in the world (Peru is 44th with a measly 150,000bbls). That’s enough oil to have a decent economy, but not enough to have Bentley-driving sheiks everywhere. Now, you’d think Quito would be wealthy enough to keep the streetlights on past 6pm, but apparently not. Our hotel, the Quito Mercure, was located in a good part of the city (the financial district), we didn’t explore the area much because the city was dark when we arrived—I mean, really dark. I'm talking “CSI:SVU intro scene” dark. There was a comforting number of Policia around, but the lack of anyone else on the street weirded us out. What kids and tourists we did see walking around or hanging out appeared to be looking for something to do, too. Food was available pretty much all over Quito Ecuador. Cops protecting Independence Square. We did get to a couple of pretty good restaurants, including Theatrum above the Opera House. But since we didn’t know where else to go or what to do in the New Town, we went back to the hotel bar, drank and watched subtitled Cinemax® movies. Had we stayed longer, we no doubt would’ve gotten to experience more of Quito, but having covered off the touristy stuff, we didn’t have the motivation to do much else. So we packed up our belongings and headed out to the airport for our flight to the Galápagos Islands ». Click here to see more of Peter Crosby’s photography, including pics from Quito, Ecuador.

[crosbyreport]

3 sights in Oaxaca Mexico that almost make up for it not being on a beach. Oaxaca, Mexico is a full eight-hour drive from the nearest coast. What the hell, right?

Before moving to California, I had never even heard of Oaxaca, Mexico. And, what I had heard about the place didn’t seem compelling enough to make me want to visit—like ever. But what really booted the city of Oaxaca off my Top-Places-To-Visit list was the fact that it’s a full eight-hour drive from the nearest beach. The Oaxaca Valley(s), no beach in sight. Oaxaca Mexico is a totally land-locked city. The Pacific Ocean looks like this. Yeah, what the what?!? I mean, what’s the point of going to Mexico if you’re not going to get drunk and pass out on a beach? Does the Mexican Board of Tourism honestly expect people (Americans) to go to Mexico for the culture? For the arts? The archeology? The cuisine? The music? In two words, yes. Imagine that you’re a big wave surfer, paddling around in the warm Pacific Ocean off the western coast of Mexico. Now, imagine if you rode one of Mexico’s famously gnarly waves all the way to shore and just kept on going for about a mile. Mexico looks like this. If you somehow managed to accomplish that feat, two things would be true: 1.) you’d be an unbelievably impressive surfer, and 2.) you’d come to a stop in a place most tourists never see or experience—a place known to the locals as “Mexico.” And that’s where Oaxaca is located. Yeah, Mexico is a whole country. Who knew? Oaxaca looks like this Americans are often surprised to learn that their neighbor to the south comprises over 750,000 square miles of sun-drenched and mountainous real estate, of which only Mexico’s outermost edges are made of beach. Places like Mazatlan, and Puerto Vallarta. Americans are equally surprised when told that much of that interior land is populated, too. A Mayan ball court Yet America’s gross ignorance of Mexico’s interior is our own loss, because places like Oaxaca are fairly jam-packed with impressive ancient ruins and freakish natural anomalies. But that lack of awareness is probably a boon for Mexicans, who might prefer that American tourists not overrun their country and ruin everything. The Oaxaca Valley(s) A brief historical history of the Oaxaca Valley in Oaxaca Mexico. That church in downtown. Though generally considered a large, single valley, the Oaxaca Valley is technically three that kinda all string together. All three lie within the Sierra Madre mountain range and were initially home to the awesomely named “Zapotec” peoples and, later, the less awesomely named “Mixtec” peoples (who I presume were mostly either DJs, salad-eaters, or both). Defensive walls that were, ultimately, a waste of time. The Zapotec and Mixtec cultures thrived more or less in this part of Mexico between 1800 BCE and 1500 CE—they even co-existed peaceably for a while without utterly decimating each other. That unpleasant job fell to the mighty Aztec Empire, an imposing people feared throughout Mexico for their warrior ethos and quilted cotton armor. The warring Aztecs soon occupied much of the region until the Spanish showed up in 1521 CE—fully attired in both metal armor and metal weapons—to give the Aztec a life-lesson about bringing quilted cotton armor to a rifle and bullet fight. None of the pre-Hispanic cultures survived the Spanish arrival, but a good number of their buildings did. Arts all over the place. During their respective reigns over the southern tip of Mexico, the Zapotecs and Mixtecs built two pretty sweet-looking archeological sites: 1.) Monte Alban, their main political center whose name means “sacred mountain of life,” and 2.) Mitla, a unique religious site named after the underworld. These two major religious mega-churches are located a mere 9 and 44 kilometers outside of Oaxaca City, respectively, on top of the least mountainous mountains within the expansive valley. They’re both well worth visiting if for no other reason than the plethora of Mescal tasting rooms you’ll find scattered all along the route. 1.) Monte Alban is kinda like Machu Picchu only without the hellish climb.

Monte Alban 222 Monte Alban again. Monte Alban, much like the Vatican in Rome, was home to assorted priests and other rich Zapotec and Mixtec folks who also probably had a beach house in Tulum. The impressive site was designed to accommodate huge religious celebrations, epic ball court tournaments, and countless human sacrifices. Monte Alban was basically a dual-use facility for the community that was half-House of Worship and half-Thunderdome. It’s entirely possible to walk up to Monte Alban, but I wouldn’t recommend it because you’ll be too tired to walk around once you’re there. You can also take a local bus, but they’re pretty crowded. Instead, we chose to hire a van to take us up the mountain because it was hot, and we’re lazy. Also, bring water with you, or buy it at the site entrance, or you will die—the place is huge, there’s no shade, and there’s lots of walking and climbing to do—without continuous access to hydration, you will not survive. Get a guide to take you around and point out interesting rocks, because the infrequent plaques around the place aren't super informative. And bring change, because if you want to use the water closet (aka, bathroom), it costs three pesos. See more photos of Monte Alban > 2.) Like intricately carved rock? Then Mitla is your jam. Mitla is super-ornate up close. The least impressive ruins in size and scope—but second most important archeological site—in the upper end of the Tlacolula Valley was Mitla. Its name comes from the Nahuatl name, Mictlán, meaning “place of the dead” which was simplified to the more pronounceable “Meet-la” by the linguistically lazy Spanish Conquistadors (as if “Conquistador” couldn’t have lost a few syllables). While Mitla lacks the wow-factor of Monte Alban, it does offer intricate, geometric designs all over its buildings. Mitla is unique among the many Mesoamerican sites in the country in that it has crazy elaborate mosaic fretwork that covers the tombs, panels, friezes, and even entire walls. The mosaics are made with small, finely cut and polished stone pieces which have been fitted together without the use of mortar. No other site in Mexico displays this level of ingenuity, nor OCD. As an added bonus, Mitla has some extremely claustrophobic tombs that you can climb down into if you like dark, scary places that trigger panic attacks. See more photos of Mitla > 3.) Hierve el Agua is one of only two petrified cascades in the whole world. Seventy kilometers outside Oaxaca lies Hierve el Agua, a unique natural phenomenon that only exists in two places: Oaxaca, Mexico and Pamukkale, Turkey. This rare “petrified cascade” is the result of a calcium carbonite-rich waterfall slowly solidifying over the eons.  Neon-green cascade pools at the top. The cold-water spring that feeds these crazy cascades also fills a few pools at its top, in which locals and tourists can swim. Its almost neon-green colored water ensures that no one will know that you peed in it. Humans for scale Our guide, Jose Ramos of El Andador Tours, took us down the winding cliff-side path that leads to the bottom of the cascades, all the while helping us avoid falling to untimely and painful deaths on the valley floor. Good luck surviving a fall off that thing. Inexplicably, the Mexican government hasn’t installed any safety measures around this rare sight to prevent gawking tourists from sliding off said cliff. They leave that job to your own sense of self-preservation—something that’s not always on display, as we saw a woman in flip-flops almost careen off the edge trying to get a selfie on her iPad. See more photos of Hierve de Agua >(Click the link) So, is visiting Oaxaca Mexico better than a beach town? They have shopping there. Oaxaca is deservedly popular with hipsters and artsy types, but is it better than going to the beaches at Cabo or Cancun? That depends on why you’re going to Mexico. If you’re going to lay on the beach, then the answer is pretty obvious.

But if you’re going for a cultural experience with great food, or a getaway to avoid extradition by US Marshals, then Oaxaca, Mexico might just be the place for you.

[crosbyreport]

Orlando Florida: We pay homage to “The Rat.” The year was 1975 when I first went to Disney World, and I haven't been back until now.

The year was 1975, and I was a small boy on vacation in Orlando Florida with my family. My eyes were wide in amazement at the spectacle in front of me. Looming larger than life, a wide windowless building spiraled up towards a single gleaming spire pointed to the stars. This structure was my life’s raison d'être. And it was the reason we’d traveled seemingly endless miles to Orlando Florida in the back of the largest passenger car ever made by General Motors — the 1973 Chevrolet Impala Station Wagon. Orlando Florida is a short grueling drive from New York. Avocado green with a rear-facing backseat and an eight-cylinder gasoline-guzzling monster under the hood, our Chevy Impala Station wagon burned an entire gallon of gas for every 12 miles it traveled. But in 1975, gasoline was free. They gave it away at stations all across the country. (Sometimes, they even gave out glassware with cartoon characters on them.) And, besides, it was summer. So proud, patriotic families like mine packed the young ’uns into huge rolling behemoths and hit the open road to discover America. This year, my father decided that we would go to Florida. And, not just Florida....but Disney World. Photo by Younho Choo on Unsplash As he said the words, I remember the rain stopping and the clouds parting overhead. Birds began singing, and two angels came down in flowing white gowns and placed a banner around my father's shoulders that read “World's Greatest Dad.” A tear began to well up in my eye. Surely, there could be no peak experience in the life of a young boy more exciting than Disney World. (This was before crack became readily available at public schools, of course.) The run-up to our trip to Disney World. My parents tolerated great hardship over the several weeks it took a family with five kids to complete the journey. But somehow, we made it intact. It was the culmination of all my hopes and dreams. Not just because we were going to Disney World, but because this was the year Space Mountain opened! The ride to end all rides, according to the countless TV commercials I saw for it. A ride so amazing that word had even traveled as far north as New York. And I was going to go! My plans, however, did not coincide with the rest of my family's. Much to my disbelief, when we finally stood face to face with the childhood equivalent of Mt. Everest, none of the spineless wimps had the guts to go on it! Now, this would not have been a problem, had my parents not deemed it imperative that I be chaperoned. I was outraged! Surely, I was completely capable of making this sojourn a cappella. In a desperate move to quell future obnoxious whining, my father stepped up and offered to take me. Again, the rain stopped, and the clouds parted overhead. Birds began singing, and two angels came down in flowing white gowns and placed a banner around my father’s shoulders that read “World’s Greatest Dad.” Tears began to well up in my eye as we waited patiently in line. Photo @Min An Then, just as I was convinced that I was about to undergo a life-altering experience, it all crashed to the ground. In an effort to ward off any legal retribution, the pansies at Disney had erected a sign “suggesting” that people with heart conditions, high blood pressure, or bad backs not go on this ride. And since my dad had all three, I never got to go into that mystical place. Photo by @METRO96 | CC BY-SA 3.0 There was no one to blame, but still, I was crushed, nay traumatized, for seventeen long years. Until last week. Now, as an adult without a heart condition, high blood pressure, or a bad back—and tall enough to ride!—there was no stopping me. Photo @Kaleeb18 | CC BY-SA 4.0 In 1992, I once again stood at the base of Space Mountain. That gleaming structure was every bit as inspiring as that fateful day in '75. But, this time, I was no small boy. I was a large man who needed neither chaperoning nor parental guidance. (But, fortunately, my college roommate was there just in case.

) This time, there was nothing standing between me and Space Mountain, except upwards of 15,000 screaming kids. But I could wait. I had waited 17 years for this moment, I could wait another four to eight hours. As I passed “The Sign,” I couldn't help reflect on my previous visit to Orlando Florida. Today, I thought, I would have my satisfaction. Today, I would close a chapter in my life. Today, I would answer one of the many questions of my life—is Space Mountain a good amusement park ride? Once past The Sign, a hallway led us up a long ramp, past images of space as recent as 1975. At the top of the ramp was a huge, open room. With a roped-off bank line about a 2.3 miles long. It was like a maze. I felt like a rat. We kept passing the same people as they progressed around us. We made some friends, but most all agreed that the two guys ahead of us were gigantic jerks. The lines at Disney World were longer than I remember. Finally, we were standing in the staging area, about to conquer Space Mountain. Still flush with anticipation, a strange calm fell over me—it was happening. Our spacecraft arrived and we got in. It held only three, one behind another, attached to a second similar car of three. I was in the middle of the first car, close to the action. Once we climbed in, they lowered the padded bar over the waist to hold us down (a sure sign of a life-threatening ride). Locked tight, we were off. Beyond the staging area, our spacecraft zipped along the tracks into darkness. There was no turning back. There was no way out. This was it. Photo @Benjamin D. Esham | CC BY-SA 4.0, I finally climb Space Mountain, metaphorically, at least. The craft turned and then jerked to a stop, followed by the all too familiar ratcheting sound of a roller-coaster climbing the first hill. The tension mounted. At the top, I mouthed a silent prayer to the gods of entertainment. And then the ride began in earnest. Into the first drop, I expected the worst, and I got it. I found myself screaming involuntarily. Things like “This is it...?!?,” “Wow, this sucks!” and “I waaaant myyyy monnneeeyyy baaaaccckk!”—Adult Peter Crosby When I finally awoke from my involuntary nap, the ride had ended. The craft had pulled up next to scenes depicting all seven planets discovered thus far, propped by the guys who did the original Star Trek TV series. Of course, Space Mountain was disappointing, but that didn’t really figure into it. The dream now, as an adult, was only to achieve closure. And I did. But, honestly, I didn't think the ride was going to be quite that lame. Back in 1975, Space Mountain was probably a killer ’coaster. Photo @Marcin Wichary |CC BY 2.0 All this just proved to me that I had grown up. I was no longer a child, and I must move on with my life. As someone famous once said, “You can't go home again,” but you can go to Disney World again. And it'll be EXACTLY like you remember it. I mean, those guys haven’t spent a dime to renovate the place. Come on, it’s 1992, for Pete’s sake. Walking into “Tomorrow World” is like stepping back in time, ironically. Wait, what is that, an IBM XT computer?!? Still, it was fun to relive the ’60s again. Pirates of the Caribbean, 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, Haunted House, Congo River, Thunder Mountain (a new ride down a mine shaft themed roller-coaster—again pretty mild), and the ever-popular Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. One disturbing realization I made this time, as an adult, was how much smaller it all seemed. I could’ve sworn everything was...I dunno...bigger. And more believable. Geez, 20,000 Leagues didn't even have any real fish! What a rip! They were all plastic models (no doubt really accurate representations of the real thing, except for the fact that they were stuck on a wire in the ground). Heck, I don't even think the lake was a naturally occurring body of water! What a rip-off. If I hadn't gotten the Florida Resident discount, I’d have been really disappointed.

[crosbyreport]

Tahiti may be the closest you’ll ever get to paradise without dying first. Tahiti makes Bali look like Detroit, Michigan in the winter.

Like any self-respecting Shangri-La, Tahiti isn’t all that easy to get to. In fact, this island of enchantment is pretty far away from most mortal kingdoms—the closest being New Zealand—and it’s even farther away from the squalid, freezing hellhole where you probably live. Yet, for as difficult as Tahiti is to get to, it’s even harder to leave. Tahiti lies smack dab in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. There’s an unmarked triangle in the South Pacific Ocean known as Polynesia—meaning “many nations”—which stretches from Hawaii to New Zealand to Easter Island. This Polynesian Triangle encompasses over 1,000 South Sea Islands and, right in the middle of it is the sun-drenched, chain of islands of French Polynesia and Tahiti. The nearest neighboring island is 12 miles away, so even if Moo’rea has a lot of loud parties late at night, you probably won’t need to call the cops on them. The first Tahitians had cojones the size of coconuts. The island of Tahiti—which means “rising sun”—was originally settled sometime between 300-800 AD by early Polynesians, a race of sea-faring folks thought to have come from East Asia. These badass mariners set off paddling 60-foot long outrigger canoes into hundreds of miles of open ocean without any idea of where they were going, or if they’d ever find land. By way of comparison, I won’t even drive to Home Depot® without using the GPS. Polynesians don’t need no e-stinkin’ GPS! @petecrosby When your people’s territory is a thousand tiny islands scattered over hundreds of miles of featureless ocean, you get good at navigating open water, or you get good and dead. Traditionally, the Polynesians navigated using the stars and other way-finding techniques—including cloud, fish, bird, and wave behaviors. Older navigators passed their knowledge down through the oral tradition, often in the form of songs like “Red Skies at Night” and the always memorable, “Ekewaka, follow that seagull!” These navigation skills are still being taught today to bored Tahitian teens staring into their GPS-enabled mobile phones. Most Tahitians are actually ex-Samoans. Today’s Tahitians mostly hail from Samoa (the island chain, not the cookie). These South Seas islands are 1,500-miles west of Tahiti, a short paddle by Polynesian standards. That proximity is why Samoans currently represent about 70% of the population. The other 30% of Tahitians are composed of people who, not surprisingly, left China, Europe, and other countries that have cold and/or shitty weather most of the year. Ancient Polynesian religious beliefs align weirdly with modern alien conspiracies. Aliens! Prior to the 1800s, most Polynesians believed that the gods inhabited a realm distinct from our physical world (like outer space), yet they were frequent visitors (aka, UFOs) and are responsible for much of what happens here, for better (world peace) or worse (anal-probing). Crazy similar, right? Fortunately, mankind has progressed beyond silly, childish Polynesian beliefs to more modern, science-based beliefs like virgin births, talking snakes, and zombie messiahs. Out with the old Polynesian gods, in with the new Christian one. Unbidden and unwanted (as usual), Christian missionaries washed up on Tahiti’s idyllic shores in the 1800s. They had the unenviable task of spreading the good word about “God’s paradise” to a bunch of folk who already lived there. Frankly, the missionaries would’ve had an easier time trying to foist psychiatry on Scientologists). Blissfully unaware of Jesus and his growing fan-base, the Tahitians lived long, happy lives and died unsaved for almost 1400 years without seeming worse off for the wear. Yet by 1850, these Catholic and Protestant missionaries had accomplished one of their primary goals—convincing the locals to stop human-sacrificing Catholic and Protestant missionaries.  The pool at the InterContinental. After a period of Polynesian civil war and the return of exiled chief Pomare II (Tahiti’s own Constantine-wannabe),

most Polynesians abandoned their festive Tahitian gods in favor of Christianity’s dour one, presumably after learning that He allowed believers to keep slaves, sleep with their dead brother’s wife, tell women to shut up, and just generally stone people for no reason. I suspect this all appealed to locals who—living on such a small island—were always looking for new things to do. The island of Tahiti is more of a concept than a reality. When the island of Tahiti comes up in conversation or in a game of Trivial Pursuit,® most people don’t imagine a real island, they imagine a fantasy island. A place straight out of the musical “South Pacific,” or one of those pulp magazine stories from the ’50s where American soldiers fell in love with beautiful island girls and gave them gonorrhea. And they’re not wrong—Tahiti is that fantasy place. The sun shines 3,000 hours per year, the water is freakishly blue, and waterfalls abound down its mountains. To the locals, Tahiti may be a tiny rock with over 40% unemployment and limited economic opportunity, but to tourists, it’s as close to nirvana as most of them are likely ever to get. Tahiti will change you beyond just making your skin all dark and leathery. Visiting this tropical paradise, even for a short time, will make you rethink any dreams for the future you had planned for yourself. Suddenly, the American Dream of “a big house, 2.5 kids, and a white picket fence” doesn’t hold a candle to the Tahitian Dream of “lounging in a beach hammock, drinking a Hinana Lager while watching pelicans procreate.”  “I could live here,” you’ll think, entirely forgetting that you have a job, spouse, and 2.5 kids back home. “I don’t need much to be happy, I could just weave a hut out of palm fronds, build a car out of bamboo, panhandle for beer money, and eat coconut cream pie all day,” you confidently tell a nearby palm tree because you’re hallucinating from full-blown heat exhaustion. The kind of climate you can generally expect on Tahiti.  Human for scale. Though most people think Tahiti has perfect weather all the time, temperatures in the South Pacific can diverge wildly from a brain-melting 88°F all the way down to a bone-chilling 70°F. You simply never know whether you'll need to wear winter- or summer-shorts at any given moment, so pack both kind—you don’t want to get caught in corduroy shorts during the summer. Tahiti experiences very little seasonal variation during the year, but November through April is facetiously called “the rainy season.” That's when storm clouds often gather ominously around Tahiti’s high volcanic peaks, threatening to wash away lives, homes, and businesses in violent torrential downpours. More commonly, the clouds unleash for, at most, 30 minutes and, if it weren’t for the resulting waterfalls and rainbows, you’d be mildly annoyed by it. If you like sunshine but hate animals, Tahiti is the place for you. Mongooses are asleep when rats are active. Much like the Big Island of Hawai’i, which imported non-native mongooses to unsuccessfully do battle with its non-native rat infestation, Tahiti has almost no indigenous wildlife besides birds. If an animal didn’t fly there on its own, or stowaway on a passing ship, the Tahitians don’t have it. The island is pleasantly devoid of spiders, bats, and snakes, but also deer, cats, lions, tigers, and even bears. I can only assume the Tahiti Zoo is just a bunch of rats and maybe a Myna bird trained to swear in Reo Mā’ ohi. But I'd still pay to see that. Not a painting. Even though it’s paradise, Tahiti isn’t all sunshine and mango-pops. There are a few dark secrets about this “island” paradise the locals don’t want to tell you. For starters, Tahiti isn’t an island. What?!? That’s right, you’ve been lied to! It’s actually two extinct volcanoes—Mont Orohena and Mount Ronui—connected by an isthmus. A freaking isthmus…yeah, can you believe it?!? Such a rip-off. What’s an isthmus, you ask? Well, it’s a “narrow piece of land connecting two larger areas across an expanse of water.

” And believe me, I didn’t fly halfway across the Pacific Ocean to drink fruity cocktails on a tropical isthmus! If I'd wanted an “Isthmus Vacation,” I could've gone to Santa Catalina or someplace. All things considered, though, I suppose it could’ve been worse—at least, Tahiti isn’t a tombolo.  Here’s something else you don’t know about Tahiti. A mysterious cabin in the woods. You’re saying it wrong. Huh?!? That’s right, you’ve been lied to…again! Tahiti is pronounced Ta-HAY-tee, not Ta-HEE-tee like everyone you’ve ever known pronounces it. I’ll be honest, when I first learned that fact, it was more than a little surprising. It kinda messed me up for a while. It was like finding out that Detroit is actually pronounced Dey-twah. Or that Constantinople is pronounced Istanbul. Next, you’re going to tell me “tattoo” is pronounced tat-tau, or some crazy shit like that. (What’s that? It is? FML.) Ranking Tahiti against other tropical islands I’ve visited thus far. Tahiti looks remote in places. Comparing beautiful, tropical islands is like comparing beautiful tropical women–it’s crass, disrespectful, and will likely get you slapped. Pitting natural beauty against itself as a list, simply for the sake of better Google rankings, is despicable and something that I’d never do unless someone had a gun to my head. However, gun to my head, here’s how I’d rank the tropical islands I’ve been to. Bora Bora Caye Caulker Galápagos Bali St. Martin Tahiti Cancún’s Isla Mujeres Hawai‘i’s Big Island Puerto Rico Jamaica Over-looking the whole “not technically an island” isthmus debacle, Tahiti ranks near the middle of my list for one simple reason—it’s a large, well-developed island, like Puerto Rico. Tahiti is so big, it has an international airport, shopping malls, and three McDonald's. No, Tahiti is just too civilized to give you the full “remote island getaway” experience, even though it is legit very remote.  To provide a more authentic experience, an island should only be accessible by small boat, outrigger canoe, or rickety, WWI-era biplane that barely looks capable of flight. Then, once you’re on the island, electricity should be sketchy, the water barely drinkable, and the beaches deserted except for a single tiki bar. The ideal remote tropical island should be a place where you go to relax and unwind, write a novel, or escape extradition and, regrettably, Tahiti is not that kind of place. Now, Bora Bora on the other hand...

[crosbyreport]

Edinburgh, Scotland: A city of culture, arts, science, and gammy bagpipes. Seriously, what the hell were the Scottish thinking when they invented those damn noise-makers?

According to folklore (and plate tectonics), Edinburgh Scotland was once supposedly warm. If you believe the locals, Scotland — and the whole of Europe, for that matter — was once situated near the equator. The locals paint Ye Olde Scotland as a tropical paradise, but after a few days there I suspect it was just the whisky talking. Edinburgh Scotland is a fountain of knowledge where many come to drink. Scottish poet Sir Walter Scott’s 200-foot high “spaceship” monument. The Scot’s drunken rambling does, however, explain the invention of the Scottish Kilt, a form of male attire—similar to a woman’s skirt—that’s not exactly conducive to a cold climate (or heterosexuality). Experiencing Edinburgh today, you’d never guess that the city had ever been anything other than a thriving, erudite, and cosmopolitan civilization slowly but surely freezing itself to death. This private school was reportedly J.K. Rowling’s inspiration for Harry Potter’s Hogwart Academy. Not that you couldn’t happily live in Scotland—famous people like J.K. Rowling, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sir Walter Scott, Alexander Graham Bell, the Bay City Rollers and Garbage front-woman, Shirley Manson, were either born, lived, or found inspiration in the chilly streets of Edinburgh. The road up the hill to the Old Town Starbucks That’s not surprising since Edinburgh has tons of indoor culture, art, and science — including a major, international comedy fest — all of it just a short, eleven-hour plane flight away from our own San Francisco (another big, beautiful city home to tons of outdoor culture, art, science, and a major comedy festival). The biggest difference between the two metropolises comes down to the total quantity of pantless, free-swinging male testicles each has, and in that regard, San Francisco wins in a land-slide. Walking around Edinburgh Scotland. Adam Smith, father of Capitalism (just not the way WE do it). Upon arrival in Scotland’s capital city, we took the famous Sandeman’s Edinburgh Free Tour because it was, well, you know…free. This complementary walking tour of the city’s “Old Town” was led by an enthusiastic female guide named Izzy. She assured the group that there was no cost to the tour, but quietly intimated that if we wanted her to guide us back to the safe part of town afterward, we’d better “pony up some dough.” At least, that’s what we think she said — her Scottish accent was pretty thick. More amazing was the fact that she wasn’t even from Scotland. Hailing from America’s own Chicago, Izzy had — in just under three years — thoroughly adopted the nigh incomprehensible brogue of a real Scot (again, that’s what we think she said). Edinburgh Scotland is a wonderland of awfulness. Edinburgh Mercat Cross (or Market Cross) outside St. Giles Cathedral and Parliament Square. Izzy then led us around the cobblestone streets of Old Town pointing out places where Scottish people of yore had been variously beheaded, nailed to doors, spat upon, burned as witches, covered with feces, and perhaps worst of all — forced to eat Haggis. Haggis is a traditional Scottish dish made by combining the most disgusting parts of animals (you’re better off not knowing which ones) with enough spices to make you not realize what you’re really eating. Haggis is so vile in concept that many restaurants offer a vegetarian version to prevent the inevitable and almost compulsory vomiting that ensues the moment first-time diners find out what they’ve just put in their mouths. Crime was never a big problem in Edinburgh Scotland. Charming street leading down to the Grass Market, I think. We got lost a lot. Stopping at the Edinburgh Mercat Cross (or Market Cross) outside St. Giles Cathedral and Parliament Square, we learned how the Scots punished wrong-doers back in the day. It seems that if you broke the law, they’d drag you to this public square and nail your ear to the wooden door of this structure. Hanging there bleeding, you’d have two choices: 1.

) Suffer the indignities of having kids kick you in the shins while adults pissed on you and threw human manure at you, or 2.) Rip your ear off, forever be known as a coward, never find work again and die shortly after. Needless to say, the early Scots didn’t have prison over-crowding problems. Edinburgh’s biggest problem was much shittier. Carrubber’s Close, a pass-through from the Royal Mile to a back courtyard. While crime wasn’t a big concern, Edinburgh still had major problems. Feces, for example. Since there wasn’t always a handy criminal at whom to throw your butt-nuggets, citizens of this highly populated city had to find some other way to dispose of their toilet turds. After what I’m sure had to be a hotly debated issue, the geniuses of Scotland landed on the idea of loudly yelling “Arr-da-lee!” as a warning to all below before heaving buckets of their filth out the window onto the street. The system never really worked too well, and lots of people got unwelcome surprises, especially the deaf. Solving the “flinging poo out the window” problem by closing the window. To mitigate the problem of everyone getting coated with keister-cakes, the King wisely decreed that you could only toss your ass-kabobs out the window twice a day, at either 10AM or 10PM. This helped in the morning, but made things far worse at night. Not only were the city streets pitch black by 10pm, it was also the time when all the pubs closed, too. It’s alleged that drunken pedestrians who heard the warning “Arr-da-lee!” and instinctively looked up inspired the euphemism of “being shit-faced.” Those streets used to be full of shit, much like your stupid boss. Excessive excrement was a real problem for a city built on a hill. More Scottish people died from dysentery and cholera than from battles. Edinburgh’s fecal fudge flowed down the streets and sluiced into the city’s primary source of drinking water, Nor Loch (or “North Lake”). As a result, all manner of infectious disease like dysentery and cholera ran rampant throughout the local population, confounding the King and his advisors. Luckily, the Scots quickly and shrewdly identified the real cause: Witches. How to tell if someone’s a witch, when you don’t have a duck handy. Being an “advanced” civilization, Edinburgh used the scientific method to identify witches. Based on indisputable conjecture and speculation, you were declared a witch if: Tell me with a straight face that witches don't live in this...building. Should you display any one of these traits — or worse, more than one — you had your thumbs tied to your toes and were tossed into the putrid, disease-ridden Nor Loch. You had red hair (unfortunately common in Scotland) You had facial moles (where the Devil had obviously touched you) You had a third nipple (where you were clearly suckling Satan), and/or You were left-handed (well, cuz that’s just weird, bro). Real witches would “logically” be held aloft and saved by Satan himself, while innocent women would make a beeline to heaven (well, after a few minutes of desperate gasping, thrashing, and screaming). To thwart Satan, any “floaters” would be fished out of the disgusting Nor Loch (“Yay!”) and burned at the stake (“Boooo!”). Yeah, take that, Beelzebub! A street scene outside the Grass Market. People from Edinburgh invented stuff, too. Still, Izzy assured us, Edinburgh wasn’t all suffering, bleakness, and dysentery. It was a city of refined creativity and innovation, too, she insisted. Royal Bank Of Scotland. Inventions such as the steam engine, bicycle, telephone, ATM, fingerprinting, television, penicillin, electromagnetics, radar, insulin, and a host of others had their beginnings in Scotland. She even told us about the two young entrepreneurs, Burke & Hare who cleverly found an innovative way to supply medical schools with much-needed teaching aids. Their radical new concept in “procurement” made them both very wealthy until around 1828 when

they were hanged for grave robbing and serial murder (a minor snag in an otherwise very inventive business plan). The Royal Scots Greys monument in Princes Street Gardens celebrates those who fought in the 1899 South African War. Over the course of three hours, Izzy continued to delight us with stories of Edinburgh’s macabre and disgusting past, wrapping up the tour in Princes Street Gardens, near the oldest floral clock in the world. We’d intended to ditch the tour right before the end to avoid having to tip Izzy, but by then, we’d forgotten how to get back to our hotel. So we coughed up what we thought the tour was worth and it turned out to be a lot. Capital building? The people of Edinburgh are hearty bastards. Now left to fend for ourselves, we once again walked the length and breadth of Old Town, stopping to spend more time at places we saw and to marvel at the city’s almost French-like architecture. Edinburgh’s stout, sturdy buildings mirror the stout, sturdy people of Scotland themselves. To call the Scots “larger than life” is no lazy cliché or hyperbole—the Scots are just pretty big people. In fact, the petite section in clothing stores has a sign that says, “Sorry, try France.” A historical plaque inside a “close.” Edinburgh is thankfully a very walkable town since if you don’t keep moving constantly, you’ll freeze to death, or the haggis will clot inside your heart and kill you. We couldn’t think of any other reasons for sane people to be outside in those temperatures otherwise. That’s not to say that Edinburgh is all that cold, it’s just colder than it feels like it should be. Scott’s spaceship monument next to Jenner’s, a Scottish department store. The weather here is not what I consider tolerable. Normally, we were assured, the weather in Edinburgh vacillates between miserably rainy and god-forsaken gray, so we were thrown off by bright sun and blue skies over the four days we visited. (Thanks, Scottish weather gods!) Yet it was still freezing to us, though obviously not to the locals. Narrow pass-throughs from the main streets to charming, feces-strewn courtyards behind Edinburgh’s huge buildings, usually called “closes.” We saw a stunning amount of pasty, exposed flesh considering the brisk temperatures and gale-force North Atlantic winds. Still, nothing seemed to dissuade the young Scots from walking to nightclubs in short sleeves and even shorter skirts. We stood out as obvious tourists thanks to our bulky coats, woolen scarves, and day-time sobriety. Eating in Edinburgh is recommended. The Grass Market with Edinburgh Castle in the background. Despite an active late-night club scene, the city’s shops and restaurants call it a day as soon as the sun goes down. Holding fistfuls of pound notes in our freezing hands, we found nowhere to spend them. So we did what everyone else does and went to a pub. In New Town, we particularly liked 1780 Restaurant and not just because it was just a short, drunken stagger away from our hotel. It’s a casual place on Rose Street cheerfully serving traditional Scottish food, over 100 whiskys, and a few drunken mooks who should’ve been shown the door hours ago. How’d you like to try and attack that? I mean, without an F-16 and wing-mounted Sidewinder missiles... The next morning, we awoke to an impressive sunrise view of Edinburgh Castle, standing high atop the volcanic crest in the center of town and decided to go there. Once an easily defensible position from which to ward off attacking armies, the Castle is now a tourist trap from which to ward off financial recession. This city offers an varied assortment of impressive rock stacking. Edinburgh Castle is an imposing and highly effective tourist trap. Going inside Edinburgh Castle would’ve cost us both thirty British Pounds (roughly US$60), so we chose instead to put our hard-earned money towards a Scotch Whisky sampling platter of Glenlivet French Oak Reserve 15, Oban 14, Glenrothes Select Reserve, Scapa

16, Aberlour 10, and Dalwhinnie 15 at the Amber Restaurant bar just south of the Castle on The Royal Mile. The Palace at Holyrood’s fancy ironwork. We then stumbled out onto, and meandered down, The Royal Mile, a road that runs from Edinburgh Castle in the center of town out to the Palace at Holyrood where the Royals stay whenever they visit Edinburgh and can’t get a room at the local Radisson (be sure to look for its hilarious plaque that says in all seriousness, “Since 1990”). The Palace at Holyrood has ample horse-drawn chariot parking. The impressive Palace at Holyrood started out as a humble Abbey in 1168AD, but as more and more people invaded the city, the place was expanded until the next invaders moved in and expanded it further. Eventually, Palace at Holyrood became a massive structure that’s been home to royalty, like Robert The Bruce, and the naked ghost of alleged-witch, Agnes Sampson, among others. Did you know pork comes from pigs? The front window of “Oink Hog Roast.” A bit peckish from all of our walking about, we sought out some comestibles. The first time we heard about Oink Hog Roast, we knew we had to eat there. It’s a small shop at 34 Victoria Street with a desiccated, roasted pig in the window reposing in its own pulled-porkiness. You can order one of three portion sizes served on a white or “brown” (i.e. wheat) bun with your choice of apple sauce, sage, and onions, or haggis and chili. I had the haggis and chili and it was fantastic, although a little dry (next time, I’d probably load up on the chili sauce more). While it may sound like a meal that should be served with rib-spreaders, you have to remember that Scotland invented the deep-fried Mars bar. So by that benchmark, this meat-fest was practically health food. Searching for the Holy Grail. The quaint hamlet of Roslin, England, final resting place of the most holy grail (allegedly). Having come all this way to Edinburgh, we felt obligated to try finding the Holy Grail before we left (just imagine what we could get for it on eBay). So we hopped on the No. 15 city bus (US$3.00) out to Roslin to see the now-famous Rosslyn Chapel — and no, that’s not a typo (they’re spelled differently for some stupid Scottish reason). Rosslyn Chapel is bigger on the outside than it is inside. After a pleasant forty-minute double-decker bus ride through Edinburgh’s suburbs, we arrived at Rosslyn Chapel in the Scottish countryside. Outside the chapel, there’s a fancy visitor’s center thanks almost entirely to the “Da Vinci Code” book/movie phenomena. Up from 30,000 visitors a year to around 170,000 now, the chapel attracts people of all religions, backgrounds and mental states — one guy tried taking an axe to one of the chapel’s columns in hopes of exposing the world’s most holy relic. He was struck dead by lightning. Rosslyn Chapel’s stained glass windows. The chapel itself is small by modern standards, but nonetheless contains an impressive, comprehensively carved interior. Nearly every square inch of the walls, ceilings and columns are ornately carved to depict ghastly religious scenes meant to terrify uneducated farm folk into behaving themselves. The front doorway to Rosslyn Chapel. The chapel was abandoned for many years during which time the wet Scottish weather had its way with it like Gene Simmons with a groupie. Afterwards, an ill-fated attempt was made to seal the wall carvings, inadvertently sealing in the moisture. As a result, the Chapel’s interior looks like it was spray-painted with wet cement. Later on, they built a giant roof over the entire chapel to protect it from the elements while it dried out over the next few years. After exploring the Chapel’s carvings, we walked down to Rosslyn castle, which is in far worse shape. Hopping back on the bus, we headed back to the Old Town to explore Edinburgh further. Sunrise on Edinburgh Castle mountain. Summing up our impression of Scotland’s best city. For more photos, see Peter Crosby’s Edinburgh Photography

In all, we had a splendid time in Edinburgh. The city’s beautiful, the people are nice and there’s lots of stuff to see and do. Sure, we didn’t spend a ton of time there, but we did get a good feel for Edinburgh and its many charms. More importantly, we left while we still had good feeling in our outer extremities.

[crosbyreport]

Of Spain’s many exceptional towns and cities, Madrid is the most tragically ordinary. In any other country, Madrid would be a must-see city. But in Spain, it’s just a meh one.

I’m not saying that Madrid Spain is as uninspiring and mundane as someplace like, say, Cleveland, Ohio. I’m just saying that Madrid seems disappointingly normal after visiting some of Spain’s more fascinating cities. Anywhere in North America, Madrid would be a stand-out city, but in the country of Spain, it’s just an also-ran. The Plaza de Cibeles has become a symbol for the city of Madrid. Still, Madrid is Spain’s biggest city (Suck it, Barcelona). Madrid Spain is landlocked. With 3+ million inhabitants and a metropolitan area of almost 7 million, Madrid is the most populous city in Spain. It’s also the second-largest city in the whole European Union (EU). Only the city of Berlin is bigger, with its 3.5 million bratwurst-biters. Madrid’s post office, turned City Hall. Spain’s main metropolis is especially impressive when you consider that the place is thoroughly landlocked. That’s right, the most popular area within Europe’s southernmost peninsula is nowhere near the “sun-sational” Mediterranean Sea. Are the citizens of Madrid Spain freakin’ idiots? Now, Barcelona is a REAL city. The country of Spain has over 3,000 miles of warm, sunny coastline with 8,000 beaches and eleven cities along it. Yet most Spaniards still choose to live in Madrid, a three and a half hour drive from the nearest coast. (What are they afraid of, this disturbingly long list of native sharks?) That’s like if the most Californians lived in Bakersfield or Fresno—hell, even Cleveland is on the water. Barcelona gets 15 million tourists every year, while Madrid only gets six. This building appears to be floating. Meanwhile, Barcelona, the country’s second-largest city—and a damn near tropical paradise—has only 5+ million people in total. Sure, ocean rise is going to turn the city into Atlantis in a few years, but in the meantime, you can live by the beach, brah! Honestly, I struggle to understand the appeal of living in Madrid Spain. Not that there’s anything wrong with the place, there’s just not a lot that seems all that right. To me, anyway. Maybe it has to do with Madrid’s troubled and turbulent past. The making of Madrid Spain—a quick primer. Templo de Debod is an Egyptian temple that was dismantled and rebuilt in Madrid. Spain has a long history of invading other countries, beginning as far back as the 1400s. Their “Naked Lust for Conquest World Tour” (more recently rebranded as the “Age Of Discovery” to make colonialism seem family-friendly), gave the Spanish an empire upon which “the sun never set.” A door that tells visitors to go away. Yet their imperialistic tendencies may have stemmed from Spain’s even longer history of being constantly invaded itself. Throughout history, control of Madrid has been passed around more than a fruitcake at White Elephant holiday party gift-exchanges. As a quick recap, the Celts (UKers) initially founded Madrid in prehistoric times, the Romans (Italians) later kicked them out, some Visigoths (Germans) then moved in, followed by the Muslims (North Africans), the Christians (Italians again), and even the French set up shop for a bit. Even back then, the city of Madrid was very popular with foreign tourists. The monarchy finally moves out of Madrid. Royal Palace of Madrid (Palacio Real de Madrid) By the 1930s, Spain had finally kicked its last royal family to the curb and formed the Second Spanish Republic (ugh, don’t even ask about the first one). This newly formed, progressive government ushered in important modern reforms, including a democratic constitution and women’s right to vote. Marques del Duero monument at Paseo de la Castellana street These advances in self-government, human rights, and female empowerment, almost predictably, led to a three-year Spanish Civil War. In 1939, peace was finally “restored” at gunpoint by General Francisco Franco. Franco was a fascist dictator-for-life who sided with the Axis powers during WWII and ruled Spain for decades. In 1975, General Franco finally lost his life during the Betamax/VHS video cassette format war.

The Puerta de Alcalá gate was hit by cannon shrapnel. The marks can still be seen. After Franco’s death—an event covered extensively on Saturday Night Live —democracy was once again pulled from the shelf, dusted off, re-inserted, and fast-forwarded past the previous 36 years. Since that time, it’s been smooth sailing for the city of Madrid except for an attempted coup d’état, heroin crisis, immigration issues, financial meltdown, unaffordable housing, unfettered gentrification, and a gambling epidemic. But, to be fair, Cleveland has had most of those same problems. Madrid’s monument to a lot of terrible people. In 1940, General Franco ordered the construction of Valle de los Caídos (“Valley of the Fallen”) in memory of all the right-wing, fascist nut-jobs who died supporting his heroic and unselfish attack on the scourge of representative democracy. The monument’s most prominent feature—rooted in the design school of Fascist Wet-Dreamism—is its 500-foot tall phallus I mean, cross—the tallest of its kind in the world. You can see this over-compensating symbol of hate and oppression from over 20 miles away. Members of the previous, democratically elected government—looking to shorten their prison sentences—helped other convicts build the monument, which took over eighteen years. Against his own wishes, Franco was buried in Valle de los Caídos after his death in 1975. In October 2019, it finally dawned on someone that Franco was the only person interred at the site who didn’t actually die in the Spanish Civil War (because he caused it). So they told his family that it was “closing time” for Franco. He didn’t have to go home, but he couldn’t stay there. His remains were then moved to his wife’s mausoleum. What Madrid Spain is kinda like nowadays. It’s not a nap, it’s a “siesta.” Sure, Ramón. Despite their history of conquest and cruelty, today’s Spanish are a far more relaxed and hospitable people. The Spanish are now so relaxed, in fact, that they can’t make it through an entire day without taking a nap. (Calling it a “siesta” isn’t fooling anyone, amigos.) In fact, the city is a veritable ghost town between the hours of 1pm and 3pm. El Sobrino de Botín (est. 1725), the world’s oldest restaurant according to Guinness. While the locals sleep off the Mimosas they had at brunch, the streets of Madrid are vacant, save for confused and starving tourists searching for an open café or restaurant. Sadly, even if the locals woke up, they wouldn’t be much help because hardly anyone who lives in Madrid speaks English. Chilling at rooftop bar, Terraza Gymage. The denizens of Madrid aren’t exactly morning people either, so stow that “early bird gets the worm” bullshit in your hotel safe. You won’t need it in Madrid Spain. Madridians have more of a “slacker” ethos thanks to the 300 days of energy-sapping sunshine that this town gets every year. Lunch at Maestro Villa Sidreria, La Latina The people here enjoy brunch, lazy afternoons, and 10pm dinner reservations. They “work to live,” unlike Americans who “work to afford healthcare.” Madridians live longer as a result—Spain ranks 5th in life expectancy while the United States ranks slightly lower at 40th mostly because of our corporatocracy. Reasons why some people might like Madrid Spain. Have you tried the jamón in Spain? So good. There’s actually a lot to like about Madrid Spain. There’s the fascinating Spanish culture, with its world-famous jamón, paella, and flamenco music. As well as its people’s penchant for day-sleeping. Madrid’s fashion scene is on fleek. But the people of Madrid like being different and unique, so they embrace more non-traditional Spanish stuff, too. Things that you might not expect to find in such a religious country, especially in the area of attire. Madrid’s focus on fashion shouldn’t have surprised me, though, because public nudity is legal here. But no one who just ate a bunch of jamón, paella, and tapas, should be allowed to walk around naked. Yeah, it’s hot in Spain—I get it—but put some pants on, Padre.

Start seeing Spain from the middle of Madrid. Gran Via (Madrid) Madrid is the center of Spain, and “Centro” is the center of Madrid. Dating back to the 9th Century, these two square miles mark Madrid’s original city limits, back when the Muslims were “discovering” the region. As the city’s oldest real estate, Madrid’s Central District is popular with tourists and pigeons alike. It encompasses some of the city’s most impressive architecture and poopable monuments. Plaza Mayor is a huge waste of Madrid’s prime real estate. Plaza Mayor, Madrid Plaza Mayor by alevision.co A few blocks to the southwest, you’ll find Plaza Mayor (aka, “Main Square), an enormous public plaza built in the late 1500s. The three-story residential buildings that surround Plaza Mayor have 237 balconies overlooking the 130,000+ square feet of sun-bleached cobblestone. It’s a great place to stroll around, go shopping, or grab a bite at one of the plaza’s outdoor cafés. Historically, however, it was a great place to hold soccer games, bullfights, and human executions, too. Fortunately, they power-washed the blood stains out long ago. Don Quixote’s adventures ended at Plaza de España. Statue of Miguel de Cervantes, Plaza de España de Madrid. We took Madrid’s metro to Plaza de España, a large public square located near the busy center of Madrid. It’s a popular destination for literary nerds who want to take a selfie with the sculpture of Miguel de Cervantes. Clockwise: Miguel de Cervantes, Sancho Panza, and Don Quixote. Cervantes is the author of “The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha,” often regarded as the first modern novel and the prequel to HBO’s Game Of Thrones. In front of the statues of Cervantes, Don Quixote, and Sancho Panza, there’s an algae-ridden pond and a park with pleasant shade. In the background, visitors can also see the city’s two tallest skyscrapers, which is not what anyone who comes to Madrid wants to see. “Today, the girls win.” (c. May 10, 2015) We happened upon Plaza de España during the largest women’s sporting event in Europe—a charity marathon for breast cancer awareness. Around 32,000 women flooded into the streets of Madrid wearing bright pink t-shirts, shorts, and running shoes. Incredibly, none of the ladies seemed the least bit concerned that they all showed up to a public event wearing the exact same outfit. Madrid’s Royal Palace disproves the old saying that size isn’t everything. Palacio Real de Madrid is seriously big. A statue out front of Madrid’s Royal Plaza At some point in our visit, we stumbled down to gawk at Madrid’s ginormous Royal Palace. The place was eerily reminiscent of the mammoth structures we saw in Vienna, Austria, in terms of its classical design, blinding whiteness, and phallic over-compensation. As the former residence of the Spanish royal family, Palacio Real de Madrid flouted every convention of the modern tiny house movement. Try to imagine tiling your front yard. This beast of a building occupies 1.4M square feet and includes almost 3,500 rooms, making it the largest functioning palace in all of Europe and a bitch to heat in the winter. Today, Madrid’s royal palace is used mostly for state ceremonies and overflow parking for Real Madrid games at Santiago Bernabéu Stadium. Madrid’s Almudena Cathedral is big enough to get the job done. Directly across from the monarchy’s tiny-penis palace, the insecure Roman Catholic Church built their own cock-compensation creation. I bet Sigmund Freud would’ve had a field day with these two. A view of Catedral de la Almudena from far away. Catedral de la Almudena, Madrid Spain The Church wanted the Catedral de la Almudena to be the biggest one in the world (hmmm). Yet when construction started in 1879, the contractors kept ghosting them because of Franco’s military coup d’état. As a result, the cathedral wasn’t completed for another 100 years. The pope finally consecrated the finished church in 1993, making it safe for Jehovah to stop by.

Catedral de la Almudena While impressively large, the church wasn’t nearly as big as the King’s Royal Palace next door. Their decision to downscale “the world’s largest church” really showed whom the Roman Catholics were more worried about pissing off (and it wasn’t their god). Or maybe they scaled it back because the pope knows you always want to buy the worst house in the best neighborhood. I guess, when your organization owns 177 million acres of land around the world, you learn a thing or two about real estate. Madrid’s museum of old art is surprisingly modern-looking. Saint Jerome the Royal (aka, San Jerónimo el Real), an old part of Museo del Prado The Museo Nacional del Prado, Madrid’s national art museum, is considered one of the world’s finest, and it’s easy to see why. Inside, you’ll find paintings and sculptures by Hispanic heavyweights like Goya, El Greco, Diego Velázquez, as well as other European masters like Titian, Rubens, and Rembrandt. The new part of Museo del Prado, Madrid Many of the museum’s works were so culturally important that, during Franco’s fascist insurrection, they were sent to Geneva and other countries’ embassies for safekeeping. With so much incredible art under one roof, it was really tragic that we only made it through one floor before needing a nap siesta. Unsurprisingly, Madrid’s modern art museum is weird-looking. The Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía is Madrid’s answer to New York City’s MoMA. And just like MoMA, Spain’s national art museum is one of the largest museums for modern and contemporary art in the world. Formerly a hospital, the Reina Sofia museum now houses masterpieces by Pablo Picasso, Joan Miro, Salvador Dalí, and other clinically insane Spanish artists who probably should’ve been in a hospital most of their crazy lives. There are freakin’ parks everywhere in Madrid Spain. Jardines Del Buen Retiro, (aka, Rose Garden) On the eastern side of Madrid’s city center, there’s a large, 350-acre park named Parque del Buen Retiro (aka, “Park of the Pleasant Retreat”). It’s dedicated to all the old, unproductive citizens who are well past their usefulness to society. With museums, galleries, rose gardens, and a statue walk, the park is a great place to kill time while awaiting the inevitable embrace of la Parca. Estanque del Retiro, a large, but shallow, artificial pond. Monument to King Alfonso XII who liked row-boats a lot. Constructed in 1650, and previously owned by the Spanish monarchy, Parque del Buen Retiro is a vast property which is mercifully about 60% tree-shade, a welcome respite from the stabbing Spanish sun. Another sunshine-mitigation feature in downtown Madrid is the Estanque del Retiro, a large, but shallow, artificial pond. This glorified water hazard is bordered by a semicircular colonnade lofting a large monument to King Alfonso XII. Nearby, you can rent row boats around and splash polluted pond water on the nearby fortune-tellers, puppeteers, and street performers. The paths and walkways around this area are popular with runners, bicyclists, rollerbladers, and black market jamón pushers. The Palacio de Cristal, Madrid, Spain The Palacio de Cristal is Madrid’s monument to the Steam Age. The Palacio de Cristal, Madrid, Spain Walking around the Parque del Buen Retiro, you’ll find the Palacio de Cristal (aka “Crystal Palace”) if you spend even five seconds looking for it—it’s pretty obvious. This old school conservatory was built in 1887 as a greenhouse to cultivate rare and exotic plants. These plants would later be de-stemmed, dried, ground up, and finally hotboxed. Constructed out of gleaming glass and intricate ironwork, this steampunk sweat-lodge is now most often used for displaying art exhibitions and perspiration stains. Out back of the conservatory, there’s a small pond for kids that’s full of ducks, geese, and turtles. It attracts small children like a guy offering candy from an unmarked panel van. Secretly, the kids’ parents placed bets on whose would fall into the pond first.

I won US$50 thanks to a 4-year-old who was clearly never taught Newton’s Third Law of Motion. We spent two days experiencing Madrid Spain like a local—we smoked, jaywalked and day-drank. If you were the King of Spain, you’d be home by now. El Escorial was built in the late 1500s for King Philip II. It was intended to be a palace, monastery, basilica, library, museum, university, and even a hospital. Not surprisingly, it’s the largest Spanish Renaissance building in the world, covering over 330,000 square feet. This sprawling complex contains 16 courtyards, 4,000 rooms, 15 miles of passageways, and 86 staircases. Yet, oddly, only a single half-bath. Madrid Spain is barely walkable, but worth it. Palacio de Cibeles, the former post-office turned city hall. Many of Madrid’s best sights appear to reside in the same general vicinity, often the Central District. They look pretty close to each other on your Google Maps mobile app. But, if you’ve ever been to Las Vegas, then you know distances can be deceiving. In reality, Madrid’s sights can be fairly far away from each other. So, walking there means you’ll be too tired to spend much time seeing or doing anything. Yet walking is necessary exercise if you’re going to stuff your paella-hole with the quantities of Spanish cuisine that we did while we were there—it was a lot, and it wasn’t pretty. In any other country, Madrid would be a must-see city. Spain’s National Library, near Plaza de Colón Square When my parents drove out to San Francisco, I recommended that they also visit Lake Tahoe, whose natural beauty had blown my mind the first time I saw it. They liked the idea, but also swung by Yosemite, a place we had yet to visit at the time. Overlooking Gran Via, Madrid Spain Upon their return a few days later, I excitedly asked them if they’d loved Tahoe as much as I had. They shrugged and replied, “Meh.” That’s because Tahoe—the clearest, bluest lake I’d ever seen—paled in comparison to the rocky splendors of Yosemite National Park. And that’s how I’d describe Madrid—it’s incredibly impressive as long as you never visit any other city in Spain.

[crosbyreport]

Vietnam’s Ha Long Bay would have amazing sea views if 1,600 stupid islands weren’t in the way. Littered with limestone lumps, Ha Long Bay isn’t great for sunset watching.

Ha Long Bay in Vietnam is unlike either of the two North American bays I’ve lived much of my life near. Both the San Francisco and Tampa Bay areas opted for lots of water and only a few islands...you know, for spice. San Francisco Bay has around 10 islands, and Tampa Bay has roughly the same number. Yet, the original creators of Ha Long Bay chose to go another way altogether. Photo by Kyle Petzer Vietnam’s Ha Long Bay contains too many damn islands. China is behind those rocks. Named “the land of descending dragon,” Ha Long Bay is littered with almost two thousand monolithic, limestone islands—technically, islets—rising from the water. The bay has so many uninhabited islands, in fact, that the horizon line—and most of the “South China Sea”*—is all but impossible to see. Still, even if the numerous islands off Ha Long Bay weren’t in the way, the southernmost Chinese island of Hainan would block your view anyway. "Chinese Type 59 tank" @Peeteekayy | CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 So, maybe it’s not a bad thing that vacationing Vietnamese tourists can’t see much of the sea. I doubt they want to be constantly reminded how close their country is to an expansionist-minded superpower. Frankly, the thought of a possible Chinese invasion would certainly cast a pall over even the happiest honeymoons, romantic getaways, or drunken girl’s trips. A Vietnamese shark @Oleksandr Sushko The net effect of this unbroken wall of briny behemoths is that, instead of feeling like you’re at the seaside, visiting Ha Long Bay feels like you’re at a lake. A very big lake, granted, but still a lake. And size isn’t the only giveaway that this waveless water feature isn’t some fake lake impersonator. No, it’s also a salt-water bay—one that could have frikkin’ sharks in it. Sun World Halong Park is Vietnam’s Six Flags Vietnam’s Ha Long Bay offers an exciting escape from the boredom of sleepy Hanoi. “2019 - Vietnam - Halong Bay - 30” by Ted’s photos | CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 About two and a half hours due east of Hanoi, Vietnam, Ha Long Bay (aka, Halong Bay) is both a UNESCO World Heritage Site and a popular vacation destination for locals, foreign tourists, and U.S. military veterans visiting their secret “Amerasian” families. The resort town of Ha Long itself is mostly hotels, condos, restaurants, and bars for people availing themselves of the many tourist activities provided near or around the Tuan Chau marina. First and foremost among them is “Sun World,” Vietnam’s version of Universal Studios or maybe just a Six-Flags. Sun World is the kind of place you’d expect to find near Orlando. “Sun World Halong Park” Located around picturesque Bai Chay Beach and atop Ba Deo Hill, “Sun World Halong Park” covers over 500 acres. The park’s unique Queen’s Cable Car aerial tramway and the Sun Wheel (one of the tallest Ferris Wheels in the world) offer visitors stunning vistas of the area’s overdeveloped landscape. Queen Cable Car on a sunny day. Sun World Halong is just one of Sun Group’s numerous parks across Vietnam, and is best-known for Mystic Mountain, Dragon Park, and Typhoon Water Park. There are also many other exciting activities for people who dislike calm relaxation and natural beauty. That is to say, people like your kids. “I mean, should we...?” | Photo @stokpic Basically, Sun World is the perfect place for exhausted parents to dump off their amped-up teenagers and recapture a few precious hours of the peace and quiet they used to know in the “Before Days.” On the park’s 900-meter artificial beach, they can sip fruity cocktails in blissful silence, mulling over the legal repercussions of packing up their stuff, heading back to the car, and just abandoning their kids there. Adult stuff to do in Ha Long Bay. Kayaking was a thing you could do. Luckily, you can pursue more mature interests from Ha Long Bay’s Tuan Chau marina, if you’re so inclined. There are excursions for hiking, rock climbing, kayaking, snorkeling, scuba-diving, and even squid-fishing if you want to die horribly when our cephalopod overlords inevitably return from Outer Space.

Of course, if you’re not someone who’s super-active or even mildly motivated, you can fly around the area in a seaplane. Or go on a retro-syle cruise ship like we did. (PRO TIP: A cruise is better than a seaplane if for no other reason than, in a crash, you’re less likely to spill your drink.) Our ship, the Victory Star 2, came with two tenders, 32 cabins, and a rooftop bar. We go on a bay cruise to a bay inside the bay. Our boat's doppelganger. VictoryStar2. Being old, we didn’t waste our time (or money) at Sun World trying to outdo our past amusement park experiences. Instead, we opted to board a 32-cabin cruise ship named “Victory Star 2” for a few days of scenery watching. Ha Long Bay, Vietnam Mostly because we had tickets for the trip, and also because the ship had a rooftop bar. Sadly, the wind and dreary weather precluded us from drinking very much. Well, on the rooftop, anyway. “Just chilling in between karsts, why do you ask, officer?” The map of Halong Bay (at right) led us to expect that we’d be sailing lazily around and amongst all the different islands that time and tides had strewn about. Over the next three hours, however, we sailed mostly straight south to Bo Hòn Island. We passed as many natural karsts as we did tanker ships seemingly hiding amongst the rocky islands like an IRL game of Battleship®. (Sink the ones transporting Russian oil for extra bonus points!) There are fancier cruise ships in Ha Long Bay. While our vessel didn’t have a Jacuzzi® in our room, nor a full swimming pool on the main deck, our Victory Star 2 was no garbage scow by any means. The mahogany deck and worn wooden hallways of this luxury vessel reminded us of every cruise-themed murder mystery by authors like the inclusively racist, Agatha Christie. Kinda what our room looked like. Likewise, our deluxe cabin had dark wood walls and floors, bay windows, and a balcony. More importantly, it had AC and a mini fridge, though we did most of our drinking during meals in the dining room and its indoor bar. Those islands are called, “karsts.” Along with the smattering of likely murder suspects, we did our best to make alliances with the other passengers. We felt it was in our best interest to shore up our alibi should the Sea Police of Vietnam (a real job) discover the dead heroin smuggler we’d murdered inside his cabin, which was locked from the inside. (Ask me how!) Heading to Ha Long Bay’s Cat Ba archipelago. About 18km south from the marina pier, the Cat Ba archipelago makes up the southeastern edge of Lan Ha Bay, a smaller bay within the larger Ha Long Bay. Cat Ba means “Women’s Island,” but not for the sexy reason I’d hoped. Centuries ago, three women were killed, and their bodies floated to the main island. I guess the name, “Serial Murder Island” was taken. "Floating past a thousand islands" by Shawn Harquail | CC BY-NC 2.0 Cat Ba Archipelago is Vietnam’s version of the Thousand Islands. It’s an archipelago. Straddling the U.S./Canadian border along the Saint Lawrence River, New York’s famous archipelago encompasses about 1,864 islands, some of which are actually Canadian. I know, gross. This island-infested waterway was a backdrop for the War of 1812. Apparently, we were pissed at the Brits for restricting our trade with France. But also, for defending Native Americans who were cock-blocking America’s destiny (which seemed manifest to all). So President James Madison ordered the invasion of Canada, a British colony. U.S. troops occupied parts of Ontario until the Treaty of Ghent made everybody return what they stole and go home. After two years of pointless combat, nothing ultimately changed—for the people who weren’t killed, I mean. The bay off Bo Hon Island. We went to Bo Hòn Island, just like everybody else. Upon arriving at Bo Hòn Island—an island in Cat Ba archipelago with a nice bay—the crew weighed anchor and our captain announced the day’s shore excursion. We quickly shoveled the rest of the stir-fried squid with salted egg into our maws and headed for the exits.

The crew of the Victory Star 2 had wisely brought along two tenders—that is, smaller boats which could more easily ferry passengers to the beach. It seemed a much better solution than just running the large ship aground every time we stopped someplace. See it? Just under that ridge in the cliff? At least one of the islands in Halong Bay is hollow. The inside of Sung Sot Cave Our first trip to Bo Hòn Island (there would be two) was to its insides. Up one of its cliff walls, through a forest canopy of rocky steps, is the main entrance to Sung Sot Cave. It’s not an easy hike, so if you’re high from sampling some heroin, you might want to take a rain-check. Of course, if you’ve already seen a ginormous cave before, you won’t miss much here. The inside of Sung Sot Cave Still, Sung Sot Cave (aka, “Cave of Surprises”) is the largest and most beautiful cave in the Ha Long Bay Area. It has an insane system of stalactites and stalagmites caused by 500 million years of dissolving and dripping limestone. You’ll find it hard to believe that, in all that time, the roof of this hollowed out island hasn’t weakened enough to collapse in on itself yet. Try not to think about that too much, but take note of the exits before you walk too far away from one of them. Part of the Cat Ba archipelago Ti Top Island has an amazing view, theoretically. "Ti Top Island, Ha Long Bay" @Johnragai | CC BY 2.0 After successfully entering and leaving Sung Sot Cave alive, we re-boarded our ship and cruised back towards the marina, the very part of the bay from which we’d departed that morning. About a mile back, we swung by Titov Island (nee Ti Top Island) to give so-inclined passengers the opportunity to go for a swim or hike its scenic peak. We hard-passed due to the aforementioned shitty weather. The alternative activity, day-drinking, had more appeal as we continued on to the marina. Bo Hòn Island was probably voted, “Most likely to hide a supervillian’s lair.” This is the boat you ride into the cave. By the following morning, we had sailed right back to Bo Hòn, just a different part of the island (apparently, loitering in Ha Long Bay is a fine-able offense for ships). This time, however, we took our boat’s tender to a pier where a bunch of wide, wooden gondolas and gondolieri waited (see photo). We grabbed a seat and let the gondolier peacefully row us directly into a cliff. Upon closer inspection, the cliff had a low pass-through tunnel at the bottom. At about 300-feet long, 12-feet wide, and only 4- or 5-feet high, the gap seemed much too low for us to traverse in our boat. (Watch the video below to see how close we came to losing our scalps.) Keep your head down while entering Luon Cave. Ha Long Bay’s Luon Cave isn’t really a cave. Inside Luon Cave Leaning waaaay back, we limbo’d our way through the limestone passageway while our gondolier squatted down hard in the back. We then found ourselves inside Luon Cave, though it really felt more like a cove. Maybe the Vietnamese Nomenclature Committee meant “cove” when they named it, but the typesetter accidentally put down “cave.” We’ll never know. Cave or cove, the enormous rock cavity is nonetheless pretty nice inside. It’s effectively an enclosed, 1-km square body of milky, jade-colored water protected from the waves and winds of the sea by 100-foot sheer cliffs on all sides. Inside, even the slightest sound reverberates like a mofo. Most people instinctively know not to make any noise which would disturb the ethereal experience. Most monkeys, on the other hand, don’t give a crap about the “ethereal experience” you’re having—they’re hungry. This is inside the island’s Luon Cave. Oh damn, here come the monkeys. "Vietnam 2017-426" by @Perzec | CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 They want food, and they know the gondolieri have it. Gondolieri, too, know that adorable monkeys attract tourist tips the same way beehives attract retired hippies looking to find a “purpose.” So, in no time, the gondolieri were chucking bags of peanuts to the monkeys to the delight and horror of their passengers.

Rappelling down the dangerous cliff-side on only tree branches and bushes, the monkeys frequently seemed on the verge of falling to a watery death. But by that point, our guy had already rowed us once around the cove, so we headed out the tunnel, and back to the dock. In the morning, we sailed back to the marina. https://youtu.be/SpOWgms2uto?feature=shared Even National Geographic couldn't find many sunny days. Is Ha Long Bay all it’s cracked up to be? Dreary Ha Long Bay (aka, Halong Bay) Supposedly, the best season to visit Halong Bay is late spring (March and April) or early autumn (October). We went at the end of February, and the weather still pretty much sucked. We saw little of the “dazzling sunshine and gentle breezes,” nor did we experience the area’s average temperature of 77°F. So that definitely impacted our impression of this place. Had the weather been sunny and warm, I can see how we’d have had a much better time here. As it was, our only consolation was the incredible profits we made selling that smuggler’s heroin when we got to Ho Chi Minh City. Ka-ching. * The Vietnamese people call the South China Sea, “The Vietnamese Sea,” because who died and made China the boss of everything?

[crosbyreport]

Mendocino, California: Artist colony or ineffective tourist trap? We drive about 3 hours north of San Francisco on U.S. Route 101 for some reason.

About three hours north of San Francisco on U.S. Route 101 and West of the Sierra-Nevada mountain range, you come upon a quaint seaside California town reminiscent of “Ye Olde” New England fishing villages. It’s the unincorporated community of aging white hippies known as Mendocino. Photo by Mick Haupt on Unsplash Mendocino is a small town in Northern California. Streetwalker Originally a bustling logging town, this tiny village is now home to artists, galleries, and dilapidated, rundown wooden shacks. For every exquisite, painfully restored New England-style cutesy bed-and-breakfast place, there are two condemned, termite-infested, lead paint-peeling eyesores. Representative British person @JeepersMedia | CC BY 2.0 Not surprisingly, Mendocino is a place where the economy depends on tourists like ourselves (only ones with money). According to an English immigrant who ran the only photographic store we could find that sold film, the cost of living here is dauntingly high. When pressed for details, the proprietor intimated that the large range of mountains you had to cross to get to Mendocino added to the price of gas, food, cable and damn near everything else you can toss in the back of a tractor-trailer. Having driven the treacherous and arduous hairpin-happy Route US1 at 30 mph ourselves, we did not doubt him. When the town’s tree-chopping business started drying up — around the time someone formed the Sierra Club, I’m betting — the place went into a kind of dormancy. This condition still very much exists in Mendocino despite being heavily populated by the artistic community—shortly after which, the artist’s agent community moved in. There are a lot of art galleries in Mendocino. There are galleries on literally every corner in Mendocino. Fortunately, the art in them is outstanding (for a change). One gallery in particular was nothing short of astounding. The William Zimmer Gallery (1-707-937-5121) on Kasten and Ukiah streets had consistently brilliant art in every room and on every floor. Being something of an artist myself, I am not impressed by anything I could do myself given enough time and a six-figure NEA grant. So it was with much child-like glee and pants-wetting that I bore witness to piece after piece of true art that I couldn’t recreate even if I’d smoked enough drugs to conceive, building a tricycle out of wood with its center pipe made to look like a pistol. Simply amazing stuff—feel free to buy me anything from the place. (I should probably tell you that most of the work starts at about $1500-2000. So you might want to check with me first.) Sadly, the gallery is now closed. Mendocino has kinduva a Wild West flair. My wife planned the trip spontaneously—and, at the last minute—so our choice of accommodations was somewhat limited. Despite little advance warning, she was able to book us into a place called the Blackberry Inn. It was designed to look like the western town in the movie “Support your local Sheriff” starring James Garner, only a lot smaller. (Our one-bedroom place occupied the entire Sheriff’s office.) Still, the place was unbearably cute. The woman who worked the front desk wore period garb and the interior of the place mostly sported period furniture except for the two-person whirlpool bath and color TV. Every morning they put a basket of fruit and fresh-baked bread or cookies in our room and two chocolate kisses on the bed. There was even a real, wood-burning fireplace. It was like a Disney property only more realistic and rodent-free. It was considerably more genuine and inviting—I highly recommend the place. There could be more restaurants. As for food in Mendocino, there wasn’t a plethora of restaurants in the town, but we managed to find two must-eat places — “Cafe Bojoulaise” and “955 Ukiah.” Since they’re the best grub this side of the mountains, reservations had to be made a week in advance. Both were in renovated houses as opposed the more jarring architectural approach of say Kentucky Fried Chicken, so we drove past the places twice.

Once inside, we were gratified to find that both restaurants were every bit as good as anything in San Francisco, with the possible exception of the Potato-pesto pizza at “Za,” which is so good some rock band wrote a song about it. (I forget which one, so don’t ask). This place is pretty chill. The only downside to Mendocino is also its upside. There is not much to do here. Once you see the beach and walk the town, you’re pretty much done sightseeing. As such, Mendocino is the perfect escape. You can sit around naked in the whirlpool bath sipping Zinfandel and watch the sun set without feeling like you ought to be out being active or experiencing something new—it’s, frankly, great. Bathing in Mendocino, or thereabouts. Climb in! On the way out of town, we tried to catch the Osmosis baths. Basically, you get into a bath of yeast and enzymes that go through fermentation around you and heat you up, supposedly expelling toxins from your body. Sounded like fun, but we didn’t count on having to slog through the meandering twists and hairpin turns of US1. We figured we could travel 70 miles in an hour or so on a straight highway, but this drive took nearly three. So we missed the baths and had to settle for a massage instead. Tragically, the grueling 2-hour drive back to SF that followed eradicated any relaxation the massage had induced. I guess I’m really saying, stay away from the PCH (US1). Seriously, it sucks. 

[crosbyreport]

Cancun Mexico: It’s not all beer chugging and wet t-shirt contests (dammit). Cancun has fascinating archeological sites and a rich history that you can explore in between Margaritas.

We hadn’t originally planned our two-week vacation to Cancun Mexico for its affordability but — when weeks later I found myself unemployed (like the rest of the planet) — it seemed like a prescient choice. In addition to its favorable exchange rate, Mexico has fascinating archeological sites and a rich history that would allow us to slip in a bit of culture between Margaritas. Cancun Mexico is a sunny paradise on the Gulf side. Our resort’s pool in Cancun Mexico We chose two new cities to visit: Cancun and Mazatlan. Cancun for its Maya ruins (Chichen Itza, Tulum and Coba). And Mazatlan for its guilt-free, lack of anything really must-see or -do. When we arrived in sunny Cancun Mexico the next day at noon, beaten and bleary-eyed from our red-eye flight, it was a toasty 84-degrees. We hit the beach and immediately fell unconscious in the Caribbean’s warm embrace for what seemed like, and actually turned out to be, a really long time. Long enough that it was already dark when we next opened our eyes, so we paradoxically headed uptown to go downtown for dinner. We ate at a vegetarian place named “100% Natural” but only loved it 97%. We had a great tasting, healthy meal — including a bottle of Viognier —and yet the most expensive part of dinner was the US$15 cab ride back to the resort. Cancun is apparently Mayan for “alcohol poisoning.” Looking down from Coba’s El Castille, 60-meters up. To be honest, I had a different image of Cancun Mexico in my mind when we first planned the trip. I was thinking the city was a thriving, hedonistic beach-metropolis; a coastal Las Vegas with skyscrapers and neon-lit dance clubs. The reality, though, turned out to be more...rustic than that. Cancun’s downtown was, well, a bit run down. Many of its sidewalks were crumbling and street signs missing — all of which might have been expected in a centuries-old city like Roma or Firenze — but was kind of surprising when you considered that Cancun has only been a tourist destination since 1971. In fact, the entire area owes its existence to a Mexican planning board that was looking for an area they could develop to attract American tourists or, at least, American money. A place where both young men and women could drink until they vomited and display their naked genitalia without fear of moral or legal reprisal. Cancun Mexico is a better name than the original. Coba’s impressive El Castillo, aka The Castle. Originally nothing but swampland lousy with mosquitoes and snakes (before the government trucked in pesticides and pavement), the area in question was renamed “Cancun” a word derived from an unpronounceable Mayan word which meant roughly, “nest of snakes.” And, while we didn’t see any reptile or insect infestations, Cancun Mexico was certainly overrun by shamelessly pasty-white tourists like myself. And honestly, I'm not sure if that’s much of an improvement over the mosquitos and snakes. Getting around El Centro (aka, “Downtown”) wasn’t as easy as it could have been. Cancun wasn’t built on a grid even though the ‘grid’ concept had been around for hundreds of years at the time Cancun was built. We got lost a lot in Cancun Mexico. Tulum, the walled, beachfront city. Rather, the city had a pretty haphazard layout — and despite our being somewhat savvy world travelers (we even had a freakin’ map!), we still had to pay some local guy on Tenkah Avenue ten pesos to find the bus stop we needed. Still, to be fair, when people speak of Cancun Mexico, they are usually referring to the tourist areas, like the Zona Hotela, a strip of white, sandy beach jammed with massive resorts and monster hotels. It’s where Cancun looked its best, usually through beer goggles. The Zona Hotela was a 5-mile strip of white sand stretching from El Centro south, encompassing an equally long inland lagoon for some reason. The worst part of Cancun Mexico is its tourist zone. El Zona was choked with monolithic hotels and mega-resorts facing the azure waters

of the Gulf of Mexico, while tacky theme restaurant/bars like Hooters, Margaritavilles, and Señor Frog’s lined the inside lagoon. That way, you’re provided with a picturesque view of water whether you’re laid out at the beach, or face-down at a bar. Almost like a Maya Square Garden. Our more modest resort, the Imperial Fiesta Club @ Casa Maya, was located near the northern entrance of El Zona. However, its less than ideal location was made irrelevant by the presence of a super-convenient city bus that passed by every 10 minutes or so. For about US$0.65, we were soon back in El Centro walking the crumbling sidewalks and looking for La Habichuela, a pretty good Yucatan-style restaurant. Afterward, we walked to the nearby “Mercado 28” which sounded like a good place to shop for interesting and authentic goods available nowhere else in Cancun Mexico, but wasn’t. Still, we hadn’t come to Cancun Mexico to buy cheap trinkets that would break before we got them home. No, we were there to buy cheap Maya trinkets that would break before we got them home. And for that, we had to do some driving. Coba is Mayan for “acrophobia.” Sacred sinkhole? My sweaty ass it is. The next day, we rose brutally early to go see two significant pre-Columbian Maya sites not far from Cancun Mexico. Coba, which had the distinction of possessing the second-largest pyramid in Central America (Guatemala has the tallest). And Tulum, which supposedly had a killer oceanfront view. Rather than brave Mexico’s questionable Interstate system by ourselves, we opted to let someone else drive us out to the ruins. (In hindsight, we could have easily driven the 3-hour trip ourselves, but we were on vacation and frequently drunk. Besides, we would have missed out on our tour guide’s helpful blathering on about all things Maya: “Established in the Yucatan around 2600 B.C., the Maya rose to prominence around A.D. 250 in present-day Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, and Honduras.” We went to Coba to see its castle. Me, on a scooter. After what seemed like an eternity, we arrived at the Maya town called Coba. And to be honest, the place was in worse shape than Cancun Mexico. Coba was literally in ruins — it didn’t look like any Maya had lived there for decades, or longer — I mean, you’d think they’d have mentioned that fact in the tour brochure! Its egregious disrepair was a shame, because there was ample proof of a once-thriving civilization. The most obvious evidence was El Castillo (aka, “The Castle” or pyramid). At over 60-meters high, El Castillo was an impressive feat of stacking rocks on top of other rocks. This rough-hewn pyramid stabbed skyward from a clearing deep in the Yucatan jungle and was visible for miles around. It wasn’t surprising, therefore, to discover that—from the top of this awesome monument—one could also see for miles around. How do we know? They actually let us climb the damn thing. No, seriously. (Do they not have OSHA here?) Our Lady of Immaculate Reception (bada-bing!) With nothing more than a thick rope to grab, the Mexican government let out-of-shape, couch-potatoesque, American tourists like me climb the 180 or so feet to the top of El Castillo without signing any legal releases first! Their unquestioning faith in the protective power of the feathered snake god, Kukulcan, was almost enough to convert me to the religion on the spot. From the summit of El Castillo, we saw what ancient Maya priests probably had seen when they weren’t pulling the still-beating heart from a live, Maya warrior’s chest: namely, the surrounding compound, complete with a Great Ball Court, a dense forest that went on for miles, and five crocodile-infested lakes where CSI:Maya detectives would likely find a lot of dead warrior remains. Tulum is Mayan for...oh, let’s say, “beach party house.” Para-advertising at its finest. In contrast to the other ruins we had visited outside Cancun Mexico, Tulum didn’t really have a pyramid to climb, but being built on a cliff 40-feet above the beautiful Caribbean, it didn’t really need one.

As Coba’s first line of defense against invading forces from the sea, Tulum was the most fortified of the Maya sites we saw. The massive 400-meter long stone wall surrounding the place was our first clue that the name Tulum might be Mayan for ‘walled city.’ But Tulum was a significant seaport and trading outpost, too. In fact, the Maya had built a road all the way from Tulum to Coba that was paved with a white substance that reflected moonlight—I forget what they called it, but it wasn’t cocaine—making night travel much easier (and probably safer than driving Mexico’s Interstate system). Chichen Itza is Mayan for “tourist attraction.” What was akin to Pok Ta Pok box seats. Chichen Itza, the most well-known Maya site near Cancun Mexico, is home to Castillo de Kukulcan which, at 24-meters, is a lot shorter than the pyramid in Coba despite being built on top of a smaller, pre-existing pyramid (kinda like a Russian nesting doll). Chichen Itza’s El Castillo is remarkably well-preserved, considering all the athletes who’ve been filmed running up and down its ancient steps for TV commercials. Disappointingly, we weren’t allowed to climb the pyramid ourselves because, back in 2005, an 80-year-old lady adventurer slipped and fell to her death. So instead, we were forced to wander the compound, learning stuff instead. The most interesting thing we learned against our will was that the Castle was designed with a number of very odd acoustic properties. By standing in front of the main stairs—which, from the side, cleverly looks like a serpent climbing down!—you can clap loudly and hear freaky echoes all around the compound that supposedly sound like their winged snake-god or something. I forget what its utility was, but it had some kind of practical purpose at the time (beyond entertaining tourists, I mean). The Great Ball Court is where the Maya played ball. The edge of the stairs make a snake climbing down the side. The Maya put that same acoustic wizardry to work when they built El ThunderDome — I mean, the Great Ball Court. This massive arena was used to showcase their national sport, Pok Ta Pok. And while every Maya city had its own Pok Ta Pok court, this monstrous 550-foot long grass one was much...well, greater. Unlike most courts which had walls angled at 45-degrees, the Great Ball Court had steep, 90-degree vertical walls made of strategically sized and placed wall stones. The court’s clever design let someone stand in the North Temple and converse in a normal tone of voice with another person in the South Temple over 500-feet away. Presumably, this allowed the Maya ruler to be heard over the crowd noise as he bellowed that timeless proclamation, “Citizens of Maya! Let us prepare ourselves to ruuummmmmbbbbble!” Before basketball, there was “Pok Ta Pok.” Pok Ta Pok was a combination of basketball, European football, and Canadian hockey. Each team of seven players attempted to keep a ball off the ground using only their hips, knees, and elbows. The object of the game was to get the ball over to a captain who was running along the sideline wall’s ledge, located about 4-feet above the field. The team captain then used a kind of stick to hit the ball through a stone hoop in the top/middle of the stone wall. What good is any place without a Hard Rock Café?  The difficulty of scoring was so great that games often took days to complete, which probably wasn’t as bad as it sounds, since winning meant that the losing team’s captain got to quite literally decapitate your captain (yes, you read that correctly). So the winning team captain was in no hurry to end the game. The “reasoning” for this apparent barbarism was that, clearly, the winning captain had just proven that he could beat all Earthly competitors and therefore, “logically,” he had to be sent to the afterlife to take on the Maya Gods. See? It makes perfect sense now, right? Frankly, we should probably apply that theory to pro-athletes today (I’m looking at you, Tom Brady).

What’s Mayan for “total dick move”? As you would expect, the pyramid and other structures at Chichen Itza are all owned by Mexico’s Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia. However, the land they stand on is owned by the Barbachano family. As we were told the story, this shrewd, but ethically challenged family, bought up the entire archeological site before the government could. The government then attempted, repeatedly, to buy the site, but the Barbachano’s wouldn’t sell because, you know…money. Finally, they agreed to sell the monuments, but only if they could keep the land underneath them. This one-sided deal let the family profit from tourism—admission, food, drinks, souvenirs, etc— without any of the costs of maintaining the site. Shrewd, right? No, wait. That’s not the right word for it... Hot and tired? Take a dip in Quintana Roo Cenote. One of Cancun's smaller mega-resort hotels. Just outside Cancun Mexico and Chichen Itza is the sacred Quintana Roo Cenote, or “Big-Ass Sinkhole.” It’s an impressive cavity in the Earth where some think the Maya performed ritual human sacrifice (those same people also think the Maya were stupid enough to pollute their only inland water supply). The cenote was considered a very holy place and it was protected and preserved for centuries until the day when someone figured out how much money they’d make charging sweaty tourists to swim in the thing. Now, it’s not so holy. A brief history of Maya. Really brief. The Maya, it is believed, were descended from Mongolians, which is why they look somewhat different from other Mexicans (they’re shorter and more, well...Asian looking). From what we gathered, they came over to the Americas back when Sarah Palin’s Alaska and Russia were still connected by a land bridge. Those Maya forbears lived in Alaska until the first Spring arrived, after which they flew to Cancun Mexico, got totally hammered and decided to stay for a few centuries. Isla de las Mejueles is Mayan for “Island of Women.” Beachy sculpture within a downtown traffic circle. Luckily, there was more to do on Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula than just studying ancient cultures. There were brainless activities, too. Like taking a boat over to Isla de las Mejueles, a tiny island just off the coast. Upon arrival, rather than take a taxi or rent a car, we rented a banged-up 1983 Honda FC50 scooter for US$35 instead and puttered around with no apparent regard for our own safety or the safety of others. We decided to take a chance with the scooter because the island has one main road that encircles most of it, so my chances of getting us lost were low. Yet having not ridden a motorcycle since I drove my brother’s Honda 50CC into a fence as a kid — I was nonetheless an absolute menace to everyone else on the road. Zany tree trunk growth. Weaving back and forth like a drunk Kennedy, I still somehow managed to stop the scooter approximately where we wanted, successfully avoiding all the iguanas and small Maya temples everywhere. Along the way, we stopped at a nice, divey beachfront restaurant known for its Yucatan-style whole fish and Puerco Pibil. Afterward, I piloted us back towards downtown so Amy could shop for some silver and I could return our poor scooter, surprisingly unscathed, all things considered. The problem with Cancun Mexico. Para-Advertising at its finest. During our week-long stay in Cancun, we wondered many things: Is Hell this hot? How do you say “Grey Goose” in Spanish? When did we last eat corn? But mostly, we wondered this: What is it about Cancun Mexico that attracts American douche-bags the way the area used to attract mosquitos? It’s veritably teeming with sun-burned “bros” drunkenly spilling three-foot-tall beers on their white-trash wives while thoughtlessly insulting their Mexican hosts like a bad episode of Jersey Shore. Or any episode, really. One of many Mexican alligators. We had hoped that by going in October—aka, the ‘shoulder’ season—Cancun wouldn’t be as crowded.

And, truth be told, it wasn’t as crowded as it probably could have been. I guess, it just wasn’t crowded with the types of people I wanted. You know, twenty-something girls trying to piss off their fathers by showing up topless in a “Girls Gone Wild” video. You might get luckier when you go to Cancun Mexico. But, for a less touristy place with fewer Americans, try the inland city of Oaxaca.

[crosbyreport]

The Douro Valley is Portugal’s less snooty version of Napa. The dress code here is basically, “Just wear pants.”

Drive an hour and a half due-east from Porto, and you’ll come upon the Douro Valley, Portugal’s world-famous wine region and answer to California’s Napa Valley, home to some of the world’s most pretentious farmers. The Douro Valley answers the question, “Hey, where can a guy get plastered around here?” The beautifully twisting Douro Valley. As you arrive, the beautifully twisting valley unfolds before you, unveiling more lush green, vineyard-covered vistas around every bend. Unlike the Napa Valley, which is a wide, flat plain between two separate mountain ranges, the Douro Valley is a lot narrower, a lot steeper, and a helluva lot cheaper when you want to get really soused. Who wouldn't want to live here? Rodolfo, that's who. If you’re like most first-time visitors to this viticultural valley, you’ll likely feel a strong compulsion to immediately move here, buy a vineyard, start making wine and immediately go bankrupt because you don’t know the first thing about running a winery—dammit, why didn’t I listen to Rodolfo...why?!? But instead of ruining your entire life on an impulsive whim, maybe just pull over at one of Douro’s numerous family-run wineries, turn off that Pavarotti libretto, dry your failure tears, and get an early start day-drinking among the Douro Valley’s green and glorious, bucolic beauty. View from one of the valley’s 45-degree angled family vineyards. Portugal’s Douro Valley makes Napa look flatter than Kansas. The town of Pinhão is the epicenter of the valley’s port-making region. The Douro Valley wasn’t always the picturesque, wine-making juggernaut it is today. Eons ago, it was a relatively flat plain overrun by hadrosaurs, “duck-billed” dinosaurs that were both herbivores and, more tragically, teetotalers. That unremarkable, underachieving plain was transformed by a spring that originates somewhere deep in the mountains of Spain. What started out as nothing more than a tiny trickle, slowly eroded a deep, meandering path through that unambitious Iberian terrain. A path that would grow until one day it became known as the Douro Valley, finally making its parents proud. The result of this eons-long effort was the creation of a large region of steeply angled valley walls which guide the languid Douro River towards the sea. Over time, its immutable rockiness had been transformed into spectacular vistas, reminiscent of areas more like Peru’s Urubamba Valley rather than the boring old Napa Valley. Portugal’s Douro Valley puts the “old” in old-ass vines. The Alto Douro region of the Valley. The Alto Douro (or Upper Douro) area of the valley is Portugal’s sweet-spot for wine. Encompassing 8,700 hectares (21,000 acres) of the total valley, this unique section is still hot, yet sheltered from the coastal influence of Atlantic winds. It’s a combination that creates an ideal climate for making Douro’s high-quality wines. The Ancient Romans noticed this climatic quirk as far back as the 3rd Century, taking full advantage of it to produce a lot of horrible-tasting 3rd Century wines. The Roman’s gross ignorance of biodynamic viticulture, micro-oxygenation, and Christianity led to Gods-awful wine and, predictably, the downfall of their empire. Random bottles of wine from another photo-shoot. During the Middle Ages, wine was one of the safest beverages early Europeans could consume, because the wine’s alcohol content killed most types of bacteria by making the bacteria very drunk and then stabbing them in their phospholipid bilayer. At least I assume—I didn’t exactly ace Biology 101. Wine was also one of the cheapest beverages Europeans could drink as most Catholic churches were literally giving the stuff away every Sunday—with free soda crackers, too! Sure, the portions weren’t huge, but you could always go back for seconds and thirds if you wore a fake mustache. Catholics and wine go waaaaaaay back. Catholics were here. Jesus “Chug this in memory of me” Christ was famously known to throw down a glass or two of wine with dinner.

Heck, he even reportedly turned water into the stuff once. So it wasn’t surprising that His fan-club down here on earth—specifically priests, monks, friars, and nuns—took to making and drinking wine with almost as much gusto as sexually abusing underage altar-boys. A bridge over to the town of Pinhão. At first, the wine that these pious perps produced was—much like non-consensual sex with a minor—repulsive and abhorrent. But the God-Squad quickly learned that offering their parishioners unappealing wine every Sunday proved counterproductive to their recruitment efforts. So they started taking the art of wine-making more seriously, and soon made wine that didn’t remind people so viscerally of human blood. In the pursuit of more drinkable wines, the Cistercian monks (you know, the quiet ones) played a major role in the development of European viticulture. They established 120 convents throughout Portugal, and not only became the keepers of agricultural academia, but also provided wine-making training to their congregations with classes such as “Grape-Stomping: Those Sinful Bastards Deserve It!” and “Belching: The Vow Of Silence Loophole.” Leaving the port town of Pinhão by boat. By the 1200s, the monks in the Douro Valley were producing vast quantities of wine for ruddy-nosed British alcoholics with whom the Portuguese had signed a treaty to guarantee regular wine shipments. Not surprisingly, the distribution of their wine soon became an issue. The monks needed a more reliable way to transport their heavy wine casks than the slow and temperamental local donkeys, who kept threatening to unionize. Photo of Rabelo Boat with casks of wine. Back then, the Douro River was too narrow and shallow to allow larger cargo boats—called barcos rabelos—to pass through, so a series of locks were installed along the river to bolster its size. Today, the mighty Douro River measures 100 meters wide and up to 30 meters deep in places, making it ideal for transporting goods like wine, port, and donkey jerky. Unlike Napa, the Douro Valley makes wine the hard, stupid way. Douro’s steep slopes are now terraced with vines from large family vineyards (known as quintas). Most grape vines in Napa Valley are planted on the plains between two mountain ridges, where it’s easy for grape machines and seasonal immigrant labor to harvest the year’s crop in a timely manner. By comparison, the Portuguese plant their grape vines up the side of the Douro’s steep valley walls, where nothing is easy. Do you want to harvest all those grapes by hand? Yeah, I didn’t think so. Douro’s angled terrain presents several harvesting challenges. For one, the vineyards are angled too steeply for machines to harvest the grapes so the work must be done by human hand. For another, those hands often belong to family members who—while working to the point of exhaustion on the side of a steep mountain—risk falling to their deaths on a regular basis. Yet, the most challenging challenge is probably convincing younger family members to reproduce faster, so the winery can keep up with increasing demand. Portugal’s Douro Valley is the birthplace of port wine. Coincidence? No. Porto is a sweet, red wine that’s served after a meal and/or with dessert. In addition to regular wine, the Douro Valley is known for inventing “port.” Port wine—or Porto, as it’s known around here—is typically a sweet, red wine that’s served after a meal and/or with dessert. Like Sherry or Madeira, Porto is a fortified wine that’s made much like table wine, except that distilled grape spirits are added to preserve the beverage and lend it different flavors. To make sure you get the real stuff, look for this stamp on their bottles. Authentic “Porto” is exclusively produced in the northern provinces of Portugal, predominantly in the Douro Valley. Much like the illegal act of intentionally mislabeling sparkling wine as “Champagne,” it’s similarly uncool under EU law to label any wine from other countries as Port or Porto.

One of the few towns in the Douro Valley, Pinhão. Of course, you’ll find plenty of fake Port and Porto in just about any US liquor store because we didn’t stop trying to trick consumers until 2006. Knock-off wines that are produced in other countries are called “port-style” wines, which, even thinking about, makes me vomit a little in my mouth. Blergh. Visiting Lisbon without going to Douro is like visiting ’Frisco without going to Napa. In hindsight, I wish it were sunnier so the photos looked better. You could do it, of course, but then why don’t you skip seeing the Golden Gate Bridge while you’re at it? Oh, and skip Fisherman’s Wharf, too. Coit Tower? Who cares! Hey, why not skip San Francisco altogether?! And if you’re not going to go to San Francisco, why bother going anywhere at all?! Hell, why not just stay home, watching American football, and drinking fake-ass American port-style wine?! The train station in the town of Pinhão. Sorry, that was entirely uncalled-for. I’ve been under a lot of stress lately. Also, I’ve been drinking a lot of Porto—it’s very good. What I’m trying to say is, if you visit the Douro Valley—and you totally should—be sure to pack an extra liver for the trip because you’ll need it. Oh, and try to wear pants.