Hiking Adventures in the San Francisco Peninsula and Beyond
It is a tough time to be a travel writer. As a baker needs flour, so does a travel writer need fresh sights, smells, sounds, experiences, inspiration. Of course, writing about past adventures is an option. For example, I could tell you about a brilliant day last autumn, cool morning, warm afternoon, mild evening, starting … Continue reading Spanish Steps
Friends, I am considering a number of topics for new posts, including Indian Summer (in Northern California) and reflections on trips to Switzerland. What is your vote? Thank you.
I wrote this article in 2011, but the sentiments and considerations are still relevant today. Enjoy. I was having lunch with a friend a few weeks ago. Beautiful sunny day in downtown Palo Alto. Pad Thai at Siam Royal. We were discussing our MBA experiences. I earned mine in May 2010, exactly 10 years after … Continue reading Networking in California
2020 is one strange year, and sitting on a balcony overlooking the Rogue River estuary, in Gold Beach, Oregon, is not exactly where I expected to be spending my summer vacation, if you had asked me in January. To be clear, I am not complaining. The river is wide and placid, in contrast to the … Continue reading Gold Beach, Oregon
Located about two miles from the Bryggen waterfront, Old Bergen is a reconstructed town consisting of 55 wooden houses, from the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. Pictured above is a rather quaint cabin, on the grounds of Old Bergen. I can only imagine life inside this cabin, assuming it was once inhabited. After walking the … Continue reading Cabin Fever (in Norway)
In the past months, sports has been reduced to a popcorn pop off or a competition between two ripening bananas, as evidenced from the most recent episode of Saturday Night Live, the “at-home” edition. The National Basketball Association was (and perhaps may still be) considering a remote “H-O-R-S-E” tournament. Local sportscasters, desperate for new footage, … Continue reading Why Sports (and Travel) Matter
Montecatini Alto, part of a 3-day visit to Tuscany last October, could not be farther from the current reality of 24-hour catastrophe TV, coronavirus memes, no live sports, shelter-in-place (house arrest), new (home-based) co-workers, distance learning (Zoom videoconferences and Google Hangouts Chat), social distancing (isolation), deep cleaning (usually reserved for unpleasant dental visits), hyper-local (neighborhood-based) … Continue reading Montecatini Alto
My first visit to Pisa was in 1988, part of a 2-week bus tour, starting (and ending) in Rome, with overnight stops in Florence, Stresa (on the gorgeous Lake Maggiore), Venice, Assisi, and Sorrento. I was with my grandparents, then in their late 50s. Whether either of them accompanied me on the climb to the … Continue reading Pisa
One of my favorites, especially during these days when travel is an impossibility. Enjoy.
I am drawn to faraway places.
Bergen, five thousand miles from home, qualifies. While Bergen is known as the gateway to the fjords, there are simpler, and far more accessible, pleasures much closer to City Center. Wake up early. Go for a morning run through the Fish Market, past the row of Hansa houses on the Bryggen, along the coast road to Old Bergen, and back to your hotel, to enjoy a hearty breakfast buffet, with gravlax, thin Norwegian pancakes, topped with lingonberry, and, of course, coffee. Stop by the local supermarket, perhaps Rema 1000, and pack a lunch, with cold cuts, cheese, fresh bread, and plenty of water. Start walking toward Floyen, but, if you can, skip the funicular, the Floibanen, and hike, for a mile or two, up the mountain (but at a reasonable incline) to the Troll Forest (pictured above). With each turn, the view of Bergen…
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If I cannot travel, I might as well reminisce. Viareggio is a quintessentially Italian seaside town on the Tyrrhenian, equidistant from Pisa and Lucca (https://johnpavolotsky.wordpress.com/2019/11/30/lucca/), our base for a 3-day visit to Tuscany this past October. The vibe is art deco. A certain timelessness pervades Viareggio; it seems that little has changed, and but for … Continue reading Viareggio
The Peninsula Hiking Club 