Ever since our first experiment with AirBnB (where we snagged a New York City...
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Soylent Green for Travelers
My very first thought upon reading Rob Rhinehart’s plan to entirely stop eating food in favor of slurping self-made nutritional drinks was that it’s just one more example of how the world is full of weirdoes.
Eating is, after all, one of life’s great pleasures. It just might be the greatest human pleasure.
Think about it. Not even sex elicits as many orgasmic moans of delight as does food. Hell, you don’t even have to eat the stuff to get that response. The mere smell of a well-prepared curry has the power to send me into a full-blown When Harry Met Sally. What sane person would want to give that up?
Big Wines on Small Change
We even got a taste of this limited edition bottle during our free tasting at Husch Vineyards
It didn’t take us long to spend the money we saved passing up pricey Napa Valley wine tastings. While we left Napa without purchasing even a single bottle, we didn’t come away empty-handed in another of California’s great wine regions.
The Anderson Valley is more off the beaten path than Napa and Sonoma, further north and harder to reach but well worth the effort. In fact, the effort is part of the fun. Driving from the coastal town of Mendocino we followed a beautifully winding, redwood-lined road that was as much a joy to drive as it was breathtaking to observe.
Trash Collecting
Sea Glass. The colorful, translucent pebbles prized by beachcombers the world over is garbage, or at least it once was before the sea reformed it into something beautiful.
Long ago these precious-looking stones were just ordinary glass from ordinary bottles and jars. That was before some asshat tossed them into the ocean, of course. Once there, the glass was broken and pummeled by the constantly churning surf into rounded, milky stones.
In Defense of Travel Tours
Tours can allow even independent minded travelers to do things they otherwise could not.
We’re independent travelers who, as a rule, don’t generally sign on to packaged tours. But like all rules, this one is made to be broken.
The conventional case against travel tours is well stated in a recent blog post by Wes Nations (a.k.a. Johnny Vagabond). It’s a view you’ll see time and again in the travel blogosphere: go your own way, flexibility above all, get lost, immerse yourself, avoid the crowds. It’s all great advice, and advice we take to heart, but it really is only half the story.
The other half recognizes that real people face real world constraints in their travels. Tours, despite their well known drawbacks, can play an important and even necessary role in easing those constraints – even for self-proclaimed independent travelers. Here’s how: Continue Reading →
Everywhere Once 