Travel
Peru
I flew into Lima in the early hours of December 14. A desert city on the Peru’s western coast, Lima is known for its depressing weather, and sure enough it greeted us with oppressive clouds and fog. This was the first day of our week-and-a-half in Peru, during which we would explore Lima, Cusco, and the ruins at Machu Picchu.
Umbria, Italy
After leaving Florence on my journey to Italy in June of 2008, my family and I drove to a small town in Umbria called Lerchi. About a 20 minute drive into the hills above Lerchi is an old farmhouse christened “La Dogana”. Nestled in the hills among the farms and forests of Umbria, La Dogana lies beneath the fortified town of Monte Santa Maria Tiberina. Monte Santa Maria dominates the horizon, its imposing silhouette overlooking the countryside in all directions.
Florence, Italy
I flew into Florence on a Wednesday afternoon in mid-June. Wrestling with jet lag, I went to bed early the first night after a delicious dinner at an osteria a few blocks north of the Arno with my family. The next day we strolled through the city and visited Santa Maria del Fiore, known as Il Duomo.
Yucatan
My flight landed in Cancun, Mexico a little before nine PM. A shuttle took my family to our hotel in Playa del Carmen, a beach town about 40 minutes south of Cancun. Perhaps slightly less blatantly commercial than Cancun or Cozumel, Playa del Carmen is still highly Americanized, and its main drag, “La Quinta Avenida”, has certainly inherited some of the materialism of its namesake. For the most part, though, we enjoyed our beach resort, the Shangri-La Caribe, and the ocean waters consistently warmer than seventy degrees.
Switzerland and Italy
Landlocked in central Europe, Switzerland is an eclectic mix of cultures. In the north, it is predominantly German-speaking, in the west, French. Parts of southeastern Switzerland are indistinguishable from Italy—they speak Italian, eat Italian food, and everything from the architecture to the landscape seems Italian. On my tour of Switzerland in the summer of 2006, I managed to see all three areas. Each had its uniquely unforgettable moments.
Skagway, Alaska
The town of Skagway is nestled on the shore of the Pacific Ocean in southwestern Alaska. It is situated at the northern end of Alaska’s Inside Passage, a busy shipping lane dotted with tiny, often uninhabited isles and rimmed by countless blue-white glaciers. I visited Skagway in the summer of 2003.