It’s almost here! In less than two weeks I’ll finally be headed south of the border. While the main purpose of this trip is to realize my lifelong dream of visiting the Mexican pyramid sites, I am also very excited to experience el DĂa de Muertos (the Day of the Dead). I will be in Mexico City for the days leading up to the holiday, and in Merida when it officially begins on November 1st. Although I’ll be on tours during the day, I should have plenty of free time in the evenings to take in all of the festivities. Have any of you ever been in Mexico City or Merida for Day of the Dead?
Of course my other primary goal on this trip is to eat as much of the local food as possible. I have already received some good Mexico City dining tips from my fellow bloggers, for which I thank you. I’d also be grateful if anybody out there has some tips for dining in Merida. I don’t know if I’ll dine out much in Cancun since I will be staying in an all-inclusive hotel, but if there are any can’t-miss places out there, I would definitely be up for checking them out.
Speaking of Cancun, I’m still deciding whether I want to make my three days there relaxing or adventurous. I would like to do some exploring and possibly some snorkeling and activities like that. I also find the idea of swimming with dolphins enticing, but I am a little concerned that I would be contributing to their exploitation, so I am still up in the air about that. Another option if I want to take a bit of a road trip is to visit Xcaret, a cool-looking park featuring underground rivers among Mayan ruins. Then again, I may become so spoiled by being pampered at the Cancun resort that I wind up just vegging on the beach or in the pool all day. 🙂
Anyway, this will probably be my last post until I return from Mexico (hopefully with lots of stories to accompany my photos). Now, I’m off to pack. See you on the other side!
Cape May is a great place for viewing sunsets because the entire western side of the peninsula faces the Delaware Bay. There is even a beach on that side called Sunset Beach, which is where most people go to watch the sun set. On that beach you will find the iconic sunken concrete ship that is visible in many Cape May sunset photos, but I’ve taken so many of those shots over the years that I decided to change things up during my most recent visit by heading out to Cape May Point, which is where most of the photos below were taken.
You can click on any image to open a photo gallery.
I’m a big fan of haunted house stories. The Shining, in particular, is both my favorite book and movie of the genre, and when I’m in an old building I like walking around and looking for creepy photo ops that might evoke some of my favorite Shining moments. During my recent visit to Cape May I took the opportunity to meander the halls of the most recognizable hotel in town, the historic Congress Hall.
A regular stop on one of Cape May’s ghosts tours, the hotel even has an Overlook-ish history. Built in 1816, destroyed by fire in 1878, and rebuilt the following year, the hotel fell into disrepair and closed for over a dozen years in the early 1900’s before reopening in the 20’s. Famous guests at Congress Hall have included U.S. presidents and famed band leader John Philip Sousa, so it would seem to be a ripe place for shining-like activity. I don’t necessarily believe in that stuff (though ask me again in the middle of the night when it’s dark and I’m alone), but I still enjoy letting my imagination run wild.
Here are some of the photos I took during a couple of brief visits (one during the day and one at night). You can click on any image for a larger version.
Just waiting for blood to spill out of the doors.I like the lonely image of an empty chair at the end of the hall bathed in stark window light, but I can’t believe I missed an opportunity while I was on this floor to get a shot of room 217 (from the book; 237 in the film).“You have always been the caretaker.”
Shining aficionados (of the book) will also notice that the sign all the way to the left mentions the boiler room.Might there be a set of ghostly twins around the corner?Perhaps when strolling through this room at midnight you might hear echoes of an old Big Band standard emanating from an ethereal orchestra.I thought this long row of empty chairs evoked a bit of eerieness. What if they all started rocking?Something creepy about this room.
The decoration hanging in the window looks like some sort of ritual doll.More empty chairs occupied by spirits of the hotel’s past?The triangular silhouettes of the closed umbrellas reminded me of the evil topiary creatures from the book.
Some additional stairwells, perhaps stalked by a specter brandishing a roque mallet.
And one final photo without comment (I ran out of Shining references :-)).
The dolphin is one of my favorite animals, though I’m not exactly going out on a limb by saying that. I mean, who doesn’t love dolphins? I’ve been on a few whale/dolphin watching cruises, which are a great way to see them in their natural habitat, but in Cape May I don’t even need to leave the beach because it is quite common to see dolphins swimming offshore.
During my most recent visit a couple of weeks ago, I managed to capture some of them with my camera. The photos are bit grainy and soft because of how far away the dolphins were and how much of the images I had to crop, but they still turned out pretty well considering. You can click on any image to view a larger version.
One of the most prominent features of Cape May is the lighthouse, which is visible from many different areas of the town, including the beach and the hiking trails of Cape May Point State Park. Here are a few photos of the lighthouse from different perspectives from my most recent visit. You can click on any image to see a bigger version.
The first two photos were taken from the beach. The second one below features my dog Heidi in the foreground.
This next batch was taken at various points along the nature trails of Cape May Point State park.
These next two were taken from the grounds of the lighthouse.
These two were taken from Cape May Point beach near dusk (the second one after the light turned on).
This final photo was my first attempt at shooting and stitching together a vertical panorama. There were some issues with the assembly as you can see below, but I still sorta like it, even with the imperfections. I’m still working out the kinks of manually shooting panoramas with my new camera (the panorama assist mode of my old camera made it much easier).
Unfortunately I didn’t get any photos from inside the lighthouse on this most recent visit as I never got around to climbing it. Oh well, next time.
Anyone who has spent much time in Cape May, NJ knows that it is a great spot for bird watching, particularly along the various nature trails. I’ve hiked the trails in the past, but not with a camera like my Nikon D5100, which is capable of capturing in-motion shots I had never before dreamed possible. I love this camera.
Here are a few of my favorite bird photos from our trip to Cape May a couple of weeks ago. You can click on any image to see a bigger version.
November 8, 2011:Â Our final non-travel day in Europe featured summer weather and a cool cable car ride to the top of a mountain to see Dubrovnik in all its glory. But first we visited the impressive Fort Lovrijenac, which sits atop a massive rock looming over the entire city.
Approaching the Fort
Just like the previous day when we walked the city walls, the fort was devoid of crowds (the advantage of being there in November). In fact, we basically had the entire fortress to ourselves, as you can see in the photos below. If you viewed my post about Game of Thrones filming locations, many of these photos will look familiar (click on any image to view a larger version):
The fort is a great place to enjoy spectacular views of the walled city:
After our visit to the fort, we headed to the other end of the city to catch a cable car ride to the top of Srd Hill.
Srd Hill Viewed from the Fort
This is where you get the iconic view of Dubrovnik from up high.
Here’s a panorama of the landscape behind Srd Hill:
While up there I visited a war ravaged building called Fort Imperial. Inside is a museum dedicated to the 1990’s Croatian War for Independence. After visiting the museum I walked around the outside of the building where there are signs saying to do so at your own risk, due to the structural damage and leftover debris.
Outside of Fort Imperial, looking down toward the outskirts of Dubrovnik. Our hotel was somewhere in the middle of that.
Here are a few more photos from on top of the hill:
After descending Srd Hill, my uncle returned to the hotel while I decided to stay in the city. We agreed to meet up later for dinner. I thought I’d to visit the city aquarium but unfortunately discovered that it was closed. Instead I headed out to the rocks on the shore outside of the city walls. There was not another soul in sight so I was able to sit back and relax as if I had the entire city to myself. I sat beneath the rock in the picture below and gazed out into the sea as the water crashed against the rocks. Simply sublime.
Being alone also allowed me to get a little goofy, as I used the self-timer to snap my traditional Karate Kid photo, which I do on almost every trip:
Later I met up with my uncle and we had our final dinner in Europe at nice a place just outside of town. We then headed back to the hotel to pack for two days of planes, trains, and automobiles until we finally made it back home to New Jersey.
This square in Split was modeled after St. Mark’s square in Venice.
The train to Zagreb ran very late, so we didn’t arrive at our hotel until late that night. We had a super early cab ride to the airport the following morning, and thus did not have time to go into the city for dinner; I just had a panini in the train station, then packed for the flight.
From Zagreb we flew to Amsterdam for a 3-hour layover, where they were already celebrating Christmas in early November—there were decorated trees all over the airport. From there it was a long flight back to JFK Airport. I mentioned in Part 1 my desire never to fly out of JFK again, and the return trip only reinforced it. On a good day you could probably drive from JFK to my house in about 90 minutes, but between ridiculously long customs lines, a disorganized shuttle service (which I will also never use again), and bumper-to-bumper traffic on the roads, it took us roughly 7 hours to get home from the time we landed. Finally, we made it to my front door, where I was greeted by my wife and dog after a month apart. It was good to be back home.
And with that, our epic 28-day Eurotrip was over, as is my two-year odyssey of writing this journal. But before signing off I need to give a shout-out to my Uncle Kipp, who made the entire trip possible, first by organizing our group’s two-week stay in beautiful Tuscany that helped me realize my dream of touring Italy, and then by inviting me to accompany him to Switzerland and Croatia after the rest of the group went home. Croatia might never have been on my radar as a place to visit if not for Uncle Kipp, but I’m so glad I went. What an amazing country. The entire trip was an incredible experience that I’ll always cherish. It truly was the trip of a lifetime—lord knows I’ll never be able to take that much time off from work again. 🙂
Michael Rappa 