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These photos are from my various walks along San Francisco Bay, including visits to Telegraph Hill, Fishermans Wharf, and Pier 39. The bay area of the city is a big reason why it is one of my favorite American cities I’ve visited, right behind Portland and on a par with Seattle.
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When I was planning my trip to Glacier National Park, the flight home was going to require a layover in one city. I believe the options were Seattle, Denver, or Chicago. I’d always wanted to visit Seattle so I decided to make a four-day stay out of it. This is the first batch of photos from my visit to the Emerald City this past September. These were all shot while riding the ferry to and from Bainbridge Island.
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Some miscellaneous photos from my walks around San Francisco, including visits to the ferry marina, city hall, Ghirardelli Square, and the Westfield Mall.
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At long, long last, I’m sharing the final chapter of my 2014 Eurotrip, nearly three years after the previous installment. I suppose that I delayed this entry for so long because of how disappointing the day was. I had originally planned an extensive recounting of the problems encountered on this tour (which I alluded to earlier in this series), but in the end I decided it’s not worth it, especially since the company did give me a partial refund, so I’m just going to briefly summarize the events of the day.
July 13, 2014: We got a late start when we departed Amsterdam for Bruges because we had to wait roughly 30 minutes on the bus for our guide to arrive with the group from the hostel. When we finally reached Bruges, the bus driver drove around for another 20 minutes not knowing where to park. He eventually figured it out but then got into an argument with the guide about how much time we would spend there, which the bus driver apparently won. So by the time we finally departed the bus, we had already lost about an hour.
Then, after hustling to the center of the city, we were informed that we had to meet back at the bus in just over two hours. I was stunned. Two hours? What was the point of even stopping here? That was barely enough time to grab a bite to eat and run around to snap a few photos. I certainly didn’t have time to wait in line and climb to the top of the famous bell tower. To make matters worse, it was raining pretty heavily, so I decided to eat first in the hope that the rain would clear. For the most part it continued to rain, though it did finally clear during the last half-hour of my visit, so I hustled around to fit in as many rainless photos as I could.
Bruges had been the entire reason I booked this particular tour, so to barely spend any time there was a massive disappointment. Needless to say, I (and many others on the tour) felt a bit ripped off. On top of that, it was my last day in Europe before flying home the following morning, so an otherwise fantastic trip ended on a sour note, but that’s the way it goes sometimes. Such is travel.
Oh well, I guess I’ll have to make a special trip to Belgium in the future so I can take my time and really experience this lovely city. In the meantime, here are a few of the photos I managed to take during my short visit. Click on any photo to open a gallery.
View more of my photos from Amsterdam and Bruges.
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Photos from my walk along the Portland waterfront, as well as my ride on the Portland Aerial Tram, which carries passengers between the waterfront district and Marquam Hill. I also included a few photos of Portland viewed from high up in my apartment. It’s such a lovely city.
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Here are some photos from my hike up to Washington Park in Portland, Oregon to visit the Japanese Garden last summer. It was a long uphill walk to the park, and then again to the garden, but it was worth it. In addition to the beautiful Japanese aesthetic, the garden also offers some nice views of Mount Hood. You almost forget that you’re in a major city.
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Last summer I stayed in Portland for four days as part of my two-week eclipse trip. These photos are from my walks around downtown. Fans of Portlandia may notice some landmarks from the show, such as the Portland Theater and the Portlandia statue, which is the second largest copper statue in the country (after the Statue of Liberty).
There is a lot of natural beauty and interesting architecture in Portland, and it often feels more like a small city than a major one, which is a compliment. In fact, of all the cities in America I have visited, Portland is my favorite.
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During my July visit to Edinburgh two years ago I decided to take a sunset hike up to Calton Hill (which is around 10:30 p.m. that time of year). Once you get to the top you are rewarded with breathtaking views of Edinburgh, such as the twilight scene captured in this photo.
You can view more featured photos at my Photo of the Day Collection.
It has been five months since the last installment of my Eurotrip journal (and two years since the trip actually happened), but we are finally hitting the home stretch with this penultimate chapter covering my one full day in Amsterdam.
July 12, 2014: My first morning in Amsterdam began with breakfast at the hotel, where I enjoyed American-style bacon for the first time on this two-week trip (bacon in the U.K. is more like ham). I chose to skip my tour group’s morning excursion to Zaanse Schans since we had not had the opportunity on the previous day to see much of Amsterdam. From what I’ve read, Zaanse Schans sounds a bit like a tourist trap anyway, so although it would have been neat to see the old windmills, I don’t feel as if I missed much overall.
Instead, I preferred to spend my only full day in Amsterdam exploring the city, so I began the long walk toward the city center from my hotel, which was located far outside the main part of the city. When I later spoke to other members of my group, they were stunned that I had walked all the way to the city center and back again–one guy said a taxi had cost him 26 Euros each way. But, as I’ve learned from my travel-savvy uncle as well as through my own experience, a long walk is the best way to truly experience a city.
Along the way, I meandered through areas with hardly any tourists and stumbled onto a large outdoor market where I was able to buy an authentic stroopwaffle. I also diverted my route to swing by an old windmill in town, so I didn’t leave Amsterdam without seeing at least one classic windmill. Between these diversions and numerous photo stops, it took me about two hours to reach the city center.
Here are some photos from my walk:
The walk back to the hotel took much longer than expected. For some reason, although I normally have a very good sense of direction, I kept getting turned around and walking in circles. Eventually, I found my way out of the circular city center and on the road back home. I kept looking for somewhere to eat dinner but nothing was striking my fancy, and before I knew it, I was back at the hotel.
I had been walking basically nonstop for five straight hours over hard surfaces on a hot summer day, so I was pretty beat and not feeling up to heading back out to look for somewhere to eat, especially since the hotel wasn’t really located near anything. So I settled for eating in the hotel, which turned out to be one of the worst meals I’ve ever had: a chorizo sandwich with such a thin slice of meat that it was basically like eating bread, and a bland appetizer platter which came out with raw ground sausage. I took a little bite just to make sure my eyes weren’t deceiving me, but it was indeed raw. Perhaps it is a delicacy there, but I couldn’t bring myself to eat it.
I then headed back to my room to pack, thus ending my time in Amsterdam. When I had first seen the city via cruise on the previous day, I hadn’t been overwhelmed, but it grew more charming during my long walk off the beaten path and into the old city center, then less charming when I reached the red light district. In the end, I was glad to have visited once, as it is a very unique city with its various canals, waterfront buildings, and heavy bike traffic (as well as some other amenities you don’t find in other cities), but I was already looking forward to the next day’s visit to Bruges, which, for me, had been the main attraction of this entire tour. Unfortunately, my time in Bruges would be mostly ill-fated, but that’s a story for the next installment.
View more of my photos from Amsterdam and Bruges.
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I took this long-exposure photo from the balcony of my hotel room in Rome, Italy.
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You can view more featured photos at my Photo of the Day Collection.
Michael Rappa 