When we visited San Francisco in 2008, we booked a tour that took us down the Pacific coast with stops in Monterey, Pebble Beach and Carmel. We began by traveling south on Pacific Coast Highway 1. The pictures in this section are some I took of views along the highway. We stopped in Monterey for lunch and had a little time to explore the town. Monterey was once home to a sardine-canning industry. Unfortunately it was over-fished and most of…
We began our 2011 tour of Hong Kong and China in Hong Kong. At the time I wrote most of my blog entries for this trip, I only wrote about mainland China. Now, as I write this, many residents of Hong Kong have occupied the international airport to protest China’s attempt to impose a new extradition law that could limit the rights of the Hong Kong people. With Hong Kong so much in the news, I revisited this part of…
While in San Francisco, we booked a sunrise photography tour through Doc Miles Photo Tours. Doc is a professional photographer and also a great teacher. He knew several places that presented the opportunity for photos with intriguing compositions. He explained camera settings and helped me use light to my advantage – and best of all, he assisted as needed (which was quite a bit). If you are interested in a photography tour, you will find more information on his website….
These are some of the other sites we saw while exploring San Francisco. In addition to independent exploring, we also did a walking tour and a sunrise photography tour. This is the Palace of Fine Arts which we saw on our sunrise photography tour. The Palace was originally built in 1915 for the Panama-Pacific Exposition. It is one of the few buildings remaining from the Exposition. It was never meant to last longer than the Exposition so was rebuilt in…
We visited San Francisco in 2008 and just returned from visiting again. We stayed at a hotel near the Embarcadero for both of our visits. Prior to the 1989 earthquake, a double-decker highway, the Embarcadero Freeway, connected the Golden Gate Bridge and Bay Bridge, but it blocked the view of much of the shoreline. There were people opposed to the freeway before it was ever completed and others who liked the convenience it provided. The 1989 earthquake damaged the freeway…
After leaving Grand Cayman, we sailed to Cozumel, Mexico. We had booked a shore excursion, Tulum, Lost Civilization of the Mayans. We took a ferry from Cozumel to Playa del Carmen where we met our guide. Before exploring the ruins, we saw The Danza de los Voladores, or the Dance of the Flyers. It is an ancient ceremony still performed in parts of Mexico and Guatemala. The ritual was recognized as an “Intangible Cultural Heritage” by UNESCO in 2009, a few…
We took a Western Caribbean Cruise in January of 2009 on the Ruby Princess. It was the inaugural year for this ship. We left from Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale; our ports of call included Ocho Rios in Jamaica, George Town in Grand Cayman, Cozumel in Mexico and the Princess Cays in the Bahamas. These are pictures of the Ruby Princess, some of its public spaces and a sunset. Our first stop was Ocho Rios, a city on the northern…
We were able to visit several monuments and memorials during our time in Washington DC. The first memorial below is the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. It lies on two acres and actually consists of three different monuments. The “Wall” is certainly the most famous and can be seen in the first two pictures below. There are 140 panels made of black granite. Additional panels were purchased in case a panel is damaged and needs to be replaced (two were damaged during…
The National Cathedral in Washington DC is an Episcopalian cathedral. While it is commonly known as the National Cathedral, its actual name is the Cathedral Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul. The idea of a national church dates back to 1792 but it wasn’t until 1893 that Congress approved incorporation papers, authorizing a cathedral and institutions of higher learning in the District of Columbia. The charter was signed by President Benjamin Harrison. The Cathedral’s website indicates that the church does…
The pictures below are of the Library of Congress. Its history dates back to 1800 when Congress authorized the expenditure of $5,000 for books that could be used by Congress for reference purposes. Initially the library was located in the Capitol building, but during the War of 1812, British troops set fire to the Capitol and the library was lost. President Thomas Jefferson, at that time retired from office, offered his personal library as a replacement. Congress authorized almost $24,000…