Articles with beach

The Challenge of Exploring Vietnam’s Marble Mountains

One of the aspects of travel in Da Nang is that many of the recommended sites to visit are not really in the city of Da Nang. They are outside the city and thus require transportation to get there. While cab fees are not particularly expensive, nevertheless they do add up. The drivers we used were all polite and business like. They also had nice vehicles. That surprised me to be honest. Many of the vehicles had the modern safety…

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Da Nang, Vietnam, A City on the Rise

The Vietnam War was fought when I was in high school and college. I could have been drafted, but I managed to escape that and did not serve. However, I couldn’t escape the war as seemingly every day the news focused on it. I became familiar with some of the cities in Vietnam. Saigon and Hanoi were often in the news. Da Nang was another name I heard frequently. Da Nang was actually the entry point for most American soldiers…

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Thanksgiving Weekend in Santa Barbara

While Silvette grew up in the Queen Ann area of Seattle, a number of years ago her parents and siblings one by one immigrated to Santa Barbara, California. Even our daughter, Andrea, went down to Santa Barbara for college. Our family is the only one left here in the Seattle area. Because of that, we have made quite a few trips to Santa Barbara over the years and have become fairly familiar with the area. This year Silvette’s sister invited…

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Sharing a Beach Adventure in Lomé, Togo

As I mentioned in my previous post, I didn’t do much sight seeing in Lomé, Togo as I spent most of my time teaching. However, on the final Saturday I did have an opportunity to go out and see some of the sights. The fun part was that I didn’t go alone. I shared that experience with a high school student from Togo. Many organizations try to help children around the world. One of the ways they do this is…

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Exploring the Filoli Gardens and Half Moon Bay Cliffs

South of San Francisco in the town of Woodside, one can step back in time to an earlier era of refinement and luxury. Filoli Gardens is a place where one can imagine life of a bygone era. Visitors can explore a large mansion built in 1917 in which only two families have lived. They can also explore the beautiful gardens around the home. Of course none of this comes free, but if one is willing to pay the price, they…

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Dash Point State Park: From the Beach to the Forest

A beautiful, sunny day in February is a great opportunity to do some exploring. On such a Saturday we decided to travel down to Federal Way and explore Dash Point State Park. Washington state has over 100 state parks so there are a number of locations to see, and we have only visited a few of them. It was time to explore more. Dash Point is on Puget Sound in Federal Way. We took the 320th St. exit off I-5…

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White Rock: A Canadian Beach Town on the Border

Although we don’t live that far from the Canadian border, it had been a while since we traveled north. COVID stopped all traffic for a while. However, the border has been open for some time, and we had talked about going up to visit. Then my brother and his wife invited us to spend a few days in Whistler with them at their time share so it seemed a perfect opportunity to cross the border and visit up north. After…

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Beaches, Boats, and Bikes in Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica

Costa Rica has been quite the adventure. We zipped over the jungle in Monteverde and rode the rapids in La Fortuna. A night walk was part of the agenda in our glamping site in Sarapiqui. Later we watched a turtle lay eggs in Tortuguero. Now we were headed to our final destination, Puerto Viejo. It was a rainy morning for our hour long boat ride back to the main road from Tortuguero. Because of the rain, they pulled the plastic…

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Spying on a Sea Turtle in Tortuguero, Costa Rica

Having left our glamping site in Sarapiqui, Costa Rica, we headed out on a bus toward our next stop, Tortuguero. Unfortunately an accident on a narrow bridge stopped all traffic. After checking out the situation, our tour guide, Danny, told us we were to get out of our bus and start walking. Carrying all our luggage Danny led us across the bridge. There we saw a line of cars, buses, and vans waiting to cross the bridge from the other…

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