A Traveller’s Eye, A Thinker’s Heart
I like to tell stories. I like to take photos.
And I like to share them. Enjoy.
-
A STUMBLE WITH A VIEW
Padma and I went out for a late afternoon walk yesterday in the forest near our home. I was focusing on some distant views of Oberwinter with its Rhine backdrop and managed to get my feet tangled in the thick leaf litter. Clumsy as I am I took a roll and ended up on my…
-
BACHARACH
Every night before retiring, I see a book sitting next to my bed. A book I use frequently to dream about my next adventure: the Lonely Planet Guide to Germany. The cover shows a little village with a dominant church on a river. After some map gazing I discovered the cover pic was taken just…
-
THE BATTLE OF VERDUN – A CENTURY LATER
As we turn our attention this weekend to the centenary of the signing of the armistice to end World War I, I look back at a visit that Padma, Xander, Joseph and I took this summer to a battlefield in France which proved to be the ultimate test of human endurance. The Battle of Verdun…
-
GRANDPA GAUSTAD
For as long as I remember, my mother has flaunted her ‘Norwegian-ness’. Her mother, Gertrude Gaustad, was of full Norwegian stock. So mom has an appetite for lefse but when I would ask her about our Norwegian ancestors she would draw a blank. She didn’t know much except that her grandfather was named Ole, he…
-
OLAV OF BYNESET
I hit a brick wall once. A genealogical brick wall, that is. For five years I had been trying to find out where my great grandfather, Ole Erickson Gaustad, came from. I was getting nowhere and figured I’d never find out. But one night in 2007, I was Googling ‘Gaustad’ and the village where I…
-
A NIGHT IN COPENHAGEN
Padma and I preferred to drive everywhere in Europe, rather than flying. So when we decided to visit Norway and meet my family, we decided to drive. We arrived in Copenhagen in early evening after driving all day from Bonn. Just enough time to enjoy the long summer day and take a stroll through the…
-
A LIONESS ALL FOR MYSELF
It’s Sunday and I’m not working on finger millet so I took the morning off to visit the Nairobi National Park. This is almost an urban park as it is a mere 15 minutes south of Nairobi with its skyline visible from the park … and yet it truly is the home to some very…
-
A TALE OF TWO MARYS
Once upon a time a man married two Marys, which is something you can do in Kenya. The man passed away but his two wives, the Marys, lived on and prospered while growing finger millet. Finger millet is a traditional crop of Eastern Africa and once grew abundantly in the Western Kenya near the town…
-
BAALBEK, THE CITY OF THE SUN
While on assignment in Lebanon, I took an afternoon off to vist the ruins of Baalbek, located in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley. They are among the world’s most impressive and best-preserved Roman archaeological sites. Once known as Heliopolis, or the “City of the Sun,” Baalbek was a major religious center dedicated to Jupiter, Venus, and Bacchus.…
Adventure Adventures Agriculture Austria Backpacking Bangladesh Belize Bolivia Botswana California Canada Cassava Chickpea Colombia Community Seedbanks Costa Rica COVID Cowpea Crop Diversity Current Affairs Czech Republic Ecuador Egypt Environment Eulogy Family Finger millet Finland Flora Food Security France Friends Georgia Germany Grasspea Greece Guatemala History Hitchhiking Honduras ICARDA India Indonesia Ireland Italy Japan Kazakhstan Kenya Kyrgyzstan Language Laos Lebanon Liberia Life's Experiences Literature Lousiana Malaysia Media Mexico Monaco Morocco Mozambique Nature Nicaragua Norway Pakistan Papua New Guinea Peace Corps Peru Philosophical Photography pigeonpea Portugal Potato Recollections Religion Rice Sierra Leone Singapore Sorghum South Australia Spain Sweden Sweetpotato Switzerland Syria The Gambia The Netherlands Togo Turkey United States Vietnam Washington Western Australia Wine Wisconsin Zimbabwe
What are you looking for?
If you see this after your page is loaded completely, leafletJS files are missing.