AKA my favorite city in West Africa.
Why?
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Cote d’Ivoire: Grand-Bassam
Grand-Bassam is a UNESCO World Heritage city and the former colonial capital of Cote d’Ivoire. It’s a popular beach resort, and I headed there for a day trip right before leaving the country. It turned out that my timing couldn’t have been better.
Cote d’Ivoire: Korhogo and vicinity
I had never heard of Korhogo, the fourth biggest city in Cote d’Ivoire, prior to a few months before my work trip. It is a city full of artisans, in a region full of artisans, and I’m excited to show you some of the beautiful handicrafts I saw while there. Continue reading
Cote d’Ivoire: Abidjan
It’s been so long since I was in Cote d’Ivoire that I need the photos to jog my memory. I went in late November / early December and spent most of my time in Korhogo, bookended on either side by a few days in Abidjan, as well as a day trip to Grand Bassam. Here are some brief Abidjan highlights…
Iceland
Writing about past travels during stay-at-home time may cheer me up or it may make me even more angsty… We shall see.
Onward! Onward backward, I should say.
This past October, I went abroad with six of my oldest, dearest friends, to enter middle age in a land where more than half of the people believe in elves. It was exactly what I needed. Continue reading
a Kenya addendum
Yesterday I told you that I was done with my Kenya posts. That’s not entirely true. I am done writing about Kenya itself, but I am not done (over)sharing about my bodily functions while there. Much as I felt compelled to tell you about my vacation-induced gastro-intestinal dilemmas, I now feel compelled to tell you all about my Kenyan pee fail. (39 was a momentous year.) Continue reading
Kenya: Masai Mara safari
The Masai Mara National Reserve is a relatively small triangle of land on the Kenyan side of its southern border with Tanzania. On the Tanzania side, the park continues southward as the much larger Serengeti. I had been on safari in the Serengeti and surrounding areas of Tanzania three years ago, and it was wonderful. I didn’t feel the need to repeat the experience in Kenya, except for two things. First of all, we had hoped to see the annual wildebeest migration in Tanzania but just missed it – the herds had already moved north into Kenya by the time we arrived. I happened to be in Kenya at the beginning of August, prime time for the migration, and so I felt compelled to take another shot — after all, I had heard that the migration is truly epic. Secondly, even though the Tanzania safari taught me that it is impossible for me to commune with wild animals when surrounded by a million other safari cars and the people leaning out of them to snap pictures, it also taught me that the scenery in that part of the world is breathtaking. I wanted to go back not to see safari animals but to see the landscapes around them. Continue reading
Kenya: Hell’s Gate, Naivasha, and a magical animal paradise
When I tacked a week of vacation onto the end of my work trip in Kenya, I didn’t realize that it would be impossible to decide what to fit into that one week. In the end, rather than cut anything I deemed essential out, I squooshed everything I wanted to do into the time available. And so, I made a recklessly overambitious plan to fit Hell’s Gate and Lake Naivasha into barely two days when I should have given them four. No regrets – it was the most amazing, stunning, wonderful two days. Continue reading
Kenya: Karen and the Ngong Hills
This post will cover two different excursions in the same general geographic vicinity – one was a full-day outing to Karen, a beautiful and posh suburb of Nairobi, and one was a half-day trip to the Ngong Hills, which are just beyond Karen. Both places were refreshing and delightful.
Kenya: Mombasa
Mombasa is a fascinating Swahili city, which, like Zanzibar’s beautiful Stone Town, was influenced by a variety of different cultures, religions, and societies, due to its situation as a trade center on the coast of the Indian Ocean. I had about four hours to explore before heading to the airport to return to Nairobi from my field trip, and I saw a surprisingly large amount of Old Town (and some bits of the newer city as well) in that time.
talk foreign to me 