Features

April 2008 issue

Exploring Chile — from its cities to the famed Lake District

Steve Cole, Lowell, MI

“Wow! They’ve cloned Ricardo Montalbán,” my wife, Sharon, exclaimed the first time we emerged from our hotel onto the streets of Santiago’s upscale Providencia area.

My first impression, too, was that there were a lot of strikingly good-looking Chilean men and women, and anyone under the age of three was absolutely too cute for words.

Adding to their good looks, the citizens of Chile’s capital were extremely well dressed. Even more striking was the fact that young people were neatly dressed and well groomed — no calf-length baggy shorts, no...

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July 2008 issue

Insights from a cultural immersion program in Venezuela

by Jim Hendrickson, Lynden, WA

In April ’08 I joined a group of 19 Americans and six Canadians on a cultural-immersion program to Venezuela offered by Global Awareness Through Experience, or GATE (La Crosse, WI; 608/791-5283, www.gate-travel.org), a nonprofit organization. I had previously traveled with GATE in Guatemala (Nov. ’06, pg. 6) and gained profound insights into the cultural and political situation there.

On this trip I wanted to personally experience life in today’s Venezuela, especially after having been exposed to considerable hostility in the American media...

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March 2007 issue

Impressed with a 6-country tour of East Africa

by Claus Hirsch, New York, NY

In late March ’06 I embarked on my first trip to Africa. It was the start of a 3½-week vacation like no other I had ever taken.

Dispelling misconceptions

Many impressions are embedded in my mind after visiting six countries in East Africa. Three of those visits, admittedly, were very brief, but they do count toward my goal of visiting a total of 100 countries.

I traveled with Overseas Adventure Travel (800/493-6824, www.oattravel.com) of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Having received personal recommendations about them from other...

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November 2008 issue

Driving Costa Rica’s ‘infamous’ roads and highways

by Inga Aksamit, San Rafael, CA

“Are you going to go zip-lining?” everyone asked when told that my husband, Steve, and I were headed to Costa Rica for our next set of adventures.

It sounded like fun until so many people asked that I started envisioning the canopy of the jungle crisscrossed with zip-lines zinging tourists across the sky. We decided to head away from the popular tourist zones to find our adventures on the infamous roads of Costa Rica (infamous due to significant deferred maintenance).

Our informal research indicated that the most popular route is from...

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July 2007 issue

Tanzania & Kenya — A mother-daughter safari

by Julie Skurdenis, Contributing Editor, photos by Katie Skurdenis-Lalli

When my daughter, Katie, was small, she had so many stuffed animals that I’d sometimes walk into her bedroom for a final ‘Good night’ and say, “Where’s my kid?” Somewhere among the cuddly pink elephants, fat-bellied hippos and lions with immense fluffy manes lay a sleeping child.

I used to think then how wonderful it would be to share a safari with her one day — not toy animals but the real thing: elephants, hippos and lions seen “on location.”

This was one dream that came true. Racking my brains...

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October 2007 issue

Portugal’s isle of Madeira boasts a profusion of blooms and a bounty of its namesake wine

by Harvey Hagman, Fort Myers, FL

After spending the winter of 1419 on the barren, white sands of the island of Porto Santo, Portuguese explorer João Gonçalves Zarco set sail for the mist-shrouded land on the horizon. Zarco found an island of towering peaks and thick, ancient woods — madeira means "wood" — with rugged, cliff-lined coasts and, inland, abundant water.

Today cruise ships calling at the Portuguese island of Maderia anchor in Funchal Bay, but jets bring in most visitors, including my wife and me.

Funchal

Our bus whisked past purple peaks, through...

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January 2008 issue

Iran — looking beyond political rhetoric to discover a most welcoming nation

by J. Norvill Jones, Alexandria, VA

Iran has been demonized by our government and the American news media, but is it really part of an “axis of evil”? As one who spent much of his working life dealing with foreign policy issues, I am inherently skeptical of government pronouncements. In April 2007 I went to Iran to see the country for myself.

The plan

Iran is an ancient land of proud and friendly people where many villages have been continuously inhabited for more than two millennia. Appropriately, the cypress tree, which bends but does not break, is...

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April 2008 issue

Car purchase overseas inspires a European vacation, plus a visit to Corsica

by Vernon Hoium, Minneapolis, MN

If you are in the market for a new car and are considering a vacation to Europe, you might consider buying a car with overseas delivery. In the last week of September ’07, my wife and I purchased a 2008 Mercedes-Benz and drove through southern Germany, Switzerland and France, then spent some time on the island of Corsica.

Getting started

While we purchased a Mercedes, similar programs are also available from Audi, BMW, Volvo and possibly others. The first step in the process is to go to your local auto dealer and ask for the European...

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