Oh, the poor, damned site of the Colonial Jamestown settlement in Virginia. Here you see a recreation of the fort, originally built in 1607, less than a year that three ships set out with 104 men from England under a charter by the Virginia Company to colonize this part of the New World. Money-making and […]
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Costa Rica is the most ecologically minded country in the world, preserving 1/3 of its land for wilderness. The size of the US state of West Virginia, Costa Rica’s environment is incredibly diverse — it has rainforests, cloud forests, tropical beaches, dry uplands, and many, many volcanoes. Going on nature tours and hiking, I was
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Here are some photographs of the coral reefs of the Cahuita National Park in Costa Rica, founded in 1970. Here, 5,600 acres of protected waters preserve 123 types of fish, 35 types of coral, along with a multitude of mollusks, crustaceans, and algae. In fact, the coral reef here is only one out of two
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The National Park of Cahuita on the Carribean side of Costa Rica was created in 1970, and is part of the extensive system of wildlife protection which is the hallmark of that country. It includes 2,700 acres of tropical rainforest abutting a coral reef) containing an enormous range of biodiversity. You can see the vegetation
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The ruins of Guayaba, located in the Center of Costa Rica near the Turrialba Volcano, are the country’s most ancient. Those who dwelt here between 1000 BCE and 1400 CE stood at an epicenter of power in the region, and commanded excellent engineering skills which allowed them to construct underground aqueducts, wide imposing roads, and
This is me at Aquiares Coffee Estate, Costa Rica’s largest and oldest coffee plantation, where farmers and specialists have been growing coffee since 1880. As my tour guide Manuel explained, the product that so many people enjoy daily (and perhaps multiple times daily!) only comes to fruition after much time and effort.The Aquiares Coffee Estate
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Turrialba Volcano is the second-highest in Costa Rica, and as you can see, it is still active. At 10,958 feet/3,340 meters, one can see the Carribean from its peak on a clear day. Turrialba was known to the indigenous Huetar people, who may have given the volcano its name from their language (Turiri Aba, meaning
A trip to the Bisti Badlands (aka “De-Na-Zin Wilderness”) is a trip to an alien world, where it’s easier to imagine the eons of time past. Badlands are landscapes in which vast amounts of clay soils and sedimentary rock have eroded, leaving scant vegetation, and often leave behind unusual rock formations from the denser minerals
Sky City is the oldest part of Acoma Pueblo, and is today the oldest continuously inhabited village in North America. The Acoma Pueblo people date it to the middle of the 1100’s CE. Besides its antiquity, Sky City has the distinction of being situated on a small mesa on top of a 365-foot (106 meter)
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Here I am, situating myself in “giant sloth” position like my fossil friend here, a _Megalonyx jeffersonii_ knicknamed Sid. Dating from the Cenazoic Era’s Pleistocene Epoch (2.5 million – 12,000 years ago), this giant sloth was 9 feet 8 inches high (about 3 meters), making him “only” medium-height among the giant ground sloths. This exquisite
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The Mesilla Valley Bosque State Park is a small jewel of a wilderness restoration area found on the southwest border of Las Cruces, New Mexico. Before its foundation in 1975, locals called it the “Old Refuge,” and enjoyed the 305 acres for its hiking, fishing (the Rio Grande is adjacent), and bird-watching. Passionate advocates for
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Along the Appalachian Trail in Virginia is a fascinating rock formation called “Dragon’s Tooth”. It sits atop of a mountain by the same name, and is one of the three “Crown Jewels” of the state beloved by nature-seekers, backpackers, and the like.The photos show first the obvious tooth formation, and second is a rock scramble
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Who wouldn’t be captivated by the Homeric rendition of the Goddess Athena? (-or this fabulous 6th-c BCE painting of her on display at the New York Met?) The Ancient Goddess of wisdom got away with behaviors completely off-limits to actual Athenian women during the city’s 5th-century “golden age,” when those born with XX chromosomes were
Athena as “Mentor” in the Odyssey and Her Identity in Ancient Greece Read More »
Right now (fall 2024) at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, there is a fabulous exhibit on Tibetian Mandalas, and here is one that is perfect for the current Halloween season.Mandalas in Tibetian Buddhism are artistic representations of the spiritual universe, often comprised of geometric shapes and featuring specific deities that reflect different aspects
The Austrian Room is a particularly lovely example of one of the many National Rooms found on the first and third floors of Pittsburgh’s Cathedral of Learning. Each of these thematic classrooms was funded by interested representatives of whatever ethnic or national group planning the room, and Austria’s was formally dedicated in 1996. The walls
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The Cathedral of Learning, aka “Cathy”, is one of Pittsburgh’s most iconic structures. Located in the Oakland neighborhood, the Cathedral forms the central building of the University of Pittsburgh’s campus.The towering skyscraper (535 feet/163 meters) is rendered in Indiana limestone, done in Late Gothic Revival style. You can see it from many parts of the
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In the midst of the Gila National Forest in New Mexico stands this cross-topped mound. It marks the crypt and burial site of Sergeant James Cooney, and the marker besides the grave tells readers that Cooney was killed by Indians in 1880 as he tried to warn settlers about an upcoming Indian raid. What the
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Squint a bit, and you will be able to see things that look like white circles along a horizontal axis in the center of this photo. They are not raindrops, but six of the twenty-seven enormous radio telescopes that make up the Very Large Array. Located on a remote plain off Highway 60 in central
Very Large Array Telescopes of New Mexico Read More »
10,000 years ago is young in geological history. This relatively small number seems counterintuitive when one encounters the vast space of white sands in the Tularosa Basin of southern New Mexico. The dunes here make up the world’s largest gypsum fields: at 275 square miles, they can be seen by astronauts from space.
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Much of south-central Pennsylvania’s landscape is extremely ancient. For instance, a large swath of Cumberland County, where this photo was taken, straddles the Cambrian, Ordovician, and Silurian Ages, dating from 570 million to 417 million years ago. Limestone was one of the major types of soil generated in these millennia. There was also a mass
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