Category: Travel

“There must always be an end in view, and the end must not be final.”

Eliel Saarinen

New York City on an unseasonably warm autumn weekend. This was my third trip to the city. Like my second trip, this trip was spent exploring Midtown Manhattan, Central Park, and the Upper East Side.

I recently went to Little Rock for work. I drove there on Monday afternoon and drove back on Tuesday. It was a short trip and a long drive.

Here is a photo series from Bonn, Germany. Bonn is a beautiful city nestled to the west of the Rhine River. I stayed for a few days in 2019 when I was traveling through Germany. I remember the parks and walking along the river. Here are three photos that resonated with me.

“Awake, dear heart, awake. Thou has slept well. Awake.”

William Shakespeare, The Tempest. Act I. Scene II.

Three Gothic cathedrals. Three countries, and three different interpretations.

“What we glean from travellers’ vivid descriptions has a special charm; whatever is far off and suggestive excites our imagination; such pleasures tempt us far more than anything we may daily experience in the narrow circle of sedentary life.”

Alexander von Humboldt

Here is a photo series from my trip to New York City in November 2021. The first time I went, I made an easy mistake and planned too many things, and a few of those things weren’t worth the time spent doing it. In hindsight, it was an easy mistake to make, because the city is so wonderful and there are so many things to do and see. This time around I was more focused and chose sights in two specific areas: Central Park and the Upper East Side. I decided to see one museum each day. On Friday, I went to the MOMA. On Saturday, I went to the Met. On Sunday, I went to the Guggenheim. And in between museum visits, I walked through the park, visited coffee shops and restaurants, and looked at architecture.

“The point of going somewhere like the Napo River in Ecuador is not to see the most spectacular anything. It is simply to see what is there. We are here on the planet only once, and might as well get a feel for the place.”

Annie Dillard

The preceding was a quote from Annie Dillard that Geoff Dyer included in his book, White Sands. I think every city has something interesting to offer. It’s just a matter of going and exploring and, like Annie Dillard said, seeing what is there. Sometimes the best trips are ones you take over a long weekend. The kind of trips where you plan to see one or two things and then fill in the rest of the time with as much as you can. My mom and I visited Boston a few years ago as a combined Mother’s Day/birthday trip. She wanted to see some of the historical sights, like Old North Church and the Freedom Trail, and I wanted to see some architecture and visit a museum. After three days of walking, I think we both definitely got a feel for the place.

“It’s an odd thing, but anyone who disappears is said to be seen in San Francisco. It must be a delightful city and possess all the attractions of the next world.”

Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

San Francisco is one of my favorite cities. It has many of things I find desirable in a city: a coastline; walkable streets; public transportation; lots of parks and natural areas; beautiful architecture; coastal weather; and a rich and colorful history. As you can see from the pictures below, there are so many unique neighborhoods and beautiful sights to see. Here is a small selection of photos from a few summers back.

“Anyone who has first seen a place in a picture and then visited it knows how different reality is. You sense the atmosphere all around you and you are no longer dependent on the angle from which the picture was made. You breathe the air of the place, hear its sounds, notice how they are re-echoed by the unseen houses behind you.”

Steen Eiler Rasmussen, Experiencing Architecture

The general atmosphere behind these photos from Germany was peace and quiet. The streets were perfect for quiet reflection. But the presence of the buildings seemed to cut through the tranquil moment I was experiencing. They didn’t make any noise, but when I saw them, I felt like I was at the symphony with a wall of sound bombarding my senses. Maybe this was what Goethe was referring to when he called architecture “frozen music.” The shapes, the details, the colors, all swirling around inside my head like a kaleidoscope.

“There is ‘beautiful’ and there is ‘poetical’: one you admire, the other moves you. The way you imagine things to be is how they ought to be. Seeing a place for the first time, you realise you have had an idea of it. Or an idea of it in song.”

Lavinia Greenlaw, Questions of Travel: William Morris in Iceland