Costa Rica 3—walking tour of San José

[I'm ironing out some kinks in the formatting on this page, so captions are missing. Stay tuned.]

A small group of folks from what will be our large (18!) group for the next two weeks met this afternoon for a walking tour of central San José. We had an excellent guide, Enrique, and it was a pleasant afternoon for a stroll and some history. (I've decided to continue posting my travelogue on Facebook, so I'm duplicating here for my own purposes.)

Souvenirs, anyone?

READ POETRY!!! That's my kind of graffiti.

A colorful street of shops.

A park corner. The trees are
Australian paperbarks.

Herbal remedies. 

Costa Rica 2—San José

We arrived in San José last night around 8:30, got to our downtown hotel around 9:30—all in the dark. So it was fun to wake up today and look out our big window. We ventured a couple of blocks to a sweet coffeehouse that served real breakfasts. Took a walk in the 180-acre Parque la Sabana, across from our hotel. Wandered through local neighborhoods. And otherwise generally rested up. (We're both still getting over a cold and/or bronchitis, and resting up felt good.) Here are some photos I took. (Click to see them larger.)

The view from our window

I loved the multitude of hearts on my latte!

A beautiful beetle.

Maybe Handroanthus chrysotrichus, golden trumpet tree

Parque la Sabana is very pleasant and well used

The lago is empty, except for puddles and
abundant water hyacinth (barely visible, but there)

A kitty friend

A rather forlorn owl

Vendors and kites

Crossing the street was challenging,
until we noticed an overpass

An artistic cow at the hotel we'll be moving to Sunday

The national stadium, and an ongoing football match:
easy to tell which side is which

The overhead wires are artistic statements unto themselves

Sunset view out our window

David after a delicious meal of
Caribbean chicken

The morning view, but at night

Costa Rica 1—en route to San José

We take a break from the countdown to 100 to splash photos around, of our Sierra Club trip to Costa Rica, which commenced with a long day of plane rides on Thursday, January 23. I normally post photos to Facebook, but I'm trying to figure out how to live without Facebook. And this is my best bet, I guess. For now. 

For this trip, I made the momentous decision to travel light. Just clothes, really, and toiletries, and hiking sticks, and shoes, and a guide to Costa Rican birds, and a journal and some pens, and I decided I did really "need" the laptop (how else could I post my daily photos?)—but for a camera, only the iPhone. No real camera. I always lug a real camera along, no matter where I go, but on recent trips the iPhone stuck in my back pocket has done 95% of the heavy lifting, and I barely even glance at the heavy camera I've dutifully packed, so this time I'm just caving in and settling strictly for documentation. iPhone photos aren't, to my mind, especially good, but they at least capture glimpses of memories. So, they'll have to do. 

So, here's installment #1: aerial shots, mostly, plus some arm-waving cats (where you have to imagine the waving because I can't post a video here).

The newly sprung Hughes fire, north of LA

Flying over Pacific Palisades, recently
devastated by the Palisades fire

Griffith Observatory and the Hollywood sign (IYKYK)
on a glorious LA day

Taking off for Houston: Marina del Rey

Approaching Houston: lots of building going on

Houston in the distance

Imagine them waving!

There are a couple of things I like about Facebook, in terms of sharing travelogues. I like the way the photos get tiled for a one-capture presentation—and then when you click, you can see the individual shots with captions. I also like getting comments—the overall sharing, of life, of experiences, of friendship. FB may be seriously compromised now by the kleptocracy/oligarchy, and I grant that. But it still does something that no other social media site does. 

I may just have to quit social media altogether. Keep this journaling spot, for my own pleasure, and not even care if anyone ever looks at it. When did we all become so needy? Or is that even what it is—neediness? No, I don't think so. I continue to enjoy all the various communities I belong to, and FB makes it easy to do so. It's allowed us all to become artists and storytellers and better citizens (well, the folks I hang out with, anyway), and to share our thoughts, concerns, and lives more easily. It's been good.

Damn you, Mark Zuckerberg, and all your greedy, careless kind. Seriously. Damn you.

88 of 100: A couple more Instagram six-packs

I'm just trying to get to 100... So here are two more half-dozens from Instagram. I'm not posting there regularly. I'm not doing this blog regularly. I'm not doing much of anything regularly—well, except watching TV (currently, Offspring and The Leftovers: loving the first, still not entirely sure about the second). I'm involved in two several-week writing workshops, so I guess that's potential regularity—only, I forget, and then I have to scramble at the last minute to deliver assignments. It's no way to live!

Anyway, here are the latest Instagram collections (click to see them larger):

They don't require captions, because they're really just impressions. 

One of the many things I'd like to be grappling with now is what (if anything) to be doing photographically. I have cameras galore. I should use them. Shouldn't I? 

87 of 100: Afternoon walks, part 3

And to wrap up the new year's walks so far:

January 5 we went to Asilomar. It was a beautiful day, and only got more beautiful as a spectacular sunset unfurled. 

Milo loves the beach: see how his ears fly!

Looking north toward Santa Cruz in the distance

Santa Cruz again, in the golden light

The last of the sun

Looking justo the left of the setting sun, same spot

Magnificence!

And finally, January 7: the former Fort Ord, Badger Hills entrance, which takes us up a wide gravel road to the ridge. Along the way we passed a couple herds of sheep—Dorper sheep from South Africa, we learned (the breed is from SA, not these specific sheep). Another perfect day, with a pretty good sunset.

Some of the sheep, with Toro Park in the background

Not sure whose skull this is, with its tuft of fur

Evening sky over Salinas

The light gets rosier

Dorpers

Splendid!

We will continue with our walks, of course, and I will continue to take photos, but for now these eight itineraries give a nice sampling of the variety of our home turf. It makes me happy to have so many options.