On my last day visiting the Zapata Peninsula I went with a wildlife guide to explore a trail known as Sendero Enigma de las Rocas. This part of Cuba has many rocks, forming caves both above and underground, and reaching into the sea. We started the expedition in a horse […]

I recently returned from The Birds in Flight Photography contest in Cuba. After visiting last year to explore the vegetation, I left wanting to see more of this amazing island. Most of my time on this trip was spent on the Zapata Peninsula, the largest protected area in the Caribbean […]

I visited Muir Woods on a recent trip to California. I enjoyed rare sunshine after weeks of rain and wind had closed it three times in two weeks, including the day before my visit. Fallen trees had closed a popular trail, but there were still many to explore. I was […]

The votes have been tallied and the people’s choice winner for France’s tree of the year is an ancient zamana tree in Martinique. This island is an overseas department of France, and though I am sure there are many fabulous and fashionable Parisian trees, they would have a hard time […]

I enjoyed seeing the permanent Chihuly exhibit in Seattle this spring, and planned to visit a temporary exhibit that opened this April in Atlanta as part of its 40th anniversary celebration. But of course I kept finding other things to do, and only finally managed to drive down for the […]

When other flowers have faded, chrysanthemums in my garden bloom profusely in the fiery shades of autumn leaves, as they have been doing in cultivation since at least the 15th century BC. Like many gardeners I tend to take this beauty for granted. That changed when I visited the New […]

Mount Rushmore is an iconic national monument, completed 75 years ago this month. Originally conceived in 1923 as a tourist attraction, the initial plans included sculptures of Native Americans. But over time it turned instead into a memorial to prominent presidents carved into the granite of South Dakota’s Black Hills. […]

Once there were millions of bison in the Great Plains, shaping the native grasslands that form over 40 percent of North America’s natural landscapes. Hunting led to their near extinction. Only around 1000 were left by the turn of the last century, hastened by the railroads that carried the meat […]

I first visited Wyoming as a teen, where at a two week summer camp I learned rock climbing and rappelling, climbed mountains higher than I’d ever hiked back east, and rode horses through lonely valleys where we camped in dark nights filled with brilliant starry skies, silent except for an […]