After out visit in 2007 i dreamed to come back. And we made it happen. Haunting place in Death Valley.

It’s sad that Desert Flower was destroyed by a strong wind last year. RIP, the strange flower, you’ll be missed!

After moving back to jersey from MA we often bitch about how it was all scenic there and not enough worthy outdoor destinations here. Which of course is not true. In fact this weekend we hit two places in one day – Apple Pie Hill followed by the lunch at the excellent burger place in Belmar called Boom and then a walk along the beach. The weather was terribly windy and cold but this contributed to the grand colors of water and skies. And nothing could beat the atmosphere of deserted for winter beachtown.

Apple Pie Hill is a local destination of sorts. There is an abandoned fire tower from which you could see endless Pinelands and even Philly. We learned about this place a year ago and since then tried to find it couple of times. Finally yesterday equipped with the GPS and precise long/lat of the destination we made it.

The weather was very windy and cold. I started to climb stairs and in the middle almost decided to turn back, it was that scary,

but it would have been a shame to miss the view from the top.

We were lucky to have the place all to our own so had time to enjoy unobstructed 360-degree panoramic view from every possible angle.

Blue Ridge Mountains Shenandoah river
Life is old there older than the trees
Younger than the mountains blowin’
like a breeze…

Country roads take me home
To the place I belong
West Virginia mountain momma
Take me home country roads

All my memories..

In one sentence: the food and wine in Portugal are pretty good and cheap, both in stores and restaurants, and portions in the latter are generous.

The discoveries were presunto – a salt cured ham that is quite different from spanish jamon serrano and served cut into quite thick slices), broa – a cornmeal bread made with a combination of corn and wheat flours and is great with some quiejo da serra, a runny mountain cheese. I brought a small wheel of this cheese home – we bought it while driving through Serra da Estrella mountains where it is made.

Restaurants we visited and can recommend: A Cozinha in Coimbra for great consistent portuguese fare – we ate there several times, Pedro dos Leitoes in Mealhada for roasted suckling pig, and Pao de Trigo in Azoia for grilled sardines and other seafood: unexpectedly they also serve pimientos de padron – apparently these peppers belong in both spanish and portuguese cuisines.

Other pictures we made are of course flickered: Dining in Portugal.

While on our way to Toronto during the xmas time we decided to stop at Corning NY, to visit a famous museum of glass there.

(the rest of pix are flickred here.)

The museum is hosted in an airy contemporary building and has an impressive collection of glass art. Especially interesting were galleries of contemporary as as well as 20th century works.

Nice gift shop worth browsing but by all means avoid the cafeteria for anything beyond coffee.

So we rented a nice Goldwing and off we rode into Nevada desert escaping the shopping madness of black friday. The weather was unusually harsh – cold, sunny with ghastly winds. We didn’t mind though – it made our long ride more fun. And it set a proper stage for the appreciation of monumental sculptures at the Goldwell open air museum, located at the entrance of the Death Valley and near by the ghost town of Rhyolite.

The rest of the pix are here: Riding to Rhyolite.

Yet another Thanksgiving in Vegas – and we were on the road even more than last year. The turkey day was spent in Zion Park. The place is magical – the severe beauty of mountains softened by water and trees.

The rest of the pix are here: Zion National Park in Autumn.

(originally written on 9/12/07)

We started the day with a breakfast at Primanti Bros to experience a famous Pittsburgh sandwich.

after which we proceeded to explore the Strip.

Though sort of similar to Italian Market in Philly, we enjoyed the Strip much more – it’s cleaner, more diverse and fun – i was thrilled to discover Penzey’s store here, and bought some sour trahana in a greek store…

The afternoon was all high brow cultural. First Carniegie Museum of Arts – for Viva Vetro! Glass Alive. The exhibition is really an eye-opening, and i pick up the William Morris’s bug here.

Then to Warhol.

And of course we can’t miss the view from Mt Washington:

At this point we’re ready for a dinner – in another Pittsburgh landmark no less! The Church Brew Works, a beer brewery and a pub inside a restored original church building.

… i really couldn’t believe we squeezed this all in one day – wow!

(originally written on 9/23/07)

Breakfast is to be taken seriously while on vacation, and we did our research, Cafe This Way being high on the list of many on Chowhound. So there we headed for our first breakfast in Bar Harbor – not completely unprepared as we had a dinner in Cafe This Way the night before and were quite pleased.

The breakfast was nice too especially pancakes bursting with wild main blueberries…

The plan for the day was to take a rest from two days of riding and do some hiking instead. Cadillac Mountain South Ridge 7 miles trail seemed like a great idea, though sudden clouds on the sky looked suspicious. H. assured me that radar looked good and we got into the Island Explorer shuttle bus to Acadia exactly at the time when the rain started. The bus slowly proceeded through Acadia picking up rain-soaked people at each stop. We got off the bus at the Blackwoods Campground, rain not stopping We didn’t have a map but H. checked the web and seemed to know the location of the trail start. We got off the bus at the general store and bought a disposable raincoat-poncho. Then we trecked about half mile to the entrance of the campground. No signs of the trail so we asked the ranger.

She explains but then asks if we’re camping here. After our negative answer she says that we can’t do hiking on the campground territory here and need to go back to route 3 where we can pick up the trail, 50 yards after the campgrounds entrance road. We agree, but proceed to the campground trail start.

After hiking about half mile we’re starting to wonder why the trail doesn’t seem to climb and at this point we start to hear road noise. Yes we made back to the route 3 and to the general trail entrance – ai little consolation that we were walking through the woods and not asfalt road.

At this moment the rain pretty much stopped: and another short but this time steep hike through somewhat spooky woods brings us to the broad ridge.

I can imagine that usually there are a lot of hikers here but they all got scared by the rain and we have the trail completely to ourselves.

At this point it’s about 2 miles more to the peak, and unfortunately we don’t have enough time to make it. Well, as a compromise we’ll be riding to Mt Cadillac next day on a motorcycle.