BK ad in Singapore
The fine art of subtlety clearly illustrated in this ad for the BK Super Seven Incher:
No more free wifi at Zagreb Airport.
Just thought someone, somewhere, might find that tidbit useful.
Susak Notebook
Dolphins as PR/tourism icon are everywhere in Mali Lošinj. So it made my day to see a school of 10 or so during a relatively brief boat ride to Susak, a small island about 10 nautical miles southwest of Mali Lošinj.
Only about 200 people live on the island year round. It’s a quiet place, relaxing. It appears that it’s been that way for some time and quite likely will stay that way. There are a small handful of stores, restaurants and cafés – most were still shuttered in mid-May — but absent are night clubs, large or even medium-sized hotels, and most conspicuously, roads.
There are no cars on the island; the only motorized vehicles I saw were a few small tractors hauling smaller trailers loaded with supplies which arrived on an afternoon boat. Otherwise, wheelbarrows, or karijole, appear to be the device of choice to push things around. I spent most of a quick coffee break observing one man, in his late 60s or early 70s is my guess, pushing 15 liters of red wine in his karijola. He stopped quickly at the café, enjoyed a coffee and a piece of baklava, and was on his way in less than 180 seconds.
I can understand quite a bit of Croatian, but am hardly fluent. Nonetheless, I did notice that the locals used a very distinct dialect, one I’ve never heard before. The island’s first inhabitants were the Illyrians; the majority of their surviving descendents left the island in the late 1940s after Croatia became part of Yugoslavia, and emigrated primarily to Hoboken, New Jersey.
It struck me as an interesting place to spend some time for a longer anthro/ag/geog/etc research project, if one was looking for such a thing. You can choose to be very isolated here, but with the luxury of a quick commute to the mainland which also happens to be an island. I came on a day trip, spent just a few hours, but long enough to want to return, at least for a few days. This type of seclusion, remote but still not that far removed, is rare, and fascinating at the same time.
Quick plug for our ship’s captain, Luciano Magazin, who operated one of about a dozen or so boats with daily departures to nearby islands from the port at Mali Lošinj. The cost for the trip, roughly an hour each way, is 100 KUN (13.66 EUR/ 19.16 USD), and he offers an on-board lunch for an additional 80 KUN (11 EUR/15 USD). Definitely worth it. We enjoyed a variety of local and fresh pan-fried fish, a hefty green salad, and a delicious potato/spinach dish, all bottomless portions, plus plenty of red and white wine. And although it isn’t quite as good as Brkinska (none is, really), the welcome glass of slivovec (plum brandy) at a few minutes after 10 was quite tasty.
Some more of my pics here, and here’s a terrific link for plenty more info:.
(Visited mid-May 2009)
dolphins 03, originally uploaded by pirano.
LJ Pic of the Day
This was rejected for a tourist brochure. The Ljubljanica, from the Fish Market Restaurant, 27-May-2009.
Absentee Landlords – Col Notebook
I recently drove through the western Slovenian village of Col, just up the road from Ajdovščina, which sits on the edge of a plateau with terrific west-facing views of the Vipava River valley (above). At 619m (2030 ft) above sea level, it held strategic importance dating back to the Romans, and as an important road junction, was an ideal place to collect tolls, thus its name, from the German zoll. Population 498 (2002).
When I was snapping a few pics of this rundown eyesore in the center of town, a local approached eager to give me the scoop. Once the most prestigious building in the village, housing a guesthouse/restaurant, or gostilna, and the local police station, its Italian owner is ignoring it like the plague, choosing to let it crumble and rot. It’s been sitting like this for more than a decade, he said, and the county, or opčina, is powerless to do anything about it.
There are plenty of hiking trails through the forests and hills nearby, and you can check out Roman ruins on the nearby Šance, Šturmanik and Rižemberk hills. Not sure what this was, just a few Kms further up the road. And old Italian military installation?
Links for more about Col:
[SLO Tourism Board] [Wiki]
35 second Hotel Apoksiomen (Mali Lošinj) Advisor
Hotel Apoksiomen
Riva Lošinjsih Kapetana I
51550 Mali Lošinj, Croatia
Visited 5-9 May 09
Very nicely done. Casual semi-statelyiness. Friendly, pleasant staff, night and day. It’s named after a 2nd or 1st C. BC bronze statue found between the islands of Lošinj and Veli Orjuli where he rested beneath the waves for about 1800 years. He’s being cleaned up at the moment and is expected to return to Mali Lošinj next year.
A terrific deal at 59 EUR/night via HRS, 10 EUR more for a portside room; two have balconies. Mine was nice. Great views and lots of sun. Don’t expect that price during the summer months.
It’s part of Vienna International group, which also has properties in Poland, The Czech Republic, Germany, France, Austria and Romania, and which claims that the cheapest rates can be found directly from their website. If not, they’ll pay you the difference. I didn’t check out the claim, but you can here.
Wifi throughout, and it was free via my HRS booking. Breakfast was OK+.
One complaint: They really need to fix that large bump in the floor that divides the breakfast room in half. That’s not something a guest needs to be wary of when carrying a cup of coffee and a glass of juice across the room before 8 in the morning. OK? Thanks.
hotel apoksiomen 2009-05-06-Mali Lošinj 02, originally uploaded by pirano.
Lošinj notebook
The Croatian island of Lošinj is the northernmost area of Europe where lemons grow. That tidbit tells you quite a bit about what to expect from this northern Adriatic island in the Kvarner Gulf. The island’s 33km long, but for all intents and purposes, considerably longer given its close relationship with it’s northern sister Cres, at a whopping 66km long and 405 square km the largest Croatian island. The two are joined at the village of Osor by a laughably small bridge that traverses its eponymous bay. (It’s laughable because I laughed out loud. I guess I was simply expecting something not so small.)
Looking for an Adriatic island trip in early May –my first– the Cres- Lošinj archipelago was a great choice, but primarily one of practicality (along with a few nice reviews). Besides Krk to the east, it’s the closest to Ljubljana and easily accessible via Rijeka or just beyond Opatija.
Ferry:
Brestova-Porozina, 15 KUN (2 EUR/2.90 USD)/person, 96 (13.15 EUR/18.39 USD) for a car. About a 30 minute ride. Service is more or less hourly, besides the longer midday/lunch break. Here’s last year’s (2008) high season schedule, which will probably be quite similar this year. If you’re on a tight schedule, note that in 2008 the last boat back left at midnight.
Roads:
From Porozina it’s a fabulous drive with plenty of great views towards both coasts, and you’ll drive through evergreen and some hardwood forests. Give yourself a little time to adjust to the narrow roads, and take care on the turns. Most bus drivers I came across took them very fast, particularly uphill. There are lots of cyclists too.
There’s plenty of road construction –some major– at the moment, with the aim presumably to have work completed before high season hits. I got the impression that that really won’t happen.
It took about an hour-and-a-half to reach the town of Cres, and another hour before we parked the car for the next three days in Mali Lošinj. Unless you’re just doing so to get your bearings, there is no need to drive into town (no free parking). There’s ample free parking available just a short walk from the port; at least a few hotels do offer closer parking but with a fee.
From the ferry dock at Brestova it’s about 70 km to Mali Lošinj, the county seat and main port, a very pleasant and relatively quiet (at least in early May) harbor town with a west facing port. The harbor’s nicely-maintained promenade, or riva, is lined with an ample number of restaurants, cafes, bars, and gift shops, along with a few hotels (I got a decent deal for the portside Apoksiomen) and a couple galleries.
While virtually anything can be done on the cheap with a little resourcefulness, if you’re looking for something low budget overall, you won’t find it here (or from what I hear, anywhere on the Dalmatian coast anymore). I dined at several restaurants, and enjoyed the fresh seafood, the local olive oils and wines. Few entrees came in at under 15 EUR, most were more.
I saw a pair of nice campgrounds nearby as well, which is where I will stay when I return.
Plenty of boats head out in the morning for day trips to the various nearby islands, most costing 100 KUN/13.70 EUR/19 USD per person. Most leave at 10am for pre-determined destination, but most captains welcome itinerary changes. I went to Susak, about an hour away, which came highly recommended.
If graffiti is your thing, save that creative energy for a small and abandoned Yugoslav navy installation just beyond the western edge of the port. Plenty of dilapidated buildings to serve as your canvas. There a small curving tunnel you can roam through afterwards. (There’s a brief blind spot in the center but fear not, you can make it without a flashlight.)
Overall, terrific. It’s said to be very busy in the summer months, so best times to visit are spring and fall. Definitely bring some sun block.
About a dozen pics on my flickr stream.
Mali Lošinj 09, originally uploaded by pirano.
LJ Pic of the Day
I’ve been listening to violins much of the day, so thought this appropriate, a gentleman jamming away near some of the Sunday morning flea market stalls a few weeks ago.
The weekly flea market is usually a pleasure to browse. Plenty of Yugoslav and Tito memorabilia, but there’s a nice selection of better antiques from time to time as well. Much of the stuff is over-priced, but do bargain. Located mostly on the east bank (castle hill side) of the Ljublanica, but has been regularly spilling spilling over to the other side via the Cobbler’s Bridge. Every Sunday, beginning at 8. Dealers begin packing up around 2.
Ljubljana 0161, originally uploaded by pirano.
Ljubljana in WaPo (LJ Pic of the Day)
There was an entertaining piece on Ljubljana in yesterday’s Washington Post Travel section. At more than 2000 words, ‘Ljubljana: Too Cool to Get Hot‘ is a breezy read, quite positive overall, and makes the city quite welcoming indeed.
I did find this a bit bothersome:
Thus would Ljubljana, which had somehow survived the Romans, Napoleon, the Soviets and more…
When, precisely, did Ljubljana “survive” the Soviets? This irksome and patently false link to the former Yugoslavia under Soviet control keeps popping up in places where it really shouldn’t. Washington Post editors, if not staff reporters, really should know better. In the bigger scheme of things, this ain’t ancient history. [Here's another recent example from the LA Times.]
Anyway, a nice read. Check it out.
By the way, again resuming the LJ Pic of the Day chore with this, shot a few days ago at the main central market.
Ljubljana 0160, originally uploaded by pirano.
Underwater recordings of seal calls
I watched Werner Herzog’s Encounters at the End of the World last night and was just blown away by these seal calls recorded beneath the Antarctic ice. Someone posted the bit on Youtube (the calls begin about 40 secs in):
It’s an interesting film, examining among other things, the quirky kinda folks who wind up at the end of the world.
Antarctica is at the top of my list of Places I’d Love To Go But Probably Never Will. Depending on where you begin, where you go, what you do and the duration, travel packages range from $6000 to $40,000.
Justice, or Self-Absorbed Bike Lane-Parking Moron 000000022
This massive hunk of steel, LJ 14-4DB, parked on Kongresni Trg on Saturday 26-April, nearly forced me into a head-on collision. When I was done cursing in about a dozen different languages, I noticed the ticket on his windshield.
We’ll call this progress, and a minor victory.
More about Self-Absorbed Bike Lane-parking Morons here, and don’t forget to check out the eponymous flickr group here.
Self-absorbed bike lane-parking moron 000000022, originally uploaded by pirano.
Remembering Emerson, briefly
I hate quotations. Tell me what you know.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, originally uploaded by George Eastman House.
LJ Pic of the Day
Quick landscape, late Saturday afternoon, looking south.
Ljubljana 0152, originally uploaded by pirano.
Photos from the Aftermath of Hurricane Mitch
I finally got around to scanning some slides I shot ten years ago when I visited Posoltega, Nicaragua, in April 1999, about six months after storms brought in by Hurricane Mitch devastated the area. The photo above is of a refugee camp set up in Posoltega, in the country’s northwest.
On October 30, 1998, torrential rains brought in by Hurricane Mitch filled the nearby Casitas volcano, forcing the slope, above right, to collapse. It produced a massive river of mud, at some points more than a kilometer wide, that swept through the area, ultimately killing upwards of 3000 people. It annihilated several villages and smaller settlements, and displacing several thousand. [A good Mitch summary on Wiki.]
Below are some scattered notes from the visit (some are still in a stash of stuff back in the US), but first some quick background:
Nicaragua dominated much of the foreign policy debate in the US during the Reagan years, so it was somewhat predictable that Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega’s tirade at the recent Americas summit brought the country back into the headlines. When he was voted out of power in 1990, media attention on the country more or less vanished until Ortega regained the presidency in close elections in 2006. By then, after setting up a mutual immunity deal with the right wing Arnoldo Alemán, who was president from 1997 to 2002, he had long since lost support from most senior Sandinista (FSLN) party partners, who left and formed other parties, taking with them countless party loyalists. During its time in power, the Alemán administration quickly became synonymous with corruption and graft. An opinion poll published during my 1999 visit found that more than half of Nicaraguans viewed him as more corrupt than the former dictator Anastasio Somoza whom the Sandinistas overthrew 20 years earlier, and for whom Alemán worked. (Alemán was charged, eventually convicted and received a 20-year sentence, which was later overturned by the Supreme Court in what most view as part of the deal struck with Ortega.)
So, the widespread tales of corruption I was told by people in Posoltega (and in Managua) didn’t come as a huge shock. At an aid distribution warehouse (pictured above), several of the workers expressed their frustration with the federal government which was doing next to nothing to help the municipality, at the time governed by a Sandinista mayor. Bill Clinton visited the area during a Central American tour in March 1999; just prior to his visit housing construction materials were trucked in, along with 2000 bags of cement, a ‘donation’ from the government. After he left, the materials were hauled away under cover of night.
I spoke at length with Posoltega’s mayor, Felicita Zeledon Rodriguez, who said that after the initial influx of aid in the weeks after the rains finally subsided, nothing had arrived in more than two months. Among the numerous problems she faced was that the aid assistance was being taxed by the Aleman administration. Food was running scarce, she said. “The first harvest is in August, and it’s only April.”
Above is Jose de la Cruz Poveda, 17 at the time, who was one of the refugee camp leaders.
In Posoltega, my translator Tanya and I met Alvaro Montalvan, a reporter for Canal 12, who was investigating reports that much of the international relief aid sent to the stricken areas was actually winding up being sold in various markets in Managua. He and his cameraman were heading to the Port of Corinto to check on the status of 28 cargo containers of relief aid which had arrived on March 19 from Los Angeles, and we joined him. We tracked down the port’s container operations chief, who eventually admitted that seven of those 40-foot containers couldn’t be accounted for. They simply vanished. And in the meantime, as the stocks in Posoltega’s relief center were dwindling rapidly, the containers above were sitting port side for more than a month.
More pics, 18 in all, are in a flickr set here.
I know that there are numerous NGOs working in the region, and that a growing number of travelers are visiting that part of Nicaragua. This is a long since forgotten footnote of the country’s history, and I’d love to hear from anyone who’s visited or worked there over the past decade who can share any updates. I’m extremely interested in learning how people in the area have fared.
Ljubljana to and from – budget flight reference
I spent most of the day booking my European summer travel –again, lots!– and as has become custom, was again frustrated by the lack of budget carriers that operate out of Ljubljana’s Pučnik airport. (Currently, there’s one.) So, when going by train –always choice No 1– wasn’t an option, I had to look at nearby airports. And instead of depositing my notes in the recycle bin, I thought I’d put them here where others may find them of use.
What characterizes nearby will vary from person to person. For me Venice Marco Polo (roughly 3 1/2 hrs by bus from Ljubljana) is the outside limit.
So here is a list of airports that will make Destination Ljubljana a little bit closer for you, and the budget airlines that operate to/from there. I’m assuming that these all list the current 2009 spring/summer timetables, but can’t be 100% certain of that. So if they’re not, don’t waterboard me. Instead, let me know! Enjoy!
Graz, Austria
- RyanAir – [route map]
- Tuifly – [route map]
Klagenfurt, Austria
- GermanWings – [route map]
- RyanAir – [route map]
- Tuifly – [route map]
Ljubljana
- EasyJet – [route map] – At the moment, only one flight daily to/from London-Stansted.
Pula, Croatia
- GermanWings – [route map]
- RyanAir – [route map]
- ThomsonFly – [route map]
Rijeka, Croatia
- Tuifly – [route map]
Trieste, Italy
- RyanAir – [route map]
Venice (Marco Polo)
(Buses from Mestre rail station: ACTV linea n°15, about 35 min; ATVO FLY BUS, 17-20 min)
- EasyJet – [route map]
- SkyEurope – [route map]
- ThomsonFly – [route map]
- Transavia – [route map]
- Tuifly – [route map]
- Wizzair – [route map]
Venice (Treviso)
For more on this airport that even The Village People use, read this.
- GermanWings – [route map]
- RyanAir – [route map]
Zagreb, Croatia
- GermanWings – [route map]
- Tuifly – [route map]
- Wizzair – [route map]
Slovenia’s Adria Airways website is here. It’s a very good airline, and while it can hardly be considered a budget carrier, good deals can be found.
And while we’re at it, here’s the website for the Ljubljana Bus Station.
Typsetting using 12 pt type, how long would the largest known prime number be?
Depending on the font, between 17 and 20 miles (27 and 32 km), according to typography.com, for this number with more than 12 million digits.
(via Metafilter)
LJ Pic of the Day
From yesterday’s Cvičkarija festival in Ljubljana, a celebration for Dolenjska’s cviček wine, which was a key ingredient for Martin Strel’s successful swim down the Amazon two years ago. Wine and Earth Day should be synonymous, no?
(The guy wouldn’t get out of the way. My apologies.)
Drei. Das Triptychon in der Moderne
Some things are more inviting in threes.
This is Steigbild X by Katharina Sieverding from Three: The Triptych in Modern Art, an excellent exhibit I checked out a few months at the Kunstmuseum Stuttgart. 60 triptychs are featured in the exhibit, including works by Max Beckmann, Francis Bacon, and one of my personal favorites, Otto Dix. Absolutely worth a visit if you’re passing through Stuttgart between now and 14-June. [Getting there]
A few more:
Detail from Argonaulen by Max Beckmann, and
this detail from GrossStadt by Otto Dix.
I snapped 22 pics from the exhibit which are here.
Steigbild X, originally uploaded by pirano.
LJ Pic of the Day
I’ve never been a ‘car guy’ –I drove a Yugo around the hills of southeast Ohio for more than five years– but these will always hold a special place in my heart.
Ljubljana 0119, originally uploaded by pirano.
Shock and Awe: Interrogators pressured to establish Al Qaida – Iraq Link
Oh, say it wasn’t so. Bush/Cheney using torture in hopes of perpetuating a lie?
From a report released yesterday (21-Apr) by the Senate Armed Services Committee (via McClatchy):
A former senior U.S. intelligence official familiar with the interrogation issue said that Cheney and former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld demanded that the interrogators find evidence of al Qaida-Iraq collaboration.
and
“There was constant pressure on the intelligence agencies and the interrogators to do whatever it took to get that information out of the detainees, especially the few high-value ones we had, and when people kept coming up empty, they were told by Cheney’s and Rumsfeld’s people to push harder,” he continued.
“Cheney’s and Rumsfeld’s people were told repeatedly, by CIA . . . and by others, that there wasn’t any reliable intelligence that pointed to operational ties between bin Laden and Saddam, and that no such ties were likely because the two were fundamentally enemies, not allies.”
and
“While we were there a large part of the time we were focused on trying to establish a link between al Qaida and Iraq and we were not successful in establishing a link between al Qaida and Iraq,” (former U.S. Army psychiatrist, Maj. Charles) Burney told staff of the Army Inspector General. “The more frustrated people got in not being able to establish that link . . . there was more and more pressure to resort to measures that might produce more immediate results.”
stun gun enema, originally uploaded by pirano.
Happy Earth Day
Rural school children, San Augustine County, Texas (LOC), originally uploaded by The Library of Congress.
Grains of sand as art.
Via Discover is this fabulous gallery of magnified grains of sand. From A Grain of Sand – Nature’s Secret Wonder, by Gary Greenberg, published last week.
Check it out. A nifty promo video is here.
