Hotel Brunswick, Lancaster, PA

Updated April 2016. Please note, this review refers to the former Hotel Brunswick in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and in no way reflects or refers to the new Hotel Lancaster which today occupies the same building. At the end of this review I wrote, "... the current owners/managers must pay more attention to details, and push staff to provide a better, friendlier service - and they need to do it soon, or the hotel may continue its decline beyond the point of no return."

That 'point of no return' occurred in late 2013, when the hotel was closed down and taken over by new owners who have refurbished the building and rebadged it as the Hotel Lancaster. The transformation from the old rundown hotel into an updated and renamed hotel seems to have given the building a completely new 'lease of life', so much so that the reviews on TripAdvisor and other sites are today overwhelmingly positive, whereas once they were almost all negative. I was tempted to delete this post, but have decided to keep it for historical purposes.

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The Hotel Brunswick in Lancaster, Pennsylvania promotes itself as “A full service hotel with a three-star rating to accommodate all your needs while travelling. We boast 221 spacious rooms and over 12,000 sq. feet of meeting and banquet space for conventions and family gatherings.”

I like to make a point of being as honest and as positive as possible with my reviews, but quite frankly I had to work hard to be positive reviewing the Brunswick. The hotel website is full of beautifully presented images that do not always reflect what I saw during my five night stay during August 2012. In fact, on initially viewing the website I thought I was looking at a completely different hotel.

An image on the hotel website shows a group of uniformed, smiling staff who look like they are bursting with energy and enthusiasm, and who want nothing more than to please hotel guests. I suspect this is a stock photo image, or at best reflects much better days for the hotel. I saw no uniformed staff during my stay, and while the few staff I did see carried out their duties well enough, reception staff came across as mostly bored and indifferent. However, my stay was not a disaster by any means, and I even extended my initial three night stay by an extra two nights.

Room 912 bathroom had plenty of towels, mini shampoo, and hair dryer, etc

LOCATION: The Hotel Brunswick is located in the heart of historic downtown Lancaster. Within walking distance of the hotel are many restaurants, the city’s famous Central Market, Fulton Opera House and numerous shops and art galleries. The hotel is also directly opposite the local bus station which is perfect for travellers (like myself) who don't have their own transport. Note: the Greyhound/Amtrak terminal is about 3/4 of a mile away at the end of North Queen Street. For those visitors with their own vehicles, a privately run parking garage is located right next to the Hotel Brunswick. Separate fees apply when using this facility.

Room 912 general view

FACILITIES: Room 912 had everything most travellers would expect to find in a typical hotel room and while I have no complaints about the size of the room or its amenities, it was immediately obvious on entering (judging by the bits of paper and other detritus on the floor), that the carpet had not been vacuumed for what seemed like several days.

Other facilities listed on the hotel website include:

Free Wireless Internet service [which worked fine for my purposes]

Cable TV and Showtime Channels [umm, can’t remember much about these]

Voice Mail [if it was available, I never used it]

Coffee Maker, Ironing Board/Iron, and Hair Dryer [yes]

Individual Climate Control [yes, if they mean the ability to adjust the air-con yourself. In fact, the air-con unit in my room was so efficient that I had to turn the temperature up to warm the room. And this was during August.]

BREAKFAST: Breakfast was passable (two cereals, bread for toast, frozen waffles, mini-muffins, coffee, apple and orange juice, etc.), but the service was very poor. Sometimes there were not enough plates, and at other times, no napkins, or the coffee had run out. To cap it all off, no one appeared responsible for cleaning tables after they had been vacated, which often meant tables were smeared with jelly and butter, or covered with food crumbs of one type or other.

Large comfortable queen size beds

GENERAL IMPRESSIONS: According to the ‘History’ section of the hotel’s website, “The property operated under the “Hotel Brunswick” name until June of 2001 when it acquired the “Ramada” flag and was named the “Ramada Inn Brunswick Conference Center.” In February of 2005 the hotel was purchased out of bankruptcy [my emphasis] by a California based company and the “Ramada Flag” was removed. The hotel owners decided to keep the historic name of “HOTEL BRUNSWICK.”

Clearly, the hotel has seen better times, and even though it apparently underwent some renovations a couple of years ago, it looks like it has never quite recovered from the financial crisis that hit in 2010. It is possible that renovations are still taking place at the hotel, albeit very slowly, which might account for the very divergent reviews for the Brunswick that can be found on TripAdvisor and other websites. The website advertises an on-site restaurant but it was not operating during my stay, and I would venture to say that the restaurant has not operated there for quite some time, although the dining area was being used as the breakfast space.

Room 912, general view

I checked the hotel website while writing this entry. Under the ‘Dining’ tab, the site states clearly that, "Our restaurant & lounge are temporarily closed.” However, under the ‘Guest Rooms’ section of the website, I found this: “The Hotel Brunswick offers an on-site restaurant and versatile meeting rooms.” I can’t vouch for the meeting rooms, but I am prepared to guess that the restaurant and lounge are still closed. It seems little has changed in that respect in the ten months since my stay.

Despite everything I have written, the Brunswick was not the dump some reviewers seem to think it is. Yes, the escalators leading to the reception area were not working while I was there (and still appear to be out of order), however the lifts were and still are operational.

The view from room 912 overlooking Lancaster Square

The excellent location and the great price make the Brunswick a perfect place from which to explore the city of Lancaster and the surrounding Amish country. However, the current owners/managers must pay more attention to details, and push staff to provide a better, friendlier service - and they need to do it soon, or the hotel may continue its decline beyond the point of no return.

Here is a short video I put together from footage recorded just after my arrival in room 912:

HOTEL BRUNSWICK, LANCASTER, PA | My Rating: **1/2

151, North Queen Street, Lancaster, PA. Ph: (717) 397-4801

Stay: Five nights (August 24-August 28, 2012).

Rate: $52.75 (average/night incl. tax). Room: 912.

Visit the new Hotel Lancaster website...

Friday Photos: Morning Glory

The Morning Star, Venus, hovers above a rising sun

My photographs today, feature a selection of images taken during the early morning hours, either before the sun had risen above the horizon, or soon after. In the image above, you can see what is popularly known as the ‘morning star’, although the planet’s official name is of course, Venus (also known as the ‘evening star’).

Early morning countryside. Mr Fox is out there somewhere.

Early morning country field somewhere along Australia’s Mallee Highway (Route B12), not far from the Victoria country town, Ouyen. I remember watching as a fox slowly loped across this open field, while presumably on its way back to its den after a night out foraging for food. I had pulled into a parking bay along the highway the night before where I slept in the back of my station wagon.

The Mulwala Bridge linking Victoria and New South Wales

Early morning at Lake Mulwala, where the twin towns of Yarrawonga (in Victoria), and Mulwala (in New South Wales) are joined together by the Mulwala Bridge, seen here soon after dawn. The name, Yarrawonga, is thought to be derived from an Aboriginal word meaning ‘place where the wonga pigeon rested’. Mulwala derives its name from an aboriginal word for 'rain'.

Early morning fog haze over Sydney

The early morning sun is rising through a haze of fog in the image seen above. This, and the photo below was taken during a visit to Sydney in 2009. In the image below, the sun has risen higher and is burning away the morning mist to promise a beautiful day out and about on Sydney Harbor.

Early morning Sydney skyline

...

Someone to watch over me. My early morning 'angel'.

And finally, the early morning sun throws my shadow 50 feet just before continuing my 2009 road trip from Adelaide to Sydney.

Click images to view larger sizes.

The Boy Who Cried, Wolf!

“Look at the dog chasing the man,” said the boy, who seemed to be around seven or eight years of age.

“What are you talking about?” asked his mother in obvious confusion.

“There,” said the boy, “see, there’s a dog chasing a man?”

It was late on a Friday evening in mid-September, when I, and a group of 20-30 international and American visitors, gathered close to the edge of Grand Canyon’s south rim to watch as a perfect autumn day drew to a close, and long shadows began to rise and stretch across canyon walls away to the north.

The young boy pointed off into the evening haze, and dozens of curious visitors followed the direction of his outstretched hand to look for the ‘dog chasing the man’.

Eventually, even the oldest pair of eyes watched in wonder as the two shadows seen in the image above slowly grew, stretched and changed shape as the sun settled lower in the west.

I don’t know if the child’s parents had ever told the lad the story of The Boy Who Cried, Wolf, but memories of that old folk tale come to mind each time I look at this image, and I remember the boy who taught me once again, the simple pleasures of looking at the world through the eyes of a child.

Montezuma Castle National Monument, Arizona

Montezuma Castle National Monument, Arizona

During my 2012 visit to the United States, I spent five nights in Flagstaff, Arizona, which I used as my base while I explored some of the surrounding country. During my stay, one of the locations I happened upon―as I headed somewhat randomly, south―was the Montezuma Castle National Monument, a short distance off Interstate 17. Phoenix is approximately 140 km (87 mi) south of the monument, and Flagstaff, is about 80 km (50 mi) north.

I had never heard of the monument before my visit, nor therefore, had I seen images of the site. To say I was awestruck by the size and scale of what turns out to be some of the best preserved cliff-dwellings in the American Southwest, is an understatement.

The cliff-dwellings at Montezuma Castle were built and used by the Pre-Columbian Sinagua people around 700 AD. The Sinagua were northern cousins of the Hohokam, and the site was occupied from approximately 1125 to 1400 AD, with peak occupation thought to be around 1300 AD. By the way, when European Americans discovered the cliff-dwellings in the 1860s, they named them for the Mexican Aztec emperor, Montezuma II, due to mistaken belief that the emperor had been connected to their construction. In fact, neither part of the monument's name is correct. The site was abandoned by the Sinagua 100 years before Montezuma was born, and the dwellings were not a castle. The building was more like a prehistoric high rise apartment complex.

Exactly why the Sinagua abandoned the cliff-dwellings is not known, but warfare, drought, and clashes with the newly arrived Yavapai people have been suggested. The five-story stone and mortar dwellings contain 20 rooms and once housed about 50 people. Nearby are the remnants of Tuzigoot (Apache for “Crooked Water”), a Singuan Village built on the summit of a ridge. Tuzigoot was two stories high, with 77 ground floor rooms that were accessible via ladders through roof openings. Unfortunately, little of this site has remained.

Montezuma Castle information panel

Due to its isolated location, only about 350,000 tourists visit the site each year. Access to the ruins themselves has not been allowed since 1950 due to extensive damage of the dwelling, and the unstable nature of the limestone cliff face. However, there is a paved trail that leads from the visitor centre and skirts the base of the cliff containing the ruins, from which excellent views of the dwellings can be seen. In addition, numerous information panels (like the one seen at right) provide interesting historical and cultural facts about the cliff-dwellings, and the surrounding landscape.

The dwellings and the surrounding area were declared a U.S. National Monument on December 8, 1906 as a result of the American Antiquities Act, signed earlier in June of the same year. It was one of the four original sites designated National Monuments by President Theodore Roosevelt. The National Monument was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966.

If you are visiting Montezuma Castle, allow time to visit Montezuma Well several miles away. The well is a limestone sink created by the collapse of a large underground cavern, which is fed by permanent springs. There are also ruins located here from large pueblos to one-room houses.

What You Need To Know

> Operating Hours & Seasons

Open Daily: 8:00 AM-7:00 PM in summer, and 8 AM-5 PM in winter.

Closed on Christmas Day.

Phone: (928) 567-3322

Model depicting internal layout of cliff-dwellings

Montezuma Castle Entrance Fees

Adults (16 and over): $5.00 (good for seven days)

Children (under 16): FREE. Entrance fees for Montezuma Castle are collected inside the park Visitor Center during normal business hours.

Passes are available at a discounted rate of $8.00 for both Montezuma Castle and Tuzigoot National Monuments.

More Information

Montezuma Castle on Wikipedia... 

US National Park Service... 

Arizona Leisure... 

TED on Tuesday: Philippe Petit, High-Wire Artist

Philippe Petit during his 1974 Twin Towers walk

Philippe Petit is a French high-wire artist who gained fame for his high-wire walk between the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, on 7 August 1974. Petit, who was born in France, discovered magic and juggling at an early age, and at 16, he took his first steps on the wire.

"Within one year," he told a reporter, "I taught myself to do all the things you could do on a wire. I learned the backward somersault, the front somersault, the unicycle, the bicycle, the chair on the wire, jumping through hoops. But I thought, 'What is the big deal here? It looks almost ugly.' So I started to discard those tricks and to reinvent my art."

World Trade Center walk

On August 7, 1974, Petit stepped onto a wire strung between the Twin Towers. Balancing 110 stories in the air, Petit played on the tightrope for 40 minutes to the wonder and amazement of the people watching on the ground. Petit was arrested as he left the wire, but as the police cuffed him, he had a huge grin across his face—for he had achieved a feat everyone, including himself at times, had thought impossible.

“The impossible — we are told — cannot be achieved,” Petit tells the TED blog in a Q&A about his new eBook. “To overcome the ‘impossible’ we need to use our wits and be fearless.”

The story of Petit’s walk was brilliantly told in the documentary film, Man On Wire, by UK director James Marsh. Petit has told the story in his own words, in his book To Reach The Clouds, also republished as Man on Wire.

In this TED talk, Philippe Petit recalls the walk, talks about finding your passion, and makes the case for confronting your fears and attempting the ‘impossible’.

Today, Petit shares his time between New York City where he is an artist in residence at the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine, and a home in the Catskills.

If you are unfamiliar with Philippe Petit and his walk between the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, this YouTube video includes a number of images of Philippe taken during the event.

More Information

Philippe Petit on Wikipedia... [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Petit]

Buy the Man On Wire DVD at Amazon.Com... Man On Wire [DVD]

Buy the Man on Wire book at Amazon.Com... Man on Wire

Armchair Travel: Norway’s Atlantic Ocean Road

Image courtesy of Peter Kvalvikfjellet [http://www.kvalvik.no]

The Atlantic Ocean Road is an 8.3-kilometer (5.2 mi) long section of County Road 64 which runs through an archipelago in Eide and Averøy in Møre og Romsdal, Norway.

The road traverses an unsheltered part of the Norwegian Sea, connecting the island of Averøy with the mainland and Romsdalshalvøya peninsula. The road is built on several small islands and skerries, which are connected by a number of causeways, viaducts and eight bridges—the most prominent being Storseisundet Bridge.

The route was originally proposed as a railway line in the early 20th century, but this was ultimately abandoned. Serious planning of the road started in the 1970s, and construction started on 1 August 1983. During construction, the area was hit by twelve hurricanes, but despite the hazards involved in completing the project, the road was opened in July 1989.

Today, the Atlantic Ocean Road is preserved as a cultural heritage site and is classified as a National Tourist Route. For reasons that will become clear as you watch the video below, the road is a popular site to film automotive commercials, and it has been declared the world's best road trip. There are four rest areas along the road from which stunning views of the surrounding landscape (or should that be seascape?) can be viewed.

The video below was filmed by Heine Schjølberg, who lives in Kristiansund, Norway, a city and municipality with a direct connection to the Atlantic Ocean Road. Schjølberg states on his YouTube page that the video was shot with a GoProHero 2 and a Sony XDCAM EX1 camera. He goes on to say that the footage was recorded the day after Cyclone Patrick (renamed Dagmar by the Norwegian Weather Service) hit the area on Christmas Day, 2011.

More Information

Wikipedia... 

Visit Norway... 

The Atlantic Road... 

Heine Schjølberg...

Happy Memorial Day Weekend, America

~ The Memorial Day Weekend is considered the official start of summer in America, and I wish I was there to see the summer in. Since I’m not, I thought I might at least point lucky visitors and locals to a few of my favorite New York-centric websites and events.

Shakespeare In The Park

Over the past 50 years, more than five million people have enjoyed free productions of plays by William Shakespeare at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. This year The Comedy of Errors is the Public Theater’s choice for their free annual Shakespeare In The Park production. The play kicks off Tuesday, May 28 and runs through until Sunday, June 30, 2013. All shows begin at 8:30 PM.​​​, and there is no intermission during the 90 minute performance.

Among the actors featuring in this year’s production will be Jesse Tyler Ferguson, one of the stars of Modern Family, Hamish Linklater, and Becky Ann Baker.

​

If you want to join the audience, you are advised to line up early on the day of performance.

​Free tickets are distributed on each performance day from 12:00 PM (midday) via the free lines at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park. Tickets are for the daily performance only. You can not line up to get tickets for the following day, or for an upcoming performance.

​

Once The Comedy of Errors finishes its run it will be followed by Love's Labour's Lost, A New Musical​, which is of course, a musical adaptation of Shakespeare’s Love's Labour's Lost. This production will run from July 23 - August 18​, 2013.

More information: Shakespeare In The Park…

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Goldstar.Com

I have written about this website before here… This is my ‘go to’ site for cheap tickets to a whole range of events in New York City and beyond. Via Goldstar you can find tickets (many at half their box office price) to numerous theatre productions and major sporting events, as well as walking tours, harbor cruises and much more. The great thing about Goldstar is that discount tickets are available for similar events in more than 30 other cities across the United States.

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SummerStage 2013

SummerStage is another annual arts and music program of New York’s, City Parks Foundation. It schedules a host of free events throughout the summer months, and 2013 will be no exception. As in previous years, the artists chosen for the 2013 program represent a wide range of genres and cultures, and perform in outdoor settings accessible to people of all ages and backgrounds. I was lucky to see one of my favourite performers, the late Gil Scott-Heron performing as part of the 2010 SummerStage concert series, and I am very grateful to the City Parks Foundation for giving me that opportunity.

SummerStage strives to develop a deep appreciation for contemporary, traditional, and emerging artists as well as the communities in which these artists originate. All SummerStage shows go on ‘rain or shine’, and are only cancelled if extreme weather events are forecasted.

You can follow SummerStage on Twitter and Like them on Facebook to keep up to date with the latest SummerStage fan content and contest opportunities.

More Information: Summerstage...

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Good things are said to come in three’s, and the above three sections point to three of the best in my experience. If you are visiting New York City for the first time, you are in for a treat, and I can only wish I was there with you. All things being equal, I plan on visiting America and New York City again next year, so you can be sure the next twelve months will be filled with much anticipation, and forward planning. I can hardly wait.

Friday Photos: Adelaide Central Market

Let them eat cake? Not when the bread is as fresh as this.

Originally known as the City Market, the facility was officially named the Central Market in August 1965, and continues to offer almost every variety of fresh fruit and vegetable available in South Australia.

The world comes to shop at the market.

Hot nuts! Once you start eating them, you can't stop.

Several tour operators offer tours of the Central Market.  For more information on tours of the Market, visit Top Food & Wine Tours… 

If it is available fresh, you will almost certainly find it at the market.

Processed meats to go.

A wide range of events and activities are scheduled each week at the market. Some traders offer product samples in ‘try before you buy’ promotions, while others present short classes, and product/produce demonstrations each week.

Ice on Mt. Brocoli.

How many varieties of Mettwurst can there possibly be? Ask here.

Mark Gleeson conducts Central Market Tours that provide participants with an exclusive experience interacting with suppliers, producers and retailers of South Australia’s vibrant food industry.

Watermelons by the ton.

Mid-eastern spices and processed foods.

More than 80 stalls offer a wide range of fresh and processed meats, cheese, seafood, nuts, confectionary, coffee and other specialty foods. And of course, let’s not overlook the bakeries, patisseries, and numerous cafés and restaurants.

There is always time for coffee and cake.

Trading Hours

Tuesday: 7am - 5.30pm

Wednesday: 9am - 5.30pm*

Thursday: 9am - 5.30pm

Friday: 7am - 9pm

Saturday: 7am - 3pm

*Optional trading day, not all stalls open

Closed Public Holidays

Here is a brief video of footage I shot during a visit to the Adelaide Central Market:

More Information

Adelaide Central Market… 

Central Market Tours… 

My iPad 2 – One Year On

One year ago today, I bought a 64Gb iPad 2. I purchased the device in preparation for the three month visit I subsequently made to America between August and October, 2012.

I had two main purposes in mind when I bought it: one was that it made it easier to leave my 15 inch Toshiba laptop behind, and thereby reduce the amount of weight I was carrying; and the other was my desire to use the iPad as an eBook reader.

I have said it before, and I don’t mind saying it again―buying the iPad was the best pre-travel gift I have ever given myself. The convenience it offered in terms of size, weight, and functionality has proved its worth over and over again.

A year after my initial purchase, the device is rarely out of my sight or out of reach. The word I keep coming back to when I talk about the iPad is convenience. Couple convenience with ease of use, and you have a device that has helped to revolutionize the way we use technology to connect with each other, and tap into the vast resources of the internet. Making use of a basic WiFi service, I find I am forever reaching for my iPad to look for information online, research some small item of interest using Wikipedia, or translate a couple of lines of French or Latin that I have encountered in one of the many eBooks I now have saved to my iBooks app.

I maintain a daily journal with Pages, track my daily spending with Numbers, and keep in touch with family and friends via Facebook. Using a free app supplied by my bank I can move money between accounts, and to the delight of my creditors I can pay bills on time with Bpay. I have far more apps than I need or use on a daily basis, but then why not? Most of them were free to download, and if I need the space for more important or useful applications, they can be deleted with a couple of taps.

I have written before about my favorite iPad apps here… and here… so I won’t repeat myself in this entry, however, I do have plans to write about some other favorite applications not reviewed already.

After twelve months my iPad continues to work flawlessly, and I am more than happy with the physical size of the device, as well as its 64Gb capacity. The quality of the images I can get with the camera is one of my biggest frustrations, although video footage is actually quite good―as long as you are shooting in plenty of light. Although I have WordPress and Blogger apps, I prefer to use my laptop to write for and maintain The Compleat Traveller. Even though I have bought a keyboard to use with the iPad, I find writing with my laptop to be easier, faster, and generally more accurate. Personally, I find the iPad’s virtual keyboard good for short journal entries, and minor text entry work for things like email, Facebook, and other such tasks, but for long periods of typing it just doesn’t suit me.

Quite frankly, apart from my complaint with the camera and virtual keyboard, I am struggling to think of any other issue that has been the cause of major―or even minor concern. The biggest frustrations are caused by badly designed apps, not the iPad itself. Recently, I exchanged my old iPhone 3GS for a new Galaxy S4, and I remain very happy with that decision. However, I can’t see myself swapping my iPad for a rival tablet device any time soon.

I realise I have not written anything about using the iPad as an eReader, but I will leave that topic for another post. In conclusion, if you have been thinking about getting an iPad, or similar tablet device, I am more than happy to recommend this amazing technology to you. It is hard to believe that tablet devices were almost unheard of five years ago, given the way they have become pretty much ubiquitous today. They can only get better, faster and more ubiquitous over the next five years.

On Ya Bike, New York!

Rue Rossini bike share rack in Paris, France

Well, it has been a long time coming, but New York City has finally caught up with many other major cities around the world with the recent introduction of the new Citi Bike, bicycle sharing program. The system will see 10,000 bicycles spread among 600 bike racks ― most of which will initially be located on Manhattan below 59th Street, and in Brooklyn in an area roughly bordered by the East River, Atlantic Avenue, Nostrad Avenue and up around the Williamsburg Bridge (see map here…).

Alta Bicycle Share, is the company running the program, while Citigroup has paid $41 million for naming rights over the next five years―hence the name, Citi Bike.

It may seem counter-intuitive to introduce bicycles onto New York City’s traffic clogged streets, but in fact since 2007, the city has added more than 250 miles of bike lanes, and the number of New Yorkers commuting to work by bike is now approaching 20,000 people, according to Department of Transportation statistics.

Recently, around 32,000 cyclists took part in the TD Five Boro Bike Tour, organised by Bike New York and the New York City Department of Transportation. The event gave participants the opportunity of riding along a 40 mile, car-free route through all five New York boroughs.

Current Citi Bike rental fees

Annual membership to use the Citi Bike system is US$95.00. So popular was the initial offering that it sold out all 5,000 “founding memberships” in less than 48 hours. Annual membership signups for Citi Bike have now passed 8,000 participants, and this number continues to increase slowly but steadily.

If you are planning to make use of the bike share program, I strongly advise you to read through the relevant sections of the City Bike New York website, especially the FrequentlyAsked Questions and the Pricing section.

The city's Department of Transportation has been pushing the bike share concept for years as an affordable commuting option, however the program stalled twice over the last year―once due to a programming glitch, and again after Superstorm Sandy damaged many of the bicycles and stands late in 2012. Despite this, the push to create bike lanes and rental programs has propelled New York into seventh place in Bicycle Magazine's list of bike friendly cities.

An Accident Waiting To Happen?

So much for the good news. The less than good news is that riding bicycles around city streets―any city street―can be a very dangerous enterprise, and riding on New York’s streets may be even more so. According to a Rutgers University study New York City had the highest fatality rate from bike accidents in North America (from 2004 to 2009). In 2010, there were 368 bicycle related crashes, 19 of which resulted in a fatality. The Department of Transportation reports that in 97 percent of fatal bicycle accidents in New York City, the rider was not wearing a helmet.

Clearly it is incumbent on all bike riders to exercise great caution while on the road, whether they use Citi Bike or have their own bicycles.

Citi Bike share station (Image: Nancy Borowick)

So how do you stay safe?

• Be aware of your surroundings at all times.
• Wear a well secured helmet.
• Obey road signs and traffic laws.
• Don’t try to beat changing traffic lights.
• Be aware of other road users who may not notice your approach. Some of the worst offenders are people getting out of parked cars, and pedestrians talking or texting on cell phones.
• Don’t wear headphones, you want to hear approaching vehicles―especially those behind you.
• Use lights for night riding. I have a flashing white headlight, a flashing red tail-light, and always wear a bright yellow safety jacket fitted with reflective strips at night.
• Ride with the flow of traffic, not against it.
• Use bike lanes — that’s why they are there!
• Make yourself visible and audible. Equip your bike with a bell and lights, and wear bright colors.

I know some of these safety tips may not make you look trendy or fashionable, but they will increase your visibility and ability to stay safe. And just because the use of bicycle helmets is not mandated by law in New York, does not mean it is safe to ride a bike without one. Do yourself a favor―be seen and be safe.

For a real world look at how bike share systems work, take a look at this video from Melbourne, Australia: How To Use Melbourne Bike Share

More Information

City Bike New York…

Bike New York…

Melbourne Bike Share...

TED on Tuesday: Wade Davis: Wilderness Worth Saving

Two great TED talks for you today―both from National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence, Wade Davis. The first is a short (6:35 min) talk called,

Gorgeous Photos Of A Backyard Wilderness Worth Saving, in which Davis urges us to save a stunning wilderness paradise in Northern Canada. Here, sacred headwaters are under threat because they hide rich tar sands. Apart from the tar sands, major energy corporations like Shell are targeting the area for the vast fields of oil and gas the region holds.

If the Keystone Pipeline, and other such developments go ahead, this stunning landscape is going to be changed in ways that are all too familiar. Wade Davis states in his talk that Imperial Metals, one of the largest mining companies in Canada “…has secured permits to establish an open pit copper and gold mine which will process 30,000 tons of rock a day for thirty years, generating hundreds of millions of tons of toxic waste that by the projects design, will simply be dumped in the lakes of the sacred headwaters.”

Davis goes on to say “…Shell Canada has plans to extract methane gas from coal seams that underlie a million acres, fracking the coal with hundreds of millions of gallons of toxic chemicals, establishing perhaps as many as 6000 wellheads, and eventually a network of roads and pipelines and flaring wellheads, all to generate methane gas that most likely will go east to fuel the expansion of the tar sands.”

It is a truly frightening prospect for one of the most beautiful places on the plant.

Wade Davis: Gorgeous Photos Of A Backyard Wilderness Worth Saving

In the following much longer (22 min) 2007 talk, Davis examines some of the worlds endangered cultures, and expresses his concern over the rate at which cultures and languages are disappearing. Fifty percent of the world's 7,000 languages, he says, are no longer taught to children. Further, he argues that indigenous cultures are not failed attempts at modernity, nor are they failed attempts to be us ― they are unique expressions of the human imagination and heart.

Wade Davis: Dreams From Endangered Cultures

In 2009 Davis received the Gold Medal from the Royal Canadian Geographical Society for his contributions to anthropology and conservation, and he is the 2011 recipient of the Explorers Medal, the highest award of the Explorers’ Club, and the 2012 recipient of the Fairchild Medal for Plant Exploration.

More Information

Official Website... 

Cultures on the Edge... 

National Geographic... 

Wade Davis on Wikipedia... 

Armchair Travel: Venice In A Day

Joerg Niggli's creative interests include producing time-lapse movies using his own video footage and photographs. The films on his Vimeo page provide stunning images of Jordan via his videos of Amman, Petra, and Wadi Rum, while other videos include a hot air balloon flight over the Swiss and French Alps, and today's Armchair Travel video documenting a day in Venice, Italy.

Venice is one of the most interesting and lovely places in the world. Visitors with a special interest in architecture will find much to delight and occupy them, with a seemingly endless array of stunning architecturally significant buildings on every narrow street or facing the many canals that make Venice such a special experience. The city is virtually the same as it was six hundred years ago, which adds to its fascinating character, and although Venice has decayed since its heyday, the city's romantic charm remains to fascinate and seduce millions of annual visitors.

The Republic of Venice dates back to 827, when a Byzantine Duke moved to what is now known as the Rialto, and for the following 970 years, the city prospered as a centre for trade under the rule of a Roman-style Senate headed by the Doge. In 1797, the city was conquered by Napoleon, a blow from which it never fully recovered. Today, Venice remains a monument to the glory days of the Renaissance, and Joerg Niggli has captured the city’s charm, beauty, and stunning buildings magnificently in his short film.

Joerg writes, “A day in Venice (Venezia) in Italy, from daybreak to sunset in time lapse. It's really a great place and I hope I can share some of its magic with this short video.” Rest assured Joerg, you have.

Venice in a Day from Joerg Niggli on Vimeo.

The video was part of the selection of Artfutura 2012 and will be shown in large cities around the world.

Music: «Heart of Champions», Chris Haigh, with a licence from premiumbeat.com. 

Joerg Niggli adds that the video was recorded mostly using a Canon G10, with some wide angle shots taken with a Canon 7D. Post production was completed in Motion, After Effects, and edited and graded in Final Cut Pro X.

More Information

Joerg Niggli Website…

Joerg Niggli’s Vimeo Page…

Friday Photos: Long Beach, California

The Ocean Center Building at 110 West Ocean Boulevard

On the penultimate day of my 2012 visit to America, I went to Long Beach, California. I had never been there before, and wanting to get out of downtown Los Angeles, a trip to the ocean seemed just the ticket before a long flight back to Australia. Here are some snapshots of my visit.

For Sale? Yes, please. Long Beach, California

I assumed Long Beach was part of Los Angeles, but it seems Long Beach is a city in its own right. In fact it qualifies as the 36th-largest city in the United States, and the seventh-largest in California. In addition, Long Beach is the second largest city within the Greater Los Angeles Area, after Los Angeles itself. As of 2010, its population was just over 462,000.

Parkers’ Lighthouse, Long Beach, California

Long Beach apparently suffers from some of the worst air pollution in Southern California and the United States. Thankfully, on the afternoon I visited, non of this pollution seemed to be in evidence judging by the mostly cloudless, and ever present bright blue sky.

Lighthouse, Long Beach, California

The Port of Long Beach is the United States' second busiest container port and one of the world's largest shipping ports. Trade valued annually at more than $140 billion moves through Long Beach, making it the second-busiest seaport in the United States.

Carnival Inspiration (left), and Queen Mary (right), Long Beach, California

The RMS Queen Mary is a 1936 art deco ocean liner which is permanently docked at Long Beach. Roughly 200 ft (61 m) longer than the RMS Titanic, the former Cunard Liner is famous for being the fastest in the world from 1936 to 1952; for its distinctive art deco design, and for its use during World War II as a troop transport. It was purchased by the city of Long Beach in 1967, and converted to a hotel and maritime museum. Unfortunately, I did not have time to get any closer than this view, which is a pity. As a former ship yard worker, I would have loved the opportunity to go on board and give the ship a closer inspection.

The Carnival Inspiration, Long Beach, California

With the Carnival Inspiration berthed so close to the Queen Mary, it was a perfect opportunity to make a visual comparison between the old and new cruise liners. One imagines vast differences between the layout and facilities of each ship, but both no doubt have their champions, even today. If you had a choice, which would you prefer to sail on?

Shopping outlet at Shoreline Village, Long Beach, California

I did not have time to check out other attractions around Long Beach, but the 5-acre (20,000 m2) Aquarium of the Pacific is located nearby, as is the Long Beach Convention Center, and the Shoreline Village, where these two images (above and below) were taken―as were the two photos above of Parker’s Lighthouse. 

Waiting for my ship to come in at Long Beach, California

Downtown Long Beach is located approximately 25 miles (40 km) south of Downtown Los Angeles. I got there by boarding a Metro train somewhere downtown, and riding it to Long Beach. I enjoyed my visit, although it was far too brief, and given the chance I would like an opportunity to spend several days in the area exploring further.

More Information

Thanks to Wikipedia for the background information used in this post. See the full Long Beach Wikipedia entry here...

P.S. Click on the images to view full size. 

Adelaide Central Market

~ At 3.15am on Saturday, 23rd January 1869, a group of market gardeners made their way to a site between Gouger Street and Grote Street, Adelaide and started to sell their produce. Over 500 people are said to have attended that first market day with all stock selling out by 6.00am!

From such a successful beginning, it was not long before the Adelaide Central Market officially opened one year later in January 1870. Thirty years later, in 1900, the first stone was laid to build the Central Market façade, which still stands today.

I have been going to ‘the market’, as most people call it, for as long as I can remember. First, as a child, along with my parents who shopped there every week, and then as an adult, either on my own or with other family members. Currently, Friday evenings are my preferred visiting hours, and shopping is always preceded by a meal in the Asian food hall close to the main market.

Originally known as the City Market, the facility was officially named the Central Market in August 1965. Despite two major fires (one in 1925, and the other in 1977), the market continues to offer almost every variety of fresh fruit and vegetable available in South Australia.

Also available from more than 80 stalls are a wide range of fresh and processed meats, continental deli’s and cheese outlets, seafood stalls, and others specialising in nuts, confectionary, coffee and other specialty foods. And of course, let’s not overlook the bakeries, patisseries, and numerous cafés and restaurants,

For more than 140 years, the Central Market has been the food Mecca for multicultural cuisine and fresh produce in Adelaide, and today the Central Market is South Australia’s most visited tourist attraction.

For those of us who live in Adelaide and shop regularly there, the market is more than a tourist attraction, of course. This is the one place were all classes of people meet and greet each other, rub shoulders with celebrity chefs, indulge their love for fresh fruit and vegetables, and soak their senses in the myriad aromas that waft around the cheese stalls and coffee stalls, and the many other outlets. The market is also a great meeting place for families and friends. Getting together for a meal at Lucia’s, or a coffee and cake at Zuma’s Café, or maybe a cheap, freshly made Won Ton soup in the Asian food hall is a standard occurrence among regular market aficionado’s.

Events & Activities

A wide range of events and activities are scheduled each week at the market. Some traders offer product samples in ‘try before you buy’ promotions, while others present short classes, and product/produce demonstrations each week.

Central Market Tours

With a 30 year background as a chef and 20 years as a stall holder in the Market, Mark Gleeson conducts Central Market Tours that aim to provide participants with an exclusive experience interacting with suppliers, producers and retailers of South Australia’s vibrant food industry. Tour guests receive a level of history and product knowledge of the Adelaide Central Market, not available by others. For more information or to book your tour, visit Central Market Tour… 

Top Food & Wine Tour

There are several tour operators in South Australia that also offer tours of the Central Market for your enjoyment.  For more information on tours of the Market, visit Top Food & Wine Tours… www.topfoodandwinetours.com.au

Trading Hours

Tuesday: 7am - 5.30pm

Wednesday: 9am - 5.30pm*

Thursday: 9am - 5.30pm

Friday: 7am - 9pm

Saturday: 7am - 3pm

*Optional trading day, not all stalls open

Closed Public Holidays

More Information

Adelaide Central Market…