T-Boy’s Top 20 Films for Halloween Viewing

Critics: Michael Rand, Jim Gordon, Brent Campbell, Raoul Pascual & Ed Boitano

20. It’s Alive (1974)

Written, Produced & Directed by Larry Cohen

Cast:

• John P. Ryan
• Sharon Farrell
• Andrew Duggan
• Guy Stockwell
• James Dixon
• Michael Ansara

Lenore goes into a particularly rough labor with her second child. Her husband Frank Davis dutifully waits in the waiting room. Something unimaginable happens in the delivery room. The baby is gone and the medical staff are all dead.

19. The Richest Man in Bogota (1962) The DuPont Show of the Week (TV Series)

Directed by Ralph Nelson

Cast:

• Lee Marvin
• Miriam Colon
• Richard Eastman
• Jennifer Gillespie
• Eugene Iglesias

Based on H.G. Wells’ short story “In the Country of the Blind”, Juan De Nunez finds himself in South America, trapped in a remote mountain village where the people (and the animals) have no eyes. In an old book, which they can neither “see” nor understand but regard as a sacred object, he discovers that there is something in the water that has caused this. The old book, written by the early settlers, indicates that their children were born blind, and that THEIR children were born (not only blind) but with no eyes! His love interest, Marina, is somehow different. When he holds a torch in front of her, she can actually follow the light. He determines that she has eyes under her skin, and he believes that he can take her back to the outside world, and with an operation, she would be able to see. This is against the community’s wishes, where De Nunez is considered a freak of nature due to having sight. Plans are made to alleviate him of his eyes.

18. Carrie (1976)

Directed by Brian De Palma

Cast:

• Sissy Spacek
• Piper Laurie
• Amy Irving
• William Katt
• John Travolta
• Nancy Allen
• Betty Buckley

Carrie White, a shy, friendless teenage girl who is sheltered by her domineering, religious mother, unleashes her telekinetic powers after being humiliated by her classmates at her senior prom.

17. Paranormal Activity (2007)

Directed by Oren Peli

Cast:

• Katie Featherston
• Micah Sloat
• Mark Fredrichs
• Amber Armstrong
• Ashley Palmer

After moving into a suburban home, a couple becomes increasingly disturbed by a nightly demonic presence.

16. Dead of Night (1945) Segment “The Ventriloquist’s Dummy”

Directed by Alberto Cavalcanti

Cast:

• Michael Redgrave
• Allan Jeayes
• Elisabeth Welch
• Hartley Power

Architect Walter Craig senses impending doom as his half-remembered recurring dream turns into reality. The guests at the country house encourage him to stay as they take turns telling supernatural tales.

15. What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)

Directed by Robert Aldrich

Cast:

• Bette Davis
• Joan Crawford
• Victor Buono
• Maidie Norman
• Wesley Addy

A former child star torments her paraplegic sister in their decaying Hollywood mansion.

14. Spirits of the Dead (1968) Segment “Toby Dammit”

Directed by Federico Fellini

Cast:

• Terence Stamp
• Salvo Randone
• Marina Yaru
• David Bresson

Anthology film from three European directors based on stories by Edgar Allan Poe: a cruel princess haunted by a ghostly horse, a sadistic young man haunted by his double, and an alcoholic actor haunted by the Devil.

13. The Changeling (1980)

Directed by Peter Medak

Cast:

• George C. Scott
• Trish Van Devere
• Melvyn Douglas
• Jean Marsh
• John Colicos
• Barry Morse

After the death of his wife and daughter in a car crash, a music professor staying at a long-vacant Seattle mansion is dragged into a decades-old mystery by an inexplicable presence in the mansion’s attic.

12. Let the Right One In (2008)

Directed by Tomas Alfredson

Cast:

• Kåre Hedebrant
• Lina Leandersson
• Per Ragnar
• Henrik Dahl
• Karin Bergquist

Oskar, an overlooked and bullied boy, finds love and revenge through Eli, a beautiful but peculiar girl.

11. The Birds (1963)

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock

Cast:

• Rod Taylor
• Jessica Tandy
• Suzanne Pleshette
• Tippi Hedren
• Veronica Cartwright

A wealthy San Francisco socialite pursues a potential boyfriend to a small Northern California town that slowly takes a turn for the bizarre when birds of all kinds suddenly begin to attack people.

10. Rosemary’s Baby (1968)

Directed by Roman Polanski

Cast:

• Mia Farrow
• John Cassavetes
• Ruth Gordon
• Sidney Blackmer
• Maurice Evans
• Ralph Bellamy

A young couple trying for a baby move into an aging, ornate apartment building on Central Park West, but find themselves surrounded by peculiar neighbors.

9. Spider (2002)

Directed by David Cronenberg

Cast:

• Ralph Fiennes
• Miranda Richardson
• Gabriel Byrne
• Lynn Redgrave
• Mrs. Wilkinson
• John Neville

A mentally disturbed man takes residence in a halfway house. His mind gradually slips back into the realm created by his illness, where he replays a key part of his childhood.

8. The Night of the Hunter (1955)

Directed by Charles Laughton

Cast:

• Robert Mitchum
• Shelley Winters
• Lillian Gish
• James Gleason
• Peter Graves
• Billy Chapin
• Sally Jane Bruce

A religious fanatic marries a gullible widow whose young children are reluctant to tell him where their real daddy hid the $10,000 he’d stolen in a robbery.

7. Vampyr (1932)

Directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer

Cast:

• Julian West
• Maurice Schutz
• Rena Mandel
• Sybille Schmitz
• Jan Hieronimko

A drifter obsessed with the supernatural stumbles upon an inn where a severely ill adolescent girl is slowly becoming a vampire.

6. The Testament of Dr. Mabuse (1933)

Directed by Fritz Lang

Cast:

• Rudolf Klein-Rogge
• Thomy Bourdelle
• Gustav Diessl
• Otto Wernicke
• Rudolf Schündler

A criminal mastermind uses hypnosis to rule the rackets after death.

5. Near Dark (1987)

Directed by Kathryn Bigelow

Cast:

• Adrian Pasdar
• Jenny Wright
• Lance Henriksen
• Bill Paxton
• Jenette Goldstein
• Tim Thomerson

A small-town farmer’s son reluctantly joins a traveling group of vampires after he is bitten by a beautiful drifter.

4. Dawn of the Dead (1978)

Directed by George A. Romero

Cast:

• David Emge
• Ken Foree
• Scott H. Reiniger/li>
• Gaylen Ross

Following an ever-growing epidemic of zombies that have risen from the dead, two Philadelphia S.W.A.T. team members, a traffic reporter, and his television executive girlfriend seek refuge in a secluded shopping mall.

3. The Shining (1980)

Directed by Stanley Kubrick

Cast:

• Jack Nicholson
• Shelley Duvall
• Danny Lloyd
• Scatman Crothers
• Barry Nelson

A family heads to an isolated hotel for the winter where a sinister presence influences the father into violence, while his psychic son sees horrific forebodings from both past and future.

2. Nosferatu (1922)

Directed by F.W. Murnau

Cast:

• Max Schreck
• Gustav von Wangenheim
• Greta Schröder
• Janet Leigh
• Martin Balsam
• Ruth Landshoff

Vampire Count Orlok expresses interest in a new residence in Murnau’s adaptation of Bram Stoker’s novel.

1. Psycho (1960)

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock

Cast:

• Anthony Perkins
• Vera Miles
• John Gavin
• Janet Leigh
• Martin Balsam
• John McIntire

A Phoenix secretary embezzles $40,000 from her employer’s client, goes on the run, and checks into a remote motel run by a young man under the domination of his mother.

READERS, feel free to offer comments on you own selections of favorite films for Halloween watching.  Please send to **@Tr**********.com , and we will post in our Readers’ poll.

READERS’ POLL (as of today)

Ramon; St. Louis, MO: What no Exorcist!? I couldn’t sleep for a week after seeing it.

Charles; Miami, FL: 1. Halloween, 2. Friday 13th, 3. Carrie, 4. The Hills have Eyes, 5. Psycho

Wendy; Hollywood, USA: The Kardashians

Jamaal, Berkely, CA: 10 Best Halloween Movies of All Time 10. Halloween III: Season of the Witch 9. House 8. Tales of Halloween 7. Poltergeist 6. The Guest 5. The Nightmare Before Christmas 4. Trick ‘r Treat 3. Evil Dead 2 2. A Nightmare on Elm Street 1. Halloween

Linda; Seattle, WA: How ’bout some classics… Dracula (1931), 2. Frankenstein (1931), 3. Dracula (1992); 4. Bride of Frankenstein (1935); 5. The Black Cat (1934); 6. Night of Terror (1934); 7. The Raven (1935); 8. The Walking Dead (1935); 9. The Fly (1958); 10. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931); Honorable mention: Young Frankenstein (1974)

Tom; Vancouver, BC: Ghost Story… the one from 1981.

Alicia; LA, CA:  Bride of Chucky, Halloween, Blair Witch P

Jackie; Burbank, CA: Monster House (2006) 2. Shaun Of The Dead (2004) 3. The Cabin In The Woods (2012) 4. The Innkeepers (2011) 5. The Witches (1990) 6. Coraline (2009) 7. The Poltergeist (1982) 8. The Honeymoon (2014) 9. Scream (1996) 10. The Others (2001) 11. Hocus Pocus (1993)

Jose; Redland, CA: Halloween II (directed by Rob Zombie) (2009)

Erin; Belfast, No. Ireland:  1. Shaun Of The Dead (2004) 2. Psycho 3. The Cabin In The Woods (2012) 4. The Innkeepers (2011) 5. The Witches (1990) 6. Coraline (2009) 7. The Poltergeist (1982) 8. The Honeymoon (2014) 9. Scream (1996) 10. The Others (2001) 11. Hocus Pocus (1993)

Jackie; Burbank, CA: Monster House (2006) 2. Shaun Of The Dead (2004) 3. The Cabin In The Woods (2012) 4. The Innkeepers (2011) 5. The Witches (1990) 6. Coraline (2009) 7. The Poltergeist (1982) 8. The Honeymoon (2014) 9. Scream (1996) 10. The Others (2001) 11. Hocus Pocus (1993)

Jose; Redland, CA: Halloween II (directed by Rob Zombie) (2009)

The post Top 20 Films for Halloween Viewing appeared first on Traveling Archive.

“Restaurant” is a derivative of the Latin word “restore.” Inns were places where travelers could have a simple meal, then hit the road for a continuation of their journey. Today, with the arrival of modern-day tourism, travelers often visit destinations for history, cultural and gastronomic components. Yes, food is the spice of life, and we asked our members to list their favorite state destinations for pleasures of the palate. It’s fun for our readers to see another side of our writers, who have been delivering original content not found anywhere else on the globe.

Richard Carroll – T-Boy Writer:

Louisiana Cooking.

Every trip through Louisiana our taste buds are jumping with delight. Louisiana, highlighted by New Orleans, the most European city in the United States, also have the most distinctively original regional cuisine in the country. The creative cuisine is influenced by Creole and Cajun cooking, and dining for us in New Orleans is an American treasure. Dishes invented in the city include Po’ Boy, Oysters Rockefeller, Oysters Bienville, Banana Foster and more. The Cajun Gumbo, Jambalaya, and various crayfish creations are the heart of the city’s cuisine.

New Orleans chefs explain that when the Cajuns migrated from Nova Scotia, the lobster decided to follow and by the time they arrived they had lost so much weight they were renamed crayfish. A resident added, “We have some 2,800 restaurants in New Orleans and if they’re not good they don’t last for three months, crayfish or not”  We have dined from open-air street stalls, where college kids with their foamy Go Cups are roaming the streets, to Armauds, steps off Bourbon Street in the heart of the French Quarter. The famed restaurant in a restored turn of the century building, family owned since 1918, and one of the grande dames of New Orleans, serves award-winning French-New Orleans inspired cuisine. A dress code is enforced, collars for men, and so we found that diners were tastefully dressed in this elegant room enjoying Creole cuisine while listening to live Dixieland jazz.

We feel that Louisiana and New Orleans for aficionados of creative cooking will not disappoint.

Ringo Boitano – T-Boy Writer:

A taste of California history.

It almost seems unfair to list California as my favorite food state destination. With a landscape of approximately 163,696 square miles, it is the most populous and the third-largest U.S. state by area.

The state’s geography is immense with the Sierra Nevada’s Mt. Whitney at 14,505 feet, the highest peak in the contiguous 48 states, to the Mojave Desert’s Death Valley, its lowest. Throw in the long Pacific coastline and Salinas Valley, coined the Salad Bowl of the World, plus the urbane euphoria of Cioppino, Ranch Dressing, Avocado Toast, Cobb Salad, French Dip Sandwich, Uramaki (California roll), and even the Fortune Cookie, which all proudly claim California as their birthplace – and you’ll find California’s gastronomic history to be both innnovative and monumental. Native-Americans were the first to arrive with a diet based on fruits, corn, pumpkin, shellfish and beans, followed by the Spanish, who brought the exotic flavors of garlic, peppers and olives, and then the migration of fortune seekers during the 1849 California Gold Rush, creating a fushion of culinary traditions, influenced by dishes from the U.S. East Coast, Latin-America, China and Italy.

And this leads us to Chez Panisse, the Berkeley-based restaurant originated by Alice Waters and film producer Paul Aratow, who ushered in the farm-to-table movement in 1971. The restaurant’s style of cooking emphasized ingredients rather than technique, using food that was fresh and seasonal, grown locally and organically. And because the ingredients were obtained nearby, the food took on a very Californian character, hence creating what is known today as California Cuisine.

Fyllis Hockman – T-Boy Writer

There is no other food!

And just to make a short story shorter. I live in Maryland. By definition that means hard shell crabs with Old Bay. There is no other food!

James Boitano – T-Boy Writer:

Favorite state for a food experience: Louisiana. 

Though I’ve only been there once, Louisiana seems to have quite the edge over other states. Sure, you can find any cuisine in the world in New York, but Louisiana has the trio of local good eating. First off, you get the best of Southern ‘comfort food’. Mac n Cheese, grits, fried chicken, red beans and rice: what’s not to love? And on top of that, Louisiana has the double Creole and Cajun experience. Both down-home and sophisticated. Crawfish, andouille smoked sausage, alligator, gumbo. Something for every mood… if you are hungry.

Phil Marley – Poet:

They have to be from Montréal to be REAL bagels.

Okay, I’m aware that Québéc is a Canadian province, not a U.S. state, but Montréal is the place of my birth and here are some of my favorite gastronomic memories.

Little Italy: Montréal’s Piccola Italia is the second largest Little Italy (after Toronto) in Canada. The community is filled with Italian cafés, restaurants and bars, specialty food shops, cultural landmarks, and Jean-Talon Market, Montréal’s most vibrant open-air food area.

Montréal Bagels: I once took a homeless man, a Montréal expat living in Vancouver, for coffee and asked if he would like a bagel, too. He declined, replying, Those aren’t real bagels, they have to be from Montréal to be REAL bagels. In Montréal you will you hear it pronounced bah-gal and yes, they are different. In contrast to the New York-style bagel, which also contains sourdough, the Montréal bagel is smaller, thinner, sweeter and denser, with a larger hole, and always baked in a wood-fired oven. It contains malt, egg, and no salt, and is boiled in honey-sweetened water before being baked.

Montréal Smoked Meat: Most Yanks know all about pastrami and corned beef, but what is smoked meat? Well, it’s basically beef brisket that has been dry-cured, but then soaked (unlike pastrami) to desalinate it before seasoning and smoking. The seasoning is apparently a secret, for no one will divulge anything else other than it makes the most delicious sandwich on the planet. Schwartz’s (circa 1928) is the oldest deli in Canada and is considered an institution, though others will make a case for the newcomer, Reuben’s Deli and Steakhouse, at only a mere 50 years of existence.

Québécois Poutine: This Québécois specialty consists of fresh-cut fries and cheese curds topped with a brown gravy. It emerged in Quebec, in the late 1950s in the rural Centre-du-Québec region. My father believed the name poutine originated from the English word pudding (French, pouding), used to describe a mixture, a particularly messy one, of the three food items. It made sense to me for in Québec, the term poutine  is slang for mess. And, yes, it is a mess, a mess of delightful flavors and textures. Some deem its high caloric character to be essential in dealing with the particularly cold Québec and Ontario winter weather. Its popularity has spread to upscale restaurants and fast-food chains alike, including Canada’s Burger King and McDonalds. Today, poutine has become a symbol of Québécois and Canadian cuisine and culture. For that, I am proud – and ten pounds heavier.

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Ed Boitano – T-Boy Editor

Apples are also good for eating.

I am embarrassed to the point of shame when discussing my favorite food items from my home state of Washington. As an unruly adolescent, I considered the bounty of food available throughout the state to be something that was on the entire world’s table. Crab apples, cherries and blueberries were designated as throwing objects in war games between other neighbors, even at the risk of facing my mother’s disdain for stains on my play clothes; with blueberries on worst. What’s the big deal, I thought, isn’t there an unlimited supply? After all we had apple, pear, apricot and fig trees in our own backyard; that is if the birds didn’t get them first.

But that was yesterday and when I return to my ancestral home in Seattle today, I recognize the immense bounty of delicious Washington state produce, produce which I had took for granted, despite having family connections to its terrain. My great, great cousin was an apple orchardist in the Yakima Valley in 1910, and today Washington produces nearly 60% of all apples consumed in the entire U.S. There’s a chance he actually thought he was responsible for that. Raspberries and blueberries also top the U.S. list in production. My in-laws own and operate Roskamp Vineyards, known for their well-sought-after grapes in central Washington’s Lower Yakima Valley. And just further east, there’s Walla Walla Sweets (onions), where less sulfur means less sharpness and tears. Cherries are delicious, but they’re no match for Rainier Cherries, a hybrid created at Washington State University, named after Mount Rainier, where huckleberries and wildflowers blanket its slopes in late July through early September.

And when the Alaskan fishing boats arrive in Seattle, we have all five species of Pacific salmon on our tables: Chinook (King), Sockeye (Red), Coho (Silver), Humpies (Pink) and Chum (Dog, usually canned for foreign markets, but now locally rebranded as the more palatable Keta).

For preparation, it’s every person for themselves; butterflied and smoked over Alderwood, or Cedar planked (steamed on soaked Cedar) and many home recipes.

Then there’s oysters and clams with the geoduck the largest, generally reaching 1.5 pounds, once sold at the Pike Place Public Market for a penny a pound.

And we have the most flavorful of all crabs, the sweet and delicate Dungeness, named after the Port of Dungeness on the Olympic Peninsula. With apologies to those who yearn for lobster, your crustacean is actually a common everyday food for Nova Scotians and New Englanders, but takes its lofty status due to shrewd marketing on luxury railroad trains to and from Chicago as the most expensive item on the menu.

But an important note should be made to chain restaurants; Dick’s, home to Dick’s Famous Deluxe, and Ivar Haglund’s Ivar’s Salmon House and Ivar’s Aces of Clams, with his famous motto, Keep Clam. Haglund (1905-1985), a city father and Seattle icon, once purchased the Smith Tower – then the tallest skyscraper west of the Mississippi – under the condition that no later buyer could demolish it. From the tower’s observation deck, I could watch the blaze of 4th of July fireworks over Elliot Bay, paid for out of Ivar’s own pocket.,

Deb Roskamp – T-Boy writer & photographer:

A taste of the Land of Enchantment.

Red, green or Christmas? It took me a minute to realize that the waitperson was asking what my preference was for chili salsa. I was asked that question countless times during my four-day culinary tour of Northern New Mexico, and was excited to succumb to the gastronomic pleasures of this indigenous cuisine that can be found nowhere else in the world. Like the food of Tuscany, New Mexican cuisine – not Mexican, Mexican-American, or Tex-Mex – is virtually devoid of any outside influences. Carne adovada, blue corn tortillas, sopapillas and biscochitos – cookies made with crushed anise seeds, a hint of orange and covered with sugar cinnamon, now New Mexico’s Official State Cookie – are among its many offerings.

Floridians stand warned: Santa Fe is the oldest state capital in the continental U.S. In its over 400 years of existence, a number of flags have flow over the city: Spanish, Mexican, the U.S. and The Southern Confederacy – not to mention the short-lived Pueblo Revolt of 1680. Today, no cars are required in Santa Fe’s enchanting plaza. Simply take a stroll, and bask in the galleries, boutiques and historic structures, and take refuge in many of city’s outstanding restaurants. As the third largest art market in the world, recommended is a self-guild tour of Canyon Road which boasts over 100 art galleries, and, a little further down the road, two centuries of adobe homes and casitas.

Maria’s New Mexican Kitchen requires a short car drive from the Santa Fe Plaza. It’s a true local hangout, with mobs of hungry and thirsty patrons waiting for a table. And when I was last there, Maria’s offered as many as 200 margaritas containing different combinations of tequilas and mezcals, but the pandemic brought the list down to forty.

My time in Taos was limited, but it was essential that I save my last meal for my favorite restaurant in New Mexico, Doc Martin’s at the Historic Taos Inn. Perhaps it was because years ago, my first experience with traditional New Mexican food was at this historic establishment. Or maybe it’s just because the cuisine is so remarkable, it’s my first choice to dine in Taos. Their award-winning chili stew is a Northern New Mexico speciality with potatoes, pork and plenty of Hatch green chili. And what may be labeled as hot might be medium or it might be fiery. As they say in New Mexico, the chili is the chili. Doc Martin’s Restaurant was well worth the drive up north from Santa Fe and proved to be a tantalizing bookend to my culinary tour of the Land of Enchantment.

The post Favorite State for a Food Experience appeared first on Traveling Archive.

Based on Oscar nominated films, and a few not.

The Power of the Dog

Written & Directed by Jane Campion.

Ranch owner Phil Burbank (Benedict Cumberbatch) defiantly lights an artistically made paper flower by Peter Gordon (Kodi Smit-McPhee) before the young man’s eyes, setting a flame for the unbridled tension that will consume them both.

A presumed act of deep, life-long friendship, where Peter gently places a lit cigarette into the mouth of Phil Burbank, whose hands are occupied by creating a rope. Unknown to Phil, the strips of leather are contaminated with anthrax, which leads to his death, a death orchestrated by Peter.

Peter watching his mother Rose (Kirsten Dunst) and new stepfather George Burbank (Jesse Plemons) from a window upon their happy return from Phil’s funeral, illustrating a new positive chapter in their lives, devoid of Phil Burbank’s tyrannical harassment.

Belfast

Written & Directed by Kenneth Branagh.

Jude Hill’s Buddy playing with other children in his working-class street, using a garbage can lid for a game of pretend. Seconds later, the lid serves as protection from hailing rocks and debris as the street explodes with sectarian violence.

Two Belfast kids trying to determine how you can tell the difference between a Catholic and a Protestant.

The euphoric dance sequence where Pa (Jamie Dornan) and Ma (Caitríona Balfe) have a sublime moment of distraction, temporarily putting Belfast’s TROUBLES on the back burner.

Drive My Car

Co-Written & Directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi, based on Haruki Murakami’s short story “Drive My Car.”

A 40-minute prologue appears before the credits open, indicating that we’re on a long journey of thought, fulfillment and artistry.

A rehearsal of ‘Uncle Vanya’ in Hiroshima with a cast of unlikely actors: one hearing impaired, who uses sign language, others who do not speak Japanese, which begins theatre director Yûsuke Kafuku’s (Hidetoshi Nishijima ) quest to a better understanding of his deceased wife and a better understanding of himself as well.

Yûsuke Kafuku’s final realization that his 20-something chauffeur driver Misaki (Tôko Miura) is not an insignificant prop, but a real person like himself.

Parallel Mothers

Written & Directed by Pedro Almodóvar.

Two pregnant women, one early forties named Janis (Penélope Cruz), the other, early twenties Jan, (Milena Smit), casually meet by chance in a Madrid maternity ward, unaware that their future will lead to a life-long bond of parallel mothers.

Arturo (Israel Elejalde), the assumed father of Janis’ infant child, informing her that he is not the father, leading to heart wrenching morale decisions.

Janis’ red sportscar, which reminds us that this primary color is frequently used throughout Pedro Almodóvar’s films.

Licorice Pizza

Written & Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson.

Jon Peter’s (Bradley Cooper) mile a minute rant that he and Gary (Cooper Hoffman) both understand the ‘way of the street.’

The exhilarating camera movements which illustrate Gary and Alana’s (Alana Haim) movement of their own lives in the San Fernando Valley of P.T. Anderson’s youth.

A Hero

Written, Produced & Directed by Asghar Farhadi.

Temporarily released from a debtor’s prison, Rahim Soltani’s (Amir Jadidi) discovers that his new-found fame has some very disturbing consequences.

Being the Ricardos

Written and Directed by Aaron Sorkin

Lucile Ball (Nicole Kidman) finally takes a tender moment from her career of stress to address her co-star and former adversary Vivian Vance (Nina Arianda) with the hand of human kindness.

Nightmare Alley

Written, Produced & Directed by Guillermo del Toro.

Stanton Carlisle’s (Bradley Cooper) slick carny conman’s realization that he himself has been conned by the cunning Dr. Lilith Ritter (Cate Blanchett).

The Hand of God

Written & Directed by Paolo Sorrentino.

Fabietto’s  (Filippo Scotti) sense of euphoria, a euphoria not realized earlier, upon learning that the world-famous footballer, Argentine Diego Maradona, will be playing for his hometown team in Naples.

Maradona on TV scoring his controversial ‘Hand of God’ goal to screaming Neapolitan fans in a game-winning match.

The Dig

Directed by Simon Stone; Screenplay by Moira Buffini.

Self-taught excavator, Basil Brown (Ralph Fiennes) brushing off Cambridge archaeologists’ demands for him to resume work at their own museum, preferring to remain in the tenure of kindred spirit Edith Pretty (Carey Mulligan), continuing with their own dig.

The return of the great Ben Chaplin in The Dig.

Don’t Look Up

Written & Directed by Adam McKay.

An almost unrecognizable Cate Blanchett playing a frivolous morning show talk hostess flirting with Leonardo DiCaprio’s Dr. Randall Mindy while live on TV

President Orlean’s (Meryl Streep) chief of staff Jason Orlean (Jonah Hill) lashing out with entitlement when scrubby, low-level astronomers’ Dr. Randall Mindy and Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence) arrive in the oval office with the terrifying news that world may be destroyed. As it turns out, Jason Orlean REALLY IS the son of the president.

The Eyes of Tammy Faye

Directed by Michael Showalter.

The undercurrent of sexual tension when Tammy (Jessica Chastain) first sees Jim Bakker (Andrew Garfield) preaching at the pulpit.

Tammy Faye at rock bottom, stripped of all her treasures and influence among a certain ‘Christian’ sect, but not defeated as she reaches out in kindness to gossiping, disparaging neighbors in front of her modest apartment building.

West Side Story

Directed by Steven Spielberg; Screenplay by Tony Kushner, adapted from the 1957 musical.

Despite the powerhouse opening with a well-choregraphed cast, camera cranes moving every which way but loose, and sweeping tracking shots — some as low-angled as an Ozu tatami-style set-up — Steven Spielberg’s big Hollywood money remake of West Side Story could barely dance to the finish line.

The performances of singer/dancers’ Mike Faist as Riff and Ariana DeBose as Maria giving West Side Story some sort of honest context.

CODA

Written & Directed by Sian Heder.

Ruby (Emilia Jones) signs “I really love you” to her CODA (child of deaf adults) family as she, the only family member with hearing, begins her drive to a Boston college.

Ruby’s family (Marlee Matlin, Troy Kotsur, Daniel Durant; all three actors deaf in real life) attends her choir recital, and while they cannot hear her sing, they take pride upon noticing the positive reception from the audience around them.

The Tragedy of Macbeth

Written & Directed by Joel Coen, based on the play by William Shakespear.

Macbeth (Denzel Washington) and Banquo (Bertie Carvel) approached by witches, with one (Kathryn Hunter) displaying an otherworldliness in voice and appearance, setting the tone for the darkness of the film adaptation.

A guilt-ridden and much older version of Lady Macbeth (Francis McDormand) begins sleepwalking, gradually descending into madness in Joel Coens first time out as a solo film director in the well-photographed black & white film.

The Worst Person in the World

(Norwegian: Verdensverstemenneske)

Directed by by Joachim Trieris; Screenplay by Joachim Trier & Eskil Vogt.

The 30-year old Julie (Renate Reinsve) learns that her former boyfriend Aksel (Anders Danielsen Lie) has inoperable pancreatic cancer.

After an encounter with a reindeer on a camping trip, Maria Grazia Di Meo’s Sunniva researches her ancestry, which determines that she is 3% Sámi, leading her to become a climate-change and indigenous peoples’ rights activist.

Aksel, realizing that his life will soon end, takes Julie to the building where he grew up and was inspired to become an artist.

Upon hearing from the hospital that Aksel will probably not make it through the night, Julie walks the streets of Oslo and watches the sunrise the following morning.

Munich – The Edge of War

Directed by Christian Schwochow; screenplay by Ben Power.

British PM, Neville Chamberlin’s (Jeremy Irons) ambiguous expression of enthusiasm upon arriving back to London and cheering fanfare after securing the Munich Agreement; perhaps realizing that it is a very fragile agreement. The scene serves as the only saving grace in this poorly made film of fictional.

TV: Kate McKinnon on SNL

Kate McKinnon’s ‘s masterful impersonations on SNL added much-needed laughter in 2021.

PIG

Written & Directed by Michael Sarnoski.

Rob, a reclusive truffle forager, returning to his forest cabin to play a tape that his deceased wife recorded of herself singing Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m on Fire” for his birthday.

The Lost Daughter

Written & Directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal.

The annoyance felt by the troubled Leda (Olivia Colman) as a large band of rebel-rousing tourists invade her once quiet and spacious piece of beach.

The French Dispatch of the Liberty, Kansas Evening Sun

Written & Directed by Wes Anderson.

Are we finally wise to ‘auteur’ Wes Anderson’s hijacking of sound and images from Jean-Luc Godard, Jerry Lewis and Jacques Tati; is it all mere icing on the cake where he clutters his films with distractions to avoid focusing on the narrative. For Godard, it was only the beginning; for Wes, the end. Despite the artifice, done with a wink of the eye to his base of believers, the film’s only true moment of transcendence is a simple bluescreen shot of Lyna Khoudri’s  Juliette and  Timothée Chalamet’s  Zeffirelli riding together on a scooter into the sunset, a shot perhaps borrowed from Leos Carax.

Plaza Catedral

Written, Produced & Directed by Abner Benaim.

The transition of the guarded, deeply wounded Alicia (Mexican actress, Ilse Salas), finally embracing the Panamanian street kid named Chief, (Fernando Xavier de Casta) who’s been conning her.

The shocking chaos that closes Plaza Catedral, and perhaps Alicia’s life too.

Epilogue: In Remembrance of Fernando Xavier de Casta

Writer/Director Abner Benaim discussing his film Plaza Catedral and the savage death of Fernando Xavier de Casta.

The post 2021 Movie Moments We’ll Remember appeared first on Traveling Archive.

The current T-Boy Society of Film & Music poll is devoted to our writers’ five favorite albums of all-time. An album is a collection of songs & music available in any forum: Vinyl, CD, Tape, etc. Initially, the theme of the poll was top five albums you’d take on a deserted island; but it made the poll a little confusing, plus we all understand the concept. It may be our most passionate poll, with some sending numerous revisions. And, yes; I was countlessly reminded by writers that their lists can change at the flip of a coin. What’s interesting is for readers to learn more about our writers in a very different capacity. And that includes me, as well.

You’ll find individual lists below, followed by results of top ten albums and selection of artists and bands. What did the lists tell me? Well, the years are passing too quickly.

• EB, Editor

MEMBERS: Selections in Order

T.E. Mattox

T-Boy Writer & Musician:

• Hard Again (1977) 
  Muddy Waters
• Father of the Folk Blues (1965)
  Son House
• Stronger For It (2012)
  Janiva Magness
• Together for the First Time Live (1974)
  B.B.King & Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland
• Masterpiece (2019)
  Albert Castiglia

Brom Wikstrom

Mouth Painter & T-Boy Writer:

• Rejuvenation (1974) – The Meters
• Kind of Blue (1959) – Miles Davis
• My Favorite Things (1961) – John Coltrane
• Swiss Movement (1969) – Les McCan and Eddie Harris
• Blonde on Blonde (1966) – Bob Dylan

Honorable Mention

East-West/Paul Butterfield Blues Band* Delaney, Bonnie & Friends on Tour with Eric Clapton/Delaney, Bonnie & Friends * Al Kooper/I Stand Alone * Revolver/The Beatles * The Harder They Come (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack/Jimmy Cliff * Lady Soul/Aretha Franklin

Mike Rand

T-Boy Writer & Musician:

• Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)
  The Beatles
• Let It Bleed (1969)
  The Rolling Stones
• The Joshua Tree (1987)
  U2
• The Bends (1995)
  Radiohead
• Appetite for Destruction (1987)
  Guns N’ Roses

Susan Breslow

T-Boy Writer:

• Moondance (1970)
  Van Morrison
• Blue (1971)
  Joni Mitchell
• You Want it Darker (2016)
  Leonard Cohen

Weave Cleveland

T-Boy Writer & Musician:

• The Nightfly (1982)
  Donald Fagen [I am going to regret not choosing a Beatles album]
• Halcyon Days (2004)
  Bruce Hornsby [I am going to regret not choosing some Vince Gill]
• Emancipation (1996)
  Prince [I am going to regret not choosing 5 Prince Albums]
• Seeds Of Love (1989)
  Tears for Fears [I am going to regret not choosing some Thelonious Monk]
• Djesse Vol. 3 (2020)
  Jacob Collier [I am going to regret not choosing VooDoo by D’Angelo]

Honorable Mention

Symphony No. 6 (Pathetique)/Tchaikovsky [And God will strike me down for not choosing any Stevie Wonder! May this island have no electricity!]

Terry Cassel

T-Boy Writer & Musician:

• A Love Supreme (1965)
  John Coltrane
• Kind of Blue (1959)
  Miles Davis
• The Best of the Bothy Band (1993)
  The Bothy Band
• Highway 61 Revisited (1965)
  Bob Dylan
• J.S. Bach: The Goldberg Variations (1955)
  Glenn Gould, piano

James Boitano

T-Boy Writer:

Tusk (1979) – Fleetwood Mac

The island for listening: Elephant island, Antarctica

Allan Smith

T-Boy Writer & Photographer:

• Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter (1977)
  Joni Mitchell
• Blonde on Blonde (1966)
  Bob Dylan
• Rubber Soul (UK) (1965)
  The Beatles
• The Nine Symphonies (1963)
  Ludwig von Beethoven, Herbert von Karajan, conductor
• Legend (The Best Of Bob Marley And The Wailers) (1984)
  Bob Marley & The Wailers

Emperor of Oldies

Musicologist:

• Sticky Fingers (1971)
  The Rolling Stones
• Bridge Over Troubled Water (1967)
  Simon & Garfunkel
• Help! (Capitol Records ) (1965)
  The Beatles
• Rubber Soul (Capitol Records ) (1965)
  The Beatles
• Sweet Baby James (1969)
  James Taylor

Honorable Mention (could be in my top five on any given day)

Every Picture Tells A Story/Rod Stewart * Who’s Next/The Who * Tommy/The Who * Four Way Street/Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young * Aqualung/Jethro Troll * Abbey Road/The Beatles * Get Yer Ya Yas Out/The Rolling Stones/ Harvest/Neil Young * Déjà Vu/Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young * Desperado/The Eagles * 461 Ocean Blvd/Eric Clapton * Blind Faith/Blind Faith * Greatest Hits/Linda Ronstadt * All Things Must Pass/George Harrison * Band on the Run/Paul McCartney And Wings

Jay Boggs

Historian & Musicologist:

• Electric Ladyland (1968)
  The Jimi Hendrix Experience
• Beggars Banquet (1968)
  The Rolling Stones
• Blues from Laurel Canyon (1968)
  John Mayall
• American Beauty (1970)
  The Grateful Dead
• Natty Dread (1974)
  Bob Marley & The Wailers

Honorable Mention

Monkey Man/Toots and the Maytals * Studio One Presents Burning Spear/Burning Spear

Roy Endersby

Philosopher:

• Highway 61 Revisited (1965)
  Bob Dylan
• Bitches Brew (1970)
  Miles Davis
• Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)
  The Beatles
• Ladies of the Canyon (1970)
  Joni Mitchell
• A Love Supreme (1965)
  John Coltrane

Phil Marley

Montreal Poet:

• Beggars Banquet (1968)
  The Rolling Stones
• Are you Experienced? (1967)
  The Jimi Hendrix Experience
• Me Against the World (1995)
  2Pac
• Nevermind (1991)
  Nirvana
• Disraeli Gears (1967)
  Cream

Honorable Mention

Let it Bleed/The Rolling Stones/ * Who’s Next/The Who.* Ladies of the Canyon/Joni Mitchell * After the Goldrush/Neil Young * Strange Days/The Doors

Brent Campbell

T-Boy Writer & Musician:

• Modern Sounds of Country and Western Music (1962)
  Ray Charles
• Mingus Ah Um (1962)
  Charles Mingus
• Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc. (1986)
  Dwight Yoakam
• Blood on the Tracks (1975 )
  Bob Dylan
• Made in USA (1986)
  The Beach Boys

Honorable Mention

Old 97s/Fight Songs * Pleased to Meet Me/The Replacements * Twisted/Del Amitri * #1 Record/Big Star * Time Traveller/The Moody Blues

Deb Roskamp

T-Boy Photographer:

• Bridge Over Troubled Water (1967)
  Simon & Garfunkel
• Peter, Paul and Mary (1962)
  Peter, Paul and Mary
• Moondance (1970)
  Van Morrison
• Canciones de Mi Padre (1987)
  Linda Ronstadt
• A Night at the Opera (1975)
  Queen

Raoul Pascual

T-Boy Writer & Illustrator:

• Sweet Baby James (1969)
  James Taylor
• All ‘N All (1977)
  Earth, Wind & Fire
• A Christmas Album (1983)
  Amy Grant
• A Chorus Line (1975)
  Original Broadway Cast Recording
• Thriller (1982)
  Michael Jackson

Ed Boitano

T-Boy Editor:

• Revolver (UK) (1966)
  The Beatles
  Sticky Fingers (1971)
  The Rolling Stones
• Highway 61 Revisited (1965)
  Bob Dylan
• Hejira (1976)
  Joni Mitchell
• London Calling (1979)
  The Clash

Honorable Mention

Darkness on the Edge of Town/Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band * The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust/David Bowie * Never Mind the Bollocks Here’s the Sex Pistols/Sex Pistols * Ladies of the Canyon/Joni Mitchell * Beggars Banquet/The Rolling Stones * Blonde on Blonde/Bob Dylan * Songs of Leonard Cohen/Leonard Cohen * Patti Smith/Land * Disraeli Gears/Cream

Top 10 albums selected

1. Beggars Banquet (1968)
   The Rolling Stones
2. Highway 61 Revisited (1965)
   Bob Dylan
3. Bridge Over Troubled Water (1967)
   Simon & Garfunkel
4. Sticky Fingers (1971)
   The Rolling Stones
5. Kind of Blue (1959)
   Miles Davis
6. Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)
   The Beatles
7. Moondance (1970)
   Van Morrison
8. Sweet Baby James (1969)
   James Taylor
9. A Love Supreme (1965)
   John Coltrane
10. Rubber Soul (UK) (1965)
    The Beatles

In order, Bands & Artists most frequently listed in the Top Five

• The Beatles
• Bob Dylan
• The Rolling Stones
• Miles Davis
• Joni Mitchell
• John Coltrane
• The Jimi Hendrix Experience
• James Taylor
• Van Morrison
• Simon & Garfunkel
• Prince
• Ray Charles

The post Five Favorite Albums of All-Time appeared first on Traveling Archive.

The latest T-Boy Society of Film & Music poll is devoted to our members’ favorite international destination. That is, the first international destination we’d visit when the roadways, skyways and waterways are deemed safe to travel. You’ll find members’ selections to be illuminating, telling us much about their own personal preferences.  – EB

Susan Breslow – T-Boy Writer

Madrid, Spain – Despite the king and queen of Spain issuing an order in 1492 for all Jews to be expelled from the country, this Semitic jet-setter is determined to return. I first visited Madrid in 2019. A big fan of walkable cities, I made my way from bustling Gran Via to Puerta del Sol (the center of the country) and then into wide, airy Plaza Mayor. Entranced by the sights, the sounds (what was a mariachi band doing playing in Puerta del Sol?), and the shops, I ventured beyond. I visited the Prado Museum, slipped into Casa Alberto at la hora de vermut (1 pm, the vermouth hour) for a glass of the sweet fortified wine and Spanish olives, wandered the Literary Quarter, attended live flamenco performances at night. It was only a taste, which left me hungry for more of this city and country.

Richard Carroll – T-Boy Writer

The first international destination I will travel when it’s deemed safe to visit is Buenos Aires. The sensuous flow of tango envelops Buenos Aires like a big hug from a long lost lover. Intricate and lush, the essence of exquisite grace, tango has long captured the heart and passion of this grand city. The Portenos are eager to explain that tango is their very own priceless art form based on tradition and cultural roots. The passion and fervor of life can be seen in the royalty of the dance, but not unlike a naughty and mischievous little child who slowly but indisputably develops into a captivating icon, and now is celebrated worldwide. Throughout Buenos Aires tango has always gracefully touched me with a joyous welcome. The tango neighborhoods of La Boca or San Telmo is where the captivating rhythms of tango rule, and where the music and dance unifies the city in an artistic way that no other destination on the planet can match. I found that not all Portenos in Buenos Aires can tango; it often depends whether their mother or father taught them, but with a few lessons tango is captivating.

Writers have tabbed Buenos Aires, The Paris of South America, maybe not, but the large boulevards, historic architecture, fine dining, and a collection of distinctive neighborhoods, captured my travel soul. Browsing through the city with drifting riffs of guitar music touching my heart is a splendid way to cover a destination. The museum-like Cafe Tortoni on Avenida de Mayo dating to 1858, the oldest in the country, hosting everyone from Hilary and the King of Spain, to the late great Spanish poet, Federico Garcia Lorca, offers a top-rated tango show that has been enjoyed by thousands of visitors and Portenos alike. It was easy to see that Tango aficionados are never at a loss for a dance or live tango music, realizing that tango was recognized by UNESCO as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The cultural heritage easily spread throughout the region. From the shores of Buenos Aires across the broad Rio de la Plata, the world’s widest river, is Uruguay with long-lasting tango roots in Montevideo with countless Tangueros or tango dancers, and a thriving tango culture.

Sitting in the crowded Bar Sur club in San Telmo, an earthy, popular, neighborhood in the heart of Buenos Aires, I was tucked around one of nine tables, where it feels as if you are smack dab in the midst of an old black and white foreign movie, and Bogart is going to wander in with a tango dancer draped on his arm, cigarette dangling. The intimate tango room with its classic black and white tile floor, twirling ceiling fans, and gorgeous servers, filling a space the size of a few postage stamps, continues non-stop. The dazzling female Tangueros have certainly left a trail of broken hearts behind them, and with a style and grace close to ballet, they are mesmerizing. I’m counting the days when I can again revisit Buenos Aires. A tango lyric is engraved in my thoughts, “Please take a slender slice of time and set it aside and listen to my fascinating music of life, passion, and lost love.”

Tom Weber – T-Boy Writer

Salò: Lake Garda’s elegant and historic town – Situated on the southwestern corner of Lake Garda, Italy’s largest lake, Salò is the most elegant town of all the lake’s locales. Sadly, during World War II, this gem on the lake also served as the capital of Mussolini’s failed attempt to relaunch fascism as the Republic of Salò.

Fyllis Hockman – T-Boy Writer

Provence, France – Only because we’re scheduled to leave November 21st, after having been cancelled twice before. So unless France closes down between now and then, we’re there!

James Boitano – T-Boy Writer

United Kingdom: Manchester and Wales – I have some longtime friends who live in Manchester. I visited them regularly every 5 years: in 2010 and again in 2015. I had planned to visit them in 2020 and even had my flight ticket to Manchester. We planned a fun trip to explore Wales and the Channel Islands. Of course, Covid got in the way for the past two years. So, the United Kingdom will be my next international destination.

Ringo Boitano – T-Boy Writer

Monterosso, Cinque Terre, Cinque Terre, Italy – The Conque Terre is a string of steep, hillside towns on the rugged Italian Riviera coastline, each with its own majestic setting of colorful houses and vineyards clinging to the terraces. The Sentiero Azzurro cliffside hiking trail links the five towns and offers sweeping, almost unimaginable vistas of the sea – and you must try to experience each of the towns! Monterosso, the first and largest of the five towns, is the only one with an expansive sandy beach, and is the best place to choose as your home base, with a recommended stay of a minimum of five days. After a day’s hike a refreshing swim is in order, followed by a Sciacchetrà, a liquored white wine from the vineyards’ slopes, a plate of fried anchovies (acciuga) caught that very day, and a bowl of Pesto alla Genovese at one of the many trattorias on Monterosso’s pulsating promenade.

Jim Gordon – T-Boy Writer

For me, it would be Italy, Italy, Italy! 2nd choice: England!

Weave Cleveland – T-Boy Writer

Lake Como in Northern Italy – It’s an early summer daydream where (my perception of) a beautiful mature lady drives me all around the region for at least 10 days, being my guide and chaperone. It also looks like I would surely agree to share the driving. Last week I watched the film The Burnt Orange Heresy and just knew that was it. I had never given it thought before but the region in Lombardy, Italy seemed like a special slice of Heaven, and the first place I would like to go is to Lake Como.

Roy Endersby – Philosopher

Brownes Beach, Barbados – The coast of the island nation of Barbados ranges from beaches with powdery sand and protected Caribbean waters to the powerful swells on the eastern Atlantic coast, good for surfing, but dangerous for swimming. Brownes Beach is conveniently set near the capitol city of Bridgetown, and serves as the perfect venue for a serious dose of Bajan flavor with nearby tropical bars and grills, local music and dancing, crowds of people swimming and snorkeling; and yet you can still find your own place in the sun. And all this from a former English colony; today a fascinating cultural fusion of the descendants of plantation owners and slaves, who serve elegant high tea and play cricket.

Phil Marley – Poet

Magens Bay, St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands – Perhaps because it was my first tropical beach or maybe it was due to its heart shape, turquoise waters and one-mile stretch of white soft sand, I was a goner the second I saw Magens Bay. Located on the Atlantic side of St. Thomas – one of the three US Virgin Islands of the Caribbean – Magens Bay is a short, picturesque drive from the port town of Charlotte Amelia. There are no waves and currents, and there is a good mix of sun and shade under the palm trees. On the ends of the beach are rock formations that provide good snorkeling. Despite its distinction of being called one of the ten most beautiful beaches in the world by National Geographic Magazine, there are also very few people. Now that I think of it, it is for these very reasons that Magens Bay is my favorite beach in the world.

Skip Kaltenheuser – T-Boy Writer

Carnival Anywhere – Right now, any change of scene looks good. But if and when festivals crank up again without becoming super-spreader events, my primary addiction has always been Carnival across different cultures. But alternatively, solitude also attracts, such as returning to museums in Berlin or pursuits of wildlife in Africa or elsewhere. Of course, there’s also abundant solitude wandering amid crowds in foreign countries, whatever they’re up to. Intergenerational travel, sharing perspectives and sights with younger eyes, is always an informative pleasure I seek.

Ed Boitano – T-Boy Editor

English Bay, Stanley Park, Vancouver, BC – A mandatory pilgrimage for me is to stroll down Robson Street in downtown Vancouver to Stanley Park, my favorite urban park in the world. In the days of my honeymoon, we knew it as Robsonstrasse, due to the number of its German and European delis and bakeries. Today, I would continue further west towards the bay, and soon I am at Stanley Park’s English Bay. With the exception of a kayak trek, I’ve never once set foot into its waters; for the cool of the evening is my desired time to visit. Locals after work congregate on the beach or at nearby bars and grilles. Hikers and bicyclists traverse the lanes along the shore, and I simply take a place on a piece of driftwood and bask in the beauty of what is Vancouver today.

Annie Brouwer – T-Boy Writer

Hello…Italy. We just watched “Luca” the Pixar/Disney film, but I think that town isn’t real (Potorroso). I’d want to go there though.

Roger Fallihee – T-Boy Writer

I would love to visit Morocco. I’ve read that a large part of country is mountainous, which includes the Atlas and Rif Mountains. Apparently both ranges are mainly inhabited by the Berbers. I need to have a better understanding of these fascinating people. I mean, who the heck are they?

Tony Chisholm: T-Boy Writer

The Oregon Coast – I’d love to repeat a trip I enjoyed a few years ago in June, when I joined a contingent of hardy (we thought) cyclists from Toronto. We flew into Vancouver with our bikes for a 10 day cycling trip down the coast of Oregon. Our group included 2 guides and we’d be camping out for this spectacular 400 mile scenic adventure. From Vancouver we drove through Washington State to the Oregon border in our mini-bus picking up the rest of the cyclists along the way.

Finally on our bikes, we head out of the town of Astoria with “the wind on our backs” as promised. We were filled with the confidence that only ignorance can produce. We rode 44 miles the first day and then camped out that night on a beautiful beach that looked to be 10 miles long and very secluded. We found out why it was so secluded. When we went into the water which at 50 degrees was totally leg numbing.

The next day we ride 60 miles. The weather is cool and my friend Chris bonks (an athlete’s expression for running out of fuel). We started a “Yellow Jersey” contest for all the cyclists. Chris wins it for showing grace during a severe bonk and in desperate need of food. In fact, that day when we finally stopped for lunch Chris just kept ordering food until something arrived on the table. It ended up being literally half the menu!
Then comes the trial.

Monday dawns with lots of rain, rain and more rain! It poured all night. Everything we owned seemed wet. So we had the lovely task of dressing in wet, cold clothes to head out on our 65 mile ride. What an experience. This was our trial by rain. As we headed out, the rain intensified. The cold water poured out of our jackets down our legs and into our shoes. It was so cold that on the downhills with the wind and the wet my hands started cramping on the brake hoods.

Finally when it seemed almost intolerable we stumbled across “Cinnamon Town” a restaurant in a tiny town that served huge, unbelievable cinnamon buns – an Oregon diet staple. There we sat, miserable in our wet cycling shorts, dripping all over the table. We tried to stay warm by soaking our feet in warm water in the sink in the men’s room. That’s how desperate we were. Then as if in a dream, the guides showed up with dry clothes. “Thank you.”

Warmer, those of us that went on, faced the rain again to start a 3 mile climb fueled by “cinnamon power”.

Oregon is well set up for cyclists. There is a bike lane all along route 101 that follows the sea. They offer excellent state campgrounds every few miles with special areas for hiker/bikers. Even at the tunnels they have special traffic signals the rider turns on before entering to warn drivers of a cyclist up ahead. The beautiful coast was broken up with side trips to lighthouses and amazing vistas on cliffs above the sea and over long unbroken beaches. I became known as “Mister Vista” when I’d continually complain that we weren’t stopping enough to enjoy the views.

By the 5th day we had a full day off riding in the old restored town of Florence to dry clothes and lick our tired muscles. The sun came out and our trial by rain was over.

As the rest of the week went on the sun got stronger and so did my legs. Must have been true for everyone because our speeds seemed to increase. We did notice a strange phenomenon. After stopping for lunch it seemed we always started out with a big hill. On those occasions it was all we could do to hold our food down. Salt water taffy was a local delicacy that we ate in vast quantities. It seemed our food consumption went way up as our bodies demanded more and more calories.

The last two days were among the nicest but also the longest thanks to a string of flats caused by the sharp gravel along the edge of the road. One day, 3 of us got 5 flats and I ended up walking most of the way back to camp having run out of tire tubes. We took all of this in our stride and everyone seemed to have a positive attitude that really helped make the trip so much fun. Besides, the rain was over and the sun just made these last beautiful days more precious.

On the last Saturday we proudly had our photos taken under the “Welcome to California” border sign. What a wonderful experience. Over 400 miles of riding past some of North America’s most spectacular country.

READERS, feel free to offer your won selections of the first international destination you’d visit in the post pandemic world. Please send to **@Tr**********.com , and we will post in our Readers’ poll.

READERS POLL (as of today):

As a lover of 20th century history, it must be Berlin, Germany. — Kyle – Seattle, WA

Though I’ve never been, island hopping in Tahiti should be the thing which I’d love to do. — Terry – Portland, OR

The post The First International Destination You’d Visit in the Post Pandemic World appeared first on Traveling Archive.

The genesis of our poll was highly influenced by Christina Newland’s thoughtful piece in BBC Culture, entitled, Why 1971 was an extraordinary year in film – BBC Culture

Number 10: Duck, You Sucker!

(aka Fistful of Dynamite)

Director: Sergio Leone; Writing: Luciano Vincenzoni, Sergio Donati, Sergio Leone; Cinematography: Giuseppe Ruzzolini; Music: Ennio Morricone. 

Players: Rod Steiger, James Coburn, Romolo Valli, Maria Monti.    

Synopsis: A Mexican bandit and an I.R.A. explosives expert rebel against the government and become heroes of the Mexican Revolution.

Memorable Lines:

• James Coburn as John H. Mallory: Where there’s revolution there’s confusion, and when there’s confusion, a man who knows what he wants stands a good chance of getting it.
• Mallory: When I started using dynamite… I believed in… many things, all of it! Now, I believe only in dynamite. I don’t judge you, Villega. I did that only… once in my life. Get shovellin’.
• Rod Steiger as Juan Miranda: Please, don’t try to tell me about revolution! I know all about the revolutions and how they start! The people that read the books, they go to the people that don’t read the books, and say “Ho-ho!” The time has come to have a change, eh?”

Behind the Scenes:

• When James Coburn was offered the role of John Mallory by Leone, he was initially reluctant. He had dinner with Henry Fonda (star of Once Upon a Time in the West) and asked him what he thought of Leone. Fonda told him that he considered Leone the greatest director he ever worked with. Coburn then took the part. Similarly, Fonda himself had been reluctant to take the part Leone offered him, but was persuaded by his friend, Eli Wallach, the co star of The Good, The Bad and Ugly (1966). Earlier, Wallach had asked Clint Eastwood what to expect when working with Leone on The Good, The Bad and Ugly. Eastwood replied, Never believe an Italian special effects man when he says the explosion won’t hurt you.
• The chanting of Shon shon shon in composer Ennio Morricone’s soundtrack was the suggestion of Leone’s wife, Carla Leone, who thought it would sound better than the original Wah wah chants. Morricone himself said the chants do not represent the names of characters but are just part of the soundscape like the chants in all the other Sergio Leone westerns. Morricone also said that Leone asked him to compose a film’s music before the start of principal photography – contrary to normal practice. He would then play the music to the actors during takes to enhance their performance.
• Rod Steiger demanded that his scenes be filmed with natural sound. This was virtually unheard of in Italian cinema and led to much tension between Steiger and Leone. Steiger had prepared for the role by taking accent and language lessons with a Mexican woman with the goal to use inflections that would imply Juan’s difficulty with speaking English instead of his native Spanish. To create Mallory accent, James Coburn vacationed in Ireland for five weeks. After the film’s completion, Steiger was content with the final result, and praised Leone for his skills as a director.

CRITICS:

• Underrated large canvas Leone; Steiger and Coburn as a revolutionary odd couple. – Dan King, T-Boy Film & Music
• Though not the towering masterpiece of “Once Upon a Time in the West” (1968), but still with Leone’s difficult to imitate directorial style of extreme closeups, generally followed by silence and violence (in this case explosions), and then cutting directly to sweeping panoramic shots of a scorched Spanish desert. And, Morricone, always on board, having contributed to all original musical compositions in Leone’s films since “The Colossus of Rhodes” (1961), including the Leone executive produced, “My Name is Nobody.” (1973). – Ed Boitano, T-Boy Film & Music
• Leone’s means are occasionally too complicated, his themes are rendered with a unique lyrical force as the leitmotifs of Morricone’s memory music. Thus, whereas the theme of “Once Upon a Time in the West” was revenge in all its ultimately futile ramifications, the theme of “Duck, You Sucker” is betrayal in all its hopelessly unresolved ambiguity. Leone is nothing if not ambitious and audacious, and I say more power to him in this era of emotionally paralyzed filmmaking. – Andrew Sarris, The Village Voice

Number 9: Macbeth

(Original title: The Tragedy of Macbeth)

Director: Roman Polanski; Writing: Roman Polanski, Kenneth Tynan, based on play by William Shakespeare; Cinematography: Gilbert Taylor; Film Editing: Alastair McIntyre; Production Design: Wilfrid Shingleton; Art Direction: Fred Carter; Set Decoration: Bryan Graves; Music: The Third Ear Band.

Players: Jon Finch, Francesca Annis, Martin Shaw, Terence Bayle, John Stride, Nicholas Selby, Stephan Chase, Paul Shelley.

Synopsis: A ruthlessly ambitious Scottish lord seizes the throne with the help of his scheming wife and a trio of witches in this chilling adaption of William Shakespeare’s play.

Memorable Lines: 

• Jon Finch as Macbeth: False face must hide what false heart doth know.
• Francesca Annis as Lady Macbeth: Things without all remedy should be without regard. What’s done is done.
• Macbeth: Come, seeling night, scarf up the tender eye of pitiful day. And with thy bloody and invisible hand cancel and tear to pieces that great bond which keeps me pale. Light thickens, and the crow makes wing to the rooky wood. Good things of day begin to droop and drowse while night’s black agents to their prey do rouse

Behind the Scenes:

• Director Roman Polanski’s wife, actress Sharon Tate, was murdered by members of Charles Manson’s Family two years before the making of the film. It is believed that due to this traumatic event, Polanski developed the story to be a more violent representation of Shakespeare’s play. For instance, the scene in which Macbeth murders King Duncan was not in the original play and was instead implied.
• The scene in which Macbeth’s thugs massacre Macduff’s household was based on Roman Polanski’s memory of Nazi SS officers ransacking his house as a child.
• Filming began with four grueling weeks in Snowdonia National Park. Richard Vetter’s TODD-AO 35 lenses won an Academy Award for reducing anamorphic distortion in close-ups.

Critics: 

• Polanski’s “Macbeth” is more interesting than if he had done your ordinary, respectable, awe-stricken tiptoe around Shakespeare. This is an original film by an original film artist, and not an “interpretation.” It should have been titled “Polanski’s Macbeth,” just as we got “Fellini Satyricon.” – Roger Ebert, rogerebert.com
• We’ve had remarkable film adaptions of Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” in the past with Orson Welle’s “Macbeth”  (1948) and Akira Kurosawa’s “Throne of Blood” (1957) which both remained true to their own directorial sensibilities. This is also the case of Polanski’s adaptation where, in many respects, the images are jolted up to an almost hypnotic and hysterical level. Yes, the period detail and violence are profound; as it often was in the Middle Ages – Ed Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• People ask why I do things, this or that film. Why? Why do I eat fish and not steak for lunch? I don’t know why. There are layers of experience, and not only artistic experience. Making a film is separate from life, but it is made by a human being and whatever happens to me has got to have an influence in what I do. A film sums up the experiences of my life. You absorb the experience, you assimilate it and you make a decision. A film sums up everything—whom I see, what I drink, the amount of ice cream I eat. It is everything. Do you understand? Everything. – Roman Polanski, taken from interview with  Bernard Weinraub of the NY Times after the release of Macbeth.

NUMBER 8: Murmur of the Heart (Le souffle au Coeur) 

Director/Writer: Louis Malle; Cinematography: Ricardo Aronovich;  Music: Sidney Bechet, Gaston Frèche, Charlie Parker, Henri Renaud.

Players: Léa Massari, Benoît Ferreux, Daniel Gélin, Michael Lonsdale, Ave Ninchi.

Synopsis: As France is nearing the end of the first Indochina War, an open-minded teenage boy finds himself torn between a rebellious urge to discover love, and the ever-present, almost dominating affection of his beloved mother.

Memorable Lines:

• Léa Massari as Clara Chevalier: I don’t know. Begin at the beginning. Wait to experience things yourself. And there’s plenty of time. I’m not rushing you. Everyone has to discover love for himself. Lots of things can happen between a man and a woman. Better to find out for yourself, not from a book.
• Benoît Ferreux as Laurent Chevalier: I’m tired of the old jazz. Always the same thing.
• Laurent Chevalier: The music store has the new Charlie Parker. Let’s go.

• Louis Malle based many aspects of the protagonist Laurent’s life on his own experiences growing up. This included his love of jazz, curiosity about literature, the “tyranny” of his two older brothers who tried to introduce him to sex, and having a heart murmur.
• While the incest aspects of the story were not autobiographical, Louis Malle did in fact end up sharing a hotel room with his mother as a child while on a trip to treat his heart murmur due to “bizarre” circumstances.
• Malle asserted in interviews that the incest, in particular, is fictional. He claimed that in writing the script, he had no intention to include incest, but ended up doing so as he explored an intense mother-son relationship

Critics: 

• Breaking a taboo, ever so gently, is just part of the magic of this very French take on coming of age. – Stephen Brewer, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• “Murmur of the Heart”  is mellow and smooth… but with the kick of a mule—a funny kick, which sends you out doubled over grinning.- Pauline Kael, The New Yorker.
• The boy is played by a nonactor, Benoit Ferreux, whose puzzlement about growing up, and whose admiration at the possibilities of life, remind us of young Jean-Pierre Leaud in Truffaut’s “The 400 Blows.” The two movies deserve comparison in more ways than one. And yet “Murmur of the Heart” isn’t really about the boy, but the mother. Lea Massari (you may remember her as the girl in “L’Avventura”) is so irrepressible, so irresponsible, so much a girl and not quite an adult, that her performance takes scenes that might have been embarrassing, and makes them simply magical. – Roger Ebert, rogerebert.com

Number 7: Straw Dogs

Director: Sam Peckinpah; Writers: Sam Peckinpah, David Zelag Goodman, based on novel by Gordon M. Williams; Cinematography: John Coquillon; Music: Jerry Fielding; Film Editing: Paul Davies, Tony Lawson, Roger Spottiswood.

Players: Dustin Hoffman, Susan George, Peter Vaughan, T.P. McKenna, David Warner.

Synopsis: A young American man and his English wife come to rural England and face increasingly vicious local harassment.

Memorable Lines: 

• Susan George as Amy Sumner: Those straw dogs were practically licking my body outside, so… Dustin Hoffman as David Sumner: I applaud their good taste. Amy Sumner: It’s not funny. David Sumner: We’ll, maybe you should wear a bra.
• David Sumner to brutes: Ok, you’ve had your fun. I’ll give you one more chance, and if you don’t clear out now, there’ll be real trouble. I mean it.
• David Warner as Henry Niles: I don’t know my way home. David Sumner  (last line in film): That’s okay. I don’t either.

Behind the Scenes:

• Sam Peckinpah’s adaptation of the novel drew inspiration from Robert Ardrey’s books, African Genesis and The Territorial Imperative, which argued that man was essentially a carnivore who instinctively battled over control of territory.
• Before shooting, Sam Peckinpah instructed Dustin Hoffman and Susan George to live together for two weeks, with co-writer David Zelag Goodman in tow. Some of their interactions during this period were worked into the film’s script.
• In the scene where David Sumner (Dustin Hoffman) first enters the local pub, director Sam Peckinpah was unhappy with the other actors’ reaction to this stranger entering their world. Eventually, he decided to do one take where Hoffman entered the scene without his trousers on. He got his reaction, and these are the shots shown in the final film.

Critics: 

• I can think of no other film which screws violence up into so tight a knot of terror that one begins to feel that civilization is crumbling before one’s eyes. – Tom Milne, Sight & Sound 
• Sam Peckinpah’s “Straw Dogs” is the first American film that is a fascist work of art. The movie follows an American mathematician (Dustin Hoffman) and his wife (Susan George), who become the subject of an escalating series of attacks by a gang of locals; its graphic depiction of rape and murder crystallized the filmmaker’s worldview that humans are instinctively attuned to violence. – Pauline Kael, The New Yorker
• You have to understand, first of all, that the movie ends with maybe 20 minutes of unrestrained bloodletting, during which people are scalded with boiling whisky, have their feet blown off by shotguns, are clubbed to death and (in one case) nearly decapitated by a bear trap. The violence is the movie’s reason for existing; it is the element that is being sold, and in today’s movie market, it should sell well. But does Peckinpah pay his dues before the last 20 minutes? Does he keep us feeling we can trust him? I don’t think so. – Roger Ebert, rogerebert.com

Number 6: The French Connection

Director: William Friedkin; Writing: Ernest Tidyman, based on the book Robin Moore; Cinematography: Owen Roizman; Music: Don Ellis; Editing: Gerald B. Greenberg; Art Direction: Ben Kasazkow. 

Players: Gene Hackman, Roy Scheider, Fernando Rey, Tony Lo Bianco, Marcel Bozzuffi.

Synopsis: A pair of NYC cops in the Narcotics Bureau stumble onto a drug smuggling job with a French connection.

Memorable Lines: 

• Gene Hackman as Jimmy ‘Popeye’ Doyle: All right, Popeye’s here! Get your hands on your heads, get off the bar, and get on the wall!
• ‘Popeye’ Doyle: Did you ever pick your feet in Poughkeepsie?
• Roy Scheider as Buddy ‘Cloudy’ Russo: Mulderig! You shot Mulderig! (a police detective). ‘Popeye’ Doyle (Ignoring him, last line in film): That son of a bitch is here. I saw him. I’m gonna get him.

Behind the Scenes:

• Cameras and equipment would often freeze during shooting due to near-freezing temperatures during the winter shooting in New York City and Brooklyn.
• According to William Friedkin, the film’s documentary-style realism through hand-held photography, use of real locations and editing style were inspired by the movies, Z (1969) by Costa Gavras, and Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless. (1960).
• The famous shot of the chase is made from a front bumper mount and shows a low-angle point of view shot of the streets racing by. Director of photography Owen Roizman, said that the camera was undercranked to 18 frames per second to enhance the sense of speed. Roizman’s contention is borne out when you see a car at a red light whose muffler is pumping smoke at an accelerated rate. Other shots involved stunt drivers who were supposed to barely miss hitting the speeding car, but due to errors in timing accidental collisions occurred and were left in the final film.

Critics: 

• “The French Connection” answered the question, can Gene Hackman do anything bad? No, some films may not be great, but Hackman, always committed and solid. – Jim Gordon, T-Boy Society of Film & Music.
• The movie is all surface, movement, violence and suspense. Only one of the characters really emerges into three dimensions: Popeye Doyle’s Gene Hackman, a New York narc who is vicious, obsessed and a little mad. The other characters don’t emerge because there’s no time for them to emerge. Things are happening too fast. – Roger Ebert, RogerEbert.com 
• A hugely successful slam-bang thriller that zaps the audience with noise, speed, and brutality. The movie, about police detectives tracking down a shipment of heroin in New York City, is certainly exciting, but that excitement isn’t necessarily a pleasure. The ominous music keeps tightening the screws and heating things up; the movie is like an aggravated case of New York. It proceeds through chases, pistol-whippings, slashings, murders, snipings, and more chases for close to two hours. This is what’s meant to give you a charge. – Pauline Kael, The New Yorker

Number 5: Death in Venice

Director: Luchino Visconti; Writing: Luchino Visconti, Nicola Badalucco, based on novella by Thomas Mann; Cinematography: Pasqualino De Santis; Film Editing: Ruggero Mastroianni; Art Direction: Ferdinando Scarfiotti; Costume Design: Piero Tosi; Music: Gustav Mahler.

Players: Dirk  Bogarde, Romolo Valli, Björn Andrésen, Silvana Mangano, Marisa Berenson, Mark Burns, Nora Ricci, Carole André, Franco Fabrizi.

Synopsis: In Visconti’s adaptation of the Thomas Mann novella, avant-garde Composer Gustav von Aschenbach travels to a Venetian seaside resort in search of repose after a period of artistic and personal stress. But he finds no peace there, for he soon develops a troubling attraction to an adolescent boy, Tadzio on vacation with his family. The boy embodies an ideal of beauty that Aschenbach has long sought and he becomes infatuated. However, the onset of a deadly pestilence threatens them both physically and represents the corruption that compromises and threatens all ideals.

Memorable Lines: 

• Dirk Bogarde as Gustav von Aschenbach: You cannot reach the spirit with the senses. You cannot. It’s only by complete domination of the senses that you can ever achieve wisdom, truth, and human dignity.
• Gustav von Aschenbach: Madame, will you permit an entire stranger, to serve you with a word of advice and warning, which self-interests prevents others from saying. Go away! Go away, immediately. Don’t delay. Please, I beg you.
• Gustav von Aschenbach: You know sometimes I think that artists are rather like hunters aiming in the dark. They don’t know what their target is, and they don’t know if they’ve hit it. But you can’t expect life to illuminate the target and steady your aim. The creation of beauty and purity is a spiritual act.

Behind the Scenes:

• Second part of Visconti’s German Trilogy, which also included The Damned (1969) and Ludwig. (1973).
• In the Thomas Mann novella, Gustav von Aschenbach is an author, not a composer.
• While Gustav Mahler may have inspired the character of Gustav von Aschenbach, many of the plot points in the novella were inspired by Thomas Mann’s own experience. According to Mann’s widow Katia, the two were vacationing in Venice in 1911, when Mann noticed a beautiful young boy staying at their hotel.

Critics: 

• Lots of self-obsessed pondering on beauty and intellect is set against a soundtrack by Mahler, with moody canals and crumbling palazzi as backdrops. – Stephen Brewer, T-Boy Society of Film & Music.
• While “Death in Venice” is indifferent to the plague (“Asiatic cholera”) as a condition in itself, the film’s intensive focus on its protagonist vividly raises the question of self-isolation. As the sole three-dimensional character, Aschenbach is necessarily solitary; his standoffish personality follows on this structural sequestration: he has to be a loner. Even in flashbacks to more gregarious times with wife and daughter, he is “a man of avoidance,” the “keeper of distances.” The friend who makes these charges gets even blunter: “You are afraid to have direct, honest contact with anything!” D. A. Miller, from My Lockdown with Death in Venice.
• The physical beauty of the film itself is overwhelming. The world of the Lido of sixty years ago has been re-created in painstaking detail. The fashions, the entertainments, the table settings reveal Visconti’s compulsion for accuracy. The photography is almost the first I have seen that is fully worthy of the beauty of Venice; the pink-and-gray city rises from waters of a glasslike smoothness, so that the water and the quality of light itself seem to suggest the presence of the plague-bearing sirocco wind. The wind brings both plague and beauty, which is its function in the Mann novel, and Visconti’s mastery of visual style almost succeeds in creating the very ideas and feelings that his heavy-handed narrative entirely misses. – Roger Ebert, RogerEbert.com

Number 4: Dirty Harry

Director: Don Siegel; Writing: Harry Julian Fink, R.M. Fink and Dean Riesner, based on story by Harry Julian Fink & Rita M. Fink; Cinematography: Bruce Surtees; Music: Lalo Schifrin; Film Editing: Carl Pingitore; Art Direction: Dale Hennesy; Makeup Department: Gordon Bau.

Players: Clint Eastwood, Andrew Robinson, Harry Guardino, Reni Santoni, John Vernon.

Synopsis:When a madman calling himself the Scorpio Killer menaces the city, tough-as-nails San Francisco Police  Inspector Dirty Harry Callahan is assigned to track down and find the crazed psychopath.

Memorable Lines: 

• Clint Eastwood as Harry Callahan: Now you know why they call me “Dirty Harry”…
  every dirty job that comes along.
• Harry Callahan: Uh uh. I know what you’re thinking. “Did he fire six shots or only five?” Well to tell you the truth in all this excitement I kinda lost track myself. But being this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world and would blow your head clean off, you’ve gotta ask yourself one question: “Do I feel lucky?” Well, do ya, punk??
• Harry Callahan: You know, you’re crazy if you think you’ve heard the last of this guy. He’s gonna kill again. Josef Sommer as District Attorney Rothko: How do you know? Harry Callahan: ‘Cause he likes it.

Behind the Scenes:

• Serial killer Scorpio was loosely based on the Zodiac Killer, who used to taunt Police and media with notes about his crimes, in one of which he threatened to hijack a school bus full of children. The role of Harry Callahan was loosely based on real-life detective David Toschi, who was the chief investigator on the Zodiac case.
• Before each of Harry’s three combative encounters with the Scorpio Killer, there is a cross and or a reference to Christ. The Scorpio Killer (Andrew Robinson ) wears a belt with a peace symbol buckle throughout the movie. According to producer and director Don Siegel, It reminds us that no matter how vicious a person is, when he looks in the mirror, he is still blind to what he truly is.
• Don Siegel ultimately directed Clint Eastwood in five films, and also appeared as an actor in Eastwood’s directorial debut, Play Misty for Me (also released in 1971).

Critics: 

• Eastwood as the definite Siegel outsider struggling against the system. – Dan King, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• Dirty Harry” is very effective at the level of a thriller. At another level, it uses the most potent star presence in American movies — Clint Eastwood — to lay things on the line. If there aren’t mentalities like Dirty Harry’s at loose in the land, then the movie is irrelevant. If there are, we should not blame the bearer of the bad news. – Roger Ebert, RogerEbert.com
• Don Siegel’s cop movie was received as a right-wing fantasy on its release in 1971, and it probably made a lot of money on that basis. But now that the political context has faded, it’s easier to see the ambiguities in Clint Eastwood’s renegade detective-who, in the usual Siegel fashion, is equated visually and morally with the psychotic killer he’s trampling the Constitution to catch. A crisp, beautifully paced film, full of Siegel’s wonderful coups of cutting and framing.- David Kehr, Chicago Reader

Number 3: Just Before Nightfall (Juste avant la nuit)

Director: Claude Chabrol; Writing: Claude Chabrol; based on Edouard Atiya’s crime novel, The Thin Line, later issued as Murder, My Love. Cinematography: Jean Rabier; Music: Pierre Jansen; Film Editing: Jacques Gaillard.

Players: Michel Bouquet, Stéphane Audran, Marina Ninchi , François Périer, Jean Carmet.

Synopsis: Charles Masson, an upper-class French advertising executive, is having an affair with Laura, the wife of his best friend. Charles strangles Laura when one of their S&M games crosses the line and she dies. Though reeking in remorse, Charles realizes that the police do not seem to have any clues about the crime, but has difficulties coping with the situation, trying to live a normal life with his two children and loving wife. Just Before Nightfall is another Chabrol film that focuses on infidelity and again it’s an intriguing drama and an excellent exploration of the human condition.

Memorable Lines: 

• Michel Bouquet as Charles: My darling, I’d like you to understand. With you, love is simple and clear. With her it was a sort of…insane drama. She forced me…she made me participate. It wasn’t love, it was violent and humiliating. She wanted me to rape her. She forced me to be brutal to her. That’s what was so horrifying… it was she who tortured me and took pleasure in seeing me suffer.
• Charles: Justice doesn’t spare a guilty man because his family will suffer.
• Charles: I confessed. I unburdened my conscience. And you absolve me. I could have committed suicide. It would have been better for all. But I would’ve been a coward… a coward.

Behind the Scenes:

• This is the last film of Claude Chabrol’s Hélène cycle, in which actress Stéphane Audran starred, playing characters called Hélène in La femme infidèle (1969), Le Boucher (1970), and La Rupture (1970).
• Stéphane Audran appeared in 24 Chabrol films. In 1964 they were married which lasted for 16 years until divorce.
• Claude Chabrol, initially a film critic for Cahiers du Cinema, became one of the cornerstones of the French Nouvelle Vague.

Critics: 

• Former French film critic Claude Chabrol is the ultimate Hitchcockian director, but with a profound Gallic twist. Along with Éric Rohmer, he wrote the very first book about the Master of Suspense: ‘Hitchcock – The First Forty-four Films.’ Like the Beatles and the British Invasion, who taught North Americans about their own music, the French Nouvelle Vague directors made us appreciate our own Hollywood films. Unlike Brian De Palma, Chabrol used his Hitchcockian influences as a starting point to transcend his own style and meaning. And, of course, there is a Hitchcock thing called, ‘Guilt.’ – Ed Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• His (Chabrol’s) characters are the molds from which the French bourgeoisie is cast. They’re terribly respectable, they live in comfortable homes and work in well-paying professions, they present a facade of total respectability. But underneath there are dark passions and well-kept secrets and, frequently, the ultimate embarrassment of murder. They aren’t killers; that’s the whole point. They’re people who commit murder to their own astonishment. – Roger Ebert, rogerebert.com
• One of the great films of the 1970s, this is Chabrol’s most representative film, and arguably his masterpiece. The first moments of the movie, with the camera intruding upon a blinds-drawn window, again invites comparisons with Hitchcock, and the opening shot of “Psycho.” But that tip of the hat only serves to underscore the extent to which Chabrol has moved on, as “Just Before Nightfall” situates us in a fully realized and now plainly recognizable Chabrolian universe. – Jonathan Kirshner, Bright Lights Film Journal

Number 2: A Clockwork Orange

Director: Stanley Kubrick; Writing: Stanley Kubrick, based on Anthony Burgess dystopian satire novel; Cinematography: John Alcott (lighting cameraman); Film Editing: Bill Butler; Production Design: John Barry; Costume Design: Milena Canonero; Music: Wendy Carlos, electronic music, realized by Walter Carlos.

Players: Malcolm McDowell, Patrick Magee, Michael Bates, Warren Clarke.

Synopsis: In the future, a sadistic gang leader is imprisoned and volunteers for a conduct-aversion experiment, but it doesn’t go as planned.

Memorable Lines: 

• McDowell as Alex: There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar trying to make up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening. The Korova milkbar sold milk-plus, milk plus vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom, which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old ultra-violence.
• Alex: It had been a wonderful evening and what I needed now to give it the perfect ending was a bit of the old Ludwig van.
• Alex: So I waited. And O, my brothers, I got a lot better, munching away at eggi-wegs and lomticks of toast and lovely steaki-wakes. And then one day, they said I was going to have a very special visitor.

Behind the Scenes:

• Because of the limited budget, various techniques had to be used such as dolly shots on wheelchairs, sound recorded live on set, the use of natural light and some scenes in handheld cameras. However, at that time the new camera zoom control was first used in the picture.
• Malcolm McDowell’s eyes were anesthetized for the torture scenes so that he would film for periods of time without too much discomfort. Nevertheless, his corneas got repeatedly scratched by the metal lid locks.
• The film was unavailable for public viewing in the UK from 1973 until 2000, due to Kubrick and Burgess death threats. British video stores were so inundated with requests for the movie that some took to putting up signs that read: No, we do not have “A Clockwork Orange” It was released the year after Stanley Kubrick’s death.

Critics: 

• Whereas Altman’s style was loose and free, Kubrick was the new visionary whose attention to detail in every aspect of his film rivaled that of Hitchcock. Where Altman pulled his audiences in with small, nuanced answers, Kubrick pushed his audiences with big bold questions. Kubrick saw a dystopian future where government gaslighted and conditioned the minds of the youth, ironically set to classic works by Beethoven and Purcell. “Clockwork” is a nightmare, but never a horror.  Mike Rand, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• Stanley Kubrick’s ninth film, “A Clockwork Orange,” which has just won the New York Film Critics Award as the best film of 1971, is a brilliant and dangerous work, but it is dangerous in a way that brilliant things sometimes are. -Vincent Canby, New York Times
• “A Clockwork Orange” manifests itself on the screen as a painless, bloodless, and ultimately pointless futuristic fantasy. The first third splashes out of a wide-angle lens like a madly mod picture-spread for Look magazine where Kubrick toiled briefly long, long ago. The middle third provides a moderately engrossing indictment of B. F. Skinnerism in action. But the last third of the movie is such a complete bore that even audiences of confirmed Kubrickians have drowned out smatterings of applause with prolonged hissing. – Andrew Sarris, The Village Voice

Number 1: McCabe & Mrs. Miller

Director: Robert Altman; Writing: Robert Altman and Brian McKay, based on novel McCabe (1959) by Edmund Naughton; Cinematography: Vilmos Zsigmond; Film Editing: Lou Lombardo; Music: Leonard Cohen; Production Design: Leon Ericksen; Art Direction: Al Locatelli, Philip Thomas; Sound Department: John W. Gusselle.

Players: Warren Beatty, Julie Christie, Rene Auberjonois, William Devane, John Schuck, Corey Fischer, Bert Remsen, Shelley Duvall, Keith Carradine, Michael Murphy, Hugh Millais.

Synopsis: A gambler and a prostitute become business partners in a remote Pacific Northwest mining town in 1902, and their enterprise thrives until a large corporation arrives on the scene.

Memorable Lines: 

• Warren Beatty as John McCabe: I tell you, sometimes, sometimes when I take a look at you, I just keep looking and a-looking. I want to feel your body against me so bad, I think I’m going to bust. I keep trying to tell you in a lot of different ways. If just one time you could be sweet without no money around. I think I could – well, I’ll tell you something. I’ve got poetry in me. I do. I’ve got poetry in me!
• Julie Christie as Constance Miller: Listen, Mr. McCabe. I’m a whore, and I know a awful lot about whorehouses. And I know that if you had a house up here, you’d stand to make a lot of money. Now, this is all you’ve got to do: put out the money for the house. I’ll do all the rest. I’ll look after the girls, the business, the expenses, the running, the furnishing, everything. And I’ll pay you back any money you put in the house, so’s you won’t lose nothin’. And we’ll make it fifty-fifty.
• John McCabe: If a frog had wings, he wouldn’t bump his ass so much, follow me?

Behind the Scenes:

• For a distinctive look, Robert Altman and Vilmos Zsigmond chose to “flash” (pre-fog) the film negative before its eventual exposure, as well as use a number of filters on the cameras, rather than manipulate the film in post-production; in this way the studio could not force him to change the film’s look to something less compelling. However, this was not done for the final 20 minutes of the picture, as Altman wanted the danger to McCabe to be as realistic as possible. Note the change when McCabe wakes up, grabs a shotgun, and starts off to the church.
• Though the film takes place in the fictional town of Presbyterian, Washington State, it was actually shot outside of Vancouver, BC.
• During post-production, Altman was having difficulties finding a proper musical score, until he attended a party where the album Songs of Leonard Cohen (1967) was playing. He noticed that several songs from the album seemed to match the mood and themes of the movie. Cohen, who had been a fan of Altman’s previous film, Brewster McCloud (1970), allowed him to use three songs from the album: The Stranger Song – which Cohen added a bridge – Sisters of Mercy and Winter Lady. Altman was dismayed when Cohen later admitted that he didn’t like the movie. A year later, Altman received a phone call from Cohen, who told him that he changed his mind after re-watching the movie with an audience and now loved it.

Critics: 

• A rich kaleidoscope of landscape, rain and smoke; a family of regular Altman players speaking in overlapping sound, accompanied by the haunting music of Leonard Cohen makes “McCabe and Mrs. Miller” feel like an opium induced dream.- Ed Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• Altman’s cool, loose style lets his camera lens roam in and out of the lives of his characters while his soundtrack captures every little nuance in the social landscape of the Pacific Northwest during the end of the Old West. Altman’s melting pot of sights and sounds is every bit as American as Ozu’s Tatami- style camera setup is Japanese. Without the flash of Scorsese or the drama of Coppola, Altman carved his footprints into America’s modern cinematic landscape. – Michael Rand, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• Less Altman’s take on the Wild West than life in an isolated Wild West community. – Dan King, T-Boy Society of Film & Music

See The 20 Best Films of 1971, Part One 

If you have a favorite film from 1971 and it’s not listed above, you can access it on IMDB’s  Feature Films released between January 1, 1971 through December 31, 1971. (Sorted by Popularity Ascending)
Send us your own list, at ad*@Tr**********.com and we will publish it in our Readers’ Poll.

The post The 10 Best Films of 1971 appeared first on Traveling Archive.

The T-Boy Society of Film & Music’s latest poll is devoted to our 20 favorite films of 1971. Part One in the series focuses on films voted by our members from eleven to twenty. Part Two will feature the final top ten.

The genesis of our poll was highly influenced by Christina Newland’s thoughtful piece in BBC Culture, entitled, Why 1971 was an Extraordinary Year in Film.

Ms. Newland writes, In the late 1960s the Hollywood film industry was floundering financially, and many of the struggling major studios were bought out by non-media companies. By ’71, film admission in Hollywood had slowed to less than a quarter compared to the heyday in the 1940s. There was no set path for studios to follow, and no certain road into the future of filmmaking.

When critics and scholars talk about the remarkable artistic flowering that came from the “New Hollywood” of the ’70s, it’s often about how artists slipped through the cracks in the chaos between the old guard fading away and the new guard taking over. By 1971, this seemed to be precisely what was occurring.

Yes, we agree with Ms. Newland’s assessment that the abundance of unique 1971 films were the tip of the iceberg, where young Hollywood filmmakers responded to the decline of U.S. optimism, reflected by the political assassinations of JFK, Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, and the continuation of the amoral War in Vietnam, complete with napalmed children and unpunished U.S. war criminals a fixture on the evening news. The studio brass was confused, and it seemed that anyone who was young with long-hair and a beard was handed a camera to make a movie. But, keep in mind, most of the new films were of literary content, not necessarily form or visual style.

So, it’s important to note that the young Hollywood directors were highly influenced by the French Nouvelle Vague’s use of new lightweight cameras and sound equipment, natural lighting and high-speed film which allowed shooting on the streets, as director Jean-Luc Godard and photographer Raoul Coutard once did when they pushed a hidden camera in a shopping cart while filming Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg on the Champs-Élysées in À bout de souffle (1960).

But, the Nouvelle Vague influences – similar to how Italian Neorealism effected the French filmmakers – did initially impact the early visual style of certain new Hollywood directors; in particular Francis Ford Coppola, John Cassavetes, Arthur Penn, Jack Nicholson, Martin Scorsese, William Friedkin, Hal Ashby and Brian De Palma. Akin to the Beatles and the British Musical Invasion of the 1960s who taught us to appreciate our own music, the Nouvelle Vague did the same with our Hollywood movies with many of its filmmakers previously film critics on the journal Cahiers du Cinéma, who had an understanding of the works of Hollywood masters such as Hitchcock, Hawks and post-Citizen Kane films by Orson Welles. In Peter Biskind’s landmark text, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, he explains that  Warren Beatty first offered the screenplay of Bonnie and Clyde to Godard and Truffaut before Arthur Penn, which reinforces the influence of La Nouvelle Vague on the new Hollywood directors; where Godard himself is considered the most influential filmmaker of the post-World War 2 era.

But, with that said, our list of top films of 1971 is not made at the expense of established masters such as directors like Don Siegel, Stanley Kubrick, Franklin J. Schaffner.

So, once again, the T-Boy Society of Film and Music’s list of our 20 favorite films of 1971 begins with Part One; films from eleven to twenty.

Initial Comments:

• For me, it’s all about change, realism (not the aging studio, “shot-on-the-backlot” attempts at realism). – Jim Gordon, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• I spent much of my time at college in the dark, at a movie theater steps away from my apartment. A roll of ten tickets cost ten dollars. That might have been the best investment I ever made, because I honestly believe I learned more from these and other films I saw there (a special nod to Bergman, Truffaut, Fellini, Rossellini, and Visconti) than I did from all that fancy education. – Stephen Brewer, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• Fifty years ago, with both the industry and wider society in turmoil, an astounding set of movies was born – which offer pause for thought about cinema today. Amid US films, there was often a fascinating split between pro-establishment works and those which embraced the spirit of the counterculture. – Christina Newland, BBC Culture
• Violating the boundaries between life and art to make their material their own was a dangerous way for these filmmakers to work. It was successful for a while, enriching both the life and the art, but as the two became more extravagant and interchangeable, New Hollywood directors lost the detachment of artists, and their lives and art sank into quicksand, joined in a fatal embrace. – Peter Biskind, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls
• “Born again Christian” Johnny Cash was asked why he recorded a cover version of the Nine Inch Nails’ song ‘Hurt,’ which focused on heroin addiction. His reply was simple: “A good song is a good song.” That echoes my selections of films that stand alone devoid of 1971 cultural and literary sensibilities. – Ed Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• A movie is a movie is a movie. – Alfred E. Newman, Mad Magazine

Number 20: TWO ENGLISH GIRLS

Director: François Truffaut; Writers: François Truffaut, Jean Gruault (adapted from Les deux Anlaises et le continent by Henri-Pierre Roché); Cinematography: Néstor Almendros; Music: Georges Delerue; Film Editing: Martine Barraqué, Yann Dedet; Production Design: Michel de Broin; Costume Design: Gitt Magrini.

Players: Jean-Pierre Léaud, Kika Markham, Stacey Tendeter, Sylvia Marriott, Marie Mansart, Philippe Léotard, Mark Peterson, David Markhm, Georges Delerue (the film’s music composer in small role).

Synopsis:

At the beginning of the 20th century, Claude Roc, a young middle-class Frenchman meets in Paris, Ann Brown, a young Englishwoman. They become friends and Ann invites him to spend holidays at the house where she lives with her mother and her sister Muriel. During the holiday, Claude, Ann and Muriel become very close and he gradually falls in love with Muriel. But both families lay down a one-year-long separation without any contact before agreeing to the marriage. So, Claude goes back to Paris where he has many love affairs and sends Muriel a farewell letter.

Memorable Line:

Stacey Tendeter as Muriel Brown (in letter): Dearest Claude, I came to see you to bury this thing. I’m glad you were the first, because it’s you, because you wanted it. I shan’t cry. Listen to me as you once did when I told you love was stirring in me. Now I tell you that it must die. So that I may live.

Extras:

• Truffaut had earlier adapted another Henri-Pierre Roché novel, Jules and Jim.
• Anne’s last words in the film are, If you send for a doctor, I will see him now. These were writer Emily Brontë’s last words before she died. We assume that Truffaut probably used her words in the film as an homage or to compare her to the character of Anne.
• Jean-Pierre Léaud ultimately appeared in seven films directed by Truffaut.

Critics:

• Truffaut’s “Two English Girls” is a film of such beautiful, charming and comic discretion that it isn’t until the end that one realizes it’s also immensely sad and even brutal, though in the non-brutalizing way that truth can sometimes be. – Vincent Canby, NY Times
• As a man obsessed with memories of the past, Truffaut continues with his tradition of period pieces. Even many of his contemporary genre films feature flashbacks to earlier days. – Ringo Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• Because Truffaut doesn’t strain for an emotional tone, he can cover a larger range than the one-note movies. Here he is discreet, even while filming the most explicit scenes he’s ever done; he handles sadness gently; he is charming and funny even while he tells us a story that is finally tragic. – Roger Ebert, RogerEbert.com

Number 19: NICHOLAS AND ALEXANDRA

Director: Franklin J. Schaffner; Writing: James Goldman, screenplay (based on the book by Robert K. Massie); Cinematography: Freddie Young; Film Editing: Ernest Walter; Production Design: John Box; Art Direction: Ernest Archer, Jack Maxsted, Gil Parrondo; Costume Design: Yvonne Blake.

Players: Michael Jayston, Janet Suzman, Ania Marson, Lynne Frederick, Candace Glendenning, Fiona Fullerton, Tom Baker, Jack Hawkins, a young Brian Cox as Trotsky, and Daniel Day Lewis (uncredited).

Synopsis:

Tsar Nicholas II, the inept last monarch of Russia, insensitive to the needs of his people, is overthrown and exiled to Siberia with his family.

Memorable Line:

Michael Jayston as Tsar Nicholas II: The Russia my father gave me never lost a war. What shall I say to my son when the time comes? That I had no pride? That I was weak? I’ve always thought God meant me to rule. He put me here. He chose me, and whatever happens is His will. We shall fight on until victory.

Extras:

• Tsar Nicholas II was the first cousin of Great Britain’s King George the 5th and Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm the 2nd.
• Director Franklin J. Schaffner deliberately cast unfamiliar leads (Jayston, Suzman, Baker) so the audience would focus on the storytelling.
• Schaffner had Michael Jayston, Janet Suzman, Roderic Noble, Ania Marson, Lynne Frederick, Candace Glendenning, and Fiona Fullerton live together during filming so that the actors would form a family-like bond, in an effort to make their scenes together more authentic.

Critics:

• The writing is excellent. “Nicholas and Alexandra” is a slice of history and intriguing. –  Richard Carroll, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• There’s always a kind of fascination in royalty. We democratic Americans even seem to like royalty more than those nations who have some. Nicholas and Alexandra may not have been the flashiest of czars and czarinas, but maybe they weren’t entirely to blame; the muted tone of the age was set by Queen Victoria, who (as Vincent Canby notes) was the grandmother of practically everybody in World War I – Roger Ebert, RogerEbert.com

Number 18: THE DEVILS

Director: Ken Russell; Writing: Ken Russell, screenplay (based on the play by John Whiting & novel by Aldous Huxley); Cinematography: David Watkin; Music: Peter Maxwell Davies; Film Editing: Michael Bradsell; Art Direction: Robert Cartwright; Costume Design: Shirley Russell; Set Design: Derek Jarman.

Players: Vanessa Redgrave, Oliver Reed, Dudley Sutton, Max Adrian.

Synopsis:

In 17th-century France, Father Urbain Grandier seeks to protect the city of Loudun from the corrupt establishment of Cardinal Richelieu. Hysteria occurs within the city when he is accused of witchcraft by a sexually repressed nun.

Memorable Lines:

Oliver Reed as Grandier: Lies! Lies and heresy. The Devil is a liar, and the father of lies. If the Devil’s evidence is to be accepted, the most virtuous people are in the greatest of danger, for it against these that Satan rages most violently. I had never set eyes on Sister Jeanne of the Angels until the day of my arrest, but the Devil has spoken, and to doubt his word is sacrilege.

Vanessa Redgrave as Sister Jeanne: Oh, Christ, let me find a way to you. Take me in your sacred arms. Let the blood flow between us uniting us.

Grandier: My lords, I am innocent of the charges. And I am afraid. But I have the hope in my heart that, before this day ends, Almighty God will glance aside and let my suffering atone for my vain and disordered life. Amen.

Extras:

• Soon to be a director in his own right, Derek Jarman’s sets are modeled on Fritz Lang’s Metropolis (1927).
• Ken Russell wanted to avoid the clichéd look of period films and insisted on anachronistic, even futuristic, design.
• Russell’s guidance to Jarman was that it should echo the ‘rape in a public toilet’ line from the Huxley novel that inspired the film.

Critics:

• Two years before “The Exorcist” hit the screen, Ken Russell puts the Catholic Church in the spotlight by filming one of the most disturbing films of all times. Except from being a sheer technical and aesthetic masterpiece, “The Devils” provokes as a film with its relentless sense of anarchy. Religious hysteria and illusions, the horror of human arrogance and depravity and the love that turns to cherishing that turns to hatred. – Vassli, IMDB.com
• Though Russell wrote the screenplay for “The Devils” his scripts and by others are only a starting point for him to transcend his own personal vision. Frustrating for many, but glad he was around. – Ed Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music

Number 17: WALKABOUT

Director: Nicolas Roeg; Writing: Edward Bond, screenplay (based on novel by Donald G. Payne and story by Nicolas Roeg); Cinematography: Nicolas Roeg; Music: John Barry; Film Editing: Antony Gibbs, Alan Pattillo; Production Design: Brian Eatwell Art Direction: Terry Gough.

Players: Jenny Agutter, Luc Roeg, David Gulpilil, John Meillon.

Synopsis:

Two city-bred siblings are stranded in the Australian Outback, where they learn to survive with the aid of an Aboriginal boy on his walkabout, a ritual separation from his tribe.

Memorable Lines:

Jenny Agutter as the Girl: I don’t know why you are telling him all this. He can’t understand. He doesn’t know what a ladder is. I expect we’re the first white people he’s seen.

Luc Roeg as White Boy: He didn’t say goodbye to us. The Girl: Yes, he did. That’s what the dance was about. It’s there way of saying goodbye to people they loved.

Narrator (last lines from “Poem XL” by A.E. Housman’s “A Shropshire Lad”): Into my heart an air that kills, From yon far country blows: What are those blue remembered hills, What spires, what farms are those? That is the land of lost content, I see it shining plain, The happy highways where I went, And cannot come again.

Extras:

• In Australia, when an Aborigine man-child reaches sixteen, he is sent out into the land. For months he must live from it. Sleep on it. Even if it means killing his fellow creatures. The Aborigines call it the walkabout.
• In his first screen role, David Gulpilil spoke no English at the time of filming.
• Director Nicolas Roeg’s son, Luc Roeg, in his first film role, was actually sun-burnt in the scene where the aboriginal boy treats his back by rubbing him with fat from a wild boar. Nicolas Roeg thought it would make a good scene for the film so he picked up the camera and shot it.

Critics:

Roeg’s desert in “Walkabout” is like Beckett’s stage for “Waiting for Godot.” That is, it’s nowhere in particular, and everywhere. – Roger Ebert, RogerEbert.com

Roeg revels in the hallucinatory, creating a wilderness that exists as much in the mind as it does the land. – Luke Buckmaster, The Guardian Australia

Number 16: GET CARTER

Director: Mike Hodges; Writer: Mike Hodges, screenplay (based on the novel Jack’s Return Home by Ted Lewis); Cinematography: Wolfgang Suschitzky; Music: Roy Budd; Film Editing: John Trumper; Art Direction: Roger King.

Players: Michael Caine, Ian Hendry, Britt Ekland, John Osborne, Tony Beckley, George Sewell, Geraldine Moffat.

Synopsis:

When his brother dies under mysterious circumstances in a car accident, suave London gangster Jack Carter travels to his working-class hometown in Newcastle to investigate his death in this chilling neo-noir.

Memorable Line:

Eric the gangster: So, what’re you doing then? On your holidays?
Michael Caine as Jack Carter: No, I’m visiting relatives.
Eric: Oh, that’s nice.
Jack Carter: It would be… if they were still living.

Extras:

• Mike Hodges’ work was influenced by Raymond Chandler and Hollywood tough guy films such as Robert Aldrich’s Kiss Me Deadly (1955), as they showed “how to use the crime story as an autopsy on society’s ills.”
• Mike Hodges favored the use of long-distance lenses (as he had used previously on ITV Playhouse: Rumour.
• The role of mobster Cyril Kinnear is played by writer John Osborne, whose play Look Back in Anger ushered in the British cultural movement in the late 1950s and early 1960s, known as the Angry Young Men or kitchen sink realism. The movement changed the artistic landscape of contemporary Britain, which reflected the disillusionment of society, anger and an impatience for change.

Critics:

• Mike Hodges has thrown his actors into real life – the faces of the old men in the pubs and betting shops, and the revelers at the dancehall take the movie into something akin to cinéma verité, even as mayhem erupts in the foreground. – Michael Hann, The Guardian
• No one can play a tough like Michael Caine; a disturbing mix of charm, kindness and savage restitution. – Ringo Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• “Get Carter” is Hodges’ best film, where the coaly Northeastern English Industrial Revolution town of Newcastle actually serves as a character in the film. Ed Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music

Number 15: SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY

Director: John Schlesinger; Writing: Penelope Gilliatt; Cinematography: Billy Williams; Film Editing: Richard Marden; Art Direction: Norman Dorme.

Players: Peter Finch, Glenda Jackson, Murray Head, Peggy Ashcroft, Tony Britton, Maurice Denham, Vivian Pickles, Frank Windsor, Daniel Day-Lewis (uncredited).

Synopsis:

A Jewish doctor, Daniel Hirsh and a middle-aged woman, Alex Greville are both having affairs with the same male artist, Bob Elkin. Not only are Hirsh and Greville aware that Elkin is seeing the other but they actually know each other as well. Despite this, they are willing to put up with the situation through fear of losing Elkin who switches freely between them. Schlesinger’s film highlights some worrying facts about how much people’s attitudes to relationships and each other have changed over just two generations.

Memorable Lines:

Peter Finch as Daniel (speaking to the camera): When you’re at school and you want to quit, people say, “You’re going to hate it out in the world.” Well, I didn’t believe them and I was right. When I was a kid, I couldn’t wait to be grown up, and they said “Childhood is the best time of your life.” Well, it wasn’t. And now, I want his company and they say, “What’s half a loaf? You’re well shot of him,” and I say I know that… but I miss him, that’s all and they say “He never made you happy” and I say, But I am happy, apart from missing him.

Critics:

• A story of a ménage à trois is a sad reflection on settling for less than we want, with London drizzle setting the mood and an onscreen, same-sex kiss crashing through barriers. – Stephen Brewer, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• I think “Sunday Bloody Sunday” is a masterpiece, but I don’t think it’s about what everybody else seems to think it’s about. This is not a movie about the loss of love, but about its absence. – Roger Ebert, RogerEbert.com
• Director John Schlesinger reportedly used the approach associated with Alain Resnais in preparing this film; he asked Penelope Gilliatt, a writer with a definite and highly developed fictional world, to produce an original screenplay, and he influenced the work through discussions but did not contribute a single word himself. – Walt Munkowsky, Traveling Boy, Time Capsule Cinema

NUMBER 14A (Tie): CARNAL KNOWLEDGE

Director: Mike Nichols; Writer: Jules Feiffer; Cinematography: Giuseppe Rotunno;
Film Editing: Sam O’Steen; Production Design: Richard Sylbert.

Players: Jack Nicholson, Candice Bergen, Art Garfunkel, Ann-Margret, Rita Moreno, Carol Kane.

Synopsis:

Chronicling the lifelong sexual development of two men who meet and become friends in college.

Memorable Lines:

Jack Nicholson as Jonathan (narrating his slide show): Marcia, 13 1/2 or thereabouts, I kissed her one night at a spin-the-bottle party. This one’s Rosalie. Rosalie looked just like Elizabeth Taylor in “National Velvet.” I had a crush on Rosalie from 14 to 15 and I never went near her. In those days, we had illusions. Here’s Charlotte. Not much on looks, but great tits for 15. Here’s Gloria, the best-built girl at Evander Childs. I took her to the Bronx Zoo once and on the bus, copped a cheap feel. Here’s Bobbie! My wife. The fastest tits in the West and king of the ball-busters. She conned me into marrying her and now she’s killing me with alimony.

Extras:

Jules Feiffer said Mike Nichols told him he was considering Jack Nicholson for the role of Jonathan. Feiffer went to see Easy Rider(1969) and thought the guy with the “hip Henry Fonda stance and twangy New Jersey drawl” had nothing in common with “the young Jewish misogynist” at the center of his script. Nichols told him: “Trust me, he’s going to be our most important actor since Brando.”

Critics:

• “Carnal Knowledge”‘ was ahead of its time (as was Mike Nichols). – Jim Gordon, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• The structure of the film, as well as the visual form given it by Nichols (lots of soliloquys in tight close-ups), is that of a Feiffer cartoon, or, more specifically, like a series of cartoons that cover the 1940s (when Jonathan and Sandy are in college), the 1950s (when Sandy is married and beginning to envy Jonathan’s bachelor freedom), the 1960s (when Sandy begins to wander from his suburban paradise), and the 1970s (when the only way in which Jonathan can successfully overcome his impotency is by elaborately pre-arranged masquerades). – Vincent Canby, NY Times

Number 14B (Tie): FIDDLER ON THE ROOF

Director: Norman Jewison; Writing Credits: Joseph Stein, screenplay (based on stories by Sholom Aleichem, with further adaptation by Arnold Perl); Cinematography: Oswald Morris; Music: Jerry Bock (based on music for the stage play by Alexander Courage, and Sheldon Harnick, lyricist for the stage play by Isaac Stern); Music Department: Jerry Bock, orchestrator; Eric Tomlinson, violin soloist; John Williams, conductor and music adapter.

Players: Topol, Norma Crane, Leonard Frey, Molly Picon.

Synopsis:

In prerevolutionary Russia, a Jewish peasant contends with marrying off three of his daughters while growing anti-Semitic sentiment threatens his little village of Anatevka. Among the traditions of the Jewish community, the matchmaker arranges the match and the father approves it. The milkman Reb Tevye is a poor man that has been married for twenty-five years with Golde and they have five daughters. When the local matchmaker Yente arranges the match between his older daughter, Tzeitel, and the old widow butcher, Lazar Wolf, Tevye agrees with the wedding. However, Tzeitel is in love with the poor tailor Motel Kamzoil and they ask permission to Tevye to get married that he accepts to please his daughter. Then his second daughter Hodel (Michele Marsh) and the revolutionary student Perchik decide to marry each other and Tevye is forced to accept. When Perchik is arrested by the Czar troops and sent to Siberia, Hodel decides to leave her family and homeland and travel to Siberia to be with her beloved Perchik. When his third daughter Chava decides to get married with the Christian Fyedka, Tevye does not accept and considers that Chava has died. Meanwhile the Czar’s troops evict the Jewish community from Anatevka.

Memorable Lines:

Topol as Tevye: Traditions, traditions. Without our traditions, our lives would be as shaky as… as… as a fiddler on the roof!

Tevye to God: I know, I know. We are Your chosen people. But, once in a while, can’t You choose someone else?

Tevye: You are just a poor tailor!
Motel: That’s true, Reb Tevye, but even a poor tailor is entitled to some happiness!

Extras:

• Canadian director Norman Jewison was brought into the project by executives at United Artists who thought he was Jewish. His first words to the executives upon meeting them were, “You know I’m not Jewish, right?”
• The title comes from a painting by Russian artist Marc Chagall called The Dead Man which depicts a funeral scene and shows a man playing a violin on a rooftop. It is also used by Tevye in the story as a metaphor for trying to survive in a difficult, constantly changing world.
• To get the look he wanted for the film, Jewison told director of photography Oswald Morris to shoot the film in an earthy tone. Morris saw a woman wearing brown nylon hosiery, and thought, “That’s the tone we want.” He asked the woman for the stockings on the spot and shot the entire film with a stocking over the lens. The weave can be detected in some scenes.
• Morris nabbed the Best Cinematography Oscar for his work.

Critics:

There are some contrived and artificial moments in “Fiddler,” but it becomes more convincing, naturalistic, and involving as it goes on, and finally builds to a powerful climax. It ranks high among the best musicals ever put on film. -Paul Sargent Clark, The Hollywood Reporter

Number 13: THE LAST PICTURE SHOW

Director: Peter Bogdanovich; Writing: Peter Bogdanovich & Larry McMurtry, screenplay (based on Larry McMurtry novel); Producers: Stephen J. Friedman, Bert Schneider; Cinematography: Robert Surtees; Editing: Donn Cambern, (Peter Bogdanovich, uncredited); Production & Costume Design: Polly Platt; Music: Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys, Phil Harris, Johnny Standley, Hank Thompson.

Players: Timothy Bottoms, Jeff Bridges, Cybill Shepherd, Ben Johnson, Cloris Leachman, Ellen Burstyn, Eileen Brennan, Clu Gulager, Randy Quaid, Sam Bottoms.

Synopsis:

In 1951, a group of high schoolers come of age in a bleak, isolated, North Texas town.

Memorable Lines:

Ben Johnson as Sam the Lion: You boys can get on out of here, I don’t want to have no more to do with you. Scarin’ a poor, unfortunate creature like Billy just so’s you could have a few laughs. I’ve been around that trashy behavior all my life, I’m gettin’ tired of puttin’ up with it. Now you can stay out of this pool hall, out of my cafe, and my picture show too. I don’t want no more of your business.

Sam the Lion: If she was here I’d probably be just as crazy now as I was then in about 5 minutes. Ain’t that ridiculous? Naw, it ain’t really. Cause being crazy about a woman like her is always the right thing to do. Being an old decrepit bag of bones, that’s what’s ridiculous. Gettin’ old.

Timothy Bottoms as Sonny Crawford:  Nothin’s really been right since Sam the Lion died.

Cloris Leachman as Ruth Popper (last line in film): Never you mind, honey. Never you mind.

Extras:

• Ben Johnson was persuaded to accept the role of Sam the Lion by his friend, director John Ford. Johnson had turned the part down three times because, according to Peter Bogdanovich, the part had too many words, but Ford reportedly persuaded him by asking if he only wanted to be playing John Wayne’s sidekick for the rest of his career.
• This film was one of the first to use already popular recordings by original artists to score a film that included songs by Frankie Laine, Hank Williams, Jo Stafford and others.
• Cloris Leachman’s last scene in the movie was printed on the first take without any previous rehearsals. She wanted to rehearse the scene, but director Bogdanovich thought it would ruin the scene if it was rehearsed. After she completed the take, she said to him, I can do better. Bogdanovich replied, No, you can’t; you just won the Oscar. Ultimately his sense of direction paid off, as Leachman won the Academy Award for her performance as Best Supporting Actress.

Critics:

• A relentless look at the banality of life manages to be energizing and affirming. – Stephen Brewer, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• Bogdanovich was more than a director, having embraced the “Auteur Theory” in 1963. With his reviews of earlier Hollywood genre films made by masters, he too taught us much about our own films. – Ringo Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music

Number 12: FOUR NIGHTS OF A DREAMER (quatre nuits d’un rêveur)

Director: Robert Bresson; Writing: Robert Bresson (loosely based on Fyodor Dostoevsky’s short story White Nights); Cinematography: Pierre Lhomme; Music: F.R. Daid, Louis Guitar, Chris Hayward, Michel Magne; Film Editing: Raymond Lamy; Production Design: Pierre Charbonnier.

Players: Isabelle Weingarten, Guillaume des Forêts, Jean-Maurice Monnoyer, Giorgio Maulini.

Synopsis:

Loosely based on Fyodor Dostoevsky’s short story White Nights, the lead character is Jacques, a young painter, who by chance runs into Marthe as she’s contemplating suicide on the Pont-Neuf in Paris. They talk, and agree to see each other again the next night. Gradually, he discovers that her lover promised to meet her on the bridge that night, and he failed to turn up. Over the next couple of nights, Jacques falls in love with her, but on the fourth night her original lover returns.

Memorable Lines:

Marthe as the woman: ” What’s the matter?
Jacques as the dreamer: ” I love you. That’s the matter.

Extras:

• Two types of films: those that employ the resources of the theater (actors, direction, etc…) and use the camera in order to reproduce; those that employ the resources of cinematography and use the camera to create. – Robert Bresson
• To be constantly changing lenses in photographing is like constantly changing one’s eye glasses. – Robert Bresson

Critics:

• Though considered to be Bresson’s ‘lightest’ film, “Four Nights of a Dreamer” offers an intense emotional experience that began with “Diary of a Country Priest” and ended with his last film, “L’Argent.” Due to the economy of his directorial style, many consider his films slow, when in fact they are remarkably fast. Each image is ironed out, with no image taking on a greater significance than the other. Bresson frees himself from what he calls ‘postcardism,’ which he considers a forced, superficial aestheticism. – Ed Boitano, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• ” Four Nights of a Dreamer” is a rare Bresson film where the mainstream audience actually laughs along with the film as opposed to laugh at it, due to a lack of understanding of Bresson’s deeply personal style. The staged ‘movie premiere’ is the closest he’s ever come to a comedy. – Phil Marley, T-Boy Society of Film & Music

Number 11: KLUTE

Director: Alan J. Pakula; Writing: Andy Lewis & David E. Lewis; Cinematography: Gordon Willis; Film Editing: Carl Lerner; Music: George Jenkins, Michael Small.

Players: Jane Fonda, Donald Sutherland, Charles Cioffi, Roy Scheider, Dorothy Tristan, Rita Gam.

Synopsis:

A small-town detective searching for a missing man has only one lead: a connection with a New York prostitute.

Memorable Lines:

Jane Fonda as Bree Daniels: Men would pay $200 for me, and here you are turning down a freebie. You could get a perfectly good dishwasher for that. And for an hour… for an hour, I’m the best actress in the world, and the best fuck in the world.

Bree Daniels: Tell me, Klute. Did we get you a little? Huh? Just a little bit? Us city folk? The sin, the glitter, the wickedness? Huh? Donald Sutherland as John Klute: Ah… that is so pathetic.

Extras:

• The first installment of what informally came to be known as Pakula’s Paranoia Trilogy. The other two films in the trilogy are The Parallax View (1974) and All the President’s Men (1976).
• According to her autobiography, Jane Fonda hung out with call girls and pimps for a week before beginning this film in order to prepare for her role. When none of the pimps offered to “represent” her, she became convinced she wasn’t desirable enough to play a prostitute and urged the director to replace her with friend Faye Dunaway.
• Jane Fonda said that she had to throw up while preparing for the scene where Bree goes through photos of dead prostitutes to identify her friends. She actually had gone to the city morgue too and it came as a great shock.

Critics:

• “Klute” showed the world Jane could act (though I always knew she could). – Jim Gordon, T-Boy Society of Film & Music
• “Klute” is Fonda’s movie, and both Pakula and Sutherland seem to recognize that. It is not an argument in favor of sex work per se, even though it does the necessary service of combating the cliches and stigmas around the practice. But Fonda’s Oscar-winning performance as Bree does argue for a fullness of character – and of womanhood – that feels radically open to different possibilities and a wide spectrum of emotional experiences, including moments during therapy where she expresses uncertainty about her future and the choices she’s made. – Scott Tobias, The Guardian

END OF PART 1
Stay Tuned for the Top Ten Films of 1971 in PART 2 of our series which proves to be both mind boggling and hopefully educational.

If readers have a favorite that’s not listed in Part One or Two, no doubt you can access it on Feature Film, Released between 1971-01-01 and 1971-12-31 (Sorted by Popularity Ascending) – IMDb.

Send us your own list, at ed****@Tr**********.com and we will publish it in our Readers’ Poll.

The post The 20 Best Films of 1971, Part One appeared first on Traveling Archive.

The enduring Celtic Cross. Photo courtesy Tourism Ireland.

Richard Carroll – T-Boy writer:

Sightless Fiji

Fiji has a profound long-lasting effect on my heart and soul. An island country deep in the South Pacific where nature comes miraculously alive with cloud rain forests, a lush tropical mountainous terrain, 333 islands, hundreds of islets, and sweeping views of a dark blue crystal clear sea, all of which seem to be suspended in time. Fiji’s dramatic setting of upscale island holiday hideaways offering pollution free skies, an unrelenting sun shimmering on glistening water, and palm-lined beaches, have attracted visitors from all parts of the world.

I experienced a heart-tugging dilemma on one of numerous visits this time with Dr. Beeve, a noted eye physician and surgeon based in Glendale California and his wife Dorothy an RN, that unfortunately this ideal scenario of sun and sea is also a huge negative for the Fijian’s creating blinding cataracts affecting a huge number of Fijians of all ages along with other troubling eye difficulties.

Fijians travel from island to island in canoes and boats, fish and farm the ocean, swim before they can walk, and are living an island lifestyle which from birth seriously affects their eyesight. The stinging contrast is the Fijians might not be the happiest people on earth, but are affable and forthcoming, welcoming visitors with open arms, regardless of personal difficulties, of which are usually overlooked or ignored by tourists.

I found this distressing and heart-tugging drama unbelievably touching. Men unable to work and support their families because they are sightless, children born with eye deficiencies, a grandmother who has never seen her grandchildren, Fijians unable to leave their island because of poor eyesight, and young mothers who see their offspring as a milky blur. I noticed that even most of the dogs had cataracts too.

Joyful Fijians in recovery after a Dr. Beeve eye operation. Photo courtesy of Beeve Foundation.

Since that visit in 1991 when the Beeve’s established the Beeve Foundation, Dr. Beeve and his staff quickly realized that the Fijians were receiving very limited eye care and medication, and had no access to modern medicine. On their first mission with a small staff which included an anesthesiologist, ophthalmic surgical technologist, a dental hygienist, and an assistant who helped with pre and post op care, and patient education and vision testing, set up a makeshift eye clinic in Bure 2 on upscale Turtle Island. The word quickly spread and hundreds of sight-impaired Fijians formed a long line patiently standing in the blazing sun, some arriving via canoes days in advance, the line of canoes stretching to the horizon. Many Fijians I spoke with could not remember when they had vision and were spellbound when the day after surgery they gazed at Dr. Beeve with better than 20/40 vision. The Beeve’s said, “When we complete a cataract operation it’s like resurrecting someone from the dead. It’s an incredible feeling.”

The Beeve Foundation Team in Fiji. Photo courtesy of the Beeve Foundation.

In 2017 the Beeve’s were honored for their more than 25 years of medical missions; 28,503 eye exams, issuing 27,714 pairs of glasses, 1,756 cataract extractions with lens implants, 55 corneal transplants, and 1,005 other procedures for more than 30,000 Fijian patients, the majority of whom were legally blind. Dr. Beeve and his wife Dorothy finally retired with Loma Linda University continuing the Fiji missions. In 2018 with a team of world-renowned cataract surgeons Loma Linda performed 137 surgeries in six days.

The Fijians live in a tropical paradise but with an ironic twist, but for a writer the unpredictability of travel can often leave a lingering memory, such as the Beeve’s and their Foundation successfully treating over three percent of the entire Fiji population.

Halina Kubalski – T-Boy writer and destination photographer:

A Memory of My Father

My father, Wiktor Surmacz joined the Polish Army in 1934. After a few years he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant in the Polish 179th Infantry Regiment, working closely under the command of General Franciszek Kleeberg when defending the Polish city of Kock, a town in eastern Poland about 120 kilometers southeast of Warsaw with a large Jewish population at the time.

On September 9, 1939 the German’s dropped bombs on the town and a fierce battle with the Germans took place. The Poles were badly over matched by the German 13th Motorized Corps and 60th Infantry Division, but fought gallantly lastly running short of ammunition with both sides suffering huge casualties. The final battles were fought October 2 – 5, and on October 6th after bombardment by heavy German artillery and outnumbered by the thousands, General Kleeberg surrendered.

The Germans sent my father to the infamous Mauthausen Concentration Camp located on a hill above the market town of Mauthausen located 12 miles east of Linz. The Germans never released the accurate death toll at Mauthausen but it was calculated that between 130,000 to 320,000 perished in Mauthausen during the war years. My father never spoke about his five years as a prisoner but did say to his wife, my mother, Maria, “There was no food at Mauthausen.”

Survivors at the Mauthausen concentration camp. Wikimedia Commons.

He was later sent to a sub concentration camp, a farm labor camp that was bad if not worse than Mauthausen. Possibly the transfer took place due to the fact that dad spoke German. He was liberated in 1945 at the end of the war by U.S. troops weighing all of 80 pounds.

My father’s one and only visit to the United States, he was astonished at the boundless selection of food in the supermarkets. He passed May 8, 1984, age 73, after six weeks in a Warsaw hospital, his health badly damaged by his years as a prisoner of the Germans.

Fyllis Hockman – T-Boy writer:

One of the Most Impactful Experiences in my Travel-Writing Career

First a little background. As a teenager I had my first visual exposure to the horrors of the Holocaust in some newsreel depictions of the liberation of some camps after the war – the emaciated survivors with their sunken eyes, gaunt bodies and harrowed auras. I called my mother, who had told me of the Holocaust my whole life, and said: “Mom, I finally understand.” Now six decades later, I came to understand even more.

The International Monument at the former Mauthausen concentration camp reads,
“The living learn from the fate of the deceased.” Wikimedia Commons.

Mauthausen, one of the largest of the camps, was built high upon a hill in Linz, Upper Austria, where Hitler was once a resident, near a large quarry. The rationale behind concentration camps evolved over the war years from imprisoning people, enslaving them and engendering fear among the general populace to simply one of extermination. And that was carried out in so many ways. Mauthausen was considered a Level 3 Camp where the guiding principle was that no one left – everyone was to be killed in some way or other. The SS excelled at very efficient methods of mutilation and annihilation.

The roots of genocide, according to our guide, were fostered in anti-Semitism, an us vs. them mentality, a de-humanization of others who are seen as “less.” It was hard not to draw some parallels to today’s world…

The “Stairs of Death” at the Mauthausen concentration camp. Wikimedia Commons.

Other cases involved prisoners forced outside during winter over whom cold water was poured – a particularly appealing entertainment for the SS guards who delighted in “showering” people to death – outside the actual gas chamber showers, that is…. Because any SS who shot an inmate trying to escape got extra days off, a favorite party trick was to entice prisoners into situations where they might appear to be escaping – and then shoot them. Stomach cringing continues.

Starved prisoners pose in concentration camp in Ebensee, a sub-camp of Mauthausen, used for “scientific” experiments. Wikimedia Commons.

Others, sick and beaten, simply died during daily roll call, a grueling process of standing in the heat or cold for 4-5 hours at a time, and being forced to do exercises when most of them could no longer stand. It is hard to hear all of this – and my stomach clenched and my eyes teared and I was overcome by a sense of helplessness and disbelief that these things actually happened – and no one cared.

Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler of the SS at Mauthausen. Hitler authorized Himmler to create a centralized concentration camp system. Wikimedia Commons.

In the barracks hundreds were housed in such horrendous conditions the term unsanitary does not begin to describe the degradation. On the wall is a quote depicting the “wheezing, hissing, moaning, sobbing, snoring” that filled the night-time air in 20 languages. “The noise fused into a single, terrible sound produced as if by a giant monstrous being that had holed up in the dark.” Another quote: “Anyone who hadn’t been brutal when they entered the world became brutal here.” More gut-wrenching stomach-churning.

And then we went through the gas chambers where thousands were killed and then the ovens where their remains were buried, with a side visit to the infirmary where unspeakable “experiments” were carried out.

And yet the neighbors and surrounding community ostensibly didn’t know what was happening, despite being within earshot of the thousands of prisoners suffering and screaming. In fact, some complained about the noise – but not about why it was occurring. The grandmother of our guide, who was seven at the time, said she could smell the stench of the burning bodies; she knew something bad was happening but nobody talked about it.

Survivors greeting US soldiers at Mauthausen. Wikimedia Commons.

Of the 200,000 prisoners who occupied Mauthausen from 1938-1945, about half were killed. There were only 20,000 survivors when liberation finally came on May 5, 1945, with another 80,000 already too ill to benefit from the end of the war. Not surprisingly, the liberators were shocked at the condition of the prisoners. I imagine so too were the community members when they were finally exposed to what was really happening in their backyard. At this point, my stomach was in perpetual decompression mode.
There were signs on walls from visitors in multiple languages: RIP, Never Again, and You won’t be forgotten. A simple drawing of an eye with a tear coming down was the one I most related to.

Most of the guards went home after the war suffering no consequences and little was said about what they had done. No one talked about it. According to our guide, it took Austria four decades to acknowledge its part in the Holocaust.

The Mauthausen Thought Area of today. Wikimedia Commons.

There were multiple school groups of teenagers at the camp and I felt thankful they were learning of the atrocities they otherwise would probably have no knowledge of. I wished I could understand what they were saying about their experience. History will now change as there soon will be no survivors, no one to say this is what actually happened, and the Holocaust will be relegated to the status of other historical occurrences which the young will learn about in school but will not relate to. Who really cares about the Crusades? There will be no visceral understanding. It will have nothing to do with them. There will be nothing to keep it from happening again. I only wish I could call my mother and tell her once again, that now I REALLY understand.

Stephen Brewer – T-Boy writer:

On the Lasithi Plateau

I saw Bartholomew for the first time when I was traveling around Crete twenty years ago. He was standing placidly, shyly almost, a fine long neck slightly bent beneath a mop of thick shiny black hair, sturdy legs planted firmly in the grass of a meadow on the Lasithi Plateau.

Lasithi Plateau in Crete. Photography by Stephen Brewer.

No, this was not a starry-eyed meeting with an Adonis. Bartholomew is a donkey. I have no idea what his real name is. The only other donkey I have ever known was Bartholomew, so that is what I call this one, too. I’ve been back to the Lasithi Plateau at least a dozen times since I met the Greek Bartholomew, who’s usually grazing outside a modest white house at the edge of Tzermiado, a village of just a few streets. I’ve encountered him plodding along the lanes that lace the fields, with bundles of earth-covered vegetables hanging from either side of his back. The cargo looks light and the weathered, bearded man leading him never seems to be in no hurry to get anywhere. I’ve also passed Bartholomew on the road that skirts the edge of the plateau. He’s been pulling a little cart driven by an ancient-looking woman dressed in black, a shawl around her shoulders despite the heat, and a kerchief concealing her hair. Bartholomew has been sauntering lazily and it’s always looked to me as if his companion has nodded off to sleep.

Bartholomew is a noisy animal, and I’ve become accustomed to listening for his hee-haws when I walk on the paths that skirt his pasture. If motorbikes aren’t idling in the broad intersection that passes as the village square, I can sometimes hear him when I’m sitting in the Cafe Kronio late in the evening. The homemade raki is usually taking effect by this time, and I can almost mistake Greek Bartholomew for the Bartholomew of my youth.

The first Bartholomew belonged to Franny, an artist friend of my mother’s who lived on a rose and holly farm her Dutch stepfather established back in the 1920s. Franny liked to throw parties on summer holidays. My parents and their friends would drink cocktails on the trim little lawn in front of Franny’s house as Bartholomew snorted from the other side of a hedge and my brother, sister, and I and any other children who were around ran through the fields and explored the two huge barns. Occasionally my father and a few of the other men would hitch Bartholomew up to a cart. They were unlikely farm hands in their white shirts and dress slacks, and I doubt they had any idea of what they were doing. They managed, though, probably because Bartholomew was docile and patient. We youngsters would clamor aboard and Bartholomew would pull us up and down the long gravel drive that led from the house and barns to the road.

Taverna Cafe Kronio, Tzemadio, Crete. Photograph courtesy of Christine Kargiotakis

One evening Vassilis, who runs the Kronio with his French wife, Christina, handed me a napkin on which he’d sketched a map. “Tomorrow you should make this walk,” he said. “I can’t go with you, but you should be fine.” He poured me some more raki and rummaged in a bookshelf to retrieve a reprint of a scholarly article about Karfi, a Minoan settlement in the Ditka mountains high above the village.

“It all uphill. Am I fit enough for a hike like this?” I asked Vassilis, who is a skilled mountaineer. “Probably. You are not as fat and lazy as many men your age.” I assumed he was implying American men. Over the years he and Christina have told me stories of Americans who have come into the Kronio, usually involving their size and peculiar culinary habits. An exceedingly large American woman on one of the bus tours that brings tourists up from the big resorts on the north coast made an impression when she asked Vassilis to top her baklava with ice cream. “Of course I told her ‘no.’ One does not eat ice cream with baklava,” he reported, shuddering theatrically with indignation. “Incroyable,” Christina added from the desk where she does the accounts.

A historic paved road on the edge of Tzermiado in the Lasithi Plateau. Wikimedia Commons

The next morning I walked past Bartholomew’s pasture so he could bray at me and soon I was picking my way up a steep, stone-strewn path that climbs a shoulder of the mountains. The mind wanders when you’re struggling up a hot hillside, and I thought again of the first Bartholomew. One of my early memories was being thrilled to see his picture on the front page of the newspaper when Franny lent him to the Adlai Stevenson presidential campaign for a photo-op during a whistle stop. I don’t know what became of Bartholomew. Franny sold the farm when I was still in grade school, and I remember being embarrassed because I burst into tears as my dad and I drove around the cul-de-sacs of split-level houses in Holly Hills, the subdivision that replaced the familiar fields.

I was now high enough to see the plateau spread out below me, a tidy patchwork of fields, comfortable and welcoming, enclosed within an unbroken circle of mountain peaks that keep the outside world at bay. White sails of windmills that pump water through irrigation channels moved with the wind. After leveling off a bit the path rose again to the crest of a rise. Just across a gully was a jumble of rocks that are the remains of Karfi, cradled in a fold of barren terrain and indistinguishable from the gray landscape. Far below, the Sea of Crete appeared as a bright blue expanse on the horizon.

Karfi was a sanctuary for the last of the Minoans, who took refuge in these heights about 3,000 years ago, and the civilization that built vast palaces and painted fanciful frescoes of dancing ladies died out on these barren slopes. I could make out faint traces of their single-story houses and gridlike streets, and I could almost see the phantoms of Minoans among the rocks. It was easy to imagine the mountainside humming with the chatter of human souls who no doubt laughed, told stories, shared meals, fought and made peace with one another. Residents out for an evening stroll must have scrambled up to the knoll where I was standing and gazed out to sea.

The return was on a longer route, across a high ridge then a gradual descent on a stone-littered track that herders use to goad goats up and down the mountainside. I’d been picking my way across the rocks for at least half an hour when I began to hear the tinkling of bells and bleats that grew louder as I neared a tall, wide tree. My thoughts of resting in the shade were dashed when I came close enough to see a large herd of goats crowded beneath the branches, sheltering from the sun.

The stunning landscape of the Lasithi Plateau.  Photograph by Stephen Brewer.

A little farther along the scrub gave way to dense, unkempt olive groves. I heard him before I saw him, a loud hee-haw from the overgrowth. Then Bartholomew appeared, grazing in grass almost as tall as him. I noticed he was saddled, and the bearded man I’d seen with him before was working a neatly plowed patch of earth tucked away among the trees. I sat down against a gnarly trunk, not far from Bartholomew, who raised his head to acknowledge my presence. There I soon dozed off, thinking about donkeys and those Minoan ghosts floating around on the mountainside above me.

Tammy Skinner – T-Boy writer:

Rediscovering my Heart and Soul

Expectation burnout. Oh, it’s a thing my friends. A very real one. Which is why when I was asked to ponder the theme of Heart and Soul travel and what that means to me, I instantly knew where I had to go to rediscover my heart and soul which has most definitely been squeezed out of me like a tired dirty mop that has barely any drips of water hanging from its threads. Point blank. I was slightly… just a little teensy OKAY a whole lot depleted. I know I’m not the only one by any means. Who of all of us hasn’t found themselves stretched with oh too many expectations over the past year and counting? Whether it was the expectation of pulling internet connectivity out of thin air when in midst of a zoom call that goes dead or the 40th call from your kids’ teacher that they were falling behind on their fractions and division… we were ALL in some way, shape or form in survival mode. And all of that on top of playing the game of KEEP AWAY with a deadly virus.

For more than 80 years the Little River Inn has been welcoming guests to experience the beauty of the Mendocino Coast. Photograph courtesy of Tamara Skinner.

As my husband and I drove up the Mendonoma Coast after dropping off the kids at their grandparents at Sea Ranch, I could feel a little bit of an exhale coming on. Then we got to Mendocino and the azure blue ocean waters started to cry out my name. TAMMY it called…YOU’RE FREE LIKE THE SEA. Soon we caught glimpse of the spot we had picked for our refuge from incessant expectations – the Little River Inn which is an inviting 80-year-old hotel that has a restaurant (with a full bar) on site and hospitality like no other. It’s been in the family over five generations and the warmth of the owners trickles down to every single employee who seem intent on doing only one thing-to nurture you back to well-being.

Central Californian coastline looking south, with the McWay Rocks in the foreground, and McWay Cove in the center. Photograph courtesy of Diliff.

We also specifically picked Little River Inn for its’ special rooms that come with a hot tub on the deck along with a built-in special back rolling massager (I can’t even talk about this without rolling my eyes to the top of my head). Because of the covid craze, I hadn’t been comfortable getting a human massage so I couldn’t wait to get in the tub and get my machine massage. Oh boy! I don’t know how to describe the pure bliss of sitting in a hot tub overlooking the deepest blue majestic water, soaking in the negative ions and having my muscles pounded releasing the tension which felt like a thousand rocks settled into the river inside my body. As I sat in the tub longer and felt more and more of the rocks dissipate, slowly my own flow started coming through as I was able to hear my intuition again. It had been a while! I missed that trusty guide of mine that I used to be able to access so easily. Turns out over a year of incessant snack demands and frustration tantrum sighs coming from my “zoombies” from their “bedrooms/classrooms” had drowned out that melodic voice of guidance.

Mendocino, California. Photograph courtesy of Jef Poskanzer.

Mother’s Day upon us, newly restored and with exploration vibes drawing us out of our heavenly room, my hubby and I got in the car and drove to the picturesque Mendocino village to see what my heart had in store for me there – revelation wise. Found in the backdrop of many films due to it being established in the 1850s and filled with New England styled Victorian homes (which have been restored into shops, inns and restaurants), we lazily strolled up and down the streets of this peninsula/bluffs surrounded land and wandered into the shops that called to us.

There was one in particular that summoned me in by its décor alone. I seemingly floated into Loot & Lore and found myself instantly surrounded by my favorite things-jewelry, tarot decks and books. I glanced at a beautiful Saints and Mystics deck that begged me to pick a card and picked a message from St. Paul who (according to this deck) was the Patron Saint of writers and spiritual searchers! The synchronicity was not ignored by me who had just told my husband that I’d like to get an intentional sign of a way to release my writer’s block. Finding two intriguing little zines (one on making vision boards and the other entitled GETTING OVER IT: Move on from the Bullshit That is Holding you Back) I decided to buy them along with a pen that had a quartz attached to the end of it with “Be the Light” etched on the side of it. At check out, I befriended the lovely store owner, Cynthia, working the register who told me this pen would cure my writer’s block. Yes please! And thank you! Enchanted by the flow and feeling of effortlessness languishing type roaming my soul told me I was healed.

Animals on display at the Little River Inn. Photography courtesy of Tamara Skinner.

I have often pondered on the fact that like machines we as Americans specifically are programmed to produce. Produce results. Produce good grades. Produce promotions. Produce babies. Produce retirement funds. But what if all of that is just one really really long inhale? What if the answer involves us also concentrating just as much on the exhale? For our waves to recede back in the waters after thy maniacally crash onto the shore? What if we just want to talk? To laugh? To have fun? Be known and understood? Feel the sun on our bare legs, drink champagne, embrace for too long? Mendocino healed me and it didn’t take much. Okay maybe it did. Ocean view+hot tub+negative ions from the waves crashing+genuinely caring employees concerned with my needs+magical stores offering guidance and hope. Most important, this stunning coastal wonder found me in the silence and without interruptions long enough to sneak its guidance in, and voila just like that I find myself back on California’s Highway 1 heading south to pick up our children, eager to practice this new mantra of “producing” less while “allowing” more.

Weave Cleveland – Travel Guys cinematographer:

Super Cool York

It’s surely timing and serendipity that set any particular place in our reverie forever. For me I will forever say that York, England is the most fascinating and enchanting place I have ever visited. You can instantly get lost in history at the walled city of York, and I mean instantly!

York’s city walls (circa 1890 and 1900). Wikimedia Commons.

You can stand in one spot and see Medieval, Gothic, Roman, and Edwardian architecture each direction your eyes are drawn… and more. Not the oldest part of town but the most compelling part is ‘the Shambles.’ Named so for the meat shelves and hooks where butchers and sellers displayed their meats for sale. Those were days long ago. Nowadays it is the ‘must see’ area of the city. It looks like a movie set. You can even spot Turkish architecture mixing in with the Tudor stylings. These narrow, tangled cobblestone streets also have something unique which I have never seen or heard of before – Snickleways. A Snickleway is a narrow tunnel-like passage to get you over to another street without having to walk around the block. An ‘enchanting’ short cut. I think there’s five of them.

Five Snickelways lead off the Shambles in York. Wikimedia Commons.

York has some serious Viking history and I learned something there that now makes sense even in my own city. The Viking word for road is gata. In English, gata gets translated to gate. So, even though I have spent my life imagining a garden gate or front yard gate, etcetera, in this case it actually means road. Bathgate, Helmsgate, Fossgate, Coppergate, Newgate, etcetera. I think that’s cool.

Another fascinating fact was how much time the Romans spent there and all the work they did. Constantine the Great was in York when he became a Roman emperor in 306 A.D. and started his rule from there. He was pretty great, he had a city named for himself – Constantinople (now Istanbul). The magnificent York Minster Cathedral has underground excavation of Roman ruins going on right now since workers in the 1960’s discovered them when trying to shore up the foundation of the Minster.

Bronze statue of Constantine the Great outside York Minster, looking down upon his broken sword, which forms the shape of a cross. Wikimedia Commons.

Now, here’s something really special, especially because I am Canadian and have grown up with these: KitKat, Rolo, Aero, Smarties, York Peppermint Patty… and the list goes on – they all came from York. Terry’s and The Rowntree Family and a few others all started in York. In fact. Mr. Rowntree even helped MacIntosh financially to keep his toffee business going. MacIntosh is still on store shelves today. Not to be confused with the MacIntosh raincoat maker or the Glaswegian designer/architect. The giant firm Nestlé may own them now but these candy bars all came from York.

If you visit York you can see the National Railroad Museum or the birthplace of Guy Faux or visit an old English pub smaller than your current bedroom and even learn all about the horse thief and notorious criminal Dick Turpin… but most of all it will be tangling your way through town that will steal your heart. What a super cool place York is.

Brom Wikstrom – T-Boy writer and mouth painter:

The real voyage of discovery consists, not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes. – Proust

It was a revelation to me when visitors to our Seattle home would marvel at our views of Mt. Rainier, the Olympic Mountain Range and Puget Sound. Likewise, guests from other parts of the country would delight in the majesty of towering cedar trees or the red flash of a robin’s breast. These are common sights to us and register appreciation but not the awe-inspiring experience that we have witnessed in others.

View of Mount Rainier National Park from Dege Peak Spur Trail. Wikimedia Commons.

The abundant natural beauty along our shorelines, in our national forests and even the arid portions on the eastern side of Washington State have always moved my spirit in ways that are renewing and I’ve always considered myself fortunate to live in the Pacific Northwest for that reason.

With that in mind, my wife and I began taking winter trips to be with family in St. Petersburg, Florida several years ago and were equally inspired by what to us is exotic wildlife and natural beauty. Because of my wheelchair, I am always in search of accessible trails, promenades and boardwalks where I can engage with nature and Florida offers many such opportunities. We stayed near two local parks that became regular destinations and offered wheelchair accessible trails that highlighted nature and native history in unique settings.

Weedon Island Preserve. Wikimedia Commons.

Sawgrass Lake Park and Weedon Island Park have miles of accessible boardwalks and trails and kayaking options and are treasures of natural wonder. I have enjoyed many peaceful hours in rapt wonder watching the diverse wildlife that call them home. Alligators ply the placid waterways along with turtles, lizards egrets, herons, and pelicans and though these are relatively common sights for residents, I am continuously amazed at the diversity and abundance present at these and other public parks in St. Petersburg.

Salvador Dalí Museum at St. Petersburg, Florida. Wikimedia Commons.

St. Petersburg is equally renowned for its beautiful beaches and the iconic Salvador Dali Museum along with the newly reopened pier and those are surprising, beautiful and culturally dynamic, but give me a few tranquil hours among mangrove swamps and leaping mullets and my heart will sing.

James Boitano – T-Boy writer:

Slovenia

As a geography buff, I’d always wanted to go to Slovenia. Its relative obscurity made vis-à-vis its better-known and more war-torn former constituent republics of the former Yugoslavia made it all the more appealing. I like obscure even more than well known Why go to France when you can go to Luxembourg or better yet, Andorra? And what was this little country of 2 million people like there tucked at the crossroads of the Germanic, Italic and Slavic worlds? I just had to wait for my chance.

Slovenia’s capital city of Ljubljana. Wikimedia Commons.

So, in 2002 while attending the Eurovision music event in Riga Latvia, I met Samo. He was a rumpled, brilliant, and kind high school teacher, a fellow Eurovision fan, and the first Slovenian I’d ever met. We so hit it off as friends, spending hours until late at night, engrossed in conversation at the hotel bar after the events and day’s rehearsals. We met again at Eurovision in 2005 in Kiev and again at Eurovision in 2007 in Helsinki. And each time, he invited me to stay at his home in Slovenia’s little capital city of Ljubljana. I finally took him up on his offer in 2011 for a 10-day visit. And you know what? I returned for another 10-day visit in 2012, And another in 2014 and my 4th x 10-day visit in 2017 (Covid prevented my last trip in 2020). Needless to say, Slovenia won my heart. During my 40 days of visits, Samo showed me every corner of the small country: from the mighty Alpine valleys to the Venetian Adriatic Coast, the rolling hills of the wine region, the little villages of the Pannonian Plain. For a small country, you can reach any region within 2 hours of Ljubljana. But most of all I met Samos friends and family.

Lake Bled, Slovenia. Wikimedia Commons.

Every night we would sit at a café and a crowd of a dozen would join us. The bar we went to was one owned by the father of the most famous Slovene, the father of Melanija Trump and they ironically called it the ‘First Lady Café’. I felt like so accepted by the people, the opposite of a tourist. Small countries so appreciate the attention, they are so often overlooked. And in small country, even a high school teacher is bound to know many people.

A traditional double straight-line hayrack in Slovenia. Wikimedia Commons.

During my visits I was a guest on Slovenian National Radio (during the coveted 1:00 am to 2:00 am spot!). Samo just knew the guy there and when he heard there was captive foreigner, I was invited. And during my 4 visits I attended several birthday parties held by his relatives and a wedding, at each being made to feel like a guest of honor. One day, I got to go on rounds with his friend who picked up produce at local farms and delivered them to grocery stores. We spent all day and crossed half the country. Imagine doing that as a ‘tourist’? And so, after all this, Slovenia has a big place in my heart…and I will return as soon as this post-Covid world allows.

Ed Boitano – T-Boy editor:

Ireland’s Romantic West Coast

My wife and I woke up to the smell of rich morning coffee. It was to be part of our breakfast on our first day in Ireland’s wild west coast. It has been said that all Irish homes become a bed and breakfast during the summer, and this Donegal County cottage with one spare room was no exception.

Full Irish breakfast. Wikimedia Commons.

The owners fussed over us at the table as we enjoyed a full Irish Breakfast: eggs, bacon, sausages, black and white pudding, fried potatoes and homemade rolls with marmalade. They told us of the area’s attractions and educated us on the Irish Potato Famine, that began in 1845 and lasted for six years, killing over a million men, women and children and caused another million to flee the country. The owner explained, the Irish in the countryside began to live off wild blackberries, nettles, turnips, old cabbage leaves, seaweed, roadside weeds and, towards the end of the Famine, green grass. The owner added you could always identify a Famine victim by the green grass stains around their mouth. He suggested that we read his favorite book about the Famine, The Silent People by Walter Macken.

To this day no one knows who these people were and how they were able to move such mammoth rocks. Photo courtesy of Nicolas Raymond & Brin Kennedy Weins, Wikimedia Commons.

We followed his instructions and found a Famine Pot in the middle of a forest, where some locals placed food for the displaced victims. It felt like we were walking through history.

We had already anticipated a trip to Slieve League Cliffs on the far west coast of Donegal, and were not disappointed once we arrived. Towering over 2,000 feet from the Atlantic Ocean, it is one of the highest sea cliffs in Europe. Its visual splendor gets my vote for the most striking site in Ireland.

We headed down the road to County Sligo for a pilgrimage to the gravesite of our favorite poet, W.B. Yeats (1865-1939), and soon found ourselves stuck in the car, avoiding a heavy downpour. We didn’t mind, we read Yeats and listened to an Altan CD, our favorite traditional Donegal music group, while basking in awe at the stunning green countryside. We read where the lyrical name “Emerald Isle” arrived from William Dennan, an Irish physician, poet and liberal political radical, in his poem When Erin First Rose in 1795.

Carrowmore Megalithic Cemetery. Wikimedia Commons.

Once the weather cleared, we stumbled upon Carrowmore Megalithic Cemetery, the largest burial site of Megalithic tombs in Ireland, built around 4600-3900 B.C. To this day no one knows who these people were and how they were able to move such mammoth rocks. We both could feel the power of the setting and something came over us; before we knew it, we were renewing our wedding vows. After a Sunday pub meal of  Irish fjord lamb, potatoes and Guinness we found another B&B, where (once again) we were the only guests. We wanted to take the owner home with us, and to this day remain in contact. From her window we could see cattle swimming across a river.

The striking ‘terrible’ beauty of the Connemara. Photo courtesy of Chris Hood, via Wikimedia Commons.

The next day, it was a drive through the sweeping Connemara in County Galway, a stunning landscape where author Charles Dicken once described as a place of “terrible beauty.” We pulled off the road to study a Famine Trail named for the Doolough Tragedy of 1849. Scores of destitute and starving people staggered through horrendous weather for 15 miles to a manor’s house in the hope of food, only to be turned away. Apparently, the owner was too busy having lunch to be bothered. Later, corpses were found by the side of the road with grass in their mouth, while others desperately crawled to a local church where they could die on consecrated ground.

The annual Doolough Famine Walk. Photo courtesy Tourism Ireland.

Once a year a famine walk takes place on the trail to commemorate the victims. As we departed down the road, we both commented that we had not seen a single car for over half an hour. A second later there was a rumbling on the road. We had a flat, not unusual on these rock-strewn Irish roads, but faced with having to unpack our little rental’s cram packed trunk just to find the spare tire was a daunting thought. Before we knew it, two cars, each arriving from the opposite direction, appeared out of nowhere. The drivers both hopped out and quickly changed our tire. They barely stuck around for a handshake. Such is the hospitality of the Irish.

It was pitch black when we arrived at our next bed and breakfast accommodations, and laughed in wonder on how the owners managed to get the bed into our little room. But where were we? In the morning, with the blazing sun illuminating this piece of paradise, we realized our B&B was nestled on the banks of a breathtaking fjord. We were in the town of Liane, where the film, The Field was made. In one of the local pubs a huge painting of the film’s star, Richard Harris, hangs above the fireplace. On our dinner plates was lobster caught that very day in the fjord. A tablemate explained to us that in pre-EU Ireland there were no taxes on food, books and children’s clothing. Upon hearing this, my wife literally held back tears.

A traditional music session at the Gus O’Connor Pub in Doolin.
Photo courtesy of Chris Hood, via Wikimedia Commons.

Eventually we made it down to the musical town of Doolin, a coastal fishing village in County Clare on the Atlantic coast. Coined the traditional music capital of Ireland, this was an adult Disneyland for us where a number of pubs specialized in Irish session music each night. We joined in with locals and like-minded tourists, had big pub meals of more lamb and potatoes, bacon (think ham) and cabbage, then nursed pints of Guinness as we listened to reels, jigs and haunting ballads, many about the Famine and emigration.

Our daytimes were spent on trips to the Aran Islands, a landscape once so cruel and unforgiving that it consisted solely of solid limestone rock, where rugged locals actually had to produce their own soil, made of seaweed and smashed rocks to grow potatoes, their only source of subsidence; then the windy, yet curiously tranquil Cliffs of Moher, standing 702 feet with a stretch of five miles, featuring panoramic views of the Atlantic as far as the eye can see; a massive Dolomite burial site located on a livestock farm (its only explanation, a note from the farmer, “Mind the Gate”); exploring additional archaeological wonders in the Burren as well as its castles, some now converted to private residences. We carry the memories with us wherever we go. Yes, Erin Go Bragh!

Postscript:

The Hand of Human Kindness: The Irish and American Indian Tribal Nations

In 1847, the Choctaw People in the U.S. collected $170 – the equivalent of several thousand dollars today – to send to the people in Ireland who were starving during the Potato Famine. The senseless deaths and struggles  experienced by the Irish was familiar to the tribal nation: Just 16 years earlier the Choctaw had embarked on the forced 5,043 mile-long Trail Of Tears, due to tyrant and American President Andrew Jackson’s illegal Indian Relocation Act. Thousands of their own succumbed to death from starvation, disease and freezing temperatures. Though the Choctaw People had meager resources, they gave on behalf of others in greater need.

A dignified Choctaw family. Photographer unknown. Wikimedia Commons

The Irish have long felt a debt of gratitude to American Indians. When current news broke that the Navajo and Hopi tribes were being ravaged by the coronavirus, Irish journalist Naomi O’Leary tweeted that now would be a good time to return the favor. That tweet went viral, and soon donations were pouring in from the Irish people, along with messages of gratitude and support.

In 2017, the Choctaw Native American Monument was erected in Midleton, Ireland, to honor the American Indian tribe that aided the Irish during the Great Potato Famine in 1847.

Kindred Spirits sculpture in Ireland, dedicated to the Choctaw Nation for their aid during the Great Irish Famine.
Credit: Photograph courtesy of ChoctawNation.com.

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The T-Boy Society of Film & Music’s latest poll is devoted to something that we all have experienced: Travel Nightmares. Our first entry by the most esteemed Richard Carroll puts the theme in the proper context. It’s really all about ourselves and should serve as Travel Lessons Learned.

Richard Carroll — T-Boy writer:

Follow the Rules, Particularly When It’s In Your Own Book

I wrote a book “Traveling Mexico by RV” for Chronicle Books, San Francisco, and on a driving trip to Central America, seemly I cast aside everything I had written and simply ignored many of the rules and tips in the book creating a travel nightmare to remember.

With two surfboards on the luggage rack of a Volkswagen Camper, called the African Queen, we were on our way back to Southern California from Panama when arriving at a huge flow of water blocking the roadway near the Guatemala/Mexico border. I thought that I could easily drive through the water though my wife and son Carson urged me to pull over. We quickly found the Queen floating down a fast moving river sideways water rushing through the floorboards. Carson shouted, “Dad, should I pull down a surfboard?” I said, “That’s not funny Carson!”  We finally became lodged on a sandbar, and all the while the chuckling Mexicans thought it was the most humorous sight ever. I could hear them, “Look what the crazy gringos are doing!”

They did help with much effort on a hot humid day to push the Queen off the sandbar, all the while staring at me with great glee, while pushing the Queen a short distance to their small village along a dirt road stopping squarely in front of a house of prostitution. The ladies came out and offered us a mattress in one of the rooms with a fan. We declined. Each morning the smiling senoritas would sit on a wall snacking and offering us hot tortillas, Carson, 17, said, “Those ladies are really pretty and so nice.” I said, “Never mind Carson

For three days we sat in front of the house along with the senoritas who were busy half the night, the Queen refusing to start. Each morning the villagers on their way to the fields would stop by and work on the Volkswagen pushing it up and down the dirt road to no avail. One morning, an older man with a large mustache who we called the Maestro, very elegantly punched a large hole in the muffler with a screwdriver thinking if the water drained out the Volkswagen might start. He stood up, bowed, and sauntered away. Throughout those three days we were invited to funerals and weddings, received baskets of fresh fruit, were friends of the senoritas, and finally on the third morning with four hefty Mexicans pushing the Volkswagen it kicked over. The wounded Queen putted out of the village on three cylinders, the villagers cheering, Carson waving goodbye to the smiling senoritas.

About a half-hour later on a lonely stretch of road we ran out of gas. For some two hours cars zoomed past us in bunches looking the other way. It was dead quiet and under a blazing hot sun and low-flying large-winged birds, suddenly a huge tanker truck pulled up behind us. The driver minus a shirt, wearing a headband, cigarette dangling, and looking like Zorba the Greek understood even before I explained that our gas tank was empty. With a dented coffee can in one hand that he was using for an ash tray he climbed to the top of the tanker and scooped out some petrol created a funnel from a piece of paper and we had gas. He never spoke, refused money, and drove away. It was like a strange vision, a happening from the heavens.

We made it home though quickly got lost in the maze of Mexico City traffic until two motorcycle cops led us to the correct highway. Then driving hundreds of miles without rear view mirrors that were stolen in Guatemala via the quickest hands in the country was a dangerous challenge. Later Carson whispered to me, “Are you going to tell anyone about the six Honduran guerrillas we picked up carrying machine guns and pistols who kept asking you in strange Spanish, ‘Do you like your president?’ I remember we dropped them off just before Tegucigalpa and they faded into the bush with six bottles of our cold water.”

It was for sure a travel nightmare but only one of numerous others driving the Queen south of the border.

Fyllis Hockman — T-Boy writer:

The Most Difficult Trek We Had Ever Experienced.

The eight of us huddled together, warned repeatedly to stay close and keep quiet. A soft cough escaped from one of our party and the guide looked immediately askance. Coughing and sneezing were very much frowned upon. If you’re scraped by a stinging nettle, don’t even think about screaming — a usually fitting response. Sharing 98.4 percent of our DNA, the elusive mountain gorillas — whom we were seeking at the time — are very susceptible to human-borne illnesses and more gorillas die from such infectious diseases than from any other cause. We were carriers and they had to be protected from us. And this was before the pandemic!

Still, eight humans a day are allowed to visit these gentle giants, as they are known, for no longer than an hour, as we did during a recent visit to Uganda as part of an ElderTreks tour.

This is not exactly a drive-by photo op. With a vigorous (to say the least) trek of 1-7 hours, depending upon where the gorillas are that day, you have to REALLY want to see them. But even with visitation restricted to an hour, it is usually well worth the effort. But more on that later.

There are about 880 mountain gorillas in the world with almost half  located in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, a World Heritage Site clearly worthy of its name, in southwestern Uganda, an 18% increase over the last census due to increased conservation efforts, education and veterinary care. This is very good news.

The prelude to the hike is itself intimidating. Treks range from 1-7 hours according to the promotional material, with a maximum increase in elevation of 500 meters. Wear good hiking boots, don gloves for the nettles, a walking stick is mandatory, bring lots of water, don’t get closer than 25 feet — and remember these are wild animals.

Anticipation mixed closely with apprehension as every person on our tour, whether expressed aloud or not, felt “I hope I can make.” The tale I’m about to tell about my travel-writing husband Vic and myself is not the norm. The tale for the other eight members of our ElderTreks tour, from whom we were separated because of the limit of eight people to a gorilla trekking group, is the opposite extreme — also not the norm.

Boy, were we ever wrong. The trek was somewhat strenuous from the beginning, with steep climbs and slippery descents, traversing narrow ravines, but we were holding our own, feeling pretty good about ourselves. Until we entered the forest. And there was no semblance of a trail at all. The guides were trail-blazing with the help of machetes deep into the clearly “impenetrable” woods, the rocks, roots and brambles beneath our feet not even visible because of the thick underbrush. With walking stick in one hand and the porter’s in the other, I tried valiantly to move forward though at times the porter was literally dragging me up the precipitous slopes or keeping me from sliding down sheer declines, twigs and vines attacking from both sides of the non-trail, entangling my feet and arms to further impede progress in either direction. At times, I thought either my arm would be pulled off by the porter or my legs by the vines.

All the while, I couldn’t help but feel guilty for thinking to myself how little at that point I cared about the gorillas and how much I was worried about surviving the grueling trip back. I was seriously considering becoming a modern day Dian Fossey and staying with the gorillas, assuming we ever reached them, just to avoid the return trip.

I wish we could say the trip was worth it but by the time we finally dragged ourselves — or more appropriately — were dragged by the porters to the designated area where the gorillas had been, they had left. This is just not what you want to hear after what most of us on the trek agreed was the most difficult thing we had ever experienced.

Ed Boitano — T-Boy editor:

Investigate Tour Operator Before Booking

Our little ferry graced the salt marshes of Hilton Head Island. Surrounded by a world of sea grass in South Carolina’s Low Country, we were on our way to the island of Daufuskie in search of Gullah history and culture.   The ferry ride served as our introduction to our tour vendor — which I’ll refer to as XYZ.  Little did I know that this very ferry ride would be the highpoint of our tour.

First, a little about the Gullah

Research told me that slave traders brought Africans from Sierra Leone to the chain of Sea Islands for their expertise in planting, harvesting and processing rice. During the 1700s, American colonists in the Southeastern U.S. realized that rice would grow well in the moist, semitropical country bordering their coastline. But the American white plantation slave owners had no experience in the cultivation of rice, so they purchased slaves with a preference for Africans from the “Rice Coast” or “Windward Coast” — the traditional rice-growing region of West Africa. The enslaved people became known as the Gullah (Gul-luh), perhaps derived from Gola, a tribe found near the border of Liberia and Sierra Leone. Daufuskie itself: translated to “pointed feather,” a name attributed to island’s earliest inhabitants, the tribes of Muskogean stock.

I read that when the U.S. Civil War commenced, white owners hurriedly abandoned their plantations and fled to the mainland, while some Gullah were actually unaware of the war and their eventual freedom from slavery. Due to this isolation, the Gullah were able to preserve more of their African cultural heritage than any other group of Black Americans. They spoke a unique Creole language and maintained a life similar to that of Sierra Leone. I was anxious to meet a Gullah person and hear their unique language in conversation, and, who knows, maybe even a bit of folklore.

As we exited the ferry we were met at the dock with a hostile sign: “No food Allowed,” and then were escorted by a XYZ employee to a row of golf carts by a general store. His scripted remarks included ‘”If you want any food you better get it here, this store is the only place on the island you can get it” (later we found an independent grocery in the island’s center) and “this is our BEST golf cart on the island… I know ‘cause I just rode it!”

We were happy to leave the man; and with map in-hand of historic Gullah sites, we excitedly navigated our golf cart down the dusty dirt road in search of these remarkable people. Sort of, that is, due to our cart running at half speed compared to the other golf carts. We returned it to the less-than-embarrassed man, who offered no explanation, and were given another, which broke down in ten minutes. This time, a more qualified man said we should have never have been assigned the first two carts and gave us another that actually worked.

So, we were now officially off on our expedition in search of the Gullah. The map turned out be fairly accurate leading us to the First Union African Baptist Church, listed as a historical landmark; followed by Maryfield School (circa 1930), the primary school for the Gullah children.  This is the school where author Pat Conroy taught in the late 1960s, later documenting his experience in the novel, The Water is Wide. Transportation only began in 1950, so the children must have had a long walk in the woods. The small Billie Burn Historical Museum was next on our agenda; with Ms. Burn considered the first true Daufuskie historian, having documented life on the island’s past in her book, An Island Named Daufuskie. The early afternoon closed after quick looks at the Mary Field Cemetery, the largest Gullah cemetery on the island, and empty ageing homes. All very interesting, but, no Gullah. Later, at the other independent store, I asked the manager, is there any place where can I actually meet one of these fascinating people. His thoughtful reply was true and educational; in fact, we learned more from him than we did with any XYZ employee. It went something like this: The Gullah have long been gone. You missed them by a couple generations. Occasionally an older person will return to the island to see their ancestral home. But… wait a sec… someone told me that right now there’s one Gullah descendent doing just that right now.

But where, I asked?

I was given complicated directions, before realizing that racing over to the woman’s private home would clearly be an invasion of her privacy. Our quest clearly needed to be tempered.

As we returned to the petite ferry it was obvious that we had been misled and even lied to by XYZ. Nevertheless, we were happy to see and learn all we did. But, were still annoyed that we had been taken advantage of, and wondered why such a company could even exist. It suddenly occurred to me that South Carolina is one of the least regulated states in the U.S., a state where the establishment of forming workers’ unions was once illegal. Curiously, the Sea Islands were the first place in the South where slaves were freed. It made no sense to my Yankee mindset.

Though it might feel otherwise, this short piece was not written as a slight or act of vengeance against any XYZ owner or employee — if fact, I never mentioned a single name — but the experience did serve as a life lesson; never book a tour with a vendor until you’ve thoroughly, independently, researched them and the specific tour. If not, there is a chance you might be disappointed. I noticed online that a tourist had commented that the island was one big tourist trap. Well, I thought, it depends on a person’s interests and perspective, but found most tourists were there for rest, relaxation and a lot of drinking. In conversation with others on the ferry ride back, it became clear not one of them had even a hint about the existence, let alone the culture, of these historic people, the people simply known as the Gullah.

Susan Breslow — T-Boy writer:

Africa: Don’t Tip the Canoe

It frightened me to go to Africa; so faraway, so different, so wild. Yet I was even more curious than I was anxious — to a point.

Tony, my outdoors-loving companion, and I were brought by motorboat to Water Wilderness, a flotilla of ramshackle houseboats on Lake Kariba in Zimbabwe. We were deposited at the main lodge, which was basically a large raft with a roof. There a guide met us. He was a tall man wearing khaki shorts that showed off bronzed legs covered with blonde hairs. A leather bandolier filled with large bullets crisscrossed his torso. He told us about the area’s wildlife and talked about the conundrum he would face if an endangered rhino charged and he had to decide in a split second whether to shoot him to save himself.

Tony, tired of only seeing animals from the vantage of a Land Rover, expressed a desire to hike. The guide motioned to the canoes tethered to the raft. “Take one, and pick a houseboat,” he said. “Try not to tip over,” he added. “There are hippos in the water and crocodiles by the shore. In the morning I’ll take you on a hike.”

I hardly slept, my dreams full of toothy crocodiles straddling hippos to slither onto our houseboat. The next morning the guide called for us in a rowboat, and this time he had a long gun slung over his shoulder in addition to the bandoliers. Terror consumed me. What if the boat tipped over and we were breakfast for hippos? What if I was breakfast for a tse-tse fly? What if after we docked on the far shore an animal charged? What if I couldn’t keep up with the hikers? What if there were deadly snakes in the tall grass? I made it into the rowboat — and burst into tears.

“Do you want to go back to the houseboat?” the guide asked kindly. I nodded. He docked the boat on the far shore, and Tony jumped out. He handled him the rifle, then turned the boat back toward my haven. Tears drying, I was embarrassed. “Don’t be,” said my bronzed hero. “If they put me in the middle of Grand Central Station, I’d have the same reaction.”

A potential nightmare averted, I spent the rest of the day on the deck of my houseboat, watching Cape buffalo meandering on the hills beyond. Even they knew not to go in the water.

Stephen Brewer — T-Boy editor:

All’s Well That Ends Well

A flame shot across my hotel room when I switched on the air conditioner. Then the draperies caught on fire. I smothered the blaze and called the front desk. I’m not sure what the man who answered the phone thought I was telling him, but he arrived with an ice bucket. He sniffed the acrid smoke, pointed to the blackened remains of the air conditioner, and declared the room a catástrofe. That much I understood.

The trip was sure getting off to a rocky start. The plan was to pick up a car in Barcelona and drive across the Pyrenees to a rental house in Languedoc, in southwestern France. Looking back after all these years I remember snowcapped mountains, sun-drenched vineyards, villages of golden stone, and cassoulet… but I jump ahead of myself.

The next morning, in the windowless garret that the clerk said was his very last room, I was awakened by a disturbing revelation. I had left the prepaid voucher for my rental car in the bedside table of the other room. The same fellow was on duty behind the desk, and he let out a dramatic sigh of distress upon seeing me. I asked him to let me into my old room. “Ocupada,” he grumbled. Occupied? How had he explained the charred walls to the new guests? As it turned out, they probably hadn’t noticed. In answer to my knock a naked man flung open the door. He had a wine bottle in one hand and said “cheers, mate” in an Australian accent. A woman, barely covered by a sheet, gave me a friendly wave from the bed. I explained my mission and grabbed the precious voucher. I thanked them and the man asked me the time. “Just after nine,” I said, and he asked if I meant evening or morning.

With a spring in my step I walked down the Ramblas toward the car agency. Even this early in the day the cafes were full of chattering patrons. Parakeets chirped away from cages that hung from tree branches. I turned into the small street where the agency was located. The windows were dark, and the place was locked up tight. It would remain so for the next three days, according to a sign in the window, for the feast of some saint with whom I was unfamiliar, though he certainly seemed to have the miraculous power to ruin my vacation. In those pre-computer days, you couldn’t just cancel a reservation and make another one online. I was stranded until I could retrieve the car. On the bright side, nothing was stopping me from moving to the nicer-looking hotel across the street. I didn’t realize the two establishments were under the same management until I came back from dinner that evening. The same clerk was behind the desk. He glared at me. I gave him my steeliest stare. “Try not to burn this place down, too” he growled in broken English, then added under his breath “tonto Americano” (American fool).

I got out of Barcelona without further incident, but I wish I could report that the rest of the trip was smooth sailing. I had just climbed out of the car to stretch my legs at the top of the Col du Portalet, one of the highest and most spectacular of the passes across the Pyrenees, when I heard the low rumbling for the first time. Thunder, I thought, but the sky was cloudless and a startling blue. Ah, farm machinery, no doubt, but nothing grew up here above the tree line. Or wait, maybe it was one of those quaint horns I’d read about, that shepherds use to communicate with one another across the heights? Or perhaps the grunts of a chamois? Then I realized that the noise was coming from my car.

The garagiste in Pau buried his head under the hood, exclaimed several “Mon Dieus,” and emerged to inform me the car was a catastrophe (that word again). The solution was simple: replace the engine. I declined.

By the time I had settled into my village the car would start only intermittently. My very nice neighbor Dieter, a summertime resident from Heidelberg, showed me how to pop start the car. I soon became quite adept at the technique, shifting in and out of second gear as I glided down an incline through the vineyards until the engine turned over. In the coming weeks I also learned the term for flat tire, pneu coupe, and I had two occasions to use the phrase. Then there was the water that kept pooling on the kitchen floor. I could not locate a leak, nor could I find Jean-Claude, the gardien who was supposed to look after the property. He was in Lyons on business, or so the snippy woman who answered his phone told me. Then he was in Nimes, visiting a sick aunt, then in Toulouse, at a fair. The peripatetic Jean-Claude never did make an appearance in my kitchen. I purchased a mop with a fancy wring mechanism. Mopping and pop-starting became parts of my daily routine. I mapped out excursions with consideration for how much mopping I would have to do when I returned. I parked only on downgrades.

On my way back to Barcelona I stopped for a few nights in Cadaques, a stunningly white seaside village at the top of the Costa Brava. My terrace overlooked a blue swath of the Mediterranean, framed by heavenly scented pines. The Languedoc reds I’d brought with me were delicious. My mopping days were behind me. Soon I could turn the problematic car over to the agency. According to my calculations, I could get all the way back to Barcelona on just one pop start. As Shakespeare said “all’s well that ends well,” and the more wine I drank, the more reassuring I found it to think that in travel as in life, the good things are what remain with us.

Ringo Boitano — T-Boy writer:

A Nightmare Train Experience With A Happy Ending

My photographer and I had just finished a stunning seven-day tour of Switzerland’s Lucerne and the Lake Geneva region.

Our final night was at a Zürich hotel, walking distance to the train station, which would depart to the Zürich airport, only one stop away. My photographer was booked on an early before dawn flight, leaving me with an extra hour of sleep and two over-packed suitcases and a backpack. No problem for me, I smirked. But the next early morning after she had departed, I found it still too early in the morning and my baggage heavy and awkward to carry. Nevertheless, it was the cross I had to carry, and slowly and methodically made it to the trainstation, drenched in sweat and gasping for breath. Fortunately, on my turtle-like walk there was not a soul in sight, sparing me the embarrassment of the macho Yank, barely able to stand up.

At the train station there were many Swiss kids and a few older, still partying from the night before. In front of me were a line of railroad trains. Of course, the world knows that Switzerland has a dense network of railways with more than 2600 stations and stops, which are as efficient as an Olympic game clock

As I surveyed the trains, I was unable to find one with the magical words, Zürich Airport. The railway representatives were a little too far away for me to bother to ask, so I stupidly thought, well, Zürich Airport is one stop away and any train going in that direction will make a stop. I climbed aboard the nearest train and took a comfortable seat. As the train ride commenced, I noticed we were covering a lot of kilometers, more than I had thought for a quick ride to the airport. A railway ticket collector appeared and carefully punched everyone’s ticket. When it came to mine, he took pause. In perfect English he asked, “Where do you think you are going?” “Zürich Airport,” I replied. The gentleman shook his head, “There is no stop at the airport. This is a direct ride to Lugano.”  Before I could reply, he took my ticket and left me with the words, wait here.  My five-minute wait felt like I was trapped in a Hitchcock film before the man returned  and informed me that the train will make an emergency stop at a platform where another train will be waiting to transport me to the airport. What! How can this be on the world’s most efficient railway system, a railway system that was so efficient as an Olympic game clock. Wouldn’t this interfere with their carefully orchestrate time table? But it was true. The train actually stopped, and I struggled over to the desolate, opposite platform with my load, where the train to Zürich Airport and its conductor was actually waiting for me. The conductor words were polite, but commanding. “Wait here! Do Not Go Anywhere! We will tell you when to get off to the airport.” And that’s what exactly happened; 15 minutes later I was standing in the check-in line at the Zürich Airport. Is there a morale or even travel tip from this? No, not really; just don’t be a clueless American and always take the time to ask questions. You’ll find many people are happy to help, particularly in Switzerland.

Richard Carroll — T-Boy writer:

Press Trip Travel Nightmares

On a media trip to Indonesia there was writer with a drinking problem who by evening time was slurring his words and unable to communicate. It was a Travel Nightmare when sitting at the dining table and it was his turn to speak to the hosts. A media cruise to South America a writer hit on a gorgeous lady sitting at a bar. He didn’t realize that she was on her honeymoon and quickly her husband appeared and there were blows. At the next port of call he was kicked off the cruise and left on the dock with his luggage. Later he sent the public relations lady roses and she returned them. Both of these were extremely embarrassing and awkward. I could write a long short story about Travel Nightmares, as could most active travel writers.

A press trip to Switzerland an editor from Sunset Magazine was always late. The Swiss PR leader instructed us that we would meet at a certain place in the heart of the village at 4 p.m. and please don’t be late. The van can only be in this area for a few minutes and it’s a huge ticket if we overstay. We were all back on the van minutes before 4 p.m. except for the Sunset Magazine editor. We looked down the sidewalk and there he was sauntering along looking in windows, as a policeman appeared at the window of the van. The PR guy lost his temper and shouted, “I’m not a damn baby sitter for travel writers and I’m tired waiting for an airhead!” He slammed the door of the van and we left him in the village. Our next stop was miles further in another Swiss mountain village where we would spend the night. Hours later about halfway through a marvelous dinner here comes Sunset Magazine straggling in through the door. The PR leader stood up and said, “Here’s the key to your room,” then sat down at the festive table. It was another awkward Travel Nightmare. He did go straight to his room and was never late again. Throughout the remainder of the trip the PR leader ignored him.

There was a media trip when two Los Angeles women were invited and the New York PR lady didn’t realize they despised each other, it was a week-long Travel Nightmare. In Puerto Vallarta on a press trip a female was sent home because she was complaining morning, noon and night. The PR lady said to her in front of the group, “We spent a great deal of money on this trip and you’re ruining it. We have booked a flight for you at 6 p.m. and possibly we can work together in the future?”

On a press trip to New York City with some excellent writers, one writer was allowed to bring along his new girlfriend. The second day he arrived at breakfast with a black eye, his glasses shattered and a huge bump on his forehead. It looked as if she had whacked him with both hands. She arrived at breakfast without a mark sitting at the table far from him. They sent her back to Los Angeles that afternoon and helped the writer to find a new set of glasses.

A trip to Asia a writer disappeared on the first night and didn’t reappear till it was time to depart. The PR firm banned him forever and spread the word to other PR firms. This writer has faded from the world of travel.

On a cruise to Hong Kong a writer from NYC attempted to commit suicide. Somehow, he stowed away on the ship and we spent the entire cruise searching for him. Finally, the staff entered his cabin for the 10th time. He was on his bed staring at the ceiling and not speaking. He told us that he was depressed and only kidding about suicide. That seemed to be the end of this writing career, and the last time I checked he’s still alive and healthy living in Chicago.

A cycling trip to Austria the PR firm was adamant that we need to be in good shape, not top physical shape but able to cycle a six mile segment to a waiting bus. It was a hot day and after 20 minutes or so a lady from Philadelphia was lagging far behind. I stopped and talked to her. She was not in good shape, sweating profusely, and refusing to go any further. The PR cycle leader walked her back to the starting village and then had to find transportation at great expense for a one hour trip over a mountain to connect with the media group. Everyone was worried about her and it sent the focused travel edge flying. She said, “I didn’t think it would be this hard.” She remained on the bus for the remainder of the cycling sessions. The European PR firm was not happy, and one of the leaders said to me privately, “Do you Americans know how to read?”

Hemingway wrote, “If you want to stay married to your wife or sweetheart never travel with her.” We have witnessed a number of couples who have had travel stress breakdowns with shouting matches, leaving overloaded luggage in hotels and parking lots and wishing they had never left home.

Weave Cleveland — Travel Guys cinematographer

Circumstances Beyond Your Control

The Greek mob, set up by the Russians, roofied, robbed, a smashed sliding glass door at a Best Western gashing my leg right open, a maid in terror watching me bleed sitting at the edge of a bathtub with the water running as I do my own surgery, me tearing my own clothes into strips to use as tourniquet’s, a restaurant owner punching me because I didn’t choose his restaurant, British Airways leaving my luggage in the rain leaving me without anything for two and four days respectively, more than one piece of luggage, think colours running into other clothes, blues into whites, etc. … and explaining why your suitcase now weighs 80 lbs. instead of 40, Heathrow Board of Health refusing me first aid and telling me to go to a hospital in London when all I wanted was to please get back home — and that’s just Europe.

Tom Weber — T-Boy writer:

Behind Enemy Lines

In a previous life, the one that provided me with a bi-monthly paycheck, I traveled a lot. The job afforded me countless suitcases full of opportunities while in the service of my government. That’s how I managed to get the lion’s share of entry-exit stamps and visas in my well-worn passports.

Colleagues were envious, but not jealous, that I was able to “change the air” and leave the office environment on a pretty regular basis for long stretches of time.

Whenever I’d pack up and head for foreign shores, I’d always tell my officemates, tongue-in-cheek, that I was going “behind enemy lines.” Truth be told, my pronouncement really wasn’t that far off.

The different languages, cultures, customs, traditions, politics, cuisine, scenery, just everyday life in general, in most of the places that I’ve visited, were odd and foreign to me at first, but after numerous return visits to some, I became more relaxed, more comfortable, and more at ease with my temporary abodes abroad.

As the old saying goes, “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.”

I learned early on that whenever I traveled outside my comfort zone, the best way to approach it was by doing my utmost to adapt to the new culture for as long as I was in “their” fair city, village or hamlet. Sample and soak in as much of your hosts’ way of life as you can. And whatever you do, do not go around comparing your way of life back home with theirs. Just leave your personal baggage behind. Don’t let it clutter or fog up the new-found moment or experience. In other words, don’t rain on your own parade.

Being “behind enemy lines” can be, and should be, a lot of fun. Don’t blame misplaced luggage, flight delays, bad weather, etc. on the place you’re visiting. These are simply the bumps and bruises of the foreign travel experience.

In the end, it all works out and makes for interesting stories to share with your office mates when you return home. Remember, they’re envious that you got to go. So, embellish a bit.

I’m probably preaching to the choir with most of you fellow, well-seasoned “road warriors,” but it’s always good to remind ourselves that when we step off the plane, train or boat, that “we’re not in Kansas anymore.”

From the Panama Canal to the Great Wall of China, from the bush of South Africa to a mud hut in the Haute Guinea, I’ve done my fair share of being placed, and placing myself, “behind enemy lines” and always made it back safe and sound. And, most importantly, I returned home more enlightened and fulfilled than I was before I left.

James Boitano — T-Boy writer

A Travel Nightmare All In Your Head

When it involves your family, a Travel Nightmare can be all in your head.

Some years ago, my parents and siblings and I all took a Carnival Cruise to the Western Caribbean out of Tampa. It was a lovely week-long visit of the Cayman Islands, the Yucatan and Belize.

The cruise ended Sunday morning with a flight home at noon and the eventual return to work on Monday. Typically, Sunday morning was sad to see the trip over, but then it turned stressful. Very stressful. Due to unexpected fog, the ship couldn’t dock for hours until after its scheduled arrival. Our noon flight was now much too early. We spent so many anxious hours, first stressing about when we could get off the ship and how we’d catch our flight, and then rushing to the airport. When they finally let us off the ship, we had only about an hour till our flight. We scrambled for all our might to make it to the airport, only to arrive 15 minutes too late to catch our flight home to Seattle. I can still remember how stressed out we were over this ‘nightmare’. My mother even abandoned a suitcase when we couldn’t find it at the base of the ship when we disembarked.

But why in the world did we work ourselves up into such a frenzy? For in the end, we got a flight home the next morning and had a lovely last day together as a family around the pool of a cheap motel somewhere in town. It turned out to be a blessing to have an extra day together as a family to extend our vacation. The nightmare was all in our heads.

Brom Wikstrom — T-Boy writer and mouth painter:

Impossible to Anticipate Conditions 

Any travel nightmare I’ve had revolves around the impossible to anticipate conditions that also make for some of the most satisfying aspects of travel. In Lugano, Switzerland, we spent an afternoon, seated in a bike repair shop, while ingenious workers improvised a fix to my wheelchair, shortening spokes they had to accommodate my broken wheels. Their pride at correcting my dilemma was a joy to behold and we were sent on our way with smiles.

On another occasion, in Arches National Park, we had been struggling up a steep trail that had been declared wheelchair accessible but wasn’t very. Just at the point where we had to decide whether to just stop and enjoy what we’d done or return to a simpler trail below, a burly guy named Bruce came along to offer an assist. In no time, we had not only ascended to the top of the trail, but he stuck with us for the entire loop trail. By the end of the day, we’d acquired a good friend.

Tammy Skinner — T-Boy writer

A Hellenic Promise

There are many nuances to being a woman — most of them fabulous but some of them not so much. One of them being the seemingly invisible magnetic sign when traveling that seems to scream VULNERABLE VICTIM. Luckily, I have radar which senses movement of possible predators and over the years of traveling have developed an intricate system to ward them off. I was 21 traveling to Brindisi, Italy by train coming from Paris. My traveling companion (also female) and I were excited to travel to Greece for the first time and our plan was to get to Brindisi and stay up all night then take the early morning ferry to Patras. We befriended a kind young man on the train who was American and, on his way, to visit relatives. Out of concern and respect, he decided he would stay with us once we got to Brindisi in order to protect us from any of the street kids. All was well until we made some “new friends” who followed us around and offered to keep us company as well. Our American friend played dumb pretending he didn’t speak their language and, in the meantime, overheard their plot to kidnap my companion and I by taking us in a boat and pretending to take us 3 but then leaving our “American” friend behind.

Since I knew of this plan ahead of time and had some theater experience under my belt, I decided to act quick. It was around 5am when they took us to the dock (not far from where we would have been actually leaving for Patras only 2 hours later) …my companion and I locked eyes as we approached the boat and off in the distance I saw a group of people who were gathering to already start their wait for the arrival of the ferry. I grabbed her by the hand careful to not show fear to our kidnappers nor draw attention to them in any way that would make them angry and I turned to her and shouted “Look!! It’s Gary and Dennis!! They met us here like they said they would. Hi guys!!!!!” Grabbing her, we ran as fast as we could towards that group all the while shouting our greetings. We were lucky. We got away. That ferry ride to Greece was hotter than hot. We were sweaty, the air was humid and life had never felt sweeter. My memories of Greece are filled with wonder as I recall the beautiful beaches of Santorini, the ruins in Athens, the mouth-watering gyros in Patras and the late nights we spent dancing in Corfu. Life is sweet and is to be savored. Yet the Greek philosopher, Socrates, summed it all when he said “Nature has given us two ears, two eyes, and but one tongue-to the end that we should hear and see more than we speak.” The lesson of my travel nightmare was no doubt doubled as well; to be always aware of your surroundings (remaining vigilant and hyper attuned) and appreciating the beauty in the environment and people you encounter along the way.

Bill Cartmel Maroldo — Television personality and broadcaster:

Be Prepared for the Worst

For the most part, travel is a double-edge sword. I love being in a new place and exploring the highlights – whether it be a village, city, or country. But for me, every vacation has its travel nightmare and it usually comes at both ends of the flight. I guess it would be cliché to say “I hate flying,” and so instead I will say I despise it.

From the park and ride (think of coming back and clearing off your car after a snowstorm); to arriving at the airport (they tell you to come early, but then you sit for a couple of hours next to someone talking loudly on their cell phone); to checking in (trying to relearn the “time saving” kiosks with instructions that change with each trip, and worrying your suitcase is 51 lbs.); to finding your gate (which just changed and is now at the other end of the airport); to boarding (feeling like I’m in line for a Rolling Stones concert); to finding your seat (which someone else is already sitting in, and the overhead storage is already full); to take off (the pilot telling us we’re backed up behind a few dozen other planes, but it won’t be long); to landing (for the moment it almost feels like it’s over, but it’s not); to disembarking (uh oh, my connection is taking off in a few minutes and they still haven’t opened the door); to retrieving the luggage (ok, I realize someone has to have the suitcase which gets loaded last onto the belt). Oh boy! Now I can look forward to finding the car rental and explaining why I don’t need insurance, and then figuring out how to get on the right highway since my GPS won’t work in the parking garage. But at last the vacation has begun, the hyperventilating has subsided, and I remember why it’s all worth it.

Raoul Pascual — Webmaster, illustrator and T-Boy writer:

The Crooks of Philippine Airlines

I will never recommend Philippine Airlines (PAL).

It is the flagship airlines of the Philippines. There are 3 other local competitors that fly people within the country, but it is the only international airline that flies straight from Manila to the rest of the world. Other international flights have a stop-over. Essentially, PAL is a subtle monopoly. This is my experience with the branch in Cagayan (Southern Philippines).

The air crew is great, but the ground crew is like a car salesman. They know they have you under their command, so they gauge your desperation and dangle ridiculous prices that seem to be plucked from thin air. It takes them forever to analyze the history of your itinerary … I mean how difficult is it to read an online document? On the official website, you can’t inquire via telephone … no contact information for an actual human being and their local/branch Philippine travel agents cannot help you. They are merely travel agents who book you and get their commission, but they cannot adjust your itinerary. The travel agent said they cannot even call the airline directly. How ridiculously antiquated is that? Any deviation from your original schedule needs to be addressed face-to-face (not even by phone) with an agent from the official ticketing office (usually on the local airport itself} which can be hours away from you.

I went to the Iligan, Southern Philippines, to visit my Dad. While I was there, he contracted pneumonia and I had to delay my return flight back to the Manila to care for him. I decided Sunday evening to change my Monday flight to Thursday. I was not prepared for the nightmare that was about to happen.

Monday

Because my Monday flight was set at 6:30 AM, I was forced to drive 1.5 hours to the PAL local ticketing/satellite office in the airport office at 4:00am. When I got there, a man named Frank was late to arrive at his office. He was supposed to open at 4:30 but he got there a little past 5 .a.m. I was the only one waiting but when he opened a rich lady stepped in front of me and she got catered to first. The two chatted and giggled for over half an hour. It appears she and Frank were old friends. When it was finally my turn, Frank took forever to realize that my US travel agent had already cancelled my flight the night before. Then he gave me a list of all official hospital documents I needed to gather in order to justify my change of departure to qualify for free re-booking. He said he could not decide on our exception, so I needed to drive even further the next day (with the documents) to the main city (another hour away) to the PAL office downtown. Before I left, I told Frank to book me in the next flight that was leaving on Thursday.

Tuesday

I spent a half a day chasing after the hospital documents because I had to line up and pay fees to obtain it.

Wednesday

I drove all the way to the downtown main PAL ticketing office. When I stepped in at 9 a.m., Mr. Granada, a massively overweight agent, told us the exception only applied if I were hospitalized, i.e., all those hospital documents were worthless. I needed to pay the full price; $300 more, “but if you want to complain, only my manager could decide on your case.” He told me his manager would be in at 3 p.m.

We returned at 3pm but by that time, a crowd had already gathered so I waited in line for an hour. Mr. Granada then rambled on about a penalty for my “no show” and I explained that my travel agent had already cancelled it. He pretended not to see that in my records. His face frowned realizing I had outwitted him from paying a penalty fee. Then he came up with a new scam. He said I should have made a reservation. I told him I told bald headed Frank to do that for me. He said there was no record of the reservation. He claimed the Thursday flight was fully booked but he would be able to squeeze me in for $1,200 more.

Mr. Granada was testing to see how desperate I was to get out of the country. I called his bluff and told him I could wait. When he realized I was not in a hurry he went to the back room and conferred some more “with his manager” (if there really was a manager). By that time, he returned, I had already checked for alternate airlines. The cheapest fare was about $500 at EVA Air. Granada came back and said the cheapest one he could get me for the flight leaving on Thursday was just a few dollars off the competitor. It was either pay a little more with another airline (and deal with the hassle of transferring flights) or buy the ticket he was offering. I had to bite the bullet and take up his offer.

Thursday (Escape Day)

It was only when the plane left the ground that I could relax. I looked around the plane and there were several empty seats … I realized Mr. Granada had lied about the plane being fully booked. It appears the scoundrel still won in the end.

Epilogue

Philippine Airlines (PAL) has a local moniker: PAL stands for Palaging Always Late. “Palaging” means “Always” so in English it means “Always, Always Late.”

I have written them to ask for an explanation and they have not responded.

Their booking system is outdated. They slide prices according to your desperation. You’d be a fool to change your itinerary once you are trapped in the country.

Steve Rosenfield — Photographer and T-Boy writer:

Story of Lost Luggage

One Friday in December, my wife Elaine and I boarded a flight from Los Angeles non-stop to London Heathrow for the purpose of attending our daughter Amanda’s engagement party in London. The engagement party was to take place in Loughton, Essex, just north of London, beginning on Sunday at 3:30 PM. The engagement party was being hosted by our future in-laws, Gary and Suki, and was specifically scheduled during the Christmas holiday so that my wife and I could attend. There were over 200 guests expected to attend the engagement party.

Our American Airlines flight was scheduled to arrive in London Heathrow at 1:30 PM on Saturday where our in-laws had arranged for a car service to pick us up and bring us to Loughton.

As the flight approached Heathrow, the plane could not land due to poor weather conditions. After circling over Manchester, England for an hour, we were advised by the flight crew that Heathrow was closed, and the flight was being diverted to Brussels. We landed in Brussels at about 4:30 PM local time and sat on the plane for about 2 hours when we were told that busses would soon be arriving to transport all passengers to the terminal from where we would be bused to the Holiday Inn for the night. The flight crew also advised passengers that luggage could not be off-loaded because there were no ground crew personnel available to do the work. We were eventually bused to the hotel where we spent the night and were told to return to the terminal Sunday morning to hopefully re-board the plane around 11:00 AM and make the short flight back to London Heathrow.

My wife and I arrived back at the American Airlines terminal in Brussels at about 9:00 AM Sunday morning and stood in line with many other diverted passengers to find out about the continuing flight to Heathrow. Unfortunately, Heathrow was still closed, and the airline was handing out hotel room vouchers for Sunday night. We were told that the luggage was still on the plane which was still on the tarmac in Brussels.

The local time was now about 10:00 AM in Brussels – 9:00 AM in London. My wife and I had to make a decision – abandon any hope of attending our daughter’s engagement party (which was not a good option) or finding another way to get to London by 3:30 PM that afternoon.

When inquiring about our luggage (three suitcases) if we were to get to London by other means, we were told by the AA agent in Brussels that the luggage would end up at its final destination (Heathrow) and that we could then have the luggage delivered to our local address in the London area.

After listening to other travelers, who were in a similar predicament, trying to get onto other flights to Birmingham or Manchester, England, or trying to get tickets for the EuroStar train from Brussels to London (which they were told was sold out), we opted to look into renting a car and driving to Paris, and from there boarding the train to London. I spoke with an agent at the Hertz car rental desk in the airport who told me that I did not need to drive to Paris, but instead could drive to Calais, a couple of hour drive, and catch the EuroStar from there to London. In the interim, my wife rented a mobile phone in the airport so that we could stay in communication with our daughter and future in-laws as we made our way back to London.

The drive to Calais took about 2 hours in the snow getting us to the train station by about 1:30 PM local time. We found the train station in Calais and went to the ticket window with the intent of purchasing two tickets for the EuroStar from Calais to London but were told that the next passenger train was not scheduled to leave until 6:00 PM that evening. Obviously, if we had waited until 6:00 PM for the train, the engagement party would have ended by the time we arrived in London. The ticket agent suggested that we take the next car-train which was scheduled to leave about 3:00 PM local time, arriving in Dover, England about 35 minutes later. With the UK being one hour behind France, we would arrive in Dover about 2:45 PM local time which would hopefully give us enough time to get to our daughter’s engagement party before it ended at 6:30 PM.

The train was late, and we finally arrived in Dover at about after 3:30 PM making our way to Loughton, Essex, arriving at the engagement party about 5:30 PM, and were fortunate to at least having been able to spend about an hour meeting our future son-in-law, his parents and family, and all of the other guests.

The next day, I returned the rental car to a local Hertz office and began calling American Airlines to check up on our luggage which we assumed was still in Brussels since we were told that Heathrow was still closed. Getting through to American Airlines on Monday was impossible and Tuesday was not better. We called our daughter back in Los Angeles who contacted American Airlines in Dallas and put us on a conference call with the delayed baggage department personnel. We filed our delayed/missing baggage report and were told that we would receive a call (to our local London number) once the bags were found. We were also told that the airlines would reimburse my wife and me up to $300 US for both to buy replacement toiletries and clothing.

My wife and I did go shopping for basic toiletries and clothing but ended up borrowing clothes and cold weather gear from our soon to be in-laws. We were hoping that our bags would arrive and the need to purchase much of what we were missing would not be necessary.

We continued to check the AA website for updates and tried calling a few times, but nothing changed. Then, on Thursday, December 23rd, we talked to an AA agent who told us that one of our bags (the smallest one) was found and that we could arrange for delivery as soon as we filled out the customs forms and sent them in. The forms were emailed to us, filled out and returned that evening. We received confirmation that the custom forms were received and that the bag was scheduled for delivery hopefully within two days due to the backup. The bag never arrived, nor did we hear any news from American Airlines for the remainder of our stay in London.

Our scheduled departure from London to Los Angeles was on Sunday, December 26th at 11:10 AM. My wife and I arrived at Heathrow at about 8:00 AM with the intent of going to AA baggage and trying to find any of our luggage. We were escorted to the pen where all of the missing/ delayed bags were being stored and, with the assistance of the AA personnel there, searched all of the bags without finding our luggage. When we asked about the one bag that American had told us was found and was to be delivered to our London location, no one could tell us what happened to that bag despite someone from the baggage department having physically seen and touched that bag several days earlier.

Three weeks after arriving back home in Los Angeles, our luggage was finally delivered although my wife’s new Ugg boots were missing and presumably stolen from her bag.

Roger Fallihee — T-Boy writer:

Rocket Salad in London

After a wonderful and exhausting day of London sightseeing, that culminated with a stunning viewing of Lichtenstein: A Retrospective, at the Tate Modern, Dot and I ducked into an inviting Italian Bistro for a pre-theatre dinner. Little did we know that our decision to share a Rocket Salad would wipe out our itinerary for the next forty-eight hours.

At around 1:00 am I woke up with the unmistakable feeling of impending gastronomic doom, the kind that lets you know that you had better be in a bathroom within ten seconds or else. I will exclude all the unnecessary details here except to say that the attack was both frightening and ferocious.

I climbed back into bed and my loving and sympathetic wife and I retraced our meals of the day, hoping that our sleuthing would produce an obvious culinary culprit. The Rocket Salad was the only food that we shared. Dot suddenly leaped out of bed and bolted toward the bathroom door. Mystery solved.

For the next several hours our hotel room took on the look and feel of a traditional English farce, with us crossing paths in and out of the bathroom, desperately hoping that one of us would be finished before the other needed the room. I started to worry that our inability to sip even a tiny amount of water could force us into an ER and IVs, courtesy, of course, of the National Health Service.

Around 9:00 am I decided to make my way down to the dining room before they ended the breakfast food service to get some toast or rolls or fruit or anything that might be able to be successfully consumed. I made it half-way to the elevator when nature forced me to head back to our room… quickly.

I reached out to the front desk at the Park City Grand Plaza Hotel in Kensington and as I explained our predicament to Ashley she said, “Can I pop up to your room?” A few minutes later Ashley arrived with a notepad. “Let’s make a list and I’ll run to the market.”  We asked for ginger ale, Premium Saltines, oranges and anything else that she thought might be appealing. Ashley came back an hour later with two bags of snacks, beverages, candles and matches (thoughtful and welcome) and a few magazines.

Throughout that day and the next, Ashley and her coworkers called regularly to check on us. They made additional trips to the market and offered to take either of us to the ER if needed. By the following morning we were feeling mostly human again, but not completely out of the woods, so we decided to hunker down for another day.

The next morning, we woke up and it was as if nothing had ever happened. We felt great. We took the tube over to the Churchill War Rooms for a fascinating tour of the tiny rooms that PM Churchill, General Eisenhower and others used to plot the demise of Adolph Hitler.

As we wandered the streets near the Parliament we realized that we were actually hungry. I asked Dot what she was in the mood for. She dryly replied, “Mmmm, how about a nice Rocket Salad for two?”

T.E.  Mattox — T-Boy writer:

I’m not going anywhere near those places!

Although, I did buy a Swiss watch in Zürich.

The post Travel Nightmares: Travel Lessons Learned appeared first on Traveling Archive.

Curated by Ed Boitano

Richard Carroll — T-Boy writer:

The Grand Canyon

I very much have the yearning to hike the Grand Canyon again to enjoy the rocky switch-back trail that leads to the bottom of this incredible national park where the Colorado River is cutting an ageless path leaving in its wake a lasting mark. The fast-moving river was a convenient but treacherous highway for American trappers, mountain men, explorers, Native Americans, and later fun-loving rafting aficionados. The problematic river with tales to share includes the heart-break and disillusionment of the unknown when explorers with overloaded boats had no idea of the advancing challenges.

Throughout my visit I would spend time to fully appreciate the million years of geological history embedded in the towering walls, to understand that the Pueblo people and other Native America tribes have existed in the Canyon when the United States was just a jagged blob on European maps, and that some Native America’s to this day believe the Grand Canyon is a holy site. I would encompass a few leisurely days in the park with notebook and pin in order to fully appreciate the lingering sunsets, the merging colors, and irregular shadows that quickly transpose the massive landscape from a deep red to pastels. I recall the flickering and fading light touching on fantastic shapes, setting the mind’s eye to run wild. The Grand Canyon is both a scenic and historic jewel and on my next encounter I hope to be firmly enlightened.

Ed Boitano — T-Boy editor:

Twin Cities: Minneapolis and Saint Paul

A quick study revealed that the distinct urban cultures of Minnesota’s Twin Cities: Saint Paul and Minneapolis, sit apart by a mere seven-mile-long football pass – that is if the pass was thrown by Minnesota Vikings’ quarterback Fran Tarkenton. Built around the confluence of the Mississippi  and Minnesota rivers, St. Paul is considered the last city of the East, Minneapolis the first city of the West. Saint Paul is renowned for quaint neighborhoods of well-preserved late-Victorian architecture, while the more populated Minneapolis is considered a modern city with a relatively young downtown and trendy uptown. Saint Paul is also the state capital and the birthplace of writer F. Scott Fitzgerald. His family home, described as a simple brownstone row house, is where he wrote his first published novel, This Side of Paradise, to prove that he would able to support the wealthy Alabama southern belle Zelda Sayre who would eventually become his bride.

Despite the blistering months of cold and snow, a car journey to Duluth would be in order to see the birth home of Robert Zimmerman (Bob Dylan, 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature). This would be followed by trip north and longer stay at Hibbing, where Dylan (Zimmy to friends), lived during his informative years from ages six to eighteen. Hibbing is famous for its Dylan heritage sites, which includes his family’s modest home, and also the site of the world’s largest iron ore mine. Why winter? For an ice fishing experience. After all, isn’t this the state of 1,000 lakes (actually 14,444 lakes). Imagine fishing in an ice hole in the comfort of a warm fishing shack, compete with a little stove, chairs, food and drink, and with Dylan songs on my phone and Fitzgerald’s This Side of Paradise in my hand. I guess a fishing pole would be in my other.

Ringo Boitano — T-Boy writer:

Oklahoma City

Often times in the past I would join press trips to places I’d never been or would probably never visit when it was on my own dime. This was true with my experience in Tulsa, Oklahoma and the Cherokee Nation. I had an ignorant west coast conception that the entire state was one big dust bowl, based on Steinbeck’s novel, The Grapes of Wrath and John Ford’s film adaptation. I was proven wrong; the Tulsa area was fresh, green and vibrant, and I learned much at the very progressive Cherokee nation. On my flight to Seattle, I thought of an old NPR broadcast at the time of the Oklahoma City terrorist bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building on April 19, 1995. Carried out by Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, the bombing killed 168 innocent people and injured more than 680 others. The broadcaster spoke of the emotional texture of its people; it went something like this: Very little happens in Oklahoma City that evokes national coverage from the press. The people are used to this lack of attention, but at time of the bombing its citizens displayed resilience, strength and empathy to one another.

Phil Marley — Poet:

Road Trip: Philadelphia to Pittsburgh

James Carville famously described Pennsylvania politically as Philadelphia in the East, Pittsburgh in the West, and Alabama in the middle. But why Alabama? Apparently, it’s due to this part of Pennsylvania’s mountainous central area is known as the Appalachian region where its local people and culture are politically more of the conservative kind than the urbanized East and West. The Appalachian region will be part of the landscape I plan on passing as I depart Philadelphia in my rental to Pittsburgh, the ancestral home of my friend, David. No doubt a stop in Pennsylvania Dutch Country (from German Deutsch), famous for its productive green farmlands, thanks to the Amish and the Mennonites, will be in order. I’ll have only half a day for Gettysburg National Military Park; for Steel Town is my goal of and I had planned on seeing as much of it as I could in two-days.  David has gushed about his city of 446 bridges, more than Venice, Italy, and its three rivers: the Allegheny River and Monongahela River united at Point State Park to form the Ohio River.

I’ve read that Pittsburgh’s ethnic enclaves are slowly disappearing since David’s departure, but still exist with the Germans of Millvale, Italians of New Castle, Slovaks of Munhall, Hungarians of Hazelwood and Ukrainians of the South Side. Plus, there’s hills galore to climb with magnificent views of the city to see.

During a much earlier trip to what would be become Pittsburg’s Point State Park, Lieutenant George Washington of the Virginia militia,  negotiated with the French during the French and Indian War of 1753.  He wrote about Point State Park in his journal.

As I got down before the Canoe, I spent some Time in viewing the Rivers, and the Land in the Fork; which I think extremely well situated for a Fort, as it has the absolute Command of both Rivers. The Land at the Point is 20 or 25 Feet above the common Surface of the Water; and a considerable Bottom of flat, well-timbered Land all around it, very convenient for Building: The Rivers are each a Quarter of a Mile, or more, across, and run here very near at right Angles: Aligany bearing N. E. and Monongahela S. E. The former of these two is a very rapid and swift running Water; the other deep and still, without any perceptible fall.”

Four different forts were built at the forks of the Ohio within a period of five years. In 1754, French forces captured an outpost known as Fort Prince George at the Point that had been erected by a force of Virginians. George Washington led British forces to recapture the fort, but suffered his first and only surrender at Fort Necessity, 50 miles to the south.

Deb Roskamp — T-Boy photographer and writer:

I have friends who vacation once a year to Sanibel Island, located along the Gulf of Mexico, just a short drive from Fort Myers, Florida. Their enchanting description of its sunsets, lighthouse and beaches harkens to  emotional thoughts of calm, peace and rejuvenation. They spoke of the island’s most popular activity known as shelling; Sanibel Island has the 3rd richest seashell beaches on earth. Apparently, you barely can walk a step on the beach without indulging in the so-called “Sanibel Stoop” in search of its shells. Research informed me that the most secluded beach on the island is Bowman’s Beach; there are no hotels in sight and the beach has a “pristine and quiet” atmosphere.

James Boitano — T-Boy writer:

Isle Royale

• Hawaii Volcanos
• Lassen Volcanic
• Gates of the Arctic

US Cities: Just picking 4 random larger cities I have not been to. No particular draw specifically: just that I have not been to them.

• Kansas City, MO & KS
• Wichita, KS
• Little Rock, AR
• El Paso, TX

US towns/Villages

• Barrow, AK (most northern)
• Pago Pago, American Samoa (most southern)
• Derby Line, VT (town divided into two by Canadian border)

Sites

• National Civil Rights Museum, Memphis, TN (where Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated)
• Appomattox Courthouse, VA (where Civil War Ended)
• Meteor Crater, AZ

Skip Kaltenheuser — T-Boy writer:

A Bucket List is any trip, anytime, anywhere.

The term “Bucket List” gives me the willies. I’m not ready to strike a bargain, have it fulfilled and shuffle off, none of that “To see Paris and die” stuff, I just want to go on seeing, the list eternal. And I can think of a worse afterlife, the Flying Dutchman finally allowed make any port of call he desires.

But I’ve plenty of domestic locales high up on my wish list for the here and now. Many of them are national or state parks and the environs around them. Some are repeats from when I was young, including places my parents took me that left indelible memories – of places, of them, of my awe. Living in a suburb of Kansas City, we usually headed West in my traveling salesman dad’s Buick of the moment. Car and man joined together as a driving cyborg, or a genie with a bit of flying carpet, gifting an endless flow of national parks and roadside attractions, another day another natural wonder, or two or five.

Many of the roads were pre-Interstate, before fascinating arteries like Route 66 withered, when roadside attractions were still legion. Where water flowed uphill and gravity was iffy. Before the Buick was air-conditioned, summer climate figured in, going across Death Valley at night, though the night sky was still something to gawk at. Kansas could get pretty hot and steamy, so soaking up the cool of the mountains counted. I think we tended to favor the West because we were lucky to have a couple horses we kept in a rented pasture that kept moving outward with the suburban sprawl, and though cowboy was a stretch the image was still internalized, polished up with a Boy Scout’s interest in all things outdoors. Plus, as driving was a parental pleasure, wide-open spaces with sudden, map-inspired detours were magnetic. The serendipity of what looked enticing on a map. No cell phones then, thank God. I still use a map.

Revisiting Jackson Hole with a then-small boy, his first downhill ski, and a dog sled in the Tetons, I realized how many repeaters I’d like to share. That was a lovely continuum stretching from my own childhood visit. Though my kids are now young adults, I’d like to share more of those memories with them, to watch them form their own impressions as they react to the beauty and the menace of places like the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone. To watch them explore the Rockies, where I once camped on a mountain ridge for a summer, working down below in Estes Park. When I was young Colorado alternated with the Ozarks as the family default, the excitement of topographical relief coming into view after the hundred mile-an-hour car ride across the Kansas flat. And I’d like to re-experience some of the skiing in the Rockies, the high ground views whispering “Are you sure?”, before my knees go on strike over bad working conditions. Is 69 really rounding the bend, just shy of April Fools? Other things now compete for my kids’ time, so any window of travel opportunity with them is gold.

My family didn’t exclusively drive West. Other child memories I’d like to refresh and share include the Everglades, and the underwater views of the coral reefs along the Florida Keys. These destinations seemed exotic to a boy from Kansas. Because they were exotic. Driving east one Spring, we took in “the educational” in a DC adorned with blossoms, leaving impressions that might have later helped draw me to the city where my family resides.

Beyond the grand repeaters, framed this time with a whiz-bang camera, locales I wish for include sites that will be new to me. Yosemite waits in my imagination with Ansel Adams. California’s skyscraper redwoods, with my hopes that climate-induced fires won’t imperil them. I’d like Death Valley to be well-bathed in rain so I can see a big Spring flower desert bloom. Hiking and biking through some of the canyons in Utah that look so surreal. I’m not a snob for elevation, I’d like to see how the Kansas Tall Grass Prairie has grown, and visit deserts like the Sonoran.

As I write this, I realize my parents also had bucket lists, with me lucky to help fulfill parts. After Dad died Mom lived with us in DC until she passed away at 101 1/2. Nothing excited her more than getting in the car for any trip, anytime, anywhere.

During the microbe onslaught, everything got relative fast. Over the last year, when they could cobble time for a break, I took my kids on local road trip explorations, appreciating the poor man’s Rivieras in state parks and coastal areas, the valleys by the Blue Ridge, a scenic winery, etc… Anything for relief from online study rigors and pandemic isolation, to break up the scenery as best one can do in two or three days or even just a day trip. I just took my son to Solomon’s Island, MD, catching roadside attractions along the way like the northernmost cyprus swamp, (who knew?).

One is never stuck for a place to go as long as the wish list is any trip, anytime, anywhere.

Arthur Lim — IT Professional: 

Colorado Springs, Colorado

Following the arrival of railroads beginning in 1871, Colorado Springs’ location at the base of Pikes Peak and the Rocky Mountain made it a popular tourism destination. The Summer of 1975 was when I visited Colorado Springs, but that was a while back and am primed for a revisit.  Aside from the many mountainous streams, two places of interest stood up in my mind: the Glen Eyrie Castle, and the United States Air Force Academy. Glen Eyrie Castle is a Tudor styled castle built by General William Jackson Palmer in 1871. He founded Colorado Springs. The United States Air Force Academy is nearby. It houses a beautiful interdenominational chapel and has an overall futuristic feel.

Roy Endersby — Philosopher:

The Mississippi Delta: Birthplace of the Blues and Vicksburg National Military Park

In a New Orleans rental car I traveled through Louisiana’s Cajun Country for lunch in Houma at Abear’s Café; a Cajun and Creole mom & pop café, famous for their specialty: alligator piquant and potato salad. The café’s founder, owner, chef and Houma native,  Albert “Curly” L. Hebert ( (1933- 2017) politely shuffled around us, expressing concern that the dish might seem rather funny to us Yankees, before proudly proclaiming that the very dish won an award at a county fair. The next two nights it was Lafayette (pronounced ‘Laugh-yet’) for a little Cajun and zydeco flavor, and then Breaux Bridge; the crawfish capital of the world.

My time was limited in Mississippi, so my final destination was a night in Natchez, home to one of the largest  collection of Antebellum (“pre-Civil War”) mansions, with many open for tours. The next morning, I decided to forego the tours and simply bask in the enchanting ambiance of a Natchez park, hanging high on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi River. I had a long and taxing day ahead of me; driving to New Orleans for a flight back to L.A. would be tiresome. I measured the distance on my map, and noticed I was close to both the Mississippi Delta and Vicksburg National Military Park. With more time allowed, I would have adored a ride further up the Natchez Trace Parkway  to the Vicksburg National Military Park. And then, further out, Highway 61 would take me to the holy grounds of the Mississippi Delta. Once home to Muddy Waters (McKinley Morganfield), and singer-songwriter and guitarist, Robert Johnson, considered since the 1960s as a maestro of Delta blues and an important influence on many rock musicians. Yes, they are gone today, but their spirit and music lives on.

The Mississippi Delta

About an hour south down Highway 61, you’ll find Clarksdale, Mississippi — better known as the Blues Crossroads. Legend has it that’s where Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil. Visit the Hopson Plantation and spend the night at the ShackUp Inn. The evenings are filled with blues at Ground Zero, Red’s or the Juke Joint Chapel. An amazing cultural and musical emersion you’ll want to experience again and again. Robert Nighthawk, Sunnyland Slim, James Cotton, Chester Burnett (Howlin’ Wolf) Bukka White, Sonny Boy Williamson II, Big Bill Broonzy, Carey Bell, Tommy Johnson, John Lee Hooker, Charley Patton, Son House… some made their names in Chicago, some made their names in the South, but all were born in Mississippi.

— T.E. Mattox, Traveling Boy’s Blues Aficionado

Birthplace of the Blues

Courtesy Visit the Delta

The Delta blues is one of the earliest styles of blues music. It originated in the Mississippi Delta, a region of the United States that stretches from north to south between Memphis, Tennessee, and Vicksburg, Mississippi, and from east to west between the Yazoo River and the Mississippi River. The Mississippi Delta is historically famous for its fertile soil and the poverty of its farm workers. More famous blues musicians have come from this area than any other region (or state for that matter) combined. Today, you can still feel that authentic vibe of Mississippi Delta blues history.

Vicksburg National Military Park (U.S. National Park Service)

Courtesy Vicksburg National Military Park

Gibraltar of the Confederacy

Confederate President Jefferson Davis remarked, “Vicksburg is the nail-head that holds the South’s two halves together.” At the start of the Civil War, Confederates controlled the Mississippi River south of Cairo, Illinois all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. With its valuable commercial port and railroad hub, the city was of tremendous importance. From points west of the Mississippi River, men, food, salt, and weapons, funneled through Mexico, made their way to Vicksburg and Confederate armies in the West.

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