Travel Adventures

06/27/2023

Good times in great places with friendly folks on a beautiful island!

71 new items added to shared album

04/01/2023

187 new items · Album by Brad Carss

03/31/2023

https://photos.app.goo.gl/E7g7wcXHdBaye26j8

187 new items · Album by Brad Carss

08/04/2022

Grandson Tripp and I spent 10 days in Galapagos exploring the unique and amazing wildlife on this isolated archipelago focusing on the Giant Tortoises and the Marine Life.
https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipNm8UuYB1f84dOFfRKmKWBTxtF4bO8bj_luv0_TRasn3tw-QXwM_ix6Upc7lD530Q

01/25/2020

Had a very engaging trip to Australia and Papua New Guinea meeting Aussies and Papuans as we visited the remote Islands of PNG.

131 new photos added to shared album

08/29/2019

Our visit to Riviera Maya

124 new photos · Album by Brad Carss

11/07/2018

My month in Nepal was exhausting and exhilarating from Kathmandu to 13,550 feet in the Himalaya!

https://www.facebook.com/1638071907/posts/10211377366863389/

11/06/2018

I had a month long Adventure in Nepal with the first two weeks spent in an Overland Tour of the country visiting a number of small venues and a National Park. The second two weeks were spent trekking to Annapurna Base Camp at 13,550 feet! Quite an exhausting and rewarding Adventure!

09/09/2018

We had a wonderful time visiting four different beaches around the small, friendly, easy-transport island of Rarotonga. Beautiful clear water and welcoming island ambiance just 9 hours away from LA!

183 new photos added to shared album

07/23/2018

My trip to Belize with Grandson Alec

216 new photos · Album by Brad Carss

05/09/2018

La Habana Reflections

Three observations hit me about our time in Cuba: Cult, Cars and Commercialization. I was completely taken by surprise that there was no Cult of Castro with flags and poster of Our Glorious Leader Fidel plastered all over the buildings and T-shirts. Only a few hole-in-the-wall shops had a few tourist T-shirt with images of Che and Fidel. All of the statues scattered around in the many small parks and plazas were of historical and much less well known figures of Latin America. Given the association propagated by the US Government between the rebel Fidel and the Revolutionary take over of the Baptista regime I was fully expecting the display of cultish reverence by a self-involved one-man regime on display everywhere. Perhaps this was true during his personal rule but now there is no sign of it. Or perhaps Fidel wasn’t the egomaniac we have been led to despise!?

The antique cars of American make from the 40s and 50s were surely on display but not quite like I envisioned it. It became very obvious that other countries were eager to fill the vacuum left by the American embargo and consequently there were many new cars from around the world whizzing by. The old Chevys and Fords and Plymouths and Studebakers were mostly on display for ogling or used as tourist taxis. We did happen by a few old jalopies parked along the back streets being repaired or just parked after everyday use but they were decidedly in the minority. So this anticipated experience was very different from what I expected with its blend of Car Cult and incipient Commercialism.

And, lastly, I was disappointed but then again not, by the to-be-expected lack of broad based commercialism in this struggling communist country attempting to emerge from the ruins of the USSR and the grip of the Castro brothers. I always like to stroll the streets of new cities at night and find interesting images of lamplight casting on streets and walls and objects to capture the lure of darkness as It descends on the city. But in many instances, this seeking out of random light reflections does require some manor of design for safety, advertisement, ornamentation or other inspiration which I found, again, to my disappointment and then not, in that I didn’t get many alluring pictures but I did feel closer to the people who were obviously not besotted with the capitalistic notions of bright lights attracting every last tourist to extract the last possible dollar from their pockets!

So Cuba was a place not like what the US Government would like us to think but a vital Independent country dedicated to slowly finding its way to prosperity in its own unique fashion. (One man stopped us on the street to tell us how much he loved America and how when the time was right WE, the Americans, would be the Heros to Cuba!).

148 new photos added to shared album

05/26/2017

https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipNaxvX939gyGjy5xnlagO5PrRlCcYyyPdPeisHCCh28xfuXvqZhfDly8dtflTbLSg?key=N0tWd3VBc0R2WnBZdlF4bnRXNlM0em9DVHFSbF9R

99 new photos · Album by Brad Carss