Category: Travel (Page 10 of 14)

Partying In St. Lucia With The Big Bamboo

March 14, 2010 / Katie L. Carroll

While in St. Lucia, the hubby and I did the Soufriere By Land and Sea adventure through Sunlink Tours. We traveled down the east side of St. Lucia by open jeep from Castries to Soufriere and back north by party catamaran. Al was our fearless driver and Thomas was our funny and knowledgeable guide (see below about bamboo for a taste of his trivia).

Here’s our jeep. Al is all the way to right (and yup, that’s the elusive hubby on the left). I’m very sad to note that I never did get a picture of Thomas. He was so busy making sure all of us tourists were taken care of that the only time he really sat down was when we were riding in the jeep.

The highlights included:

Getting pummeled by a waterfall, which was quite refreshing (yes, be kind…that’s me in a bathing suit!)

Driving into a volcano, complete with sulphur springs that smell like–you guessed it–rotten eggs

Being entertained by the Captain (that’s him jamming behind the wheel) as he sang along with Bob Marley and “Big Bamboo.”

Every time I hear the word bamboo, it just brings me right back to St. Lucia. Did you know that bamboo was the national tree of St. Lucia? That is until they found out bamboo isn’t a tree at all. Now bamboo is the national plant of the island and calabash is the national tree. All the Americans on the tour agreed that our country would have changed the status of the bamboo to a tree just to avoid having to admit being wrong!

Remembering One Paradise While Headed to Another

February 27, 2010 / Katie L. Carroll

Time to make you all a little jealous: the hubby and I are off to St. Lucia tomorrow morning. We’re staying at Rendezvous, an all-inclusive with a swim-up bar and everything.

In honor of getting out of snowy New England, here’s some pictures from the last time I took an island vacation, which was to the incomparable French Polynesia.

A Tour Through the Largest Shopping Mall on the East Coast

October 19, 2009 / Katie L. Carroll

I recently attended the Eastern PA SCBWI Fall Philly Conference. My hotel room was in King of Prussia, PA right next to largest shopping mall on the East Coast. This mall is so big that it has been separated into two different buildings, each of which is the size of a regular mall. The inside of the mall is gorgeous (way more posh and much cleaner than the mall near my house…sorry I forgot my camera, so there’s no pics), and I even saw a mall cop on a segway. No worries…he was wearing a helmet!

Now I’m not a big shopper, but I wanted to check out the bookstore, which was (of course) as far as it could possibly be from where I entered. I walked all the way through the first building (and I accidentally took the long way), into the second building, and all the way to the far end of the second building. Phew! I like to think I’m in pretty good shape, but I was tired after all that walking.

So on my long walk I passed by a Teavana, which is now where I get all my tea (Black Dragon Pearl tea not only has a really cool name, but it also tastes awesome). I texted my husband about seeing a Teavana (they only have two locations in CT…and none of them are that close to my house…boo). Then texted him about seeing a Pottery Barn because we just bought couches from there and the closest Pottery Barn to our house is about 30 minutes away. (Can you tell from all that texting that I was a bit lonely–maybe a little bored too–all by myself in that big mall?)

As I walked more and more, I jokingly texted the hubby that there were so many stores in the mall that there was probably at least one of every possible store. A little while later, I spotted the Teavana on the floor below me. I though Oh no! How did I walk around the whole mall and miss the one store I was looking for? Then I realized I was in a totally different building from the first Teavana, and this was a whole other Teavana. Wow! There really is at least one of everything in that mall!

I did finally find the Borders and bought a few books to be signed by authors I would be meeting at the conference the next day (more on that to come).

One last thing before I go…Mary Cole of Andrea Brown Literary Agency is hosting a query contest over at her Kidlit website. Good luck to those who enter!

Rivers of Fire

September 13, 2009 / Katie L. Carroll

WaterFire Providence is an interactive work of art that was designed by Barnaby Evans. It consists of 100 iron braziers that seem to defy physics as they float on three rivers in downtown Providence. The fires are lit at sunset and keep going until after midnight.

(Here’s Waterplace Park in the daytime. You can see the braziers are stacked with wood. On the left is the Courtyard Marriott and on the right is the Westin Hotel. Even more buildings have been put up since this picture was taken a few years ago. This area of Providence has gone through a real growth period over the last ten years.)

The WaterFire experience is really something that can’t be described, but I’ll give it a try. Imagine a communal ritual based around fire—very natural and primal—but in a modern, urban setting. The juxtaposition is part of the beauty. In order to really appreciate the full work of art, the hubby and I walk down the riverside in a slow procession of people, surrounded by the sounds, smells, and sights of city and art. For once, I don’t mind having to take a minute to pause and experience all the moment has to offer. All my senses are engaged.

(Here’s the park at night from a different angle. Providence Place Mall is in the background.)

Sight is obvious. The bright orange flames glow in the braziers, reflecting off the inky waters. Bright ash flits by us. The boats move up and down the river: the pontoons full of people, the romantic gondola designed for two, and the staff boat with the black-clad volunteers that steal up to the braziers like some kind of fire phantoms. Then there’s the city scape: the Bank of America Building (locally known as the Superman Building), which always reminds me of Dana’s apartment building in Ghostbusters; the cars driving by; the mall; the people; the bridges; and all those the city lights. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention the street performers dressed as gargoyles and fortune-tellers.

Smell is pretty obvious too, given that the scent of fire is pretty distinct. These fires smell of pine and cedar. But there’s also the city smells: car exhaust, street vendors, and all those unidentifiable, funky smells that are part of city life.

Sound is prevalent as well. The wood cackles and pops as the flames hit air pockets, and the musical program that is part of the art experience echoes along the walkway (my favorite song this visit is Chopin’s “Nocturne No. 8 in D flat major” performed by Daniel Barenboim). And of course, there’s the sounds of the city: car horns, the shuffle of feet along the walkway, quiet murmurs of the crowd, and the whir of motors of both cars and boats.

Touch is more subtle. The fires send a wave of warmth across my skin. A light breeze blows my hair around my face. The stone walkway is cool and uneven beneath my sandals.

Taste is the most elusive sense. On this trip, I have the delicious memory of the previous night’s dinner. The hubby and I went to Constantino’s on Federal Hill. We started with carpaccio (which neither of us had ever eaten) and some Riesling. Then I had gnocchi and the hubby had chicken parmigiana. Both were awesome! For dessert, I had a cannoli platter…of course! But none of that really has anything to do with the WaterFires. Sure, there’s a bunch of restaurants along the rivers, but I want a better connection between taste and fire. Well, the program informs me that Indian Buddhists believe the element water is associated with taste (fire is sight, earth is smell, and air is touch).

Even with having to stretch a little for taste, it was still a lovely evening.

Answering the Tough Questions from Kids

August 17, 2009 / Katie L. Carroll

I spent last week relaxing in Vermont; not exactly a jet-setting type of vacation, but one that was much needed. The room in which my husband and I stayed had a bird’s nest on the outside sill. It had three little blue eggs (most likely robin eggs) in it.

(This was taken through the window…hence the weird glare)

When the kids (my 10-year-old nephew, 4-year-old niece, and 3-year-old nephew) arrived in Vermont, they all had to see the eggs. The novelty soon wore off for the boys, but my niece was a little obsessed with them. Every time she came downstairs, she just had to see the eggs. Then she started asking all these questions about the eggs.

Now, my niece is very curious (as most 4-year-olds are), but trying to answer some of her questions has gotten me into trouble before. Recently, I was wearing my dragon-claw necklace, and my niece wanted to know all about it. She loves when I make up stories, so I told her one about how I defeated a dragon and took his claw as a souvenir of my triumph. It sounds a bit gory, but I kept it pretty tame.

At some point during the story, my niece wanted to know what color the dragon was—I think I said it was blue because that’s what color the stone in the necklace is—because clearly that’s a very important detail when you’re fighting a dragon. Then she asked why the claw wasn’t blue anymore, and I said I had to dip it in metal to preserve it. “What’s preserve?” she asked.

Somehow my explanation led to how living things—including people—decompose when they die, which I told her means they turn to dirt (I guess they really turn to dust, but dirt was easier for her to understand). She looked at me with big eyes and said, “I don’t want to turn into dirt.” I told her she didn’t have to worry about that because she wasn’t going to die for a very long time and hoped she would forget about it.

Well, she didn’t. My niece now periodically asks her mother about when she or Grandma or whoever is going to die and turn into dirt. Mostly she thinks about this right before she goes to bed. My sister is so very pleased with me!

Anyway, back to Vermont. My niece asked, “When are the birds going to hatch?” I don’t really believe in lying to kids (and my sister is pretty straight-forward with them), but I didn’t want to repeat the turning-to-dirt episode, so I told her eggs usually only hatch in the spring and since it’s already summer, these probably won’t hatch.

She was okay with that for a little while, but not for long. “Why aren’t they going to hatch?” Luckily, my sister and my mom were there to answer these questions, and I was off the hook. My mom said that without a mommy bird to keep the eggs warm, the babies inside can’t hatch. “Where’s the mommy bird?” My mom explained that maybe the mommy bird had to leave the babies. “Why would the mommy bird leave?” Well, no one really had a good explanation for that. We said that maybe the mommy bird was hurt, or even died, because some times that happens in nature, but none of our answers were really good enough.

I realized while we could give her scientific answers to her questions, they weren’t really the answers she was looking for. And really, don’t we all still have those questions? Why would a mother abandon her unborn offspring? Why do animals have to die? Where do they go when they die? Why do bad things happen to innocent beings?

I’m not sure what’s harder: telling my niece that these bad things happen or not being able to really explain to her why these things happen because I don’t know the answer myself.