Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts

Friday, August 27, 2010

Rediscovering Simplicity: The Cyclists of Italy (a photo diary)

by citisven

Whenever I travel to different countries and cities, one of the things I'm interested in is how locals move around in their daily lives. Call me a transportation glutton, but I'm a sucker for trains, boats, rickshaws, trams, buses, gondolas, back alleys, and sidewalks.

Then, of course, there's the most sublime transit invention of them all: the bicycle. It's so simple — even a non-techie like myself understands how it works — and yet so deliciously useful, relieving traffic, getting you anywhere quickly, reducing CO2, keeping you in shape, letting you see a place and interact with its people.    

One thing I noticed on my trip to Italy a few months ago was how much bikes were part of everyday life. With David Byrne's Bicycle Diaries as my companion I strolled through the streets of cities and towns, trying to capture the mundane beauty of cycling.

Italy-bikes_03



continued at Daily Kos....

Friday, August 6, 2010

Cinque Terre: an enchanted photo journey

by citisven

This April, after Eyjafjallajökull had thwarted a planned visit of an old friend in Spain and stranded us in my native Germany, my partner Deb and I spontaneously decided to take my dad's car to explore relatively nearby Italy instead. Our first stop on our impromptu tour was Cinque Terre, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and National Park consisting of five villages located along beautifully terraced hillsides on the Ligurian coast.

While it was bound to be a marvelous vacation, I did not expect to be stepping into a model study for ecocities and villages, which, for those of you who know me, inevitably put me in trigger-happy and note-taking research mode...



continued at Daily Kos...

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

Bicycle Diaries

by gmoke

When I read a book, I note anything that strikes me.  Here are my notes from Bicycle Diaries by David Byrne NY:  Viking, 2009 ISBN 978-0-670-02114-7 David Byrne, the musician and artist who was in Talking Heads, has become a bicycle advocate after years of riding all over the world.  He takes a folding bike with him on his journeys and tours and bikes wherever he is.  Byrne also keeps a blog: http://journal.davidbyrne.com/

continued at Daily Kos....