Theme Week Dominican Republic – Higüey

27 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  5 minutes

Basilica-Cathedral of Our Lady of Altagracia © MRDU08/cc-by-sa-3.0

Basilica-Cathedral of Our Lady of Altagracia © MRDU08/cc-by-sa-3.0

Higüey, or in full Salvaleón de Higüey, is the capital city of the eastern La Altagracia Province, in the Dominican Republic, and has 415,084 inhabitants, according to the 2022 census. The Yuma River flows through the urban areas of Higüey.   read more…

Portrait: Ramesses II

27 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: Portrait, UNESCO World Heritage Reading Time:  5 minutes

Great Temple at Abu Simbel © panoramio.com - youssef_alam/cc-by-3.0

Great Temple at Abu Simbel © panoramio.com – youssef_alam/cc-by-3.0

Ramesses II commonly known as Ramesses the Great, was an Egyptian pharaoh. He was the third ruler of the Nineteenth Dynasty. Along with Thutmose III of the Eighteenth Dynasty, he is often regarded as the greatest, most celebrated, and most powerful pharaoh of the New Kingdom, which itself was the most powerful period of ancient Egypt. He is also widely considered one of ancient Egypt’s most successful warrior pharaohs, conducting no fewer than 15 military campaigns, all resulting in victories, excluding the Battle of Kadesh, generally considered a stalemate.   read more…

Theme Week Dominican Republic – Santo Domingo

26 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  7 minutes

Calle Arzobispo Meriño © Mario Roberto Durán Ortiz/cc-by-sa-4.0

Calle Arzobispo Meriño © Mario Roberto Durán Ortiz/cc-by-sa-4.0

Santo Domingo (meaning “Saint Dominic” but verbatim “Holy Sunday”), once known as Santo Domingo de Guzmán, known as Ciudad Trujillo between 1936 and 1961, is the capital and largest city of the Dominican Republic and the largest metropolitan area in the Caribbean by population. As of 2022, the city and immediate surrounding area (the Distrito Nacional) had a population of 1,029,110 while the total population is 3,798,699 when including Greater Santo Domingo (the “metropolitan area“). The city is coterminous with the boundaries of the Distrito Nacional (“D.N.”, “National District”), itself bordered on three sides by Santo Domingo Province.   read more…

Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.

26 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Universities, Colleges, Academies Reading Time:  8 minutes

Georgetown University © Duane Lempke

Georgetown University © Duane Lempke

Georgetown University is a private Jesuit research university in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C., United States. Founded by Bishop John Carroll in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic institution of higher education in the United States and the nation’s first federally chartered university.   read more…

Theme Week Dominican Republic

25 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  9 minutes

Cabeza de Toro beach in Punta Cana © Danu Widjajanto/cc-by-sa-4.0

Cabeza de Toro beach in Punta Cana © Danu Widjajanto/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Dominican Republic is a North American country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles of the Caribbean Sea in the North Atlantic Ocean. It shares a maritime border with Puerto Rico to the east and a land border with Haiti to the west, occupying the eastern five-eighths of Hispaniola which, along with Saint Martin, is one of only two islands in the Caribbean shared by two sovereign states. In the Antilles, the country is the second-largest nation by area after Cuba at 48,671 square kilometers (18,792 sq mi) and second-largest by population after Haiti with approximately 11.4 million people in 2024, of whom 3.6 million reside in the metropolitan area of Santo Domingo, the capital city.   read more…

North Sentinel Island

25 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  5 minutes

North Sentinel Island © NASA Earth Observatory - Jesse Allen

North Sentinel Island © NASA Earth Observatory – Jesse Allen

North Sentinel Island is one of the Andaman Islands, an Indian archipelago in the Bay of Bengal which also includes South Sentinel Island. The island is a protected area of India. It is home to the Sentinelese, an indigenous tribe in voluntary isolation who have defended, often by force, their protected isolation from the outside world. The island is about 8 kilometres (5.0 mi) long and 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) wide, and its area is approximately 60 square kilometres (23 sq mi).   read more…

Skagenröra

24 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon appétit Reading Time:  3 minutes

© Liamking17/cc-by-sa-4.0

© Liamking17/cc-by-sa-4.0

Skagenröra is a mixture of shrimp, mayonnaise and dill, as well as other ingredients that vary according to taste and recipe. Common ingredients, in addition to those mentioned above, are crème fraiche, sour cream and red onion. Common additions are lemon and fennel or sikrom. A common ingredient on the west coast (Sweden) is white fish or surimi in small pieces. It is not uncommon to add this to make the mixture more balanced.   read more…

Bundoran in County Donegal

23 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  8 minutes

Bundoran beach © geograph.org.uk - Rossographer/cc-by-sa-2.0

Bundoran beach © geograph.org.uk – Rossographer/cc-by-sa-2.0

Bundoran (Irish: Bun Dobhráin) is a town in County Donegal, Ireland. The town is located near the N15 road near Ballyshannon, and is the most southerly town in Donegal. The town is a tourist seaside resort, and tourism has been at the heart of the local economy since the 18th century. Bundoran is a surfing destination and was listed by National Geographic magazine in 2012 as one of the world’s top 20 surf towns.   read more…

Citadel of Acre

22 November 2024 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, UNESCO World Heritage, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  6 minutes

© Liorca/cc-by-sa-4.0

© Liorca/cc-by-sa-4.0

The Hospitaller commandery of Saint-Jean-d’Acre is a monumental complex founded by the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, also known as the Knights Hospitallers. It is located in the city of Saint-Jean-d’Acre (now Acre in Israel). In the 13th century, the commandery became the headquarters of the Order until the fall of the city in 1291. The Citadel is part of the UNESCO world heritage site “Old Town of Acre”.   read more…

Return to TopReturn to Top