Speaking of Photos -- My Three Favorites

Over the past several years, Katy and I have had the great opportunity to travel to a number of places. We are fortunate to have the time to do that. Here are my three favorite pictures:

This one is the Taktsiang Monastary in Bhutan. It is located at 10,000 feet, about 3,000 feet above the valley floor outside Paro. Taktsiang means "Tiger's Lair" -- so named because the story is that the Guru took the form of a tiger, bounded up the side of the valley and founded the monastery.

We climbed up to the monastery with our friends Jan and Sandra. It was a moderately difficult climb with a couple of steep precipices (obviously). Along the way we were passed, going and coming, by a number of Buddhist monks, running barefoot on the path. Make you feel inadequate!

This one is, I swear, not a photo shop image. Katy took it from the waterfront on the coast of Zanzibar. It is actually a sunset, not a sunrise photo, even though Zanzibar is off the east coast of Tanzania. We are looking back west, towards the African coast.

The ship is known as a dhow. The rigging is traditional for the area and was the key to the great commercial success of the region in Medieval times, since it let the ships sail to windward and make a passage all the way to
the Persian Gulf. As a result Zanzibar was a key trading stop for spices, silks and, of course, slaves. Zanzibar itself is a classic multicultural melting pot of African, Indian, Arab, Portuguese and British influences. WeI particularly love the small man in the kayak to the left, that gives you a great sense of perspective.

Finally, there is this one. Again, I swear this is how it looks in real life! We took it at Petit St. Vincent, a small private island in the Caribbean.

PSV has only 22 cottages on it. The cottages are each isolated so that you really get a feeling of being alone. There are no phones in the cottages, so if you want service, you just raise a little flag. And if you want to be totally left alone, you can raise a red flag and nobody will disturb you.

Each morning we get some coffee delivered to the cottage and then go for a walk. After room-delivered breakfast the tough choice is whether to go sit by the beach or sit on the deck of your cottage. Later in the day, there's a nap and tea -- a real tough life.

This palm tree leans out over the clear blue waters beside one of the beach palapas -- thatch covered huts that give you shade but are open on each side to the sea breeze. We like to take our lunch under the palapas with this view in mind.

So there you have it -- probably the 3 best photos we've ever taken on travel. Thought I'd share them with you.