Paris, France

July 10, 2026

In a world drowning in disunity, it’s comforting to find a sense of order - a consistency of style leavened with variety in detail.

We appreciate trees lining streets like soldiers in formation, shielding pedestrians from summer sun and passing cars. Grand boulevards blending with cobblestone streets and hillside steps. Façades on buildings tastefully tall, that exude symmetry to exalt beauty. Low-slung bridges crossing the Seine, linking quais and quartiers that remain distinct on both banks, adorned with emblems and statuary exalting heroes that glorified France. Dozens of neighborhood churches and museums, any of which would be reason enough to visit most American cities, are almost afterthoughts amid the abundance.

But the greatest monument in Paris is the city itself. There’s no other like it. It’s the suave sister its urban siblings long to be. But reconstructive surgery was required to evoke their envy.

Ramshackle City

At the time of Philippe Auguste in the late twelfth century, Paris was a city of wooden shacks and muddy streets. Its original Roman name, Lutetia, was an apt appellation (“marsh” sounds much better when translated into Latin).

Philippe, appalled by the offal and filth that marred “roads” along the Seine, ordered all paths paved with stone. During his reign Notre-Dame’s façade was finished, and the Louvre was built as a fortress guarding the Seine.

All this helped… but not much. Under Philippe Auguste, Paris became permanent capital of France. But much of the city remained ramshackle. For several centuries, plague, war, and religious turmoil kept it mired in dilapidated chaos.

Even the arrival of the Renaissance focused affluence and art more along the Loire than beside the Seine. While Valois chateaux rose between Blois and Tours, Paris bided its time.

At the turn of the 17th century, the Bourbons began beautifying the city. The Protestant Henri IV decided Paris was worth a Mass, and became Catholic to be crowned king.

During his reign the Pont Neuf and Grande Galerie du Louvre were completed. But his greatest bequest was the Place des Vosges, the former jousting ground that graces the Marais. Tall privacy walls and large wooden doors shield exquisite mansions, museums, and corporate headquarters on the other side.

Venus from a Cesspool

Despite decamping to Versailles, the Sun King continued making improvements to Paris that his grandfather began. The Place Vendôme was his most significant development.

Started by the architect-developer Jules Hardouin Mansart in 1686 as a for-profit townhouse ploy, the project began to wobble. Louis XIV was importuned to rescue it by putting the royal mint and other offices along the site.

At first, Mansart had erected only the building façades… as a Potemkin gimmick to entice buyers. When the scheme failed, they were torn down and the plaza was redesigned in 1699 to the familiar octagon it is today.

The Place des Victoires was a more successful private venture, a 127-foot-diameter circular plaza, also by Mansart, focused on an equestrian statue of the king.

But the main problem persisted. The Royal purse couldn’t sustain both Versailles and the city. So Parisians suffered cramped streets, filthy slums, awful sanitation, and inhuman housing for much of the populace.

But like Venus from a cesspool, beauty occasionally popped its head above the mire. The marvelous dome and complex of Les Invalides rose in 1671 as a soldiers’ hospital and home in a rural quarter on the Left Bank.

Across the river about the same time, Lenôtre laid out the Champs-Élysées. The boulevard became an elaborate entrance to Paris and a formal approach to a Tuileries Palace that rarely saw the Royals.

Touristy and a bit tacky today, when it opened the avenue was essentially a grand, expansive road through the woods. Development around it would mostly wait till after the Revolution.

As trees were depleted in the 17th century, virtually all new buildings were combinations of dressed stone, brick, or stucco. In 1667, the crown attempted to place height restrictions on Parisian houses, limiting them to five stories plus an attic. These caps were loosely enforced and often ignored.

Pebble in a Pond

The beautification (and sanitation) of Paris would wait till after the wreckage of the Revolution, and of a few that followed in the next half century.

The re-design was (literally) the surface achievement of the Second Empire. Emperor Louis Napoleon styled himself a “second Augustus”, envying how the first one made Rome “a city of marble.” With Haussmann as his prefect, he “ripped open the belly of Paris”.

During the operation, the entire abdomen was removed. The patient was in rough shape. For three centuries the population of Paris had exploded, with hordes of unskilled workers drawn from the stingy soil of a harsh countryside to the Medieval maze of Parisian streets.

The Seine had become the city’s main sewer. Streets were a fetid stew of pestilence, trash, and excremental deposits from hundreds of horses and thousands of men. Tenants piled into dilapidated structures that rose up to six stories above the street, with residents’ wealth declining inversely with distance from the ground.

Like a pebble in a pond, the new Paris radiated outward from the Arc de Triomphe. The number of avenues extending from l’Étoile rose from five to twelve.

Their names recall famous Frenchmen and Napoleon’s victories. The two exceptions are the Champs Élysées and the Avenue de la Grande Armée that extend each direction from under the arch.

Haussmann oversaw destruction of about 20,000 buildings lodging more than 100,000 people, particularly along the narrow streets in the center of the city. The outlines of demolished structures and streets remain marked on the Parvis de Notre-Dame, the open plaza in front of the cathedral.

Some argue that the tight Medieval maze made Paris tough for authorities to control, prompting the emperor to open it up to crack down. Perhaps.

But sanitation was terrible, with trash, human waste, and animal excrement ubiquitous, flowing thru streets to streams, and into the septic system known as the Seine.

At mid-century fewer than 5% of the city’s dwellings had running water, none of it clean. It came from wells that fermented fatal diseases. Cholera outbreaks were common, and became more likely as crowding continued. Some alleys retain the camber that once carried sewage down their center.

Haussmann tapped springs from the Champagne region as sources of clean water, and appointed Eugene Belgrand to expand a subterranean sewer system for Paris. He harnessed the hydraulic power of waste and rainwater to propel flow thru his expanding network of underground pipes.

Horizontal Sutures

At the surface, Haussmann’s grand boulevards served as horizontal sutures after reconstructive surgery, with unifying apartment blocks featuring friezes and balconies as horizontal seams.

Adorning these immeubles haussmanniens, a couple stories below the Mansard roofs, transition lines of cast-iron verandas and decorative friezes are civilizing influences, using geometry to accentuate urban order thru architectural unity.

Immeubles can’t be taller than seven stories. The cut-stone façade is their distinctive feature. All floors and windows are set at the same level, giving the buildings an appealing cohesion that helps stitch the urban fabric.

Entrances are often double doors between shops or businesses on the ground level. These establishments usually have high ceilings and a narrow mezzanine corresponding to a second floor.

Parisian buildings exude decorum. Aside from monumental government or religious structures, they don’t strive to awe the bourgeois with bold statements. They’re unified by elegance and understatement, with diversity reserved for storefronts on the ground floor. Other than the occasional flair enlivening the entrance, Parisian edifices tend to be dignified backdrops to activity on the street.

Most of these streets, and particularly the grand boulevards, are also deliberately assembled. Even wide avenues convey the intimate sense of cozy corridors. Most Parisian streets predate the automobile, many by centuries. Some, like the Rue St Denis or roads to Montmartre, were once country lanes leading out of Paris.

But the city has done an admirable job accommodating the car. Parisian boulevards are pieced together in an elegant way, allowing motor traffic, parking, and pedestrians to share the corridor in an amenable manner.

Even the widest roads, which are usually garish and revolting in the United States, are pleasant thoroughfares in the heart of Paris. This is because of conscious coordination among constituent parts.

Small medians typically line each side, hosting series of identical trees formally planted at equal spacing and standard height. These form an emphatic line along the street, making it look less wide than it actually is, while also separating side (local) lanes with parallel parking from the main flow of traffic, and offering shade and a psychological shield to pedestrians.

Streets are very ordered, with disciplined architecture featuring rusticated neoclassicism, with arched doorways and cut stone incised into a uniform array of outer walls. The ensemble is bound by beautiful buildings of appropriate height, with façades fronting the edge of the sidewalk, and often anchored at either end by a terminating vista of an iconic edifice.

Paris reminds us that appealing urban places are contingent on the ability to shape space with public buildings. In its plazas, parks, avenues, alleys, and promenades, Paris does this.

Shops, bars, and bistros line sidewalks and surround plazas, with waitresses, patrons, and pedestrians flowing in and out of adjacent buildings. This scene is common all over Paris.

In this city, as in much of Europe, people congregate because the setting is inherently appealing. Concerts, games, and gimmicks aren’t needed to attract them to town.

Geometry, Proportion, and Scale

The French place greater emphasis on geometry, proportion, and scale than their English-speaking counterparts. They employ these elements to infuse order and unity into public spaces. This is particularly evident in their parks.

With some notable exceptions, such as the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont on the east side of the city, most Parisian parks retain the Baroque formality of Lenôtre. Unlike informal “green spaces” in England and America, Parisian parks respect their purpose to present a peaceful part of a civilized place, not to pretend to be wilderness in the middle of a city.

Urban greenery is necessarily formal. Parisians understand this, and don’t use parks as palettes to replicate the rural. Like Parisian streets, the city’s gardens are layered. Just like the people they were designed to please.

But no place is perfect. Like any of them, Paris makes mistakes. Tomorrow we’ll take a look at some of the few things it’s done wrong.

JD

Verdun, France

July 8, 2026

[NB: Previous installments are linked here, here, and here]

“But here in this graveyard that’s still No Man’s Land
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
To man’s blind indifference to his fellow man,
And a whole generation who were butchered and damned.”

- Eric Bogle, “The Green Fields of France” (1976)

Every village in France has a monument to the dead… morts pour la patrie. About a million and a half French soldiers went to early graves between the Guns of August and the Treaty of Versailles.

This death toll exceeds what America suffered in the War Between the States and both World Wars… combined. Of eight million men France mobilized during the Great War, almost six million became casualties.

Traversing the green fields of northeastern France, the traveler can’t imagine that beneath sunflowers swaying under gentle breezes were pestilential pits resembling waiting rooms in Hell.

The ruts were deep enough to stand, but precluded their captives seeing over the top. Drudgery, disease, lice, fleas, flies, rats, excrement, flooding, and filth were the daily lot for millions of young men who’d barely escaped being boys. Many others never would.

With much of the front below sea level, trench depth assured soldiers’ shoes (assuming they had any) were always in mud. Water oozed from the walls. For more than half the year it fell from the sky.

Excepting seasons when it froze, bailing the seepage was a full-time job. During battle, emptying the trench wasn’t possible.

Even without rain (which was often relentless and torrential), the pits became open sewers that submerged torsos enduring enemy fire.

Along the front, battlefield mud was almost alive, with an insatiable appetite that consumed any man, machine, weapon, or horse that had the misfortune to step or fall into the hungry mire. Accounts relay that whatever did rarely got out.

The typical British, French, and German soldiers weighed less than 150 pounds. The average American may have contained 10-20 more.

But they wore, carried, or bore clothes, packs, and guns that could add another 100 pounds of soaked gear thru mud up to their knees and water over their waist. Trench foot joined shell shock as maladies indelibly linked to the First World War.

Ubiquitous Death

Incoming artillery often arrived in a deluge akin to drops of rain in a summer storm. Some might’ve welcomed the barrage of bullets, to provide eternal release from this abhorrent existence.

When fighting occurred, the troughs became muddy medical units and makeshift morgues. Stacked corpses reinforced sodden walls that otherwise caved at the slightest touch. As they became desensitized to ubiquitous death, soldiers used dead bodies as stepping stones, supporting props, or temporary tables within the trench.

This nightmarish existence persisted for years amid armed conflict at a scale no soldiers had ever endured. Artillery barrages were relentless in persistence and scope, with many shells emitting the yellow pall of poison gas.

The carnage was unfathomable. France suffered almost 300,000 casualties in the two-week massacre known as the Battle of the Marne, including about ten percent of her officers. And this was a French victory… still referred to in France as the “Miracle on the Marne” for how it was “won”.

In the first five months of fighting, France mourned three quarters as many dead as the Britain buried during the entire Second World War. Almost 30,000 Frenchmen fell on the first day of the Battle of the Frontiers.

It got worse. The British army suffered 60,000 casualties (20,000 dead) on the first day along the Somme… a battle that lasted four more months. That single offensive would claim more than a million casualties.

Numb Disbelief

We spent the day in and around the village of Verdun. Few places are as simultaneously solemn, harrowing, lovely, and revolting.

Between the first Battle of the Marne and Ludendorff’s last assault before the Americans arrived, Verdun joined Ypres as the sites of the only German offensives on the Western Front. The focus of fighting was the fortress of Douaumont on the right bank of the Meuse.

Verdun was the longest battle in modern history, and among the deadliest of all time. Vegetation has reconquered what was once a moonscape of mud, masonry, and human remains in which whole companies were buried alive.

Four hundred thousand Frenchmen were killed or wounded at Verdun, of which about 160,000 went under the earth. At Verdun, forty times more lives were lost in the battle than lived in the town.

The tower and crosses of the Douaumont ossuary guard the remains of 130,000 unknown soldiers in shared granite tombs. Down the road, we walked thru tunnels under the fortress French and Germans fought over for most of a year. After the fighting, the only upshot was destroyed towns, scorched terrain, and hundreds of thousands dead.

On the site of Fleury-devant-Douaumont, a village that vanished under the Battle of Verdun, the façade of a memorial chapel is graced by a Madonna. The Chapelle Notre-Dame-de-l’Europe mourns the town that died for France.

For France, the “victory” was “glorious”… yet Pyrrhic. Its devastating losses essentially assured defeat a generation later.

The Western Front carved these peaceful fields like a seismic fault that kept slipping. Within northeast France, the devastation and death were so extensive that they still evoke numb disbelief.

The Second Battle of the Aisne cost France 180,000 casualties. Unsurprisingly, within weeks of that slaughter (and after three years of senseless butchery), men began to mutiny.

They attacked their officers, decoupled engines from trains, and implored entire divisions to refuse to fight. Within a month, the insurrection afflicted half the French army.

General Pétain restored order before the Germans found out. He reassured his forces by letting them wait “for the Americans and the tanks.” U.S. intervention would tip the balance of this war, and press the scale to assure another.

The collapse of Russia relieved German forces in the east. Ludendorff made a final push to crush the Allies before more American doughboys arrived. This “Spring Offensive” claimed another 1.5 million casualties.

Pea Gravel

That summer, the Spanish Flu made its appearance, ultimately claiming more lives than the entire war. Through the infection, the fighting persisted.

German forces came within sixty miles of Paris before being repelled in the Hundred Days Offensive. This final campaign carried the war to its conclusion, with another two million killed, wounded, or unaccounted for by the time the Armistice ended the carnage.

Or did it?

East of the Rhine, communism was ascendant, revolution was in the wind, and ancient animosities erupted among ethnic tribes fighting over the carcasses of fallen empires.

To the West as well, “peace” was a passing illusion… a pause in a gruesome Thirty Years War. But France welcomed the respite to lick its wounds.

The catastrophe cost the country seven percent of its population. As with the British and Italians, more French were killed in the First World War than in the Second.

Even the late-arriving Americans, who (aside from the usual financial interests and munitions makers) had no stake in the outcome of the slaughter, lost men at a faster clip than in the War Between the States.

This afternoon, we paid respects to some of the dead. It’s almost impossible to see each of the thousands of cemeteries bearing bones of soldiers sacrificed in that worthless war.

We chose the French National Cemetery around Douaumont Ossuary, the tower of which depicts an artillery shell. Over 16,000 French soldiers lie here, plus those of a couple thousand Muslim colonists. Within the nearby fort, hundreds of German soldiers are also entombed.

Like pea gravel on a park path, tombstones and crosses pack together across northeastern France. After four years of incessant carnage, ten million men quietly screamed beneath the earth.

But while wreaths on their graves were still green, leaders in countless countries above the ground had already discarded what they had to say.

JD

PS - One of the best songs about this worthless war was written by Eric Bogle, and the Dropkick Murphys gave one of its most poignant performances (which, I grant, is not how Dropkick Murphys performances are usually described):

Reims, France

July 7, 2026

[NB: Previous installments are linked here and here]

Three centuries after Christ, the Roman Empire was coming apart. But fourth century Gaul was among the more materially prosperous, intellectually advanced provinces of the western realm.

The rising Franks had arrived from the east, pressed west by encroaching Huns. They were a hardy race that reveled in being free. That’s (ostensibly) what their name meant. They were enfranchised after liberating themselves by repelling Roman rule.

Though they could be fearsome fighters, they waged war less often than our own enlightened leaders. The Franks also left legislation that preserved relative prosperity and general peace.

These prescriptions were inscribed in the Salic Law. Though wide-ranging, its most consequential code proscribed Salic land being inherited into female hands.

A millennium later, this clause kept English King Edward III from capturing the French crown thru his French mother. That slight launched the Hundred Years’ War.

In the fifth century, a possibly apocryphal Frankish ruler called Merovech spawned a dynasty, and had a grandson who essentially founded France.

Clovis (a Merovingian version of “Louis”, the origin of eighteen French monarchs of that name) was fifteen when he took the throne as the “first” Merovingian, and consolidated his kingdom by grabbing northwestern Gaul. A few years after his death, the Burgundians abandoned Arianism for Catholicism, and succumbed to the Franks.

Clovis’s conquests reached Brittany and the Loire. They also included Clothilde, a Christian woman who became his queen… and converted him to the Faith.

Baptized by St Remi at Reims, Clovis set a precedent for his successors. After 1027, most French kings were crowned in that city’s cathedral.

For some, it took a while, which undermined their legitimacy. During the third phase of the Hundred Years’ War, the English invasion precluded Charles VII from receiving his crown at Reims.

After lifting the siege of Orléans, Joan of Arc led Charles to Reims to legitimize his reign. The tide of war turned, the English were ousted, and Reims retained a soft spot in French hearts. As does its cathedral, which has been our companion and guide since we arrived.

From the window and balcony of our hotel room, it fills the scene and awes the senses. From a distance, it’s a benchmark and compass: its eastern orientation provides direction; the twin towers become looming beacons that bring us home.

Style and Structure

Like the Scholastic summae of the Middle Ages, Gothic architecture synthesizes preceding traditions rather than exclusively adopting or rejecting previous forms. It represented systematic construction, creating overall coherence from individual components.

The cathedral often dominated Medieval cities. In Reims, which is now home to almost 200,000 people, it still does. After visiting it, we can see why.

With counterparts at Amiens and Chartres, Notre Dame de Reims is one of three major Marian cathedrals from the 13th century. The cathedral that preceded the current masterpiece burned down in 1210, when building began on the Gothic gem for which the city is now known.

Twin towers (which originally featured spires) entice the pilgrim as he approaches from the west. The front tympana boast rose windows that let evening light flood the nave. Though these heavenly filters replace sculpture that often adorns space above doors, statuary abounds around the façade.

More statues grace Reims cathedral than any other church in France. Thousands of saints, angels, prophets, demons, bishops, and kings fill archivolts and pediments, surmount columns, and consume space between the towers and beside the doors.

I’ve not seen flying buttresses as systematic and dramatic as they are at Reims. That’s because architectural ingenuity makes them hard to see at all. Their bases are capped with ornate spires that grace engineering with the gift of art, becoming decorative turrets that strengthen the structure.

Gothic vaults push outward against the walls. Flying buttresses redirect that lateral thrust into vertical piers on the exterior. But horizontal thrust combines with the weight of the pier to create a diagonal force. If that force’s vector tilts too far from vertical, it exits the base of the buttress, tempting it to topple outward.

The heavy stone spires atop the piers steepen the force vector, pulling it vertical so it stays within the middle of the buttress’s footprint. Because masonry is excellent in compression but very weak in tension, keeping the thrust-line centered prevents the joints from opening on the outer face.

The pinnacles atop Reims buttresses are unusually tall and elaborate. Many house tabernacles with statues of angels. That extra mass isn’t merely an ornamental flourish.

The added weight permits slimmer, more daring buttresses while still resisting wind loads and the thrust from the high vaults. In a partnership that was once an aspiration of architecture, style and structure perform supplemental functions.

The roof superstructure is a concrete copy of the wooden original destroyed in the First World War. To supply flexibility, oak pegs secure the reinforced concrete beams.

With the new roof being more structurally stable and less susceptible to fire, visitors are allowed to wander under the rafters - a space resembling an overturned hull of a concrete ship. We were proud to learn that American donations made this restoration possible.

A proliferation of immaculate stonework reflects admirable attention to detail. These craftsmen were indifferent to our inability to detect defects from the distant ground. Sculptures are everywhere. Angels, demons, gargoyles, beasts, and anonymous men make an appearance in stone.

Uncredentialed Expertise

Interiors of Medieval cathedrals are typically distinguished by a light choir and darker nave. But Reims offers the opposite effect, primarily because the stained glass windows were removed from the nave yet remain in the choir.

Reims features a three-part elevation of aisle, triforium, and clerestory windows. Verticality defines the nave, with bay pillars topped by intricate capitals.

Looking up, standard four-part vaults support a distant ceiling that recedes toward the sky. The triforium arches are sharply pointed, consistent with those connecting the aisle to the nave. Elaborate capitals enhance the columns, and epitomize the uncredentialed expertise that created these gems.

In most cathedrals, a wall separates the altar from the ambulatory. Reims does too. But the wall is low enough to permit a view thru the candelabra toward the west entrance. It’s astonishing. A pair of stained glass rose windows represent the interior of the tympana over the central doors.

About fifty statues surround the lower rose, including depictions of John the Baptist, Old Testament prophets, and the story of Melchizedek giving bread and wine to Abraham, with the patriarch dressed as a Medieval knight.

The choir windows are original, and the stained glass is a remarkable arrangement reflecting apostolic succession. The apostles grace the upper tiers, with assorted bishops (including the Archbishop of Reims and his subsidiaries) featured below. Reims cathedral itself is also shown, emphasizing its perceived primacy in the annals of France.

Ravages of War

Leaving the church, we glance again at the jamb statues around the central west entrance. Most notable are depictions of Mary and Elizabeth during the Visitation. Their graceful disposition differs from most stiff Medieval sculpture. The facial expressions and garment folds betray familiarity with the ease and flow of Roman forms and Greek art.

The “smiling angel” Gabriel has for six centuries greeted visitors at the west front portal. But he was forced from his post for a dozen years. The statue was decapitated during the First World War. The Germans had taken the town, and converted the cathedral into a hospital.

When the occupiers abandoned the city, the church received their heaviest artillery. Some of it hit the rear of the building, igniting pine scaffolding that was emplaced around the edifice.

Flames consumed Medieval rafters and beams supporting the roof. The heat caused some of the stones to crack, and severed the head from the neck of the smiling angel.

At the time there wasn’t much to smile about. By the end of the Great War, over 90% of Reims was in ruins.

Of a population of 115,000 that heard the guns of August, fewer than 2,000 remained to appreciate the Armistice. Many had hidden in Champagne cellars honeycombed beneath the city.

A sizable post-war sentiment wanted to leave Reims in wreckage as a memorial to the ravages of war (much as Oradour-sur-Glane was embalmed after the next world war). Fortunately, that inclination didn’t last.

Reconstruction commenced, and though the cathedral didn’t re-open till 1935, the smiling angel retrieved his head almost a decade earlier. Around the façade, other saints and angels attest the horror of war with their missing limbs.

What Matters Most

Before the First World War, Reims rivaled Chartres in the glory of its stained glass. Most of it succumbed to German shelling in the first months of fighting. The transparent panes are bandages on war wounds that never healed.

An exception is in the apse behind the altar, a set of 20th century stained glass in intense deep-blue: a deliberate nod to the lapis hue that’s common to Gothic glass.

But the images depicted in the panels… the Tree of Jesse, a mingling of the story of Abraham with the life of Christ, and the coronation of French kings… intentionally reflect modern influence, to remind viewers what was lost.

When we learned these panes were by Marc Chagall, a favorite artist of my wife’s late father, we were consoled that what matters most will always be with us.

JD

Reims, France

July 6, 2026

[NB: The previous installment is linked here]

“When a man say no to Champagne, he say no to life.”

- Julien Grinda in The Deer Hunter

“The magnum is the best format for two people… when one of the parties is not drinking”

- Winston Churchill

Seventeen years after the Nazis surrendered in Reims, its cathedral was selected for a ceremony presided by Charles de Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer, to celebrate reconciliation between France and West Germany.

They picked a city with ample fuel to fill their glasses. The Benedictine monk Dom Pérignon is the reputed creator of the beverage named for this remarkable region. But no one really knows.

Family Business

Another Benedictine, historiographer and theologian Dom Thierry Ruinart, lived amid the aristocracy of Paris in the age of Louis XIV. Among them he witnessed a fascination for “wines with bubbles” from his home region of Reims.

He shared his perception of commercial potential with his family, but died two decades before his nephew, Nicolas Ruinart, started the business. Demand grew so quickly that within a decade Nicolas abandoned his textile ambitions to sell champagne.

Established in 1729 atop the Butte Saint-Nicaise southeast of Reims, Maison Ruinart is the oldest producer of champagne in Champagne. The cellars are spectacular, accessed thru enormous underground rooms, excavated from the surrounding chalk down to forty meters under the earth.

It was these caves that sixth-generation owner Andre Ruinart opened as shelter to locals when Reims was razed by German guns. Today his descendants opened them to us.

Almost 140 steps burrow into a five-mile network of tunnels carved thru the soft stone. Subterranean walls reveal marks third-century Romans made when they quarried chalk from tapered crayères resembling conical flasks, which Ruinart adapted to ferment and age his fine champagne.

Much as I shun dark enclosures, part of me resisted entering these confined spaces. But the chalk walls lend a light airiness that alleviates claustrophobia. And I had to go when I learned Thomas Jefferson ordered cases from these underground vaults. On our way out, we did too.

Twenty-four Grand Marques, hundreds of cooperatives, and thousands of small independent producers dot the rolling hills around Reims. Machine picking isn’t allowed on any of them.

In Champagne, all grapes must be picked by hand. Each August, a hundred thousand of workers take a couple weeks to relieve the vines of ripe fruit.

About a half hour from town toward Épernay, past the village of Bouzy, Ambonnay nestles in the valley of the Marne.

Ostensibly established by a third-century Roman who gave his name to the town, Ambonnay is now home to Champagne Dominique Foureur, where vigneron Gaëlle Foureur and her brother manage a small estate her ancestors started in the 1850s.

Gaëlle guided us thru the tunnels and workshops of the family business she now runs. Producing about 15,000 annual cases from her ten acres of vineyard, Foureur makes champagne from her own grapes, and sells excess supply to other operators.

She emphasizes environmentally-minded viticulture, grassing over the vineyard rows to avoid herbicides (a common practice among producers in Champagne, including Ruinart).

Biological controls displace insecticides to alleviate pests. Among Gaëlle’s techniques are applying moths’ pheromone so males can’t locate females, which disrupts reproduction without spraying poison on the vines.

Against caterpillars that eat the buds, she deploys a naturally occurring bacterium emitting a protein toxin that afflicts caterpillars, but that leaves people, animals, and other insects unimpaired.

She demonstrated manual and mechanized methods of yeast extraction, cork installation, and label application during the bottling process, then welcomed us to her small tasting room to share results of her tireless effort.

Window to Heaven

France is famous for the fruit of the vine. It pours into millions of homes, bistros, cafes, and bars. But even in a country where faith is fleeting and many churches serve as municipal museums, some wine still fills the occasional chalice.

Remnants of Christian culture remain in Reims, most emphatically in ecclesiastical edifices that embellish the town. Notre-Dame de Reims anchors the area. But the nearby Basilica of St Remi was built first.

This eleventh century abbey replaced a sixth century chapel from which remains of St. Remi were moved. Though it survived the Revolution, the basilica suffered extensive damage during the First World War, and was assiduously refurbished during subsequent decades.

Smaller and darker than the nearby cathedral, the basilica is more peaceful and intimate than that popular church. Because of its blend of styles, it’s in some ways more architecturally interesting.

Begun as a Benedictine abbey built in the 11th century, the Basilica of St Remi is the largest Romanesque church in northern France. As with most ecclesiastical architecture surviving from the Middle Ages, it accrued additions and upgrades in subsequent eras.

As well as any structure, the abbey epitomizes the transition from Romanesque to Gothic. It also reflects the Catholic notion… derived from Pythagoras and Plato… that mathematics reveals the world’s relation to God. Geometry in particular was perceived as humanity’s window to Heaven, a cosmic blueprint connecting man to the Divine.

Ecclesial architecture in the High Middle Ages was a mathematical depiction of theologic principles and celestial order that exemplified symmetry, proportion, harmony, and beauty. The 13th century choir at St-Remi Basilica epitomizes this devotion to geometric consonance.

St Augustine believed God ordered everything “according to measure, number, and weight”. This influence is obvious to anyone entering the choir, a masterpeice of Trinitarian symbolism. Triple windows light three levels of the main apse. Multiplying the eleven bays in the elevation by the three stories of the choir yields the number of years Christ spent on earth.

The basilica is a transitional structure bridging architectural eras. Consecrated by Pope Leo IX in 1049, the transepts intersect a galleried nave extending 125 feet. As the original part of the building, this Romanesque core features the hulking walls, rounded arches, and thick pillars typical of that sturdy style.

The magnificent choir, radiating chapels, pointed arches, and groined vaults rode the Gothic wave of the next couple centuries. The stained glass gracing the apse and transepts also dates from this period. But lower levels retain the Romanesque aversion to large windows that jeopardized structural stability before later buttresses relieved lateral thrust.

Nave windows are correspondingly small… or (along the north aisle) blocked to preserve strength in the walls. Inside, elevation guides the transition from Romanesque to Gothic. Roman arches ascend toward groined vaults above the rounded windows of the clerestory. Similar cross vaulting supports the ceiling above the aisles.

An interior wall near the north transept reveals the architectural groping of those who built the abbey. Several windows appear to have been sealed, likely to enhance structural support for the Gothic Rose above the doors. Remnants of a column protrude about halfway up, presumably to support the pointed arches around prior windows.

The basilica houses remains of St Remi, the fifth century bishop and patron saint of Reims who baptized Clovis as first King of the Franks. The tomb of Clovis is also here, as is the Holy Ampulla - the glass vial containing the chrism that anointed the kings of France.

When Remi baptized Clovis in 496, the ampulla was ostensibly brought from heaven by a divine dove. It was found in St Remi’s sarcophagus in the 12th century and first used to coronate Louis VII in 1131.

As with almost everything else they touched, Revolutionaries destroyed it in 1793… though fragments were preserved and used again when Charles X assumed the throne in 1825.

Three French kings were anointed at St Remi, all before the cathedral was constructed. Since that structure was completed, such ceremony has mostly shifted from this church.

The “new” cathedral warrants its praise. But the old basilica deserves a toast.

JD

Reims, France

July 5, 2026

Atlanta boasts having the “World’s Busiest Airport”, as if that’s something to brag about. Why not remind everyone how awful the traffic is too?

Friday afternoon, we made it thru both, onto our flight, across the ocean… and into France the morning of the Fourth.

The airport at Charles de Gaulle isn’t great either. It’s busy, hectic, and (as we were reminded) can be quite disorganized. But at least it’s easy to escape.

Or so we’d assumed.

French trains are comfortable, fast, and frequent, and radiate from Paris like traffic from L’Etoile. But not all of them take us where we need to go. We had to board one to find that out.

Plane, Trains, and Automobile

As expected in summer, Parisian stations are packed… particularly at Charles de Gaulle. Around the atrium chairs were full. Walls propped the backs of prospective passengers, while luggage and floors supported their butts.

Overhead screens flipped train schedules like a hyper-caffeinated croupier. Yet the one to Reims never appeared. Within thirty minutes of departure I began to worry.

But then my SNCF app gave the signal. Our train would depart from platform 6. Relieved, we grabbed our bags and went toward the gate.

We weren’t the only ones. The mob moving out of the atrium resembled the evacuation from Dunkirk. The train to Champagne remained disconcertingly absent from the smorgasbord of cities blurring the board. But I trusted our app, and led my wife into the crowd.

We found our gate, and showed our tickets to the first agent we saw. With an indifferent smile she waved us forward.

Still uncertain as we inched toward an escalator that supposedly descended to our train, I asked another person wearing official colors. Then another. And another. Each assured us we were where we should be. But none could explain why schedules revealed no train to Reims.

“It’s OK”, the last one lied. “Ça viendra à voie B.” Well, if “it will come to track B”… then off to track B we’d go!

Once again, we hauled our bags thru the throngs, and wound our way to the appointed spot. Assured we were finally in the right place, we grabbed a seat, caught our breath, and began to relax as we awaited our ride.

A few minutes later, a train arrived. Because it was bound for Montpellier, we stayed put. Almost everyone else climbed aboard. But like giving financial assistance to a Nigerian prince, what we’d done didn’t make sense.

The platform was empty, our train was already supposed to have arrived, and our destination was still AWOL from any announcements. Something was off… almost eerie. I decided to ask another agent. When I did, his eyes widened and his voice rose.

“This is it!”, he insisted, pointing at the Montpellier train which had been sitting idle several minutes. “Get on! Get on! Now! It’s about to leave!”

I ran back to my wife, and told her (in what I’m sure was a very calm, composed tone) “LET’S GO! WE HAVE TO BOARD!!”

As we hustled, I wondered what I was doing. I knew where Montpellier was. That it was about 500 miles in the wrong direction should’ve fazed me. Yet I’d followed orders like an idiot, assuming a stranger in a uniform could’ve cared less where we were trying to go.

For all I knew, he and friends were buckled over laughing at making a moron of an American. But this one needs no help.

We clambered aboard, and the train started moving. Once it did, I again felt like I’d left the iron on. Going to Languedoc to get to Champagne didn’t seem right.

On a whim, fatigued and frustrated, I showed our tickets to another attendant.

“Oh no”, she gasped.

Uh oh.

“We’re on the wrong train?”, I sighed.

“No”, she said. “You’re in the wrong car.”

“But it’s the right train?”, I pleaded… enlisting hope as my only strategy.

“Oui”, she promised. “But you need to take another one.”

(What?)

“Get off at the next stop and go to platform 3. Take the train to Strasbourg. It will stop at Reims.”

At that moment it hit me what happened. Our tickets included our departure time, assigned seats, and final destination. Yet they kept an important step a secret. We were supposed to change trains at Marne-la-Vallée Chessy. It was like booking a flight from Pittsburgh to Paris and not being told about the connection in Atlanta.

At the next station, we hopped off, hauled our bags, and hurried to the Reims train. Assured we were on the right one, we sought our seats… which two people were in.

I showed them our tickets. They showed me theirs… which looked just like mine. They were in the right seats. A helpful passenger took a glance, and pointed out a familiar mistake.

“You’re in the wrong car.”

I started looking for Alan Funt.

But then I realized he was right. I’d been looking at our return ticket. For this trip, we needed to be one car up. There we found (our) two empty seats, and enjoyed a comfortable ride the rest of the way to Reims.

From the station we took an Uber to the hotel.

War Room

The Hotel Caserne Chanzy is centrally located, part of the modern façade of an ancient city.

The suicide of the West known as the First World War destroyed most of Reims. German bombs turned almost 90% of it to rubble and ash.

Because the damage during the Great War was so extensive, Reims was a fortuitous site for Allies to receive the German surrender after the sequel.

This was a common pattern since the Prussian war, after which the victorious Teutons proclaimed a unified Germany in the hall of Versailles. The French demanded the same spot to exact vengeance after World War I, which had ended with an Armistice at Foch’s rail car in Compiègne. Two decades later, Hitler chose Foch’s car in Compiègne for the French to submit when the Occupation began.

We wanted to see where this pattern persisted. After checking into our hotel and dispatching our bags, we decided to walk. Under warm skies of unblemished blue, we strolled toward a nondescript structure across the river from the center of the city.

The brick building once housed the Collège Moderne et Technique, but that purpose was paused when Eisenhower used the logistical advantages of Reims to make the school the regional base for the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF).

For several minutes, my wife and I stood alone in the place where the war in Europe came to an end.

In a dark room below Ike’s old office, large maps fill each wall, depicting the Allied stranglehold on the Reich. These were irrefutable arguments to anyone in the room, and surrounded a long rectangular table hosting sixteen chairs.

Three are isolated on one side. In them sat delegates of the defeated regime, who asked that German officials and citizens be treated with respect. From the other side of the table, the request was met with the silence of disdain.

The Allies wanted unconditional surrender. When the document demanding it slid under his pen, Alfred Jodl had no choice but to sign. The next day in Berlin, Wilhelm Keitel ratified the capitulation.

Eisenhower was too contemptuous of the Nazis to share the room with their three representatives, so he let Bedell Smith procure their signatures. When the Germans left, Eisenhower met Jodl on his way out.

He had only two questions. Did Jodl understand the conditions, and was he prepared to carry them out? Jodl said “ya”, accompanied by a submissive bow.

Eisenhower warned Jodl he’d be held personally responsible if terms were violated. Then the General walked away, and never shook the German’s hand.

Works of Fire

War has always afflicted Reims. The Remi tribe arrived a few decades before the Romans. They were still settling in when Caesar showed up. When he did, his new subjects secured his favor by helping suppress restless Gauls.

Originally called Durocortorum to denote its configuration as a “rounded fortress”, the settlement soon adopted the name of its tribe.

The city is delightful. Elegant edifices mingle with Roman ruins and Gothic influences. Beneath modern Reims the second-century Porte de Mars (the widest surviving Roman arch in the world) and the half-buried cryptoporticus at the Place du Forum are relics of Durocortorum.

Notre-Dame Cathedral and St Remi Basilica are the most obvious Medieval mementos. Around them are blocks of Art Deco decor with classical flair, reflecting the era when the city was rebuilt: after bombardment of the First World War, but before the architectural assault inflicted after the Second.

The Art Deco building in which our hotel is housed celebrated its hundredth anniversary Saturday night. Red carpets, Jazz Age ornaments, and ladies adorned in period dress welcomed singers, musicians, and dancers to a champagne party along the cobblestone block.

Our Fourth finished with lots of music, plenty of light, and genuine fire works. A fire-eating flame twirler dazzled attendees as they swigged champagne.

Les sapeurs-pompiers were honored as saviors of the city, with a few of these firefighters using our hotel balcony to descend to the street. By the time they did so, the works of fire were doused, the music ceased, and the cathedral bells tolled a new day.

JD

PS - a firefighter preparing to leap from our balcony ledge, as your correspondent snaps a photo while sipping champagne:

Atlanta, GA

June 12, 2026

Sometimes we need someone else’s eyes to see our blessings.

Most of us view the world thru distorted filters. Everyone reading this has a digital colander that sifts facts to console preconceptions.

Images from across the country or around the world form or reinforce certitude about ambiguous (and mostly irre…

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Sea Island, GA

June 7, 2026

During the warming period of the Pleistocene, sea levels were fifty feet above… and the shoreline eighty feet west of… the current Georgia coast.

Glaciers never covered this state. But their northerly retreat deposited offshore dunes along the south Atlantic coast.

Adjacent to St Simon’s, Sea Island is among the newer buffers shi…

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Savannah, GA

June 4, 2026

A soft breeze lifts the mist from the Savannah River. As the sun ascends, its light reveals a glorious day.

My office this morning is the Gallery Espresso, a charming café off Chippewa Square. I arrived before the rush, grabbed a cappuccino, and nestled comfortably into my al fresco seat.

I was here yesterday too, when the eclectic…

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Atlanta, GA

May 28, 2026

The best big cities are essentially assemblages of small towns knitted together. Like San Francisco’s districts or the arrondissements of Paris, they’re dozens of unique neighborhoods quilted into a cohesive whole.

America has few cities of such fabric. New York is an obvious exception, with dozens…

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Savannah, GA

November 19, 2025

Like a chessboard beside its namesake river, Savannah was first settled by James Oglethorpe in 1733. Crossing the Atlantic on the Anne, Oglethorpe established the city and created the urban plan that remains an ornament of this town and the envy of others.

We came from the other direction… tho’ an ocean voyage probably offers a greater variety of views, and about as many places to stop.

Flat and effervescent as a bad glass of Champagne, the road from Macon to Savannah is a dull drive. This is the approximate path Sherman took, but his pillaging armies found more places to eat.

The terrain between the fall line and the ocean is coastal plain featuring Cenozoic sediment… and little else. For food or fuel, the town of Dublin is the only oasis in this alluvial desert.

That’s OK.

My wife and I were ready for the ride. We had a full tank, a cooler of food, and a couple hours to catch up. A beautiful woman makes time pass fast. Before I knew it, we were in Savannah.

Strategic Port

As the southernmost colonial port and a cornerstone of the Confederacy, the city was captured by both obstinate British and invading Yankees.

The Americans and French attempted a siege of the city to oust the English. It didn’t work. John Bull held the town till Cornwallis capitulated.

Eight decades later, Savannah was the object of Sherman’s March to the Sea. Some say Savannah’s beauty convinced Sherman to spare it. It’s a nice thought. But a naive one.

His “mercy” had little to do with the alluring layout of a charming city. It was a strategic decision, not a sentimental one. But we’re glad he made it.

Savannah is lovely. Arranged on an Enlightenment plan inspired by Vitruvius and Locke, Oglethorpe’s city is composed of landscaped squares surrounded by fetching blends of businesses and homes.

The squares anchor twelve-acre wards comprising eight city blocks. Within each ward are “tythe” and “trust” lots dedicated, respectively, to family homes and civic structures.

Churches dot these districts, with steeples and spires piercing the sky. For farming, gardens, and military training, tracts were provided to each tything just outside town.

As Savannah expanded, its distinctive pattern repeated. The original six wards quadrupled, creating an attractive network of walkable streets, appealing parks, and inviting structures at a comfortable scale.

Like silk scarves draping an elegant lady, Spanish moss adorns stately oaks, and cloaks Savannah under an enchanting aesthetic.

Oglethorpe meant to replicate his city plan throughout the colony. Regrettably, aside from a couple cities along the coast, it didn’t spread beyond Savannah.

First and Last

The Oglethorpe Plan let ordered beauty buttress the practical purposes for which his colony was founded. As Chair of the Gaols Committee in Parliament, Oglethorpe saw Georgia as a relief valve for the abused poor in debtors prisons. The territory would also be a military buffer between the prosperous Carolinas and Spanish Florida.

Under Oglethorpe, Georgia was the first American colony to ban slavery. A couple decades later, it became the last to allow it.

The state again prohibited importation of slaves in 1798, but the institution continues… and Savannah remained a hub for human trafficking. Among its more infamous episodes was the “Weeping Time” auction of 1859 (about which I elaborated here), when more than 400 slaves were sold to settle gambling obligations of Pierce Butler.

Savannah emerged impoverished from the war. Industry languished and shortages abounded. As with Charleston, our silver lining is Savannah was too broke to rebuild. Poverty forced it to keep the character that makes it attractive.

Vibrant Fabric

When Oglethorpe proscribed slavery, he outlawed lawyers. He also prohibited booze and Catholics. Given the abundance of pubs and that I somehow snuck into the city, I assume those statutes have been rescinded.

If not, River Street is one of the loudest speakeasies I’ve ever seen. I opted to shield my ears and walk the other way.

Along cobblestone streets, past elegant edifices, and around exquisite squares, Savannah spills south from the river. I spent the morning soaking it in.

We’re here at the right time of year. Summer - which lasts about seven months - is like breathing thru a wet sponge. But mid-November couldn’t be nicer.

Days dawn cool and crisp. As shadows shorten, sweaters come off. Gentle breezes soothe steps of those who stroll Savannah. Plenty of people do. Why wouldn’t they?

Most cities are indistinguishable hodgepodges of wide highways, vast parking lots, and bland buildings with blank walls that repel people.

Savannah is welcoming once you reach her. With most buildings being fewer than five floors, heights are of human scale. Façades front sidewalks, which line streets of reasonable width.

Oaks and palms provide shelter from the sun and shield pedestrians (physically and psychologically) from passing traffic. Parking is mostly parallel, underground, or behind buildings.

An array of Greek Revival, neo-Gothic, and Victorian styles, the city is a reminder that architecture needn’t be ugly. It also shouldn’t strive to show off, or to reflect condescending disgust for the general public.

Before function vanquished form after the Second World War, beauty was an essential component of public space. Not only individual structures, but the way they threaded a cohesive whole… where residential, retail, and religious edifices weaved with streets and plazas to form a vibrant fabric.

In many municipalities, zoning ordinances make such arrangements illegal. Commercial and residential areas are rigidly defined and strictly separated. Minimum numbers of parking spaces and absurd offsets encourage acres of asphalt over relentless sprawl. Cars are needed to get anywhere.

Savannah isn’t immune to this scourge. After all, cars come here too. But they accommodate the city, not the other way around.

As Vin Scully said of Fenway Park, Savannah is what it is and where it is, and those who want to reach it will find a way. Most things worth having play hard to get.

But Savannah can be more elusive than most.

Low Hanging Fruit

In San Francisco, a statue of Benjamin Franklin adorns Washington Square, while General Washington graces Franklin Square. Savannah plays the same games.

Johnson Square is the oldest plaza in city, anchored by an obelisk honoring (who else?) Nathaniel Greene. The Jasper Monument adorns Madison Square. James Oglethorpe stands in Chippewa Square. Monterey Square honors Casimir Pulaski. Wright Square features Washington Gordon.

And a Confederate Monument somehow survives in Forsyth Park.

I’m not sure how this happened, but am relieved it did. Throughout the South, from Texas to the Potomac, sculptures of heroes have been defaced or destroyed, to browbeat Southerners (and other traditional Americans) into being ashamed of their ancestors... and of themselves.

Confederate monuments are low-hanging fruit. Cultural vandalism doesn’t end when those are picked. That’s when it starts, as we’ve seen the last five years.

Fitting Perpetuation

I wrote most of the preceding beside the fountain in Lafayette Square. Caddy-corner across the street is a High Victorian Gothic basilica incorporating French influences.

The prohibition of Catholics faded (yet didn’t disappear) after Independence. French immigrants arrived in the wake of the Revolution and after slave uprisings in Haiti.

The congregation of St John the Baptist became their home. Their cathedral was the first structure in Georgia built with brick. Repairs were recently completed to replace girders that had rusted away and risked collapse.

I was greeted by the grand organ as I entered the nave. Side aisles guide parishioners and petitioners toward separate chapels to the Virgin Mary. Stained glass and vaulted ceiling surround the high altar, which was regrettably repositioned after Vatican II.

Beside the Basilica is the Greek Revival Academy of St Vincent, where Jefferson Davis’s children were students during the War Between the States. It opened a couple decades earlier as an orphanage, boarding house, and free school. The Sisters of Mercy tended to wounded during the war, and secretly taught the children of slaves.

Up the block, the Daughters of the American Revolution erected a memorial arch as gateway to Colonial Park. This was the second cemetery in Savannah, and cradles the graves of Georgia luminaries before and during the secession from Britain.

Burials were permitted for a century preceding 1853. It became a city park forty years later, a fitting perpetuation of Oglethorpe’s plan.

JD

Damariscotta, Maine

November 9, 2025

(NB: Previous installments of this series are here, here, here, here, here, and here)

It’s nice being tucked away on the coast of Maine. Amid idyllic scenes and small towns, I’ve been spared the neuroses of unrelenting “news”. It’s like wandering out of a Kafka novel into a Rockwell painting.

Part of the appeal of taking an extended course away from home is the opportunity to learn about somewhere else. I’m here almost two weeks. For ten days I’m at the Shelter Institute, which leaves three to explore my surroundings. One was last Sunday when I landed. The others were yesterday and today.

Weekdays are packed with plumbing, wiring, framing, and scaling. But evenings are quiet, peaceful… and dark. There’s little time or light to see much.

For anyone accustomed to urban living, a lack of light is illuminating. Ambient light is misleading. Only remote areas reveal how artificial it is.

When our class ends, the sun has started its evening commute. Often, it’s already home, fast asleep on its celestial couch… leaving us to find our way under its eyelids.

Bath Tubs

With the exception of one night when Shelter team hosted a cookout, I’ve spent each evening having dinner in Bath. Like most villages on the coast, it’s a quaint place.

Bath is near the mouth of the Kennebec, an aorta carrying commerce from the Atlantic Ocean to the interior of Maine. It sits atop vertical ridges of rock that vary in strength, like upright mattresses of alternating firmness.

Between Bath and Woolwich, tectonics, glaciers, and geology created the valley the Kennebec filled. The river’s orientation and banks were suited to launching skiffs, brigs, and schooners, making Bath an ideal port for building boats.

Shipyards sprouted along the shore, and Bath boomed. By the second half of the 19th century, Bath built two-thirds of America’s ocean-going vessels. It produced a quarter of Naval destroyers during the Second World War. In a sense, Bath was known for making tubs.

Ornate Victorian, Italianate, and Neoclassical edifices on Front, High, Center, and Water Streets echo prosperity of those eras. Many of these buildings now house restaurants, souvenir shops, and real estate offices common to many seasonal tourist towns.

One is a Greek Revival structure housing an Arts Center. Known as the Chocolate Church, it was Congregationalist till vacated in the 1960s. It was doomed to demolition till a local preservationist group saved it. The turnbuckles supporting the roof were conceived by Pat Hennin at the Shelter Institute.

Most Bath businesses are open, yet fairly quiet with winter approaching. That’s fine by me. Tables are plentiful and service attentive. That’s partly because early dusk induces early dinner. By 7:00, I’m finished eating.

From the Ashes

With clocks reverting to normal last week, the sun sets around 4:30 in the northeastern-most American State. A few lingering leaves cling to trees, braced to be stripped by the next brisk breeze.

A southerly wind brought me here. I arrived last Sunday, flying from Atlanta to the largest city in the Pine Tree State.

Founded 240 years ago, the Portland area is home to almost half of Maine residents. The town inherited its name from an island in England, and bequeathed it to a city in Oregon.

After a renting my car, I drove the short distance from the airport, found a place to park, and began strolling. City Hall was a good place to start. This Beaux-Arts gem was inspired by its counterpart in New York.

The granite structure features a towered cupola atop five dormers, an ornate balustrade, and arched entries at the ground floor. Being Sunday, I was unable to go in. That’s fine. Given what happens in places like this, they usually look best from outside.

Walking toward the water, the Woodman Building caught my eye. This elegant Second Empire edifice offers cast iron pillars and arches under elaborate dormers, corner turrets, and Mansard roof. Like City Hall, this structure rose after an 1866 fire that decimated the city.

Portland is filled with appealing buildings from before the First World War. I admired many, but kept going.

Bittersweet Discovery

The day was brisk, clear, and cool. Beside Casco Bay, it was windy and cold, blowing me onto the cobblestones of the Old Port. As on many waterfronts, this is a revitalized district of boutiques, bistros, and bars.

Wandering from the Old Port toward the West End, I stumbled upon a monument to filmmaker John Ford. Depending on my mood, The Searchers is the greatest Western ever made, and among the ten best movies of all time.

I’d stumbled onto Gorham’s Corner, gateway to Portland’s Irish enclave. Apparently, Ford’s father ran a pub here when Ford grew up with the surname of Feeney. It’s now an upscale area known as the West End.

Above it rises the Maine Irish Heritage Center. As an Irish-Catholic, this discovery was bittersweet. It’s always great to find places that honor the Irish. But this one is in a gorgeous neo-Gothic structure that was once St Dominc’s Catholic Church.

Not long ago, a Catholic church would’ve sufficed to celebrate being Irish. From an Irish perspective, the two were almost synonymous. Alas, no longer. I suppose it’s as fitting as frustrating that a people with fading faith would covert their church to “community center”.

Marketing the West End as an enclave of “historic architecture” was good bait to get me to bite. Some of it was lovely; much was ordinary… a reminder that “historic” often means “old”.

Fortunately, it was a nice day and a short walk. But shadows were lengthening, signaling time to hit the road, and check-in to my hotel.

Regional Variation

Even as a Southerner, I appreciate aspects of New England. In a world awash in soul-crushing homogeneity, it’s nice to find some regional variation.

Among the more obvious is the distinctive dialect. When most places seem anxious to suppress local accents, it’s refreshing to hear broad As and lost Rs.

The Yankee accent can be harsh. To Southern ears, it isn’t particularly appealing. But it’s inherent to this area, and how people here should speak. I’m glad they still do.

Many mid-Maine towns feature local establishments and family-owned shops. I’m in one now, at Barn Door Cafe, which shares space with Maine Coast Books.

Around me almost everyone is reading a printed newspaper or a physical book. Most patrons are locals, on first-name bases with baristas who know their order. It’s like I stepped back three decades in time.

This location is a link in a chain. But it’s a fairly short one, stretching only from Saco to Bar Harbor. Independent bookshops are common in most hamlets along the shore.

Coastal New England’s rough winters partly explain its literary culture. As with the “coffee society” in rainy Seattle (another bookish place), weather entices shelter in bindings of books.

From a Distance

Yesterday was too nice to stay indoors, so I went inland… to peek at the place where elected Mainers make mischief. Named for the daughter of Revolutionary War General Henry Dearborn, the state capital is about an hour from Bath.

Augusta is nestled at a beautiful spot on the banks of the Kennebec, the furthest upriver that ocean tides can reach. But this lady looks a little worn, and best viewed from a distance.

Steamboats were big business on the Kennebec, carrying river traffic to Bath and Boston. Several railroads also concentrated on the the capital. Times were good after the war.

Water Street is lined with dignified buildings emblematic of that erstwhile era. Yet few were open, and many were empty. It was a little eerie, especially after where I’d been that morning.

Forgotten Falls

A charming village at the base of Mt Battie, Camden is a quintessential mid-Maine coastal town, as if plucked from a postcard.

Pretty as it is, it’s less lovely than when I last visited twenty-seven years ago. On that occasion, my wife was with me.

Like most Maine towns, Camden once fell to flames. As with the others that succumbed to fire, you’d never know it now. This handsome hamlet hugs a picturesque harbor, fed by falls flowing from Megunticook Lake.

I’d forgotten they were there.

In a park beside the Colonial-style Camden library, I was standing above them Saturday morning when I called my mother for her birthday. After telling her where I was, she asked if I’d seen the falls.

Thinking she was nuts, I told her I couldn’t see them. While secretly assuming “the falls” didn’t exist, I told her they must be in another part of the harbor.

“I’m sure they were in Camden”, she said. “I remember seeing them. People climbed up the rocks. They were fairly impressive.”

“I’m sure they were”, I assured her as I rolled my eyes. When a pedestrian passed, I pointed at the phone and twirled an index finger around my ear.

Then, I heard a sound resembling… rushing water.

“Wait”, I said. “I hear something. I think I hear the falls under where I’m standing.”

I walked down the path, and found torrents coming under Main Street shops.

“Oh, good”, she sighed. “At least I’m not crazy.”

“Of course not”, I assured her. “Who’d ever think that?”

True Lunatic

A true lunatic is the guy I saw later in the day.

The weather warmed throughout the afternoon. It was cool in Camden. But temperatures flirted with the upper fifties as I left Augusta.

They were there by the time I got to Georgetown. But someone diving into a New England inlet in November still seemed insane.

Georgetown is an island village accessible by bridge from Woolwich. It’s idyllic, as is the drive there. I decided to stop for a photo. Pulling over, I noticed a man at the edge of the water.

Assuming he was soaking in the scene, I thought nothing of it - till he removed his shirt and shorts… and jumped in. Then he saw me.

“Come on in! The water’s warm.”

“I’ll take your word for it”, I promised. But I kept my distance. Remembering that Stephen King lives in Maine, I decided to drive on.

The end of the road was worth the ride. It was a complimentary caricature of the Maine coast. A lobster shack sat on shore, a series of rocky islands dotted the bay, and residual leaves glistened in the glow of a New England autumn.

I couldn’t stop staring. Yet as the sun sank, the temperature dropped, and compelled me to depart.

Appropriate Weather

The mercury kept falling overnight. So did the rain. This morning, I left the hotel… and walked back in. I grabbed an extra coat, and proceeded to Pemaquid Point.

Most of Fort William Henry remains only in ruins or replica. The main bastion was rebuilt early last century to evoke the tower that initially rose in 1692.

The English built it to protect their northern frontier. But the bastion was poorly constructed with weak mortar, and the French and Indians destroyed it four years later. The British needed the Shelter Institute.

Up the road, the Pemaquid Point Lighthouse was commissioned by John Quincy Adams in 1827. As at the fort a few minutes earlier, no one was there when I arrived.

I can see why. A light rain fell as wind whipped off the Atlantic. But like playing golf in Ireland, inclement weather somehow seemed appropriate.

For a while.

Above, the clouds moved. Below, the waves rose. Ahead, the wind intensified. It was time to find salvation.

Mass in Maine

I’ve just come from Mass in neighboring Newcastle, at a building constructed when Thomas Jefferson was president. St Patrick’s is the oldest active Catholic Church in New England.

When erected, Maine was a northern outpost of Massachusetts. Its first Catholics were French refugees from the Revolution, One of them, Father Jean Lefebvre de Cheverus, was sent to Maine to minister Indian tribes in the area.

A couple Irish brothers followed in ensuing decades. Father Cheverus would occasionally check in. With more Catholics moving in, a brick church was built in Federal form. That’s where I just heard Mass.

A bell forged by Paul Revere hangs in the steeple. A bygone sense of proportion epitomizes the outside. The interior directs attention toward the altar, which is the original… a style familiar to what Father Cheverus knew in France. The exterior walls are solid brick, baked locally.

I could’ve stayed all day.

Serendipitous Sign

From my Damariscotta cafe, I went to Brunswick. Approaching town along the river, I saw a sign for an “Historic Bridge”. To my right I glanced a span that looked familiar. At the next street, I turned around.

Years ago I was a civil engineer helping retrofit the Golden Gate Bridge. During that time, I’d studied several spans. Among them were pioneering suspension and truss structures of the nineteenth century.

One of those was a swinging pedestrian bridge over the Androscoggin. I’d forgotten all about it, and had no idea it was here. Seeing it was serendipity.

Supported by two A-frame towers and anchored at a couple concrete abutments at each end (all have been replaced), the “swinging span” was constructed in 1892 to ease passage of Cabot Manufacturing Company employees between Brunswick and Topsham.

The bridge was engineered by the Roebling Company that built the Brooklyn Bridge and was initial designer for the Golden Gate. I walked across it and along the opposite bank of the Androscoggin to the “Black Bridge”, another famous span that carried two decks till eight years ago.

The upper railroad portion still exists and operates. The suspended underside roadway was demolished after a couple accidents (and inadequate government funds) made repair impractical.

First Ripples

Until today I’d been lucky with the weather. Yesterday was gorgeous, with few clouds, lots of sun, and temperatures touching the upper 50s. I suppose even today could’ve been worse.

This morning, there was word of snow to the west. The firmament was an ominous shade of dim grey. After wandering the banks of the Androscoggin looking at old bridges, I’d become cold. It was time to get back in the car.

Behind me as I drove from Brunswick to Bath, the sun descended under a cloak of clouds. With it went the weekend. In its wake are the first ripples of winter.

JD

Atlanta, GA

September 3, 2025

An old adage holds that no one reports the planes that land. Normal news isn’t covered. Good news rarely is either.

But occasionally both happen in the air. When it does, we should honor the people who make it possible.

Ad From the ‘50s

Yesterday we flew home from Tampa. We’d spent Labor Day weekend visiting family and reacquainting with old friends.

Anytime we hurl 500 miles per hour at 30,000 feet, we hope the flight will be uneventful. Making our way thru the airport, crowds were sparse and “security” was quick.

So far, so good.

With an hour to absorb, we settled into the Sky Club. After a quick lunch and cup of coffee, we boarded the plane, stowed our bags, and took our seats.

We were in the Exit Row, which entails a safety briefing from the stewardess. These perfunctory recitals are usually performed professionally. But this one was different.

The young lady approached the passengers to remind them where they were seated, and to ensure they were comfortable opening doors and assisting others in case of emergency.

But the way she did so caught our eye. It was as if she’d been transported from an airline ad in the 1950s.

Displaying the safety brochure, she leaned slightly toward us, and with a genuine smile looked each person in the eye. Opening the brochure, she displayed it like it was the prize item at a premier auction. We couldn’t help but listen.

Although the flight attendant was an attractive young woman, our attention had nothing to do with her physical appearance. It was all about her demeanor.

Attentive, Pleasant, and Proactive

For several decades across every industry, customer service has slipped. Since covid, it’s fallen off a cliff. In most cases it’s still plummeting.

Some of the decline comes from inadequate staffing, supply chain disruptions, or poor processes. But much of it derives from simple indifference.

In most cases, employees don’t want to be there. With surly expressions, short responses, or sheer frustration at having to assist customers, they let us know it without wielding words (tho’ they often use those too).

That’s why this young woman stood out. She was remarkable for being attentive, pleasant, and proactive. After her Exit Row spiel, she assured us she’d be happy to help if anything was unclear. As with most of the normal functions of her job, this wasn’t unusual.

But she made it seem she was eager for us to ask. She wasn’t overbearing or fake. There was neither pestering nor pretending. Her gentle voice, soft smile, and confident nod were sufficient assurance she was willing to assist.

She was authentic, and never made us think she was merely doing her job. We all know modern air travel can be drudgery. But it was evident that in her mind, she was there to make our trip pleasant. For anyone she encountered, that’s what she did.

Engaging Smile

The short flight lasted about an hour in the air. Her “jump seat” faced us. During take-off, she noticed a passenger across the aisle trying to free his video screen from a stubborn arm rest.

After flight attendants were allowed to stand, she went straight to him. With the same welcoming disposition she’d exhibited a few minutes earlier, she knelt down and released the monitor. To ensure he didn’t feel stupid (I don’t think he did), she let him know that “these things often stick”.

Noticing that even in the Exit Row this tall gentleman had limited legroom, she immediately lifted a few crew materials and moved them elsewhere. The passenger thanked her with almost stunned sincerity.

He hadn’t complained about the monitor or the space, nor asked the attendant to do anything. She simply sensed she could help and decided to do so. As she did, that engaging smile never left her face. I doubt it ever does.

After beverages were served and the carts were stowed, our stewardess returned to her seat as we prepared to land. As we descended, she pulled out her phone. I assumed she was taking a quick breather before we touched down.

When she looked up, she addressed the man next to me.

“Excuse me, sir”.

“Yes?”, he responded, somewhat surprised.

“Your connecting flight is departing from Gate B10. We will arrive at A6, but you should have plenty of time.”

“Thank you”, he said. “I appreciate you letting me know.”

Looking back at her phone, she gave similar information to other passengers in the area. As we were about to land, she did it again.

Apparently, some of the departure gates had changed, so as she provided these personalized updates, she apologized for being too quick with the original information.

“I Love People”

No one minded. Most were shocked that such a pleasant professional can still be found on a plane. We decided to let her know how much that meant. My wife did so first.

“You are a terrific representative of the Delta brand”, she told her.

“Oh, thank you”, she beamed. “I love my job.”

“We can tell. We watched you throughout the flight. You are a delight. Your attention and attitude are rare these days.”

“You are very kind. I love being around people, and Delta passengers are wonderful.”

Noticing her name tag and accent, we asked Anny where she was from.

“I am from Sao Paolo, Brazil, but now live in Boston. I used to live in St. Petersburg, so it’s always nice returning to Tampa. I like Boston too”, she laughed, “but not the cold. Fortunately, because I speak Portuguese, I usually fly to Lisbon. It’s usually warm there. I also go to Brazil, which lets me see my family.”

After we landed and waited to deplane at the gate, other passengers chimed in as they heard us chatting. All of them commended Anny. Given how enjoyable she made this flight, all were amazed she hadn’t been doing this longer.

After telling Anny I’d once worked for Delta, she responded as if we were long-lost family.

“Wow! That’s awesome. It’s so nice to see you. I’ve been with Delta about a year. My last job I worked remote, but I’m not a good remote worker. I love being with people too much.”

That was obvious, and no doubt mutual.

“What did you do before that?”, one passenger wondered.

“I was a school principal.”

“Really? Where?”

“In Brazil.”

“Then you should be used to handling children like us”, another person joked.

Anny dismissed the comparison with a chuckle. “Not at all. Our passengers are the best. I love the children too. But this is where I belong.”

None of her customers would argue with that.

JD

PS - I meant to get Anny’s full name. But if anyone from Delta should read this, she was on DL1099 from Tampa to Atlanta on September 2, 2025.

Nairobi, Kenya

June 9, 2025

[NB: Our journey started a couple weeks ago. Previous installments are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here]

“He thought a little about the company that he would like to have.

No, he thought, when everything you do, you do too long, and do too late, you can't expect to find the people still there.”

- Ernest Hemingway, The Snows of Kilimanjaro

Beside the River Mara, we were woken by a chorus of honking hippos, barking jackals, shrieking monkeys, and meandering mongeese.

Rising before the sun, I strolled the lighted path toward last night’s bartender, still at his post brewing this morning’s coffee.

Like everyone we’ve encountered in Africa, this delightful man gave me a genuine smile. When I requested two cups to-go, he said he only had one.

Paper cups aren’t as common in places where people can’t compute not sitting comfortably to savor their coffee. Drinking it “on the go” seems to defeat the purpose.

One of the most impressionable lessons of this trip was imparted the night we arrived, and reinforced over subsequent days: that in Africa there is no hurry. Locals recognize that (in some sense) to be truly wealthy is to be unrushed.

By way of unnecessary apology, the bartender barista offered to give me the coffee urn for my tent. Before I could thank him, he was ahead of me. He accompanied me several hundred yards, carrying the dispenser up the path.

When we arrived, I expressed appreciation as he handed me the carafe. In the pre-dawn darkness, he responded with a smile bright enough to read by. His only concern seemed to be my happiness.

He needn’t have worried.

The Tree

We’re finishing a marvelous voyage. The terrain is terrific, scenery spectacular, and the fauna fantastic. But we could be anywhere and the trip would still have been wonderful.

My immediate family has always been close, albeit from a distance. We see each other far too infrequently.

Tho’ we’ve recognized this for years, last summer my mother decided to do something about it. When my step-father died in July, he bequeathed a reminder that even the longest lives are deceptively brief.

My mother called a few months later. She assured me she was doing well, and felt fine. She’d resumed traveling, and remained active.

But we never know how long that will last. For any of us.

Our family is fortunate. We don’t need much. If anything, we’re trying to ditch superfluous stuff we already have. My mother and I spoke a few months before Christmas, and agreed not to exchange gifts.

In recent years, buying presents felt perfunctory. We’d check boxes to ensure everyone had something under the tree. But what meant most was that we all gathered around it.

At some point, material belongings become a burden. As Epictetus put it, “wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants.”

We don’t have many. But the most pressing ones are measured more on the hands of a clock than by bucks in the bank.

Time is what matters most. Our hours and days continue to dwindle (if we’re lucky). My mother wanted to make the most of those we have, by enjoying as many as possible with people we love. She had an idea how to do so.

“What would you think about going to Africa?”

I hadn’t considered it. But when she suggested my family and my brother’s join her for fourteen days in Tanzania and Kenya, I decided it would be rude to refuse.

Coming Clean

After being here a couple weeks, I’m glad my mother raised me to be polite. But she also taught me to be honest. So now it’s time to come clean.

Whenever I told anyone we were going to Africa, I received one of two responses. This trip was either a “bucket list” item for those who haven’t been, or a “life-changing” event for anyone who has.

I’ve never had a “bucket list”. As my wife will (ruefully) attest, checking boxes isn’t my thing.

But like all of us, I have only one life. One way or the other, it’ll change whether I like it or not. From inertia or intent, it’ll get closer or further from what I want.

But what is that?

The question came to me as we left the Masai Mara, and descended into the cup of Nairobi. But accompanying it was an embarrassing confession I must lift from my chest:

I wasn’t excited about coming to Africa.

Yet I couldn’t resist my mother’s offer. So I didn’t.

But part of me wanted to. Not because I had an aversion to Africa. I was simply indifferent, and there were other places (I thought) I’d rather go.

Yet I agreed because I wanted to spend two weeks with our family, and since I assumed everyone else would be thrilled by this exotic expedition.

To many (including your author as he recalls his idiocy), this must sound insane. Because it is.

In retrospect, I was being so dense that beams of light would’ve bent around me.

I was told this would be the “experience of a lifetime”… which was why I agreed to go. Friends assured me the animals were amazing, the lodging exquisite, and the scenery breathtaking.

Maybe it was. But I would’ve been happy to take their word for it.

I’m glad I didn’t.

The last few weeks are among the best of my life, and always will be. I wasn’t excited about coming to Africa. But I should’ve been.

Therein lies a larger lesson.

Self-Imposed Shackles

Sometimes we should welcome “life-changing” experiences even when we (think we) don’t want our life to change. Perhaps especially then.

Voltaire observed that it’s difficult to free fools from the chains they revere. Most shackles are self-imposed. We spend our lives seeking comfort, or dodging problems that don’t exist.

By doing so, we miss experiences that become blessings, even (or especially) if we accumulate cuts and bruises along the way. Our wounds create wisdom. But on this adventure, insight came from other avenues.

I’d grown comfortable… and become accustomed to playing it safe. Even worse, I’d convinced myself I was being “sensible” by minimizing risk. But this was usually a rationale for avoiding it altogether, and a sad excuse to do nothing.

I’ve done plenty of that the last several years. During that time, I’ve had friends, relatives, and (thru replies to these essays) strangers exalt my untapped talent… and remind me it’s best to pour it out before it inevitably evaporates.

Unknown Pails

This journey filled a bucket I didn’t know I had. I’m glad it did. But how many unknown pails remain empty?

Among the litany of blessings my mother has bestowed, this adventure was among the best. We went to fantastic places and made new friends.

But what I’ll remember most is the awe, love, and laughter she allowed her family to share amid scenes her provincial son was too indifferent to anticipate and too apathetic to appreciate.

My mother offered this experience as a gift to us and a present to herself. I hope she enjoyed it. Her elder son couldn’t have done so any more than he did.

After my misguided misgivings, I can’t think of a more marvelous way to be proven wrong… or to be so eager to admit it.

I guess Africa really is life-changing.

JD

Masai Mara, Kenya

June 9, 2025

[NB: Our journey started a couple weeks ago. Previous installments are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here]

“Looking back on my life in Africa, I feel that it might altogether be described as the existence of a person who had come from a rushed and noisy world, into a still country.”

- Karen Blixen, Out of Africa

A few years ago, we wrote about the state-sanctioned displacement of Gullah Geechee from Sapelo Island. For a couple centuries, the Masai have resisted similar efforts in East Africa.

To little avail.

Part of the Nilotic peoples native to sections of Ethiopia, Uganda, Sudan, Tanzania, and Kenya, the Masai originally migrated to this area from the Nile basin, and now occupy regions of the Great Rift below the Ngong Hills.

To Tanzanians, the Masai Mara is the Kenyan appendage of the Serengeti. On this side of the border, the Serengeti is considered a Tanzanian extension of the Masai Mara.

For two nights we’ve camped beside the Mara river. Within its waters and along the banks, herds of hippo honk their horns, swim in their sh*t, and emit their “perfume”.

Mara is a Masai word meaning “spotted land”. Upon arrival from the southern Nile, the Masai noticed speckled balanites interspersed across these plains… and gave a name to the vast grass.

The Masai have historically been warriors and herdsmen on the highlands. Once feared by passing travelers and neighboring tribes, they are now notable for their elaborate fabrics, intricate beads, and (in our experience) gracious hospitality.

But with their distinctive spears and extravagant shields, they’ve been known as much for fitness and fighting as refinement and grace. Not that they’re without ample dignity and a certain elegance.

A Masai Village

A few days ago, we visited a Masai village. Cow dung covered the ground, and helped precipitate fires that cook food and warm huts.

We crouched into a typical structure… a small, low, dark hovel where we were warmly welcomed by the man of the “house”. He showed us the cowhide “bed” on which his family of four sleeps, under a tiny opening supplying hints of air and a speckle of light.

The adjacent “room” contained a small pit for cooking, with surrounding holes that served as storage.

As all Masai women do, our host’s wife built the hut. Made of olive wood, with roofing of acacia and cow hide, the structures take three months to build and last about ten years.

Masai men are polygamous. Their role is to manage their wives and tend the herd. Each of his wives has her own hut. His kids attend a village school where they learn Swahili, English, and practical arts.

A Masai medicine man explained that his people prefer prevention to remedy, and showed us some natural palliatives to address or avoid common ailments. Surgeries and other serious treatments require travel to the “Western” (i.e., modern hospital) several hours away.

We’ve often recalled how civilization requires low time preference. While emphasis on education seems to be expanding horizons, the Masai historically devoted their attention almost entirely to the present.

Lacking a savings ethic or the capital accumulation it encourages, the Masai have little choice but to live for today.

There’s no plumbing, electricity, or refrigeration to preserve food. They consume what they can from that day’s kill. Whatever remains is hung from a tree.

The next morning more cattle is slaughtered. From it comes more meat and blood on which the Masai subsist. The process repeats the next day.

Because they shunned anticipation and planning, the Masai were always difficult to enslave or imprison… at least for an extended periods of time.

To the extent they envisioned tomorrow, they couldn’t imagine it being different from today. With such a limited outlook and little ability to hope, most quickly died when captured in war.

After initially prohibiting the Masai from fighting in the First World War, the British decided to conscript them. The Morani warriors refused, and disappeared into the bush.

In pursuit, the King’s African Rifles killed two old women while mistakenly firing into a manyatta. This precipitated open revolt on the Masai Reserve.

The British negotiated a fragile peace, and received some Masai assistance in the fight against Germany. After the war, the Crown increased its control over Kenya.

Reminiscent of what Valois kings did to Loire peasants, the Masai were shoved from ancestral land to create hunting grounds and game preserves.

The Edges of Dogma

When Karen Blixen arrived from Denmark, she noted a striking lack of prejudice among the Kikuyu near her coffee plantation. She attributed this indifference to long acquaintance with many races and tribes.

This makes sense. Isolation encrusts conviction. But as commerce commences and travel increases, the interaction of goods and culture softens certainty. As exchange proliferates, competing beliefs rub against each other, dulling the edges of dogma.

As Blixen put it,

“Nearly every Native, down to the little herdboys of the plains, has in his day stood face to face with a whole range of nations as different from one another, and to him, as a Sicilian to an Esquimo [sic]: Englishmen, Jews, Boers, Arabs, Somali Indians, Swaheli [sic], Masai, and Kavirondo. As far as receptivity of ideas goes, the Native is more a man of the world than the suburban or provincial settler or missionary, who has grown up in a uniform community with a set of stable ideas.”

The Masai Reserve was across the river from Blixen’s Ngong farm. She was there almost three decades, during which she opened a school on the property.

School Visit

Being several hours from there, we visited a different school on Saturday. With about seventy-five students, Kileleoni is in the middle of the Masai Mara, and named for the “peak” below which the academy sits.

When we arrived, dozens of smiling faces waited outside. Standing in a horseshoe formation, the kids began singing songs to welcome their guests.

Most children were under twelve. Some were as young as two. The youngest came as wards of older siblings.

Students usually wear uniforms, but Saturday morning (which is a half-day) their usual attire was in the wash. Many walked barefoot, marching nonplussed thru piles of manure that grace the grounds.

The children danced as they continued singing. Grabbing our hands, they guided us toward their humble class. We waited as they walked in. A few minutes later, we followed.

Ducking our head under the low lintel, we saw about thirty students crammed behind or between planks that doubled as benches and desks.

Within this modest, fly-invested enclosure… with cramped conditions, poor ventilation, and little light… the instructors and students put to shame what passes for most “education” in the U.S. The only technology was a blackboard and some chalk.

Students and teachers were actively engaged. With each question every hand went up. Nine year-olds pleaded to be at the front of the room, to show off their proficiency to their American audience.

When we were asked to complete an equation or identify a word, cheers and applause rewarded the accomplishment. The children were fascinated with us, wondering about our age, children, favorite color, and (in a couple instances) number of wives.

Smart phones captured their attention, which quickly fixated on photos of themselves. By providing additional exposure to our screens, I left lamenting the damage we might have done.

Eyes of God

“In normal years”, as Blixen related a century ago, “the long rains began in the last week of March and went on into the middle of June.”

We’re at the tail end of that window, which in recent decades seems to have shifted earlier by several weeks.

Distinguished from the “short rains” in November and December, the more intense Spring soakings are liable to cause flooding, close roads, and inhibit migration.

April absorbs over eight inches of rain. June receives fewer than four. While most drops are presumably behind us, lingering moisture remains a magnet for mosquitoes. So do we, tho’ we’re relieved to have attracted relatively few.

The weather has been beautiful. This is the “chilly” season on the highlands of East Africa. Nights are cool, the days comfortable, breezes common. Temperatures rarely breach 80F, and touch the mid-50s just before dawn.

By the time yesterday’s sunrise arrived, we were under a balloon above the earth, watching the world thru the eyes of God. Thru the darkness, we dodged hippo and buffalo to reach the baskets that would lift us aloft.

Lights flickered beyond the plain and thru the trees, signaling the location of surrounding homes. In Kenya, these houses can be owned by their inhabitants.

This contrasts with Tanzania, where all property is owned by the government and leased to those who wish to use it. Most U.S. states work the same way, tho’ governments use “property tax” as their euphemism for “rent”.

Fine Wine

After boarding the balloons, we cut the cord that tethered us to earth. Below us zebra, buffalo, wildebeest, hyenas, and warthogs scattered and scampered among the balanites of the Mara.

As our balloon ascended, the rising sun revealed the scene. The great vault filled with clarity like a fine wine into a crystal glass.

Suddenly yet gently, the plateaus and peaks caught the light. As the earth turned towards the sun, grassy slopes assumed hues of gold. Balanite dots affirmed the wisdom of the Masai’s appellation.

Tho’ the same ecosystem, the Masai Mara is more concentrated than the Serengeti, often making animal sightings easier.

Whereas the Serengeti is characterized by vast plains - and Amboseli features a mix of open grasslands, thick marsh, and acacia woodlands - Masai Mara offers diverse landscapes… including riverine forests, prominent plateaus, and sharp escarpments.

After an hour surveying this sublime scene from a clear sky, we softly descended toward champagne breakfast on the savannah.

Innocent Bystanders

Our palates cleansed and our stomachs full, we then came upon another feast. On the road from our breakfast were four lions enjoying brunch. Within the hour they’d killed a giraffe, which they’d begun to ravage in a dry ravine.

Like innocent bystanders at a murder scene, a tower of giraffes and dandy of zebras watched the victim being devoured. They were keeping their friends close, but their enemies closer… to prevent the lions from launching an ambush.

Back at camp, an afternoon lull offers opportunity to write. Thru my outdoor “office”, a soft breeze wafts off the Mara.

In the river, a dozen hippos take a nap. Across it, an army of monkeys frolics in the foliage. Around us flit a gang of mongoose, flocks of birds…

… and a symphony of sounds from a million creatures we’ll never see.

JD

Nanuki, Kenya

June 7, 2025

[NB: Our journey started last weekend. Previous installments are here, here, here, here, here, here, and here]

“Maybe we should just go to Busch Gardens.”

- Me to my wife, when trying to obtain a visa to Tanzania

Doug Casey is among the world’s most successful speculators. When he shares investment philosophy, it’s wise to listen.

Shun bonds, hold gold, receive warrants, and diversify politically are sound suggestions he offers today.

But given where I’m writing, another adage Casey recently repeated might be more relevant: avoid investing in any country with the color green in its flag.

We’ve wandered two republics featuring verdant hues in their national banners. Each offers ample reason to heed Casey’s advice.

Equatorial Resort

I’m glad William Holden didn’t. On a tour of Kenya in 1959, Holden and a couple friends bought a hotel property near Nanyuki.

Over the ensuing decades, luxury cottages, sunken baths, tennis, golf, and wildlife facilities sprouted from the lush terrain west of Mt Kenya.

The Mt Kenya Safari Club sits astride the equator thirty miles from its namesake mountain. Drinks are ordered from the main bar in the northern hemisphere, and enjoyed by a fireplace situated in the south.

At 7,000 feet above the sea, the resort sits on a hundred acres… across which llama, peacocks, baboons, and colobuses roam free across the lawn. Last night we indulged a fire-fed feast along the Leakey River.

On site is a remarkable “orphanage” for vulnerable animals, some to be tended the rest of their lives, others destined to be returned to the wild.

The landscaping is immaculate, the service superb. On the grounds is a golf course that serves as a walking safari. Across it scamper baboons, impala, waterbuck, warthogs, and colobus. In his final shot of our round yesterday, my younger son walked off with a hole-in-one.

Rough Ride

Getting here wasn’t easy, which reinforces the maxim of which Casey reminds us.

A forty minute flight carried us from Amboseli to Ol Pejeta. Here resides the largest population of eastern black rhinos in Kenya.

But the assortment of animals by which they’re surrounded is astounding. Anything we’d seen elsewhere we saw here, while also adding a couple cheetahs and more hypnotic terrain.

From there, we stopped for lunch, and proceeded north. The ride to (and thru) Nanyuki was rough. The roads treated us the way James Bond’s bartender treats his martinis.

Most paths were unpaved. Whichever weren’t may as well have been. We weaved incessantly around ubiquitous potholes, which in most places were more prevalent than pavement.

Originally settled in 1907 by British, Nanyuki became a base for the King’s Army, as it now is for the Kenyan Air Force.

Small farms and wildlife conservancies surround the town. Within it, poverty grinds and festers as in most Kenyan villages.

Buildings are makeshift, and look liable to fall under the seismic shove of a strong sneeze. From them traders sell supplies to regional ranches, farms, and parks.

Along the road, children emerged from school. Some chased our epileptic truck, extending hands and smiles in hopes of receiving samples of “sweets”.

Wasabi and Sushi

Bruised backsides aren’t the only obstacle to reaching this region. Planning a trip to East Africa isn’t like preparing to visit South Dakota.

As with almost all international travel, passports are required. But so are visas and (presumably) yellow fever vaccines.

Yet like the IRS forcing you to tell them what you think you “owe”, much of what’s really required is a guessing game. If you choose incorrectly, you’re made to pay a fee and then try again.

All governments share general traits. But they’re exhibited with varying degrees of effectiveness and efficiency.

Corruption and incompetence are common to all of them. But like wasabi with sushi, the mix and amount determine the discomfort they cause.

Many are insidious, yet inept… which can be OK. If the people appointed to push us around are going to be awful (which is the sort of person such roles typically attract), it’s best they be bumbling imbeciles incapable of inflicting too much harm.

The worst governments would be ruthless regimes run by brilliant psychopaths with powerful tools and elite capabilities. Fortunately, that combination is relatively rare.

Long Slog

For Tanzania and Kenya, the visa processes couldn’t have been more annoying… or the vaccine requirements more ambiguous.

Not that I wasn’t warned.

Family friends visited this area last fall. Apparently, applying for visas would take longer (and be more painful) than the flights to Africa.

That was a bit of an exaggeration. In reality, getting here wasn’t nearly as painful as getting permission to come.

Our friend’s advice was to grab a cup of (Irish) coffee… or a fifth of Scotch… and settle in for a long slog. When she put it that way, it didn’t sound so bad. Until I logged in to the official “websites”.

I tried Tanzania first.

With trembling hands I followed the links, and made my way to the questionnaire. I answered several boilerplate inquiries about where I was from, who I married, and whether I’d ever been to Tanzania.

It seemed easy, and I began to relax. At the bottom of the page was a transparent banner offering the option of returning to the previous page or continuing to the next.

Underneath was a final question I now can’t recall. But I couldn’t answer it because it was under the banner. I was unable to scroll down or proceed to the next page.

I decided to go back to where I’d been, which made me repeat answers I’d already given. I was dumb enough to do this several times.

I decided to call the Tanzanian embassy. No one answered. I phoned the home government in Dodoma, but was told the number didn’t exist.

After a few days of this idiocy, I paid a third-party a couple hundred bucks to obtain Tanzanian visas for each member of our family… which it did.

The Horse’s Mouth

The Kenyan website worked a bit better. But it indicated that yellow fever vaccination (or a doctor’s note attesting the shot should be avoided) was required to enter the country.

Additional research revealed such proof was required only if entering Kenya from a “high-risk” area. Was Tanzania among them? It was unclear. I decided to call the Kenyan embassy.

After several calls that no one answered, I finally reached a woman who sounded like she was in the bottom of a well.

“Good afternoon. May I help you?”

“Good afternoon”, I replied. “I’m a US citizen planning to travel to Kenya from Tanzania next month. Do I need to have proof of yellow fever - or any other - vaccination to do so?”

“No”, she laughed. “There is no yellow fever in the United States.”

“Yes, I know”, I responded. “But we will be coming to Kenya from Tanzania…”

“You do not need it”, she interrupted.

“Even if we come from Tanzania?”

“Yes.”

“Can you send something on Kenyan government letterhead corroborating that?”, I requested.

“Why?”

“In case someone asks me for proof at the border.”

“They won’t”, she insisted thru rising irritation. “You are hearing this from the horse’s mouth.”

“Is that the reference I should provide the border agent?”, I wondered.

A couple other members of our party had similar questions about Kenya’s yellow fever requirements. They also called the embassy, and received the same answer from a woman who called herself “the horse’s mouth.” I’m sure it was the same person, probably the only employee of the Kenyan “embassy”.

While comforted by the possibility no vaccination was required, I remained unsure. All documentation I’d seen implied (or insisted) that it was.

The only contrary evidence was an assertion from some nameless voice in what claimed to be the Kenyan embassy. I doubted a border agent would accept that when I tried to enter his country.

We’ll never know. When we came to Kenya a few days ago, no one requested my yellow fever vaccination card.

Maybe “the horse’s mouth” was right. Or perhaps such uncertainties are inherent crapshoots when going to countries with green in their flag.

Just as they are in those where it isn’t.

JD

Amboseli, Kenya

June 5, 2025

[NB: Our journey started last weekend. Previous installments are here, here, here, here, here, and here]

“A zebra doesn’t change its spots.”

- Al Gore

The Masai call the western crest of Kilamanjaro the Ngàje Ngài, the “House of God”. Time won’t permit us to ascend the summit. But we’re pleased to be on the Lord’s lawn.

The drive from Arusha to Namanga is desolate, like central Nevada with more shrubs and worse roads. But the Kenyan version made our Tanzanian trek feel like the autobahn.

One-Stop Shop

We breached the border with little difficulty. Named for the neighboring hills, the Namanga crossing is a “one-stop” shop that processes travelers transiting between Tanzania and Kenya.

A single room with the national boundary between two plexiglass windows, it operates more by whim than regulation. Passage is mostly a matter of each agent’s mood.

Sometimes fingerprints are taken. Occasionally, health records are checked. Every once in a while, luggage is screened. From time to time, some travelers are simply waved thru. East African whimsy isn’t confined to borders.

Earlier this week, flying from Serengeti to Arusha, the metal detectors and luggage screeners were on the fritz. In the U.S., flights would’ve been delayed or canceled till security theater could be resumed.

But in Seronera, shoulders shrugged. Thru the small airport we walked without question or inspection onto the tarmac, and proceeded to the plane with all the formality of boarding a bus.

To avoid screening at Namanga, our bags were carried around inspection by locals having good “relationships” with border officials.

Bribes are common in Kenya, as they are in almost every country. This includes the United States, where they’re commonly called “speaking fees”, “book advances”, or “campaign contributions.”

All we offered were brief answers to whatever was asked, which wasn’t much. Tanzanian agents and Kenyan officials were smiling and pleasant. Each side checked our visas, stamped our passport… and moved us along.

The real gauntlet came next.

Mobs of Masai women “greeted” us as walked toward our truck. We averted our eyes from the barrage of beads they brandished to lighten our wallets.

Tho’ it’s tempting to make token purchases to alleviate their plight, signs of interest or empathy would cause the swarm to surge. Heads down and legs churning, we parted the pack and found our truck.

Secure in our seats, we turned from the window. Outside, the pleading persisted. Faces and hands pressed the panes till we drove away.

Corrugated Road

The “road” from Namanga to Amboseli removed a few fillings. It was like riding in a paint shaker. There’s apparently a plan to pave the path, in anticipation of which speculators are buying plots of adjacent real estate.

It’s now occupied by dilapidated shacks, a few missionary schools, periodic corn, plenty of coffee, and occasional cattle.

Moving north from the border, trees multiplied and foliage thickened. Mountains resembled the Appalachians, covered from piedmont to peak in a sheath of green. But during the incipient dry season, most vegetation will wither away.

Continuing into the country, cows, giraffes, and jackals nibbled leaves and grass along the corrugated “road.”

Agriculture is the largest industry in Kenya, fueled mostly by exports of coffee, tea, and flowers. Starbucks is among the bigger buyers of beans, while the Netherlands imports the most Kenyan flowers.

The dominant tribe in Kenya is the Kikuyu, found mostly in the central part of the country. Originally farmers, they are becoming more proficient in business.

Swahili is the most common language, tho English is the official one. Eighty percent of Kenyans are Christian. As in Tanzania, the legacy of Arab traders concentrated Islam on the coast. Traditional beliefs of forty-four tribes honeycomb the country.

As terrain flattened and foliage thinned, trees yielded to dry scrub. An import from South America, prickly pear made an appearance. Dust rose when the wind whipped, an appropriate entré to Amboseli.

The Only Kink

Kilamanjaro loomed above us as we passed the gate. This protrusion from the plain has three peaks formed by volcanic eruptions over millions of years. One is now dormant, while two have merged over time.

The highest free-standing summit in the world moved from Kenya to Tanzania when Queen Victoria gifted the mountain to her nephew… who would eventually become the German Kaiser.

Or so the story goes.

It’s superficially plausible, but probably apocryphal. The boundary was among many artificial constructs drawn in European boardrooms during the “scramble for Africa”. This one was etched in 1886.

From Lake Victoria to the Indian Ocean, it separates Kenya from Tanzania in one of those unnaturally straight lines that denote political chicanery around the globe. The only kink is where Kilamanjaro sits.

This came from negotiations that allowed German East Africa to keep the peak. They did so till the First World War.

Britain’s vast empire was her Achilles heel. To relieve pressure on its forces in Europe, the Germans decided to expand the war around the world… including British holdings in East Africa.

In this theater, imperial powers relied on others to do their fighting. The Germans conscripted thousands of natives. The British imported Indians, or impressed those who were already here. Most were poorly trained, and understandably indifferent to this internecine squabble.

When the fighting was finished, Britain received Tanganyika, which retained the mountain. But Kenya kept the view.

Measured in Teeth

It’s most visible from Amboseli, a European distortion of a Masai word meaning “salty dust.” It’s an apt appellation. Wherever we go, a white coat covers the earth or sprays the air.

In Amboseli, elephants are everywhere, like “painted ladies” near a naval base. This attribute makes it a prime destination for wildlife enthusiasts.

Up to 2,000 elephants roam the Amboseli ecosystem, which features that animal the way Serengeti offered up Lions. Many familiar faces are also here: wildebeest, zebra, warthogs, and hippos.

But elephants are most prominent. Their lifespan is measured in teeth, of which they exhaust six sets over as many decades. When they lose the last one, they’re unable to eat. Before long, the great beasts starve to death.

Unless people get them first.

Human hunters are the main threat to African elephants. Amboseli rhinoceri have already been poached to extinction, so harsh measures try to protect these pachyderms. Poachers can be legally shot on sight.

Recent rains washed away what pass for “roads”, making passage thru the park particularly bumpy. But the most reliable water comes from below.

Kilamanjaro snow is there all year, replenishing Amboseli ponds thru underground fissures formed when the mountain erupted millions of years ago.

Palms are more prevalent here than in other places we’ve been, yet dry grassland remains pervasive. But reliable water attracts the elephants, while brackish pools become home to hippos. Antelope, wildebeest, and zebra all appreciate the ample supply.

But only if they can get to it. Late yesterday under an impending dusk, a lone zebra lay prone on the ground.

His solitude and position were each unusual. Zebras are ornery, but rarely alone. They’re often around other animals as well as each other.

But this zebra was by himself. He was obviously debilitated, most likely from the venom of a viper.

Whether from poison or predators, he likely knew his days were done. When the sun set, he’d likely have his last night on the Lord’s lawn.

JD

Serengeti National Park, Tanzania

June 3, 2025

[NB: Our journey started last weekend. Previous installments are here, here, here, here, and here.]

Thomas Jefferson requested fossils, bones, and live animals when he sent Lewis and Clark to explore the west. He kept what he received in the parlor at Monticello, hoping it would one day grace a worthy museum in the United States.

Within Jefferson’s lifetime, the precursor to the Smithsonian was founded. In 1816, a group of Washington citizens formed the Colombian Institute for the Promotion of Arts and Sciences. Thomas Jefferson was an honorary member.

Growth was slow. But in succeeding decades, specimens, shells, and minerals compounded its collection.

A bequest from British Scientist James Smithson followed a somewhat convoluted path to seed the museum that would bear his name.

In the middle of the 19th century, its distinctive “Castle” adorned the Mall. By the turn of the 20th, the National Zoo opened a few miles away.

The Natural History Museum arose in 1911. To help fill its coffers, another former president offered to gather samples of fossils and fauna.

“Clearly Insane”

Theodore Roosevelt looked and acted like a caricature of himself. The teeth, the glasses, the bombast, the bravado: had he not existed, he couldn’t have been invented. With ample evidence, Mark Twain called him “clearly insane.”

He was a bastion of unbridled energy. Roosevelt rarely rested, and needed no impetus for adventure.

Rumor had it that he read a book before breakfast and gulped a gallon of coffee every day. To relax, he once announced he’d take a month off to do absolutely nothing…except write a biography of Oliver Cromwell.

Which he did.

Predictably, boredom afflicted him when he left office. To stay busy and out of his successor’s way, Roosevelt went to Africa.

Andrew Carnegie funded the voyage, which the Smithsonian sponsored. The ostensible intent was to collect samples for the Natural History Museum. It was successful, bringing back 11,000 specimens for the burgeoning gallery.

Needless to say, the effective founder of the U.S. National Park Service supported the British government creating game reserves from “wilderness” on which indigenous tribes happened to live. Roosevelt was to some extent responsible for creating playgrounds for the rich on two different continents.

Paradoxically, the man who killed over 500 animals on his east African safari condemned “game butchery as being objectionable as any form of wanton cruelty and barbarity”, while castigating protestations against game hunting as “a sign of softness of head, not soundness of heart.”

Unknown Origin

A couple decades later, Ernest Hemingway reached the Serengeti. While here he hunted, fished, and contracted amoebic dysentery. His evacuation and recovery inspired The Snows of Kilamanjaro.

Hemingway returned twenty years later, joined by his fourth wife and burdened by the weight of irredeemable alcoholism. Declared dead on a couple occasions, he twice had the opportunity to read his own obituary while in Tanzania.

Some claim Hemingway introduced the word “safari” as a way to describe what we’ve been doing. Others credit British explorer Richard Burton a century earlier.

Who knows?

Maybe one introduced the word, and the other popularized it. “Safari” is of Swahili descent and Arabic origin, describing a “journey” to seek wild animals in their natural habitat.

For many years, this entailed hunting or (when that became illegal) poaching. Our objective was more modest. We simply hoped to catch a glimpse or take a gander.

Tripartite Composition

We’ve been three days in the Serengeti, a vast savannah covering an area the size of Connecticut. Formed several hundred thousand years ago, till the last couple centuries these prairies were known only to Masai herdsmen and a few hunter-gathers.

The arrival of Arab slave-traders and European resource prospectors revealed the largest number of lions in the world. This attracted hunter tourism among Western adventurers.

It also attracted us.

“Serengeti” is a Masai word meaning “endless plain.” Volcanic ash from the Ngorongoro Highlands formed or influenced these fertile grasslands supporting a wide variety of famous fauna.

While most of the same animals can be found in many parks across east Africa, a few distinctions make this place unique.

Serengeti is home to the largest population of wildebeests and zebras, which form the core of the Great Migration. We’ve watched part of this progression from our exquisite accommodations, which offer boundless vistas over this terrestrial ocean.

The scene is mesmerizing… a smattering of exposed rocks, stand-alone trees, and an unrivaled array of animals amid a tripartite composition of infinite grasslands.

The “short-grass” extends into southern Serengeti from Ngorongoro, The “intermediate” surrounds these to the north and west, and the “long” plains reach further north near Seronera.

In the woodlands and on the savannah are “bunch grasses” growing in clumps or tufts. These have deep roots, rendering them less nutritious and suboptimal for grazing.

“Lawn grasses” are most common in the Serengeti. With shallow roots offering ample nutrients, they are ideal for grazing and the most prevalent grass on the plains.

Sporadic trees are essential to the ecosystem and ornamental to the eye. Like a tornado thru a trailer park, many are toppled by elephants seeking sustenance from the roots. Those the pachyderms pass provide perches for birds, food for hungry giraffes, or camouflaged bases for leopards on the look-out.

Ensemble Cast

A diverse bird population blesses these plains, with over 500 species in the Serengeti. Wildebeest are in abundance, with almost two million ambling annually on their Great Migration.

A few hundred thousand zebra join this circular trek, using the wildebeest as radars for rain... and as guinea pigs willing to test river crossings for lurking crocs.

More ominous animals are here too. The critter that kills the most people in Africa is the hippopotamus, a creature whose closest relative is the whale.

As national animal of Tanzania, the elegant giraffe strides gracefully across the Serengeti stage. An ensemble of baboons, topi, impalas, elephants, klipspringers, and jackals join legions of lions lurking, climbing, or lounging in the grass, on limbs, or atop the rocks of this prodigious park.

Being notoriously shy, cheetahs and leopards eluded us. But lions lack such reclusive pride. On a couple occasions we found families feasting on carcasses of wildebeest and zebra, or tending to needs of their frisky cubs.

In their wake were the gluttons of the air, wild vultures that precisely perceive the remnants of a kill. Vultures travel almost 150 miles per day and can see a carcass from 6km.

They can’t kill for themselves. Their talons are too weak to lift, so they must wait for future food to die, or to scavenge scraps from satiated lions. Hyenas clean whatever remains.

One species is conspicuously absent on the endless plain. Humans no longer inhabit the Serengeti.

The Masai were pushed out sixty years ago, because poachers disguised themselves in their garb. They were relocated to Ngorongoro, from which they’re again resisting a forced removal.

Rhinoceri are most coveted by the poachers, primarily for their horns. Every seven hours in Africa, someone tries to kill a rhino. The culprits are mostly uneducated locals acting as middle men, usually paid just enough to entice them to kill.

Poachers can get creative, crafting shoes impressing animal prints to disguise their trails. They better hope it works.

Because corruption causes many poachers to be set free, Kenyan law lets them be shot on sight. We’ll bear that in mind as we head north.

As we do we remain receptive to any eventuality, recalling an observation from Denys Finch-Hatton that “the earth was made round, so we wouldn’t see too far down the road.”

JD

Karatu, Tanzania

May 31, 2025

[NB: Our journey started last weekend. Previous installments are here, here, here, and here.]

We’re traveling astride the Great Rift Valley… an intercontinental system of ridges and ruts running from southern Turkey to Mozambique. Along it lie the Ribbon Lakes of this region, the Red Sea, Gulf of Aqaba, Dead Sea, and Lake Gennesaret.

Beneath us, fidgety faults are splicing Africa into separate plates: the Nubian carrying most of the continent west, the Somali sending the horn of Africa toward Asia.

The rift formed in the Miocene, about 25 million years ago. Active volcanoes and brittle faulting dot and define this dynamic topography.

For the moment, we’re just south of the equator and more than a mile above sea level. But as mantle plume keeps heating and heaving the overlying crust, the terrain will continue to expand and fracture… and move us east.

As it does, the valley slowly sinks, till one day ocean water will flood the basin. With any luck, that won’t happen in the next few weeks.

While we wait, the rift lakes remain permanent basins for local rivers. As incoming streams deposit sediment, they store fossils that capture an anthropologic record… which extends back millions of years.

Tectonic shifts open dusty panes to humanity’s past. As lakes migrate with moving plates, their inputs carve layers revealing a thousand centuries of encased fossils. It’s like natures versions of a roadway cut.

Some of the larger ones are in the Ngorongoro Crater, the largest intact un-flooded caldera in the world. A couple hours west of Arusha, this remnant of an extinct volcano is a maternity ward of prehistoric man. Our lodge is perched along the crest of the crater.

As when Edmund Hillary climbed Everest or Roger Bannister broke the four-minute mile, the discoveries of Louis and Mary Leakey opened the floodgates to eclipse accomplishments previously thought impossible.

Of all places on the planet, few feature evidence of earlier human habitation. Since the Leakeys’ discoveries in the Olduvai Gorge, fossilized remains of hominids and encrusted remnants of cultural behavior have increased exponentially.

The gorge is divided into five geological layers, with a main branch and side off-shoots, with distinct species of hominids known as Australopithecus and Homo Habilis found within the lower pleats of volcanic ash.

Among the fossils were roughly chipped rocks believed to be the earliest known stone tools. Within the layers of sediment and stone were the bones of those who crafted these implements. These mark the onset of the Paleolithic Age.

The Ngorongoro remains home to some humans. Masai inhabitants had dwindled to fewer than a thousand after the Second World War. But they’ve increased a hundred-fold the last eighty years.

From the perspective of a government maintaining a wildlife reserve, their proliferation is a “problem” primarily because of their cattle, which competes for food with zebra, wildebeest, and a menagerie of protected critters within the crater.

Toward the top of the volcano, thatched roofs cover Masai huts, the number of which do not directly reveal prosperity of Masai man. His wealth is more accurately measured in cattle, wives, and children… often in that order.

Heavenly Illumination

Our visit came by way of Lake Manyara, a soda lake at the foot of the Great Rift Valley. Like many protected areas of east Africa, what’s now the Manyara Reserve was once used for hunting.

Unlike other game preserves in the region, Manyara is thick with foliage. Its designation as home of “the climbing lions” is a marketing gimmick. Not because lions are rare, but because trees are ubiquitous.

All lions can climb. But most parks have few trunks to claw or limbs to lounge on, so Manyara makes the most of what makes it unique.

While we were there, whatever lions it boasts were hidden by leaves. We consoled ourselves with an assortment of baboons, monkeys, elephants, and antelope.

From Manyara our voyage carried us up the wall of Ngorongoro, and to our rooms atop the caldera.

This morning we awoke to a startling sunrise over Lake Magadi. Like a night watchmen protecting the darkness, clouds deflected incipient rays into the water below.

It was as if the light were on at the base of a pool. Heavenly illumination seemed to ascend, dissolving fog to dissipate the dawn. The caldera lake, floor, and walls slowly came to view.

Before us was the reputed cradle of man. With that qualification and its abundance of wildlife, this geologic goblet can make its case as the Garden of Eden.

We drove down from 7,600 feet. Thru the mist, a group of giraffes roamed the top of the ridge. Their long front legs prohibit them from journeying into the caldera, so they wished us well on the steep decline.

The bottom of the bowl is more than a mile above the sea. A distant elephant lumbered alone on the dry prairie west of the lake, a saline basin within the grip of a graben.

Her Own Script

Gazelles were first to greet us: First a handful, eventually hundreds. A lone rhino posed in the distance, herds of buffalo shuffled near the water, and confusions of wildebeest bumbled across the road.

To our astonishment, we found two male lions lyin’ on one side of it. Both were asleep, as lions typically are twenty hours each day.

Aside from one of them casually rolling onto his side, they didn’t flinch at our being a few yards away.

Several minutes later, three females were resting within a couple hundred feet. In the distance, dozens of wildebeest began to gallop. For whatever reason, one decided to break away.

He trotted toward our truck. Between him and us, one lioness tucked her ears and lowered her back. As her hind legs prepared to pounce, the oblivious wildebeest continued to approach.

Our only option was to start recording. A few seconds after I did, the prospective prey perceived his plight.

Seeing his predator, he changed course, picked up speed… and ran away. The lioness relaxed, and resumed her watch.

Lions are more liable to pounce than to chase. Rather than speed, they rely on strength and surprise. Their strategy is to stalk and ambush.

Occasionally they get lucky, and fresh meat falls in their lap. Sometimes our luck fails, as when we narrowly miss a wildebeest serving himself up.

We were disappointed to not see a kill. But as our guide reminded us, “Mother Nature always writes her own script, but it’s always blessing us.”

He was right.

A few minutes earlier, we’d seen a rarity. A few channels connect a small pond to the main lake. Within it was a large rock… that began to move.

Like a giant slug slithering to shore, the mighty hippo pierced the surface. A couple others soon appeared, and make their way into one of the canals. Like the Ever Given blocking the Suez, the twin beasts clogged passage.

Behind the initial hippo, a small object floated on the pond. It was the “tiny” off-spring of the lead animal. With its mother, the baby came ashore.

Briefly.

Because of lions and other predators, it’s rare for infant hippos to leave the water. Within minutes, this one jumped back in… before emerging again and hiding in the grass.

Loyal Sentries

Most of the morning we were among Zebras. Like sheep dotting the fields of Ireland, they filled the flatlands on the far side of lake. Many surrounded us for our al fresco lunch.

On the water, flamingos flourished. But rising salinity places their sanctuary at risk. Beyond the birds as we rode away, the tusks of a half dozen elephants glistened in the sun.

As we made the ascent up the caldera wall, a troop of baboons flanked the road. Further up, we approached the lodge.

As we made the turn, our loyal sentries remained at their post. Standing watch above the world, a troop of giraffe welcomed us home.

JD

Arusha, Tanzania

May 29, 2025

[NB: Our journey started last weekend. Previous installments are here, here, and here]

We landed late Monday. After collecting our luggage, clearing customs, and meeting our driver, we made our way to the Gran Melia.

Over roads resembling London after the Blitz, the trip covered a short distance in a long time. Potholes provided us an “African massage” during the thirty-mile ride, which ended at 2:30 Tuesday morning.

At the airport, we’d apologized to the guide for our late arrival and slow procession thru Immigration.

“No problem”, he assured us. “In Africa, there is no rush.”

We immediately learned he was right. Thank goodness.

The leisurely pace is welcome relief. But it requires adjustment. Americans are used to watching our watches. We’re anxious for action, and grow weary of waiting. This is a perfect place to break that habit.

An Active Hive

The patient staff checked us in, took our bags, and showed us to our rooms. Awakening later that morning, we pulled the curtains for the grand reveal.

The scene is spectacular. Lush. Dense. Colorful.

And calm.

An intermittent rain soothed the soul as it soaked the soil. Surrounded by plantations of coffee, bananas, papaya and tea, the resort nestles at the base of Mt Meru, the second-highest summit in Tanzania... and higher than any peak in the contiguous U.S.

We’re just outside Arusha. Dubbed by (of all people) Bill Clinton as the “Geneva of Africa”… for its proclivity for peace agreements, diplomatic conferences, and international tribunals… the city is exactly halfway between Cape Town and Cairo.

Arusha is of relatively recent vintage. Less than two centuries ago, it was little more than mud huts and stick “houses”. Excepting several enclaves reserved for the rich, few parts look much better now.

It buzzes with outdoor markets that appear chaotic in the manner of an active hive. Products and produce are wheeled in carts and barrows, or precariously balanced atop feminine heads.

Unemployment is high, prompting vendors to peddle knick-knacks to scrounge some shillings. But all do so with relative good cheer. While it’s always wise to watch your wallet, no one approached us in a threatening manner.

Arusha traffic flows like molasses. The town features few stoplights, each of which is entirely optional. “Lanes” are a figment. As a legacy of British rule, an assortment of vehicles rides on the left side of the road. But they use it to go in every direction.

A couple roundabouts offer a semblance of “order”. One encircles the clock tower marking the midpoint between Cairo and Cape, another the Uhuru Monument commemorating Tanganyikan independence.

Wealth of Smiles

The main sources of Arusha’s $150 per capita monthly income are agriculture, tourism, and mining.

Many Tanzanians live hand-to-mouth. While electricity is common, many homes (up to 80% in certain areas) have no running water, relying on community tanks to replenish supply.

White corn, bananas, and coffee are predominant crops. Irrigation is limited, creating precarious reliance on fickle rain. Government subsidies ladle support to supply inevitable deficiencies. But they do so by draining the pot they presume to replenish.

Despite material poverty, Arushans offer a wealth of smiles. The locals we meet (admittedly a limited sample) seem happy and hospitable, and warmly welcome their pampered guests.

Blue Jewel

This region is under enormous pressure. Earthquakes and volcanoes are symptoms of tectonic forces pulling the continent apart.

The opening of the East Africa rift started millions of years ago. Separation proceeds to this day, and will continue till where we’re standing becomes the bottom of the sea.

For now, the process is reflected in an assortment of mountains and the Rift Valley. Tectonic trenches create alignments of large faults, and the formation of minerals of varying type and rarity.

Among them are garnet, sapphires, scapolites…

and tanzanite.

A variety of zoisite, this violet-blue gemstone is among the most unique on earth, found only in the Mererani Hills southeast of Arusha.

Tanzanite is mined from four designated “blocks” in a confined region, the only place on earth where the gem is found. Two zones are allotted to large operators, with the others reserved for local miners.

Tiffany & Co bestowed the name as part of a marketing campaign sixty years ago. But resource wealth was recognized long before.

White Highlands

The Masai ruled the region till the Berlin Conference of 1884, when Europeans decided to carve this continent. Land was divided and artificial borders drawn. Some encompassed the colony of German East Africa.

By the turn of the 20th century, Arusha’s location made it a convenient base for safaris, and a stopover for weary travelers traversing the continent.

A Greek magnate built the iconic Clock Tower outside the Arusha Hotel. The hotel became famous, hosting such notables as Baron Von Blixen and John Wayne, whose movie, Hatari!, was filmed at Momela Lakes and Mt Meru.

After the British evicted the Germans during the First World War, they built railways, which attracted commerce, growth, and a modicum of prosperity.

Arusha became a haven for the “White Highlands” of East Africa. Safaris proliferated between the wars. At the time, the primary purpose was the hunt… with the “Big Five” (rhinoceros, cape buffalo, elephant, leopard, and lion) being the most difficult animals to bag on foot.

Layered Clothing

Tanganyikan Independence was signed in this city in 1961, as were the 1993 Arusha Accords that resolved the Rwandan civil war. Similar agreements for Burundi (2000) and South Sudan (2015) lent additional credence to the “Geneva” moniker.

Arusha has been an official city for only a dozen years. Most growth has come this century, during which population has doubled. It’s risen six-fold since 1990.

Tho’ just south of the equator, Arusha’s elevation moderates humidity and provides pleasant weather. Layered clothing is appropriate. Sweaters and coffee mitigate morning chill. Short sleeves and cold beer help moderate afternoon warmth.

Tanzania is a new country with a long pedigree. Like many colonial constructs in the Middle East and Africa, its boundaries make little sense outside the wartime boardrooms of Western Europe.

The country comprises more than a hundred tribes, and as many tongues. Swahili is the main language, tho’ there isn’t an “official” one.

English is neither ubiquitous nor unusual. But its arrival is relatively recent (which is good enough for us).

Khoisan preceded it by at least 10,000 years. I’d give a history of the people who spoke that neolithic language, but I have no idea who they are.

The next few days may offer a clue. We’re going to the Ngorongoro Crater, where some pieces of Pleistocene puzzles are ostensibly scattered.

Today we ride west toward the Great Rift, to see if any of them fit together.

JD

Zanzibar, Tanzania

May 27, 2025

After a long flight, a late hour.

The day started early. We woke before dawn, and made our way to Charles De Gaulle. We left Paris a few hours later, by an aerial route Da Gama would’ve envied.

The flight was terrific. I’d forgotten how much I enjoy Air France. Years ago I worked for Delta Air Lines, where I helped develop pricing, revenue management, and financial settlement for the new SkyTeam Alliance.

I was one of Delta’s primary liaisons to Air France, whose headquarters were my office about a week each month. Their equipment was my occasional aircraft when I crossed the ocean.

The service wasn’t that different from Delta, which is better than any other U.S. airline. And it certainly isn’t the caliber of Singapore, Emirates, or Qatar.

But their smiling stewardi instinctively offered wine, Champagne, or Cognac each time they sashayed up the aisle.

They almost insisted on it, and seemed offended when anyone refused. On long flights, those details (and especially that one) make all the difference.

“Black Coast”

We have a short stint on this small island… to allow Zanzibar-bound passengers to deplane, the crew to change, and ground personnel to pretend to “clean” the cabin.

In the Indian Ocean only 15 miles from the mainland, we’re surrounded by shallow sandbars, pristine beaches, and crystal clear turquoise seas.

Along the shore, baobab trees resembling upright belemnites intermingle with stone ruins of houses, minarets, and wells… remnants of ancient ports into with Arab traders steered their dhows.

Tourism has increased twenty-fold the last four decades, and the place seems worth a visit. But, exhausted and confined in the middle of the night, we’ll have to accept other people’s word for whatever attractions we’re forced to miss.

We’re on an archipelago comprising three larger islands and several small ones. The biggest is officially known as Unguja. It’s more commonly (at least by non-natives) referred to as Zanzibar, from Arabic and Persian roots denoting the “black coast”.

At this hour, that could describe the darkness. But it probably referred to the native inhabitants, whose ancestors have been here for 20,000 years.

Into the Night

It feels like it took us that long for us to arrive, tho’ we hope to leave within the hour. About half the passengers from Paris already did, which may provide room to stretch-out on our next leg.

Outside, the tropical air is thick and sultry. As local passengers begin to board, a gentle rain soaks the tarmac as condensation and darkness obscure our view.

In the cabin things are easier to see. The flight is filled mostly with Europeans and North Americans, including a family beside me from Tennessee. A dash of Indians and Arabs spices this hop to the interior of Africa.

The first Europeans came with Da Gama five centuries ago. With the changing tides of shifting empires, colonization and safari kept bringing them back.

The Bantu arrived a thousand years before Da Gama dropped anchor. A succession of Persians, Greeks, and Romans made stops. Proximity and trade allowed Arabs and Indians to sink deeper roots.

Few were here as briefly as the travelers who’ve remained on this plane. Having topped the fuel, collected new passengers, and replaced our crew, the engines are on and the gate is receding.

The lights dim as we reach the runway and pick up speed. When we leave the ground, low clouds envelop the plane. What little illumination the island emits is a faint blur, like distant streetlights in a thick fog.

Within minutes, all is dark. Thru slight turbulence, the wheels retract, our eyelids drop, and we ascend again into the African night.

JD