The website for the mass transit bus on Oahu, called The Bus, said that the trip to Sea Life would take a little over an hour to get there. We found where the nearest bus stop was to our hotel and what time to be there and collected our stuff in anticipation of getting out of the heart of the tourist zone for a few hours. We walked down the street to the bus stop and just like mass transit anywhere in the world, we waited. And waited. And waited. Our bus finally arrived and after an hour and a half of stopping repeatedly to let passengers on and off and listening to the driver politely try to explain to non-English speaking tourists where the bus was going we finally made it to Sea Life Park. I really hate riding the bus!

We recently watched the movie Dolphin Tale and our daughter, Sydney, is now really into dolphins, along with every other living creature. Sealife Park has a dolphin show where she would get the chance to see a real live dolphin. Or at least she would have had we the forethought to check the schedule of shows for the day before leaving our hotel. Once at the park we saw that we had missed the one and only dolphin show for the day. Fortunately, there was another show that involved some other dolphins and would be starting shortly. As we were trying to figure out if it was worth spending $80 for the three of us to enter for only a couple of shows in this tiny marine park, a lady approached us and gave us an extra adult ticket that she had. Well, that settled it. It would only cost $50 for the three of us. We paid our entrance fee and made our way into the park and found the dolphin tank.

Once at the dolphin tank Sydney and another girl were mesmerized by the dolphins swimming round and round in the tank. The dolphin trainers had the dolphins do some tricks while blasting 80′s music. Next, they marched out the penguins, once again to 80′s music. And then came the sea lions and their tricks to more 80′s music. The show was cheesy, but Sydney enjoyed it.

Jumping Dolphin

March of the Penguins

Sea Lion Tricks

Sea Turtle and his $4 Lunch

We wandered the small park and saw what little there was to see, which wasn’t much. Kerri and Sydney wanted to feed the sea turtles and for only $4 for a small amount of salad greens (it looked like the leftovers of someone’s lunch), they got their wish. We discovered where the dolphin show is held and watched as some tourists, who after taking out a second mortgage on their homes, had the opportunity to swim with dolphins. I’ve heard that if you are going to swim with dolphins, do it in Mexico. You get more bang for your buck. It must have something about the lack of animal rights groups and regulations.

Our overall impression of Sea Life Park is that it is really small and like everything else within and around Waikiki, really expensive! I think what would have made the park even better would be a sushi stand. I think it would have been a huge hit with all of the Japanese tourists and would have answered one of life’s big unknowns; does dolphin really taste like tuna?

Once at our hotel in Waikiki one of the first things I did was find the address for Puka Dog and try to locate it on the map. This was high on my list of things to do in Waikiki on this trip. My wife Kerri, on the other hand, was not impressed with the idea of wasting valuable vacation time in the pursuit of processed meat in a bun. I tried to assure her that this would be worth it, but she wasn’t buying it.

A couple of days after arriving it was around dinner time and we happened to find ourselves near Puka Dog. Coincidence? I think not! We made our way over to the little whole in the wall shop and ordered three Puka dogs with fresh squeezed lemonades. They actually squeeze the lemon right in front of you. It’s fresh! When ordering a Puka Dog you first choose either a skinless polish sausage or the vegetarian dog and then choose the secret lemon garlic sauce, choice of a fruity relish, and Hawaiian mustard. The “bun” is basically a small loaf of bread with a hole in one end. They have special toaster prongs that the bun goes over to toast the bread on the inside while leaving the outside soft. After toasting, the sauces you ordered are squirted into the bun and the sausage is dropped into the hole and then topped off with some more sauces.  It is one of the most unique hot dogs we had ever seen and the assembly process was fascinating. Yes, we are easily amused.

We really enjoyed that night’s dinner, including Kerri, and found ourselves back there for another one a few days later. If you find yourself in Waikiki and enjoy a good sausage dog, you will love this place! And I highly recommend the mango relish, spicy jalapeno sauce, and lilikoi mustard. This really is the world’s greatest hot dog!

UPDATE: I just got an email from Puka Dog saying that the name of their Waikiki store is going to be changed to Hula Dog starting tomorrow. I bet too many people were calling it “Puke-a-dog” and it would make sense to change the name. Would you want to eat something with the word “puke” in it?

Enjoying Puka Dogs

Three years ago we spent three nights in Waikiki before heading to the island of Kauai. We had expected to hate Waikiki, but ended up liking it a lot. Here is what I wrote about it:

“While we were expecting our trip to Oahu to not be a good one, we were really surprised that it was a lot of fun. I especially liked Waikiki and if we were ever to move to Hawaii, I would want to live right in the middle of Waikiki. It is close to a great beach, a great park with a zoo, Diamond Head, shopping, it’s very clean, the locals are very friendly, and it has a great vibe to the place.  Sure it has a lot of tourists, but so do a lot of other places. The prices are high, but the weather is perfect and the activities are plentiful. It could be a great place to live after we are done traveling the world.”

Wow, we really liked it! We liked it so much that we decided to go back and spent all of last week there. But after this last visit, I no longer feel the love I did the first time we visited. It really is tourist hell! I think the difference between our two visits was the fact that we had a rental car the first time around and spent most of our time outside Waikiki visiting Pearl Harbor, the North Shore, and Diamond Head. But having to spend $25 a day for parking was a bit too much for us to rent a car on this last trip, so we decided to use local transportation, which kept us trapped in the hustle and bustle of Waikiki.

Hawaii is generally very expensive, but Waikiki is even more expensive. Milk costs over $9 a gallon, bread is $5 a loaf, and vehicle fuel is 50+ cents a gallon more compared to the mainland. We met an Australian family visiting the island for a few weeks and we asked them how the prices in Hawaii compared to those in Australia. They told us that the prices for food and goods in Hawaii are a lot cheaper than in Australia. Wow, there goes our plan of staying long term in Australia. I don’t think we will be able to afford it.

Waikiki is home to a lot of high end shopping. Walking down the street you see stores with designer names like Rolex, Coach, Armani, Chanel, Prada, and Gucci. On our first visit I was wowed by the glamour and glitter. But this last visit, I was sickened by the commercialization and the high prices people feel compelled to spend to keep up with the Jones’.  Even the guidebook said that Waikiki will present a lot of options for you to lose your hard earned money. Waikiki is the land of dreams, not reality. And who the hell are these Jones’ that everyone is trying to keep up with?

One of the things we love about visiting the tropics is waking up to the sound of tropical birds and the smell of tropical plants. In Waikiki, you wake up to the sounds of sirens, garbage trucks, and transit buses and the smell of vehicle exhaust. We already live in a big city and like to find some solitude on our vacations. There is no solitude in Waikiki.

Okay, so I have spewed a lot of negativity towards Waikiki, and that may not be entirely fair. It does have some great things like a great beach with warm ocean water that you can go in without worrying about hypothermia, unlike the Oregon coast. There are large parks and plenty of free outdoor activities. The trade winds are warm, and the people are friendly. It’s just not a place for quiet and solitude. But neither is any other large city that is a tourist magnet. Waikiki is Las Vegas with a beach. And I think the older we get, the more solitude we want. Damn, we REALLY must be getting old!

Our visit to Waikiki had some unexpected consequences.  Every time we travel we gain experience that will better prepare us for our upcoming round the world trip. Usually, the experience is more about our gear and clothing; what works, what doesn’t. But this time it was our expectations that we realized need to change. We plan to visit some seriously touristy places around the world and we cannot expect to like them all. We travel to see new places and try new things. Long term travel is an adventure, not a vacation, and we need to keep that in mind. We also realized that we should probably split the time in each of the countries we visit between the touristy sites and the non-touristy areas so we can get a true feel about each of the countries. You cannot experience a countries culture by hitting just the tourist traps. But then again, we wouldn’t want to miss out on seeing some amazing places like the Eiffel Tower and the Great Pyramids of Egypt. There is a reason they are tourist traps! We also learned that there are places around the world that are more expensive than we would have thought and we had better get a good sense of the cost of living before heading to a new country. After all, the longer we can stretch our travel budget, the longer we can travel.

So, if you are thinking about staying in Waikiki for a vacation, you may end up hating it if you stay too long. Best to split your trip up and spend a few days in Waikiki to see the sites, and then head to one of the other islands for solitude and to finish off your vacation the way a vacation should be. Relaxing! After visiting Oahu twice, Hawaii (the Big Island) twice, Maui once, and Kauai twice, we can honestly call Kauai our favorite. That island is truly magical!

As the 2011 Travel Photographer of the Year is announced, some tips to invigorate the way your document your trips

Winter is always an interesting time of year for photographers specialising in international and travel-based work.

Falling somewhere between art and journalism, travel photography is a genre of its own. What is more, with a wealth of portable HD and SD cameras available in both pocket sizes as well as full-size models from electrical experts such as Currys, travel photography is extremely accessible to anyone with a camera and a ticket to ride…

This year’s winner of the coveted Travel Photographer of the Year Award was London-born Louis Montrose, who in fact grew up in New York City and is now based in the San Diego area of California.

Whilst Montrose, formerly an Elizabethan scholar now turned professional photographer, is a working artist with an established portfolio, the beauty of the TPOTY Award is its openness to work by amateur and new artists.

As well as the Young Travel Photographer of the Year Award, the scope and range of the competition – and the subsequent exhibition held at the Royal Geographic Society in London every year – allows photographers to command huge sums for their images.

17 and 18 year old former winners have gone on to garner five figure deals for their portraits of diverse communities and individuals from their travels. Are there any tips to fellow travellers and camera-lovers, regardless of whether they want to earn money?

Key is to purchase a camera with which you feel both comfortable but which also has the capacity to capture the kind of definition you require.

If you are very interested in taking portraits of communities in the countries you visit, prioritise high-definition cameras with excellent crisp zoom and manual focus, which will allow you the time and personalisation to make small and significant changes in your photo-taking.

Alternatively, if you are planning a very long trip, or a trip to countries where you do not wish your photography to be ostentatious, one of the latest pocket high-def cameras from Canon or Sony could be just the ticket.

Taken on a Nikon D80

I love reading books! A decadent, luxurious day for me is to curl up with a good book in bed and read all day. A good book can transport me to a different world, time, or place; it can make me laugh out loud, cry, or feel empathy for the injustices of the world. While flying to Hawaii, I just completed reading the book Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosney, a fictional story based in Paris, France. The author intertwines the story of a young Jewish girl during the round up of Jewish French citizens including children into the Vel d’Hiv in July 1942 and a women searching for the truth of what happened during the round up in modern day Paris. It is one of those books that drew me in and I could not put it down. It creates a vivid picture of Paris and the tragedy of Vel d’Hiv. The book provided me a bit of history that I cannot recall learning in school. It also inspires me to travel to Paris to visit these spots and learn more about the tragic history. I have read many other books both fiction and non-fiction that too have inspired me to travel and learn more about a place or a time in history. I thought I might share some of my favorite books that have inspired me to travel.

Fiction

The Kite Runner by Khalid Hosseini – this story is set in Kabul Afghanistan. Though fictional, the characters live through the fall the monarch, soviet invasion and rise of the Taliban. It helps give a picture of what Afghanistan must have been like before years of war and chaos took over the country. Unfortunately given current instability and anti-American sentiment, I will never probably be able to visit this country. I will have to be satisfied in visiting Afghanistan in my comfortable bed through books. If you like this book, Khalid has another equally good book called A Thousand Splendid Suns. A Thousand Splendid Suns is also set in Afghanistan.

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak – The story is set in Nazi Germany and is narrated by Death himself. It is about an orphan girl and her relationships with her foster parents, neighbors and a Jewish prize fighter that her foster parents hide in their basement. Initially this book is confusing. But after the first few chapters, the book draws you in. Once again this book makes a little bit of history more vivid than any text book could.

The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan – This is the first of 2 books with a 3rd book on the way. Though this is found in the young readers section, it was a book that we all liked. The book is about the adventures of a brother and sister (Carter and Sadie) who discover that they are descendants from Egyptian pharaohs. I especially enjoyed learning about the different Egyptian gods. It makes me excited about seeing the pyramids and learning more about ancient Egypt.

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Vergese – The book is set in Ethiopia. It is about twin brothers whose mother dies in child birth and are abandoned by their father. Without giving up much about the book – this is a tear jerker. I know very little about the history of Ethiopia, but helps create a picture of Ethiopia during the time of the emperor. Though in our travels we will probably not see Ethiopia, this book is still an excellent read.

Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan – This is a series of books found in the young reader section. Even though it is classified in young reader section, my 7-year old daughter, Sydney, and I have been enjoying listening to the series on CD. The book is set in modern day New York. It is about a boy named Percy who has learned that his father was the god Poseidon. His birth has broken the pact between Zeus, Hades and Poseidon made after WWII to stop fathering any further half blood children. Admittedly my Greek mythology is a bit fuzzy. I vaguely remember reading about the adventures of Odysseus and Jason has forced me to watch Jason and the Argonauts several times. In listening to the Percy Jackson series, it has been fun relearn some of the mythology.

Coroner’s Lunch by Colin Colterill – This is the first in series of murder mysteries with the main character Dr Siri Paiboun. The stories are set in Laos around 1976 after the communists have taken over and the professional class has fled to Thailand. Siri who has no experience in being a coroner is forced into the role as he is one of the few Dr’s left in the country. This book gives a little history of Laos. Embarrassingly, I had to look up where Laos is located when I read this book. If you are looking for a good murder mystery this is it.

Non-fiction

Wide-eyed Wanderers by Richard Ligato and Amanda Bejarano Ligato –This is one of the first travel books I read. It made me realize that anyone can travel and that you do not need a lot of money to just go. The authors decided drive a VW bus through Latin America and parts of Africa. This book had some inspiring and also really funny moments. I could not put this book down

The Diary of Anne Frank – I did not read this but listened to on CD. The person who did the reading was marvelous to listen too. I could just imagine Anne in the throes of adolescents trying to adjust to life in hiding during WWII with not only family but family friends. The Diary of Anne Frank helps reveal the daily fear of the possibility of being discovered and the day to day frustrations living with a group of people. When we travel through Europe, the Anne Frank house is high on my list. I also plan to read this book with Sydney.

Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert – Elizabeth writes about her journey to find herself after her divorce. She took a year after her divorce to travel through Italy, stay in an ashram in India and travel through Bali. Of all the places Bali really captured my imagination and am hoping that this will be one of our stops along the way.

360 Degrees Longitude by John Higham – This is about a family of 4 who took off one year to travel the world. The youngest child is about sydney’s age (7). For part of the journey the Higham family bicycled through Europe. This book has a great list of books for children and the family to read while traveling to learn some of the history of the area. They also help give an idea about budget.

One Year Off by David Cohen – This book is about a family of 4 taking one year off to travel the world. This book made me laugh out loud and was a great read. This book helped me realize that we too had the possibility of living our dream of traveling the world. It is excellently written. I especially love the part where the family is taking a trial run of driving across country before leaving to travel the world. To help prevent fighting between the siblings , David and his wife started out with a large bag of m&m’s. Every time the kids started bickering, they threw out the window a handful of m&m’s.

A Vineyard in Tuscany by Ferenc Mate – This book is about a family who bought a vineyard in Tuscany. It is a great read. Ferenc also talks a lot about the food around Tuscany. One of the things I look forward to while traveling is the food and wine. This book makes me want to travel to Italy not just for the sites, but for the food!

Book Lust to Go by Nancy Pearl – if you are looking for a good book about a place (both fiction and non-fictional) this is a great book. I have found many good reads through this book.

I am interested to hear what books that have inspired you to travel or brought a place or time to life for you.

In order to travel round the world it is usually necessary to have a plan; or at least a compass bearing in which way to circle the globe. I guess someone could, and probably has, aimlessly wandered from place to place and eventually made a loop. When we travel we are more of the point A to point B type of people with a noncommittal for points C and D. That is, we generally know where we are (most important!) and where we will be heading next, and have a pretty good idea of where we will go after that. But, we may alter our plans and go somewhere else or find someplace we like along the way and stay there. With travel, you must be flexible. Over planning will just give you a headache and you may miss something along the way.

So, here we are, about 9 months away from launching out of our careers and comfort zone and into the unknown world. Do we have a plan? Of course we do! Our plan is to head east. When planning the rough itinerary for our round the world (RTW) trip we chose all of the places that we have always dreamt of visiting, and then played connect-the-dots. We have always wanted to visit Europe and it seems like the easiest transition from American life to the life of full time travel, but at a price. Western Europe is expensive! So, it seems there is no better way than to test the waters, and our budgeting skills, than to start our adventure in Western Europe and leave the more exotic places for our second year of travel when we will be a bit more seasoned.

So, here is our rough itinerary (subject to change):

Month 1: Paris France

Ahh, Paris (pronounced Pear-ee.) The city of unshaven women, starving artists, and dog poop on the sidewalks; what a great place to start! It’s also home to an art museum and tower featured in the hit comedy National Lampoon’s European Vacation. I wonder if I should buy us all matching berets to help us blend in. Actually, Paris will be a great introduction to Europe. It has plenty of somewhat affordable apartment rentals in the off-season, great food, a great place for photography, and enough museums to keep us busy for the whole month. I just hope we don’t burn out our daughter Sydney on visiting museums. We are also hoping to sign up for cooking classes at the famous Le Cordon Bleu Culinary Art School and learn the art of cooking frog legs and snails… or maybe a nice pastry.

Month 2: French Riviera or Southern France

See, already we are leaving it open as where to go. This decision will really depend on the time of year when we will be arriving, which should be October or November if all goes as planned. We know little about either place, but why decide now when we can decide later, right? We will need to check climate and what there is to do in these areas before pinpointing a city to stay in. But whatever we choose, it should be awesome!

Month 3: Spain. The land of tapas and bull fights!

This will be the final month of our 90-day Schengen visa that allows us to travel in most of Western Europe. Since it will be winter at this time, we plan to head south. Once again we are not sure where we will stay, but we would like to visit Barcelona and whatever else we can find as we make our way south and out of Spain before our visa expires.

Month 4: Gibraltar and Morocco

Once we leave the Schengen area we must be out for 90 days before we can enter for another 90-day visa. Gibraltar is part of the United Kingdom (UK) and is therefore outside the Schengen area and is also located at the southern tip of Spain. Perfect! We do not know how expensive it would be to stay in Gibraltar, so if it turns out to be expensive we will not stay long and take a ferry across to northern Africa and visit Morocco. And once again, we have no idea where we will stay or what we will do in Morocco, but we really want to visit. So, we have a whole month to figure out where to stay between Gibraltar and Morocco.

Month 5: Ireland

You can’t go on a round the world trip without stopping in Ireland for a pint of Guinness. So, that’s our plan. We would also like to visit Northern Ireland where the Guinness is said to be colder.

Month 6: England

We visited England 11 years ago, and other than the food, we really enjoyed it. Everyone thought we were Norwegian, which we still think was very odd. But the people were really friendly, and the sites were amazing. There is so much more to see, so we are coming back!

Month 7: Dash Across Europe

At this point it should have been 90 days outside of the Schengen area so we will take a ferry from England to Belgium where we should have another 90-day visa to tour Europe. We will then go to the Netherlands, Germany, Czech Republic, Austria, Switzerland ($$$), and then make our way towards the pizza capital of the world.

Month 8: Italy

We think Italy needs more than a month, but we will do the best we can to see what we can. Since our time is limited we will probably rent a place near Rome and take day trips to take in the highlights. I am getting hungry just thinking about all of the wonderful food we will eat there.

Month 9: Greece

Once again we have no idea where we will be staying. But, it will be fantastic! Greece is one of those far off places that was the stage for so much of the world’s great history. This will be our final stop in the Schengen area before our visa expires again.

Month 10-11: Turkey

We will most likely take a ferry from one of the Greek Islands to the mainland of Turkey, a country outside the Schengen area. We will then stay a month in Istanbul and a month along the Mediterranean coast, or vice versa. We just hope that we do not buy too many Turkish rugs while staying there. Turkey is said to have better food and more historic places than Greece.

Month 12: Israel and Egypt

Because of tensions in Syria and lack of ferry service, we will be flying from Turkey to Israel, as long as Israel is politically stable. We would really like to visit Lebanon, as well, but we are not sure if we can add that one in due to keeping a budget. After our visit in the Middle East we will head down to Egypt where we will visit the pyramids outside Cairo and then head to Luxor to see the Valley of the Kings. I have heard that Egypt is expensive, so if that is really the case we will not stay too long… unless we like it.

Month 13+: India with maybe a pit stop in Dubai

Since Dubai in the United Arab Emirates is on the way to India, I would not mind stopping for a couple of days to see the city. Also, I heard they have the world’s best water park. Score! If we survive this far without getting killed, imprisoned, or going broke, we will start our second year of traveling with a month or so in India. Honestly, I have an absolute fear of India. I have heard that you WILL get a stomach bug there. And if that doesn’t kill you, the malaria will. Lovely! But, the people, the culture, and the sites are not to be missed. I wonder if I can survive on granola bars for a month. And if we survive the first month, we may stay longer.

Month 14+: Thailand

US citizens are only allowed a 30-day visa per visit, but we would probably like to get an extension. Thailand is supposed to be amazing and really cheap. There can be nothing wrong with a place that has Thai food!

Month 15+: Cambodia and Vietnam

Cambodia’s Angkor Wat is high on our list of places to visit, but the US State Department warns of crime and violence in Cambodia. Of course, they say the same for Mexico and that does not stop us from visiting that country. So, the amount of time we stay and where we stay will be dependent on how safe we feel. And if we can get a visa, we would like to visit Vietnam. The length of stay there depends on if we can even get a, visa.

Month 16+: Malaysia

Saw it on the map, must stop there. Actually, Singapore looks like a great city to explore.

Month 17+: Indonesia

Other than Bali, we know little about Indonesia. All the better to stop and learn about this country.

Month 18-20+: Australia

Australia takes up a whole continent, so we must stay at least two months to see it all. Plus, they allow US citizens to stay up to 6 months. I just wished they did not have the most poisonous critters on the planet. Yikes!

Month 20-21: New Zealand

Since we are near Australia, we might as well stop off in New Zealand for a month or two and taste some fresh lamb.

Month 22-24+: South Pacific

What a better place to end a round the world trip. In fact, I plan to seriously find a way for us to extend this part of the trip as long as legally possible. The stop after this is back to the US, and who wants a trip like this to ever end? Or maybe we will be homesick and really wanting to get back to having 8-5 jobs again in corporate America. Of course, if we have any money left there is always South America…

We had set a launch date for 2012 when our daughter, Sydney, would be turning 8 years old. We did not want to leave when she was too young to remember the trip and not too old that she would hate spending everyday with her parents. So, 8-years old sounded like the perfect age for her to travel. We also needed to save money and waiting five years would allow us to do just that. While a lot of people were buying larger houses and newer cars, five years ago, we decided to stick with our small 2 bedroom house and the cars we had. And we are lucky that we did not buy a larger and more expensive house in that period, or we may have ended up upside down in our mortgage; a situation that would have killed our dream of round the world travel. But we did take advantage of the lower interest rates and refinanced our house from a 30 year mortgage to a 15 year which was one of the best things we could have ever done.

After we had decided on our five year plan we told our family and close friends about our exciting plans of traveling the world; they looked skeptical. They all gave us that, “well, that’s a nice dream, but…” kind of look. And I am sure they were all thinking, “Who in their right mind would give up everything they worked so hard for in the prime of their lives to go on a long vacation?” They thought we were crazy and likely hoped that we would come to our senses. But we were serious!

The year 2012 seemed so far away five years ago, but here we are. Our family and friends no longer doubt us. Actually, I’m sure they are cringing about who will get stuck with storing our photo albums, Christmas ornaments, and taking care of our aging pets. We are planning on putting our house on the market in May and will hopefully be flying to Europe in early Fall to begin our 2-year long round the world adventure. It has always sounded like such a simple plan, but there is still so much to do. So much to do…

After 5 five years of saving money and dreaming about what we would see and do while traveling the world I must admit that we feel a little overwhelmed with the reality of having to actually to do this. Getting rid of everything you own is harder than it seems, especially since we are still using a lot of it. We need to finish all of those house projects that we have been putting off, and we only have five months to do them. Housing prices continue to fall and the unemployment rate continues to rise and we fear that our house won’t sell. We can’t leave until it sells! And then there are all the other what-ifs. What if we get sick, what if we get hurt, what if we get kidnapped, what-if we get robbed, what if Sydney misses her friends, what if we suck at being home school teachers,  and the biggest what-if; what if we can’t get a job once we stop traveling. Where will we live? I know our relatives really don’t want us showing up on their doorsteps hoping to couch surf.

So here we are in the year 2012. The year of the dragon. The end of the Mayan calendar. The beginning of our adventure. It’s going to be a busy year. Wish us luck!

We had a rental car and it would have been easy to just drive up to the border and cross, right? It would be easy if the rental car companies allowed you to cross borders, but they don’t. Looking around online I found that there is a parking lot at the border crossing where you could park your vehicle, walk across the border, and then grab a taxi to Granada, or wherever you wanted to to go for a fair price. This seemed like a good option, until we found out another fact. The line to the border is long! There is a line of semi-trucks miles long. It is said to take a truck 2-3 days to cross the border. Yikes! Fortunately, the hotel we were staying at, Ecoplaya, offered a day trip to Nicaragua. The price seemed a bit steep, but in hindsight after having actually done the tour, it was a well worth it.

To prove the point of how few people were staying at our hotel, every single person staying there signed up for this tour and we all fit into a single van. On the day of the tour we all loaded into the van at the hotel and drove north towards the border on the 2-lane Pan-american Highway. One lane heading north, the other lane heading south. We soon approached the line of trucks for the border crossing and learned that our van driver was actually a taxi driver, which showed in his aggressive game of leap frog. He would jump out into the lane of oncoming traffic (trucks) and floor it until we came to a vehicle heading right at us. He would then squeeze between two massive trucks at the last second, or pull off the road. It was very unnerving having to experience this for miles and miles, but it was the only way to get to the border. There was no way we would have been able to make it to the border driving ourselves. The screams from my wife, Kerri, would have made us all suffer permanent hearing loss.

Our tour guide, Humberto, was a seasoned pro at this border crossing thing. He expertly guided us to the correct windows to get our passports stamped and before we knew it, we were in Nicaragua. A group of hawkers were selling their goods and we could not pass up buying a beautiful handmade hammock for $7 USD. We are suckers for hammocks, especially at those prices. We also noticed political posters covering everything. While political posters are not an uncommon sight while traveling or even back home, we did not expect to see Daniel Ortega on them. Wow, there was so little we knew about this country. Humberto suggested we go into the heavily armed bank located on the Nicaraguan side of the border and exchange some money for Nicaraguan currency, the Córdoba. He suggested we get small bills if we were planning on buying anything because most people in Nicaragua cannot make change for large bills.

When everyone had exchanged their money we loaded back into the van and headed north. We passed through what looked to be a shanty town just north of the border and we got our first glimpse of why this country was one of the poorest in the world. The houses, if you could call them that, were slapped together with whatever the people could find. We continued north and soon got our first glimpse of Lake Nicaragua and volcanic Ometepe Island. Lake Nicaragua is home to the world’s only freshwater shark and you could easily be eaten if you go for a swim. No thanks! We passed many agricultural farms and a wind turbine farm, which I never would have imagined being in this country. Once again, there was so little we knew about Nicaragua.

Next stop, Catarina!

Kerri and Sydney at the Nicaraguan Border

Daniel Ortega Political Poster

Nicaraguan selling really nice leather goods at the border

Lady selling hammocks. We bought a beautiful hammock from her for only $7 USD

When I was searching for the perfect travel camera I wanted pro DSLR quality and performance in a small package and at an affordable price. It seemed impossible at the time, until I coupled the Nikon 50mm f/1.8D lens with the body of the new Nikon D7000. Perfection! Modern DSLR lenses are big and heavy and a pain in the neck (literally) to carry around attached to your already big and heavy DSLR camera body. Even the newer prime lenses are big. But Nikon’s older, yet still manufactured, D lenses lack the built-in focus motors which reduce the weight and size. But, you can still autofocus using the motor from Nikon’s higher end camera bodies, including the D7000. The focus may not be as fast as having a built-in lens motor, but fast enough for most situations. It was this combination that convinced me that a Nikon D7000 with a small prime lens would be my perfect travel camera.

I found the 50mm lens to take incredibly sharp photos and was ideal for low light situations where I could take advantage of the wide aperture. The only fault I could find was that it was somewhat of a telephoto lens. Back in the dark ages, the days of 35mm film, a 50mm lens was a “normal” lens. It saw the world the same as a person would see it. Not wide and not zoomed in. But the D7000 has a DX format sensor, which means it has a 1.5x crop, making the 50mm lens equivalent to a 75mm lens for 35mm film or full frame (FX) sensors. I would see a great shot, put the camera to my eye, and then would start walking backwards in order to fit everything into the frame. This has often had me backing out into traffic or running into parked cars or other objects. I really need to be a bit more careful! The other thing I love and hate about this lens in the bokeh, the not in-focus part of a photo. At f/1.8 the depth of field (DOF) is very shallow, which can be great for portraits of a single person or object where you want a nice creamy blurred out background. But with a group of people, the depth of field increases, which has caused me to miss a few shots because I misjudged the result of my settings. I now carry around depth of field charts in my camera bag. Remember those?

Now for what most of you have wanted to hear; what the REAL issue is with the Nikon 50mm 1.8D lens. A few weeks ago we were at the Oregon coast where I shot a few longer exposures mounted to a tripod using the 50mm lens, somthing I had not previously done before with this lens. Since I do not have any neutral density filters, yet, I stopped the lens down for the longer exposure time. The photos looked good on the screen, but when I got home I was shocked at what I saw on the computer screen. There was a big purple, blue, violet (or whatever color it may be) spot right in the center of EVERY photo that I shot at f/11 to f/22. I checked the lens and the sensor convinced that I had some foreign object or smudge that was ruining my photos, but found nothing. I tried another lens and had no problems. Turning to Google I found that I am not the only one that has had this problem. The theory goes that the light bounces off the sensor in certain conditions causing the purple spot and many people have had this happen from f/11 – f/22. What good is a lens if you can’t stop it down below f/8?

I contacted Nikon about this issue and sent them some sample images. They told me to send them the lens, so I did. A couple of weeks later I got a reply from Nikon saying that the lens needs a cleaning and they want to charge me $45 to do this and ship it back to me. I argue this case and send them about 10 links to other people having this same issue with this lens. I know for a fact that my lens was spotless. They escalate the problem and then send a response saying there is nothing wrong with the lens, and it might be my camera sensor. Yeah right! I have yet to receive my lens back, but once I do, I plan to try it on a couple of other Nikon cameras to see if I can reproduce the purple spot. If I do reproduce it on a different camera, it will be interesting to see what Nikon has to say about that.

Here are the photos with the dreaded purple spot. The only processing these photos have had was converting them from RAW to JPG format and re-sizing:

No purple spot: 1/250 sec at f/8, ISO 180

Purple spot appears: 1/60 second at f/11, ISO 100

Purple spot is more pronounced: 1/30 second at f/16, ISO 100

Oh yeah, we got a purple spot: 1/20 second at f/20, ISO 100

Purple spot: 1/15 second at f/22, ISO 100

Purple spot: 1.3 seconds at f/22, ISO 100

Purple spot: 0.6 seconds at f/22, ISO 100 (a swinging suspension bridge is not a good place to shoot from)

Crop from previous photo: 0.6 seconds at f/22, ISO 100

UPDATE December 15, 2011: I got my lens back from Nikon and just tried it again on my Nikon D7000 and then tried it on a Nikon D90. Shooting it indoors under florescent lighting showed no spot, but going outside to the overcast sky yielded a purple/blue spot on both cameras. Sorry Nikon, but it’s not the sensor, its the lens. This is a great lens for shooting wide open, but it sucks for f/11 and higher where you risk a large spot in the middle of your photo. If you need a pro quality lens for cheap up to f/8, this is your lens. If you need something that can stop down below f/8, I would not buy the Nikon 50mm f/1.8D lens.

So what do you think. World record for largest carrot?

Sydney with the giant carrot