The Empty Quarter

Oman

January 22, 2015

The Rub' al Khali (Arabic: الربع الخالي‎) or Empty Quarter is the second largest sand desert in the world, encompassing most of the southern third of the Arabian Peninsula. 

The desert covers some 650,000 square kilometers (250,000 sq miles – about the size of Texas or France).  It includes parts of Saudi Arabia, Oman, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen.  It is part of the larger Arabian Desert. 

Shall I attempt to describe the Empty Quarter?  I’ll leave that to my guide Mohammed and to my photographs.  (Mohammed also did a photo shoot of Mr. Jan.)

Duqm

Oman

January 25, 2015

Dear Fellow Drivers,

On the road from Salalah to Duqm, across mostly flat and nondescript desert, I encounter a canyon of inspiring beauty and grandeur.    

In Duqm, Abdullah, my host at the Duqm City Hotel, recommends I make a day trip along the coast to Ras Madrakah.  Ras-Al-Madrakah – a wondrous combination of jagged rocks, rough seas and vigilant sea birds.

So, fill up your tank.  Travel with me across the desert and through the mountains to the sea.

Jan

The Souk

Sinaw

Oman

January 29, 2015

On my drive to the north coast of Oman, I stop in the city of Sinaw.   The guidebook lists the population at about 10,000, but on this Thursday Market Day, the city explodes into a multi-colored array of buyers and sellers from around the region.

Unlike the Nizwa Goat Market where the participants are all men and boys dressed in the traditional white dishdasha,  the souk here in Sinaw is crowded with both men and boys and women and girls. 

Kythira

Κύθηρα

Greece

May 2, 2015

Here’s a brief discussion:

“You have a strategic decision to make,” observed my New York friend David L. when I told him of my upcoming journey to Athens and The Balkans.

“I have already made that decision,” I responded.  “As an alternative to sailing east from Athens to visit the ever popular Greek Islands, I am driving west to the Peloponnese peninsula.  I anticipate a destination of rich diversity and ample rewards.”

But, once on the Peloponnese, I cannot resist at least one island.  The Ionian island of Kythira is my choice.  (I had never heard of it.   Have you?)

Olympia
Peloponnese
Greece
May 1, 2015

My Fellow Athletes,

Can we agree on one thing?  Frank Shorter started it all.

In 1972 at the Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany, Frank Shorter became the first American man to win the Gold Medal in the Olympic Marathon.  (The Marathon by definition is 40.2 kilometers or 26.2 miles.)

In 1984, Joan Benoit added her name to Olympic Legend when she became the first American woman to win the Gold Medal in the Olympic Marathon.  Actually she was the first woman ever to win Gold since the female Marathon event was first added to the Summer Olympics in Los Angeles that very year.  (Joan had already won the Boston Marathon in both 1979 and 1983.)

After Frank’s championship and surely after Joan’s extraordinary Olympic accomplishment, we Americans decided to emulate our two new heroes.  We donned our sweat suits and our Nike Waffle Trainers and Adidas County Striders, dutifully performed our stretching exercises, and headed out the door for our training run. 

The Peloponnese

Greece

May 4, 2015

Civilizations are born, grow, prosper, decline and disappear.

Empires are here for a moment and fade into history books.

Fortresses are built. Castles and walls are constructed, besieged, breached and conquered.

Here in Greece I encounter three such examples.

How many past examples do we need?

The American writer William Faulkner wrote: “The past is not dead.  It's not even past.”