week 264

Mon: Shibam and Seiyun cities plus the nearby village of Al-Hajrain provide an unforgettable display of Yemeni high rise adobe architecture.

Tue: Going through Arthur’s Pass national park in the Alps of the southern hemisphere gives its northern mountain range counterpart a run for its money.

Wed: To climb the spiral minaret of the great mosque of Samarra to enjoy the city view is stepping into the deep human past of the region.

Thu: For the love of kids, a primary school teacher in Kyzyl Suu moves her classroom to a yurt in the highlands where her pupils expend summer tending their cattle.

Fri: Male frankincense resin collectors in the mountain plains around Taqah together with female incense burner makers from Mirbat permit the Dhofar region maintain its mythical status as the starting point of the trade route.

week 263

Mon: The Musandam peninsula in northern Oman carved into fjords by former glaciers makes geological processes very visual.

Tue: Rotorua lake filling a semi-active volcano caldera gives a glimpse of how Te Ika-a-Maui came to be.

Wed: Mikea people in southwest Madagascar barely survive the onslaught of wild fires caused by farmers’ ever greed to grow more crops.

Thu: Nowruz festivities in the mountains around Akre with the kurdish people of Irak, finds a Michael Palin worried about the peaceful coexistence with the rest for the country.

Fri: A “harat” (old town) visit to that of Ibra, Ibri, Izki or Imti should be on every traveler’s to-do list.

week 262

Mon: Willingly participating in the Vietnam war put aussie society into soul searching about its new allegiance to the USA, but only after the fiasco.

Tue: Intact bows and daggers from the archaeological site of Salut near Bahla in northern Oman dated to ~1000 BCE reveals contact/conflict between Yemenis and Persians.

Wed: The very north tip of the New Zealand’s north island may provide a more welcoming, read less wet climate, than further south, if the wallet can afford it.

Thu: A few private reserves, east of Windhoek, keep running efforts for a sustainable cohabitation between cattle farmers and leopards in the wilderness of Namibia’s vast interior.

Fri: Having bivouac in the Rub al-Khali desert (a.k.a. Empty quarter), our dear german female motorbiker should have known better and avoid the Sharquiya sands tourist trap.

week 261

Mon: Maralinga nuclear tests in Australia received a subdued note in the new south Wales sponsored documentary about the social events there in the ’50s.

Tue: Verdant Wakan village, on the slopes of the Jebel Akhdar, although being pretty has been way too much sold to tourism.

Wed: North American grizzly bears share a deep evolutionary link with the Pacific coast sea lions.

Thu: For all its objective information, genetic studies of ancient remnants of Guanche people in the Canary islands reveal the limits of what biological sciences can contribute to factual history.

Fri: Balad Sayt mountain hamlet, on the way through the wadi Bani Awf, retains the “Arabia felix” feeling. For how long?