Puerto Rico, Goodbye to Hurricanes
To anyone who lives in Puerto Rico, even just a few years, hurricanes become a fixation. In other places, it could be earthquakes, tornadoes, blizzards, life-threatening diseases or, as it is here in the Inland Northwest, wildfires. Perhaps true of most…Continue reading→
Old San Juan: The Scaffolding of Iglesia de San José
In spite of hurricanes, economic crises, births, deaths, and other milestones in life, some things in Puerto Rico never seem to change. Sadly, one of them is Iglesia de San José in Old San Juan. When I left the island in…Continue reading→
Puerto Rico’s New Niche in Tourism
When I wrote for travel magazines about Puerto Rico, a few decades ago, tourism in San Juan consisted mainly of high-end hotels and resorts. There were few offerings for budget-minded travelers. It seemed a shame the island wasn’t courting those of…Continue reading→
Old San Juan: The Ships of San Cristóbal
No return visit to Old San Juan would be complete without a look at the ships. I don’t mean the large cruise ships that dock in San Juan Bay. I mean ships on a much smaller scale, artistic endeavors created under…Continue reading→
Trendy Loíza Street
I lived in Ocean Park for many years. A small seaside neighborhood, it is wedged between the better known tourist districts of Isla Verde and the Condado in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Skirting the edge of Ocean Park is McLeary Street,…Continue reading→
El Yunque’s Transformation
Puerto Rico’s El Yunque National Forest is the only tropical forest in the US Forest Service system, a small (28,000 acres) but rich patch of land featuring hundreds of species of trees, ferns, orchids, and bromeliads along with impressive numbers of lizards and…Continue reading→
Back to Puerto Rico
My first novel (The Irony of Tree Ferns, as yet unpublished) starts off in a rain forest on the island of Puerto Rico in the year 1942. A teenage boy discovers the body of an American woman in a remote section…Continue reading→
Pulse Growing on the Palouse
Every August (this year, the 16th and 17th), thousands of visitors flock to Reaney Park in Pullman, Washington for the annual National Lentil Festival. While there, they stroll through the garbanzo garden, buy from marketplace vendors, sample the world’s largest bowl of lentil…Continue reading→
The Palouse: An Overview
Driving through the Palouse is as relaxing as sitting a hot tub, jets turned off. I first experienced the ride when my husband and I spent a couple of days in Walla Walla. On the way to the city of vineyards…Continue reading→
Ponderosa Pine: Spokane’s Official Tree
Author Barb Bentler Ullman lists ten native tree species inhabiting eastern Washington: the ponderosa, lodgepole, and western white pines; interior Douglas fir; western larch and quacking aspen; the netleaf hackberry, water birch, black cottonwood, and Oregon white oak. Ten species, and the three…Continue reading→