Old Cape Cod - September 7-8, 2007

B & B with private Porch




Breakfast is served!.................................................The Murphy Bed



Desperado from Colorado

(Although I wrote this one year ago, Cape Cod is still the same and so aren't we. Daktari)

Cape Cod is beautiful this time of year. Rena and I are heading for a romantic getaway to a bed and breakfast in Wellfleet. It’s bright and sunny in the late afternoon and the dashboard thermometer reads 93 degrees F. Time to head for the beach!

We stop at a nice restaurant outside Plymouth to have a pizza and a salad in a small café while the Friday evening traffic clears. The waitress is incredibly perky and the Red Sox are winning. So far so good! I tell Rena how thankful I am for this opportunity to be alone for a weekend. “We’re always doing something but never by ourselves. It’ll be like old times.”
“What do you mean we’re never alone!” protests my wife of 36 years.
“When was the last time we did something just the two of us,” I counter.
She thinks for a minute then cracks a wide smile. “Hey, we just spent 38 hours alone together flying from Cape Town to Boston.” We both break out laughing. That trip was not exactly quality time – 4 flights, three stops, endless lines, bad food and expensive airport coffee. Like steerage on the Mayflower – to use a phrase from Cape Cod’s pilgrim past.

We pull into our bed and breakfast about 10 PM. It looks beautiful – a small Victorian house right in the main part of the village. There’s a Koi pond in front filled with fat orange fish coruscating beneath underwater lights. There’s a private entrance to our room which is spacious and has a fireplace. The bed is a Murphy bed – one that folds down from the wall – What fun! We have our own porch so we slip a note under our hosts’ door to serve breakfast outside at 9 AM. And so to sleep – perchance to dream.

Sleep must have been dreamless. I don’t remember anything. The next thing I do remember is scrabbling noises coming from the bathroom along with muttered curses. “Whazzup in there?” I inquire. “I left my deodorant at home,” wails Rena. “Use mine,” I suggest. “But then I’ll smell like a guy,” she complains. “Consider the alternative,” I admonish.

It’s 9 AM and we are sitting on our porch, both smelling vaguely like guys – ahh togetherness and sharing – isn’t that what this weekend is all about? Our porch overlooks the front yard of the Flying Fish Café where the locals are reading their papers and sipping their first java of the day. Our hosts, Dan and Brad, bring the breakfast. They are a very nice couple. (and they smell like guys too!) After introductions, breakfast is served.

Breakfast is fresh coffee, granola, fruit and a basket of muffins – yum! We ask Brad and Dan a little about Wellfleet and try to remember the last time we stayed here. I think it was at least 30 years ago. “I remember our favorite restaurant, Aesop’s Tables and the seafood crepes with a white grape garnish,” I say. Dan and Brad exchange looks. “ Then I think one of us must have served dinner to you guys,” says Dan. “We were the waiters at Aesop’s Tables for years and years.”

Dan gives us some tips on places to eat and then suggests we head to Great Island on the Bay side of the Cape. It’s a nature reserve where footpaths lead to several isolated sandy beaches. Isolated beaches sound good to Rena. In addition to forgetting to bring deodorant she has neglected to bring the bottom of her bathing suit. “I can’t help you there,” I say. So she decides to make do with her bathing suit top and a pair of yellow and pink underpants. She tries on her ensemble and we both laugh. “Hey, this is the Lower Cape. It’s not the first time that folks wearing men’s deodorant take off for the beach in underpants and a bra,” I exclaim. We are laughing again.

The sky is azure and it’s mid-80 degrees. Perfect! Rena’s little orange car with the pink-and-purple mermaid on the driver-side door takes us along the bay to the reserve’s parking lot. Making sure the coast is clear, we hike off along a piney forest path toward Great Island. We remember characters we met on our old days on the Cape: Mary who used to swim down from the nude beach in Truro, heaving her 250+ pounds out of the ocean covered with goose bumps to trudge happily back the way she came. Michael with his boundless enthusiasm. And beautiful busty Rhonda with the seagull feathers in her hair.

We find a beach where there are no other people and arrange our little enclave – folding chairs, newspapers, towel, plastic bag of peaches. The sun is warm but a sea breeze keeps us from feeling it. We both get a little burnt! I go for a swim but can’t entice Rena to join me – underpants at the beach is one thing but wet underpants is definitely over the line.

A woman and her two boys – one aged about 8 and the other about 4 – approach along the waters’ edge. The little one goes on strike just before they reach our spot. He sits down in the sand and won’t go further. Mom and older brother continue on. For some reason this little tableau strikes me. It’s a contest of wills. Will the angry little boy get his way? Will Mom and big brother come back for him? Will he give up and run to join them as they get farther and farther away? Finally Mom gets too far ahead for her own comfort. She turns and heads back, picks up her younger son and the three recede the way they came. It’s mostly wordless – no pleading, cajoling, or angry words. A decision is made without thought. This family could be gazelles on the savannah or ancestral anthropoids traversing the great lake-bed at Olduvai. In the dazzle of the shore, they stand out so clearly illuminated. Parenting seems an ageless dance, complicated but familiar – coming together and then going apart and coming together again. Sometimes I think that beyond words lies a whole “nother world”– like ours but more authentic. The world of dancing birds.

Rena and I hike back the way we came. After changing into tourist outfits back at the B & B, we walk into town and explore. The Wellfleet General store combines food, books and bumper stickers with multi-colored kites and assorted tapes and glues. I buy a bumper sticker which has 01-20-2009 at the top and the caption says “Bush’s Last Day”. I plan to send it to my Mom. Rena spots a poster for a coffeehouse in Eastham. “Tonight 8 PM – Paul Rishell and Annie Raines - Blues Concert”. Sounds good to us.

We set out to find dinner and the coffee house. I give Rena a couple of gifts to mark our little adventure. A CD of tunes that I’ve compiled from the internet and a black and white photo, enlarged to 5 x 7 and framed. It’s me at age 21 when I was working as a hail-chaser in New Raymer, Colorado. I’m in jeans and a work-shirt with binoculars slung over one shoulder and a large sombrero. All of us hail-chasers were wearing sombreros that summer in imitation of the bad guys in the Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns. I’m sporting a scruffy beard. My first facial hair - I remember I was quite proud of it at the time. In the background is a washing machine piled high with the detritus of my bachelor prairie existence. It’s 1969, the same year that Rena and I met.

We drive off listening to the new CD and searching for food. Just before passing out from starvation I find a bar and grille in Falmouth where we score a table for two by the window. We share a great lobster salad followed by lobster alfredo. The Red Sox are still winning!

The coffee house is hard to find but we make it just before all the seats are sold out. Great blues - only my damn shoulder has been starting to ache and by intermission it is killing me. It’s been three weeks since I wrenched it while cage diving for great white sharks and it still hurts at the end of the day. We skip the second set and return to our nest to curl up with a DVD. After Rena falls asleep, I turn off the TV.

As I watch her sleeping, I’m thinking of the backyard wedding that we passed earlier on our stroll through Wellfleet. Will the young groom be staring at his spouse’s back in 36 years and fondly remembering the old days? I hope so. Silently in the middle of the night, I wish the two of them the best of luck and many happy years together. Us too.

Daktari

Peeing in the Public Baths - Budapest, Hungary August 25, 2001

Szechenyi Baths Outdoors.......................................................................................Indoors

Vajdahunyard Castle

TECHNOMUSIK RULES (NOT)

THE DANUBE BY NIGHT

PEEING IN THE PUBLIC BATHS
The next day Bernadette, Rena and I take the subway to the Szechenyi Baths. We’re not feeling particularly grimy but everyone says the public baths in Budapest are not to be missed. They are fed by some of the hottest springs in Europe.

At the subway station, Rena notices that nobody pays the fare except us. “Buying a subway ticket must be a tourist thing.” she observes. We stop paying for public transportation after that. When in Budapest do as the Budites and the Pestians. Incidentally, the fare is not the only thing that is free on the Budapest subway. Free entertainment is provided by handsome young Hungarian couples who kiss and nuzzle constantly while riding to and fro.

The Szechenyi baths are a combination of indoor and outdoor pools. The warm pools are relaxing and refreshing on a summer’s day. They are also an acknowledged source of merriment for the locals. Watching tourists from all over the world struggle with the etiquette of bathing in public is a popular spectator sport.

The two ladies and I pay our entrance fee in one line and then move to a second line – this being the one to enter the changing area. After a few minutes, I tumble to the fact that I am the only guy in a long line of women, who are all looking at me and whispering. This happens to be a recurring theme in certain dreams of mine. Quickly, I check my fly to make sure it’s zipped. Whew – all OK there! I smile and say my only Hungarian word (kozonom or thank-you) as I stumble forward to find the men’s line. Guess what? There is no men’s line. Curiouser and curiouser.

Next thing I know, my elbow is seized by a short male bath attendant who is holding back an entire file of whispering women with his other hand. Talking slowly and loudly in Hungarian, he guides me through the turnstile and into the baths. I try to relax – it’s no use. On the far side of the turnstile the whispers are becoming more animated.

Now I’m in big trouble. I’m on one side of the floor-to-ceiling turnstile and Rena is on the other side. She’s way in the back of the women’s line. And she has my swimsuit in her bag! Yikes! I try going back through the gate but the turnstile doesn’t budge. It’s one-way only!

By this time, my cool has deserted me entirely. I’m reduced to calling “YooHOO!” through the slots in the turnstile to try to get Rena’s attention. This must be a very funny word in Hungarian. The whole line of heavy East European women stop whispering and begin to titter and giggle. Meanwhile the male attendant is getting more alarmed. He has probably received training at bath attendant school on how to spot Western perverts. Now he’s becoming suspicious that he has a live one. Calling “YooHOO” in a pseudo-falsetto at a large group of women could be the final event before full frontal exposure. The attendant’s hand grabs for my elbow again.

I try to de-escalate the situation by pantomiming pulling on my speedo - afterwards holding my hands palm up, shrugging and shaking my head. The Magyar ladies are roaring out loud now. Scattered applause is about to break out when the crowd hands Rena to the front of the line.

“You’ve got my suit,” I yell desperately. “Your what?” Rena inquires. “My swimsuit. Give me my swimming suit!”

Rena gives a big “Ohhhh” and collapses on the floor, laughing so hard she wets herself. This brings the house down. Hungarian women are guffawing with tears in their eyes and slapping each other on the back.

Finally my wife stops convulsing long enough to extract my horrid black and green jams from her backpack and shove them through the hole in the turnstile. I grab the suit, shuck the amazed bath attendant, and flee to the men’s room. For the rest of my time in the baths, I wear sunglasses, hoping that no one will recognize me. Wearing sunglasses in an indoor bathhouse does attract a few searching looks from the uniformed pervert patrol but I am able to maintain a modicum of anonymity.

HOUSE OF SEVEN BRIDES
From the baths we sidle over to the Vajdahunyard Castle. This is on an island in City Park. We walk through a “Disney-like” archway into a small courtyard, which is jam-packed with brides. The castle apparently is where every Hungarian Princess comes to marry her Prince Charming. It’s astonishing - at least 7 brides in white and scads of bridesmaids, groomsmen, photographers, antique limos, etc.

“Is that thunder?” asks Bernadette, paranoid about another summer downpour. “No, “ I answer confidently, “It’s just the yard where they turn the trains around.”

We are both wrong. It’s Budapest’s annual ear-shattering techo-musik Love Parade. Flatbed trucks with major amplifiers drive through the streets while hordes of Magyar teenagers climb aboard dancing to the loudest thumping and screeching you have ever heard. Extremely high-energy but the voltage is too much for us. Back to our hotel for aspirins and a cold glass of wine followed by a tour of the opera.

THE HUNGARIAN STATE OPERA
The Opera House is hot, smells of varnish, and is not air-conditioned. But it is free of techno-musik, and the guide explains the lives and loves of the last of the Austro-Hungarian emperors with enthusiasm. While Rena rests her bare back against marble pillars to cool off, our girl guide tells us about Franz Joseph, who disliked Hungarians and hated the opera. So, naturally, he built his Hungarian subjects an opera house - probably as a form of revenge. The Empress, Elisabeth, nicknamed Sisi, spoke Hungarian, loved Hungarians, loved opera and even had an affair with the Prime Minister of Hungary. Hungarians loved her too and built a very nice bridge over the Danube called the Sisi Bridge, so that she could keep assignations with the P.M.

After the opera tour, we learn two more Hungarian words = Karolyi Turos. This is Hungarian for jello and whipped cream mixed together and served on stale piecrust. Don’t get it!

KLEZMER’S GREATEST HIT
We have our showers and naps and then go out for the evening. It’s Saturday night and a crowd is assembling in front of a Jewish community center next to our hotel. We go inside and pay a small fee to see local young people play Klezmer music. They are great! All the old Yiddish and Hebrew favorites. We clap along and keep them playing for over an hour.

The music gives us our second wind and we walk to the waterfront to take a boat ride on the Danube. All the sights are alight and there’s a small fireworks show off the starboard bow. We glide by palace after parliament after church after bridge while drinking free champagne and taking lots of photos. The commentary on the headphones is in Arabic but so what. It’s actually relatively understandable compared to Hungarian!

Midnight finds the three musketeers noshing on blintzes with sour cherries in almond sauce in the public square, while an old man blows up balloons and sends them flying through the moonlit sky. Bye, bye Budapest! We love you!

Daktari

Eurasian Aliens Invade Lake Gardner - July 26, 2008

...................


...Research team Assembles........................................Kat's Weed Gear

KAT WATCHING CAT DO YOGA

Lake Gardner Reflections

.

.............White Water Lily..........................................Eurasian Milfoil

It’s six o’clock AM on Saturday and quiet as a mouse. I brew a pot of tea while I watch the sun pull clear of Powow Hill on the eastern horizon. I’m up early to advance the cause of environmental science. Science is my favorite subject, so why not? But I’m a little worried that today’s expedition won’t get off the ground. Gabriel, my 16-year-old science helper, had a fight with his Mom last night and is grounded. Bummer!

I immediately offered Rena the chance to go muck around the lake at the crack of dawn. That didn’t fly. Rena is definitely not a morning person. Finally, in desperation I called Kat. I know she’s not a morning person either, but I think I talked her into it. Still I’m not sure if she’s actually going to show or not. How many amazing scientific discoveries have been lost due to failure to show up? Woody Allen says 95% of life is showing up and I tend to agree.

At 6:32 AM Kat’s Jetta pulls into the driveway. Amazing – she’s early!! I hand her a mug of my special Kenya tea – a mix of super-strong Kericho Black cut with Borden’s sweetened condensed milk and flavored with a special spice blended by Rasik Sangrajka’s wife and sent to me from Kisumu on Lake Victoria. It’s heaven in the morning and packs quite a caffeine jolt!

The tea combined with perfect butterfly weather (no wind, warm sun and blue skies) dispels any lingering cobwebs. We sit on the deck sipping tea and rubbing the sleep from our eyes as we gaze at the perfect mirror surface of Lake Gardner.

“What exactly are we doing again?” asks Kat.
“Saving the planet from invading aliens,” I respond.
“No way!” exclaims Kat, She throws me a skeptical squint through a cloud of chai vapors
“You’re right, “ I admit, “but pretty close. Bruce thinks that Lake Gardner is besieged by exotic alien plant species which have invaded our backyard ecosystem and are strangling the waterway. Today we’re mounting an expedition to find out.” (My neighbor Bruce is a member of the town Lakes and Waterways Commission.)
“Wow,” says Kat. “Why so early in the morning?”
“Tradition,” I explain. “Vampires and alien invaders are best tackled by teams of scientists and always at the crack of dawn.”
“Vampires?” Kat expostulates. “Who said anything about vampires?”
“Don’t worry, I’m packing garlic just in case.”

I load up Kat with a ton of scientific gear – weed rake, life jacket, paddle, fresh croissants, zip lock baggies, yellow plastic rope, hot-pink measuring tape and a clove or two of garlic – and we head down to the dock. We dump the water out of the old Alligash canoe and clamber aboard. Kat is an experienced kayaker so we have no trouble paddling a mile or so to the Amesbury town beach. We are the first team there. Bruce’s wife Bernadette has baked a fresh blueberry coffee cake to nourish the troops.

At 7:20 we have eight teams of two, each with a canoe. Bruce hands out the maps. Kat and I have sector 1 and sector 2. We re-embark in the canoe and backtrack another 1 ½ miles to the opposite end of the lake. The warmth of the sun on our backs and the calm reflection of the dark green forest ahead, mirrored on the still surface of the water, is delightful. Dragonflies are everywhere and the white water lilies are in bloom. My favorites.

When we reach the first sector line we set up gondola-style, facing each other. I get the boat in position and measure the depth to the bottom. Then Kat dredges the bottom with the weed rake. The resultant smelly collection of bottom weeds is decanted into a ziplock bag. Then I re-position the boat 10 feet further out on the sector line and we repeat the process. When the water is about 8 feet deep, the amount of sunlight reaching the bottom is too little to sustain plant growth. We tie our specimen zip-locs in a trash bag and paddle off to sector 2. What a team!

At sector 2, Kat receives morning greetings from a black cat doing the ‘downward facing dog’ pose on an upturned rowboat. It is a beautiful shot and I snap a pic with the digital before we set to work sampling the bottom feeders at our new locale.

Kat and I are feeling it in the biceps, as we paddle to Bruce’s backyard to examine our finds. All the other teams join in and we discover that only one species is truly threatening our beautiful Lake. It’s the Eurasian milfoil, Myriophyllum matogrosense, and it’s ubiquitous to a depth of about 6 feet. The milfoil is a popular home aquarium plant which has escaped into the wild and now threatens lakes in every state except Wyoming and Montana. Now we know what we’re up against! Bruce says milfoil is a pain to control. One idea is to lower the level of the lake in the winter, exposing the milfoil, so it will freeze to death!

Kat spies a piece of goo sticking to the underside of a lily pad. Oh-mi-god! It’s a Plasmodial slime mold. I get so excited over this little critter. A Plasmodial slime mold involves numerous amoeba-like cells attached to each other. There are no divisions between the amoeboid cells. Instead, a common cell membrane encompasses the whole colony. This "supercell" is essentially a single bag of cytoplasm containing thousands of individual nuclei. Most slime molds are smaller than a few centimeters, but the very largest reach areas of up to thirty square meters, making them the largest single cell organisms on the planet! Our little guy is only about a square centimeter in size, but even so, it’s a rare treat to see a one-cell organism with the naked eye.

By 10 AM the party’s over and we paddle back to my backyard, where Rena is sipping coffee and reading a book on the back deck. “You missed a good one,” I enthuse to Rena. Rena casts a glance at our slimy and smelly exteriors and shakes her head.
“Too early and too dirty, if you ask me!” she says.

Still, Kat and I feel satisfied with our morning’s accomplishments. Kat has a two-year-old’s birthday party at noon, so I wave goodby as she puts the top down on the Jetta and speeds away.

“Vampires, slime molds, crack of dawn, ubiquitous Eurasian invaders – all in a day’s work for Daktari,” I muse as I head for the showers.
“De gustibus non disputandum.”

Daktari

The Miracle of St. Gellert - Budapest August 24, 2001

Dohany Synagogue
St. Gellert with an admiring pupil

Elisabeth ('Sisi') Bridge links Buda to Pest

We are staying at the K + K Opera Hotel right next to the Budapest Opera House. Breakfast is a meal so substantial that we don’t eat again until 10 PM. We exit the K + K and walk a few blocks to the old Jewish quarter. Security is tight for the Wallenberg Memorial and the Dohany Synagogue. The Dohany is the largest synagogue in Europe and second largest in the world. In the synagogue is a traveling exhibit of Chagall paintings. It’s too nice a day; it costs extra; we don’t go.
Instead, we stroll to the Danube waterfront to buy tickets for a Sunday cruise on the river. Sorry - sold out! I step into an antique shop where a small ivory netsuke is calling my name. Only $250!!
We decide to hike to the hilly Buda side of the city - across the “Sisi” bridge, up the Gellert Hill to the Citadel and then down the back of the hill to the Taban or hot-springs district. Here the ancient Celtic inhabitants would sit in the hot water snacking on wild grapes and mastodon jerky while waiting for spring. Much later, Scandinavian diplomats would build embassies and art-deco hotels with saunas and swimming pools heated from the very same springs.
HUNGARIAN- ONE EASY LESSON
Language is a big problem in Budapest. Hardly anyone speaks English. The Hungarian language was brought to Hungary by mistake when Attila, the original Hun, made a wrong turn in 896 CE. He was looking to sack Rome, that being the Holy Grail of Hundom, but stopped in Budapest for a hot bath and voila - a whole country speaking Hungarian.
Incidentally this was also where we got the famous quote, “I think you’re making a wrong turn, Hun.” Spoken by Mrs. Attila of course but in Hungarian, so no one in Europe understood a word. Mrs. Hun had her heart set on spending the winter in Italy with the Pope but, true to his macho origins, Mr. Attila ignored her totally. No one else in the horde much cared one way or another. If grapes and hot baths were good enough for the Celts, they were good enough for barbarians too.
Which brings us to the one word of Hungarian that we manage to learn. It means “Thank You” (we hope). The first time we hear it, we think it’s pronounced “Goosin ‘em”. It’s very hard to express our thanks without breaking up. Especially after we forget the last part and can only remember the “goosin” part. Imagine the consternation of the polite Hungarian waiter who brings an extra plate to the table only to have a group of seemingly sedate American customers yell out “goosa -me” and fall off their chairs laughing. “Goosa -you” is also hilarious.
Bye and bye we find out that the actual expression of Hungarian gratitude is spelled Koszonom and is pronounced “cursin em”. This is a major improvement over our previous efforts. We’ve been cursin’ em in Hungarian ever since.
THE MIRACLE OF ST. GELLERT
At the Citadel, Rena and I try on some surplus Russian military headgear while Bernie manages to lose her guidebook in the ladies toilette. The three of us ponder the fate of St. Gellert, patron saint of Hungarian primary school teachers. Gellert led a saintly life and taught the children of the Hun invaders how to read and write Latin. Some years later, a group of his former pupils recognized their saintly, white-haired teacher. They promptly lassoed him, dragged him behind their horses, stoned him and lanced him through the heart. (Latin, apparently, was not their favorite subject.) Death by former students qualified him for martyrdom – (as if teaching a classroom full of obstreperous Huns was not punishment enough). Beatification followed martyrdom sometime in the 11th century.

While we are looking at St. Gellert’s femur and other bits of bone, Rena goes to the same toilette as Bernie and donates her sweater. An hour later Bernie and Rena realize they are missing one sweater and a guidebook. They go back to the toilette and retrieve their goods from the efficient Magyar toilette attendant. It’s another miracle for the blessed St. G! Is there a patron saint of things left in public toilets? I nominate Gellert.
THE ETERNAL SEARCH FOR FOOD
Hiking down from the Citadel, our stomachs begin to growl. It is quite hot and we are thirsty. We skip the Semmelweis Medical Museum and cross over the “Sisi” bridge into Pest. After Rena buys two embroidered table cloths, we cash some dollars at the local beauty parlor and, flush with forints, saunter into the Central Cafe for a light snack - coffee laced with vanilla ice cream and accompanied by Dobos torte - seven layers of butter creme separated by thin slices of chocolate cake. Topped with caramel! Yum.
This pretty much settles our appetites. Back to the K+K for naps and showers. At night, our maniacal cabbie, Karolyi, takes us to the Hungarian State Folklore Orchestra. The orchestra plays beautifully and the dancers are enthusiastic, but I get distracted by the cello player on the end who is a dead-ringer for Gene Wilder. I kept expecting him to fall off his chair or shoot his bow out into the audience.
After the concert we stop at an outdoor cafe to eat. After two hours with nothing served but a salad and a bowl of goulash, we plunk down some forints and leave. Now we know why Hungarian girls are so thin!
Our stroll home is very pleasant with no tropical downpours. The lighted chain bridge and parliament buildings and the bulk of St. Stephen’s Cathedral guide us back to the opera house and home. Five squares of Toblerone and another hit of Ambien and it’s lights out.

DAKTARI

Look Ma I'm Flying - Sky Venture, NH - July 21, 2008

CRASH TEST MARY AND FRIEND

FLYING KAT AS 'WENDY ' ********************FLYING SOPHIE ********************DAKTARI AS 'ROCKY'

The e-mail from my friend Greg is intriguing:
“Fly without wings – no experience necessary. Meet at my house at 6:30. If we get 12 people it’s only 35 bucks each.”
“Count me in,” I type back.
“Good! – That makes five. Get more volunteers.” Greg responds.

‘Fly without wings.’ Mmmm. I’m thinking maybe balloons or blimps. I click on the link in Greg’s email. Sky Venture, New Hampshire – no balloons, blimps or dirigibles -just straightforward extreme physics. Unlike butterflies, people aren’t actually designed to fly. But given arms, legs, torsos and a 160 MPH vertical wind it can be done. Aha! This is great – it’s ‘second to the right and straight on till morning’. Neverland, here I come!

Who else would be crazy enough to take up the challenge of wingless flight? Certainly not my wife who prefers to keep both feet firmly planted on terra firma. Hmmm.

My young friend Kat is always up for an adventure.
“Hey, Kat. Wanna fly like Peter Pan?” Kat’s definitely in.

After work, I swing by Newburyport to pick up Kat on the way to Greg’s mansion on the banks of the Merrimack River. We’re joined by Kathleen, Stephanie and her 13 year old son Christopher. The six of us pile into Kathleen’s Acura. It’s a tight squeeze but just 40 minutes later we decant ourselves out of the vehicle and into Sky Venture. We’re met at HQ by our instructor Matt and his fashionably outfitted crash-test dummy, Mary.

The last class of junior birdmen is just finishing their second flight in the Sky Venture and we scramble upstairs to watch. Matt explains, “There are four fans in the ceiling of this vertical wind tunnel that generate winds up to 200 miles an hour going straight up.” We gaze into a Plexiglas octagonal space about 12 feet in diameter where perfectly average people are body surfing with their instructor in a man-made Class 5 hurricane! Kowabunga, dude –surf’s definitely UP!

Adrenaline floods our nervous systems as Matt gives out the flight suits. First, we have to remove anything that can fly off our bodies and ding the Sky Venture or its occupants. We put our rings, bracelets, necklaces, wallets, keys and loose change in the lockers. Then we don helmets, goggles, ripstop nylon flightsuits, and special tie-on sneakers. (Velcro doesn’t stick very well in a hurricane.) Now we all look like crash-test dummies.

Matt takes us to ‘ground school’ where we learn to arch our backs, lift our chins, extend our legs and flex our knees in the classic sky diver position. We also learn how to maneuver – up, down, forward and back. Did you know that Superman flies faster when his legs are out straight? If his knees were bent, he would fly in reverse!

The moment of truth approaches. We stuff wads of foam into our ear canals. (Hurricanes make a lot of noise – even the controlled ones.) We line up on benches in a circle around the outside of Sky Venture, putting 13 year old Christopher in first position next to the entry. He arches his back, crosses his arms, clicks both heels together and falls through the open doorway into the chamber. Matt guides Chris to the center, adjusts his position and Voila! He’s flying – suspended by the winds in the middle of the maelstrom. At the end of one minute Matt gently shoves Christopher to the exit door where he grabs the sides and jumps through for a landing.

Kat’s turn comes. She’s a natural, as she flies through the air with the greatest of ease. Very gracefully – definitely more of a Wendy than a Peter Pan.

I’m next. I fall through the doors, the wind takes me and I’m airborne. How cool is that?!
What’s it like? Indescribable – but here’s my best shot:

I remember when I was 12 years old or so, and my grandfather Bowles would drive Uncle Richard and me into Fort Morgan, Colorado on Saturday afternoons to take Mom shopping in town. Rick and I would be in the back seat and the windows of the big ol’ Buick Century would be wide open, inviting us to stick our arms out. While the Buick sped along at 50 or even 60 MPH trailing an enormous plume of prairie dust, I would put my hand out the open window, curving and straightening my cupped fingers. My arm glided and pirouetted -- rising and falling like a leaf in the stream of moving air. Now, just imagine your whole body feeling exactly like that floaty arm out the window of a speeding car. That’s the feeling of Sky Venture!
Matt, like all of the Sky Venture instructors, is an accomplished sky-diver and assures us that we are experiencing exactly what a diver feels after she reaches terminal velocity and before her chute opens. We do miss the beautiful view, of course, but on the plus side we don’t lose our lunches as the fall out of the airplane sends the pits of our stomachs freefalling from zero to 160 in only a few seconds.

After another one minute flight we go downstairs to view and purchase $15 photos of our experience. I’m kinda hoping I look like an aging, slightly debonair Peter Pan but, alas, it is not to be. The green flight suit definitely works but the goggles don’t go with the Pan image. Plus the wide grin on my face allows the wind to puff out my cheeks with air.
‘Look up in the air. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No – It’s ROCKY THE FLYING SQUIRREL!’

A.K.A,
Daktari

Butterflies are Free - All Others Pay $9.50

Kat's Butterfly Tattoo
MADAM BUTTERFLY- RENA


NOT IN KANSAS ANY LONGER!


BUTTERFLY RESTING

MY FAVORITE!

My massage therapist, Kat, tipped me off to “The Butterfly Place” in Westford, Massachusetts.

I was lamenting the lack of butterflies in my garden this year.
“You won’t see them when it’s cloudy,” says Kat. “They only fly around in bright sunshine.”
“How do you know about butterflies?” I ask.
“I have one tattooed on my shoulder,” replies Kat.
(Sure enough she does. But that as they say is another story.)

That’s a good enough recommendation for me. Taking Kat at her word, I also take a quick snap of her tattoo for blog purposes. Then, I bicycle back to my house, fire up the family Suzuki, load Rena in the front and a couple of beach chairs in the way-back and we’re off – heading West to Westford.

“Nice day,” I exclaim. “Good butterfly weather.”
My wife, who is used to strange utterances about weather conditions as well as spur-of-the-moment travel adventures, doesn’t even ask where we’re going. We plug in Marvin, our GPS. Marvin is a bit temperamental and often refuses to talk if he’s not in the mood. But today is such a bright, sunny wonder of a day that even Marvin cooperates by giving directions. It’s a good thing, because ‘The Butterfly Place’ is not easy to find.

“Here we are,” I exclaim as we pull up to an un-prepossessing suburban ranch house with what looks like a largish detached sunroom on the side. I stop at the stick-your-head-in-the-hole plywood outside the entrance. ”Guess what – it’s a butterfly farm!”
“So the sign says,” agrees Rena, as she sticks her head in the hole and I take a quick blog snap.

We enter and Rena checks out the butterfly gift shop while I buy two adult tickets for $9.50 each. I’m tempted to ask for senior tickets but the old battle-axe behind the counter looks like she could be wise to that canard. I can just see me down at the local constabulary:
“What was his offense officer?” asks the magistrate.
“Impersonating a senior citizen,” replies Officer Krupke. “This cheapskate wanted to ding ‘The Butterfly Place’ $5 off the regular admission by using a fake senior ID.”
“How do you plead, Mr. Cheapskate?”
“Guilty as hell,” I reply.
I pay the $19 and we head for the entrance to the sunroom.

To enter you have to pass through a ‘butterfly trap’. Basically it’s a dark hall with tight doors at both ends to prevent the little guys from escaping – like an airlock into inner space. Emerging from the dark, you reach the inner sanctum. Suddenly it’s a Technicolor world – just like Dorothy after her house fell on the wicked witch. Sunshine and butterflies. Fountains and flowers. Several sculptures and a bench or two. There are feeding stations where butterflies eat mashed bananas and other delicacies.
At first we are like kids in a candy store, fluttering from place to place and exclaiming “Look at that one!” and “Ohmigod look over here”.

Then Butterfly Bob, the sunroom’s naturalist, explains that butterflies spend 90% of their time sitting still and only 10% of their time flitting about. I try sitting still on the bench. Sure enough as my breathing slows and my gaze sharpens, I see nine times as many butterflies in the bushes, up the trees and on the ground. How cool is that? Gradually, I relax into a butterfly trance beside the stream of consciousness. Butter-fly questions flutter-by:

“Don’t we all spend too much time flitting about and not enough time resting?”
“Are all butterflies born free and if so are they born again?”
“If a caterpillar can become a butterfly, then isn’t anything possible?”
“If a caterpillar can become a butterfly, can a doctor become a trapeze artist?”
“What the heck is a moth, anyway?”

Rena breaks into my reverie, “Come on. Time to go. We’re done.”
I rouse myself enough to hear Butterfly Bob explain that a moth has feathery antennae and a butterfly has straight ones. Also butterflies transform via chrysalis while moths prefer cocoons.

“Ready, willing and able,” I exclaim.
“Roger, over and out we go,” asserts my spouse.

We brush off any butterfly hitchhikers and push through the airlock. Surely we can’t be back in Kansas already! It’s a tough transition. I shake my head to clear the lepidoptera from my pre-frontal cortex. I’ve still got butterflies on the brain!

I ask the gift-shop clerk where I might find a beach. We follow her directions but no beach is in sight. Marvin isn’t much help. He seems dazed by the butterfly experience. We stop at a donut shop for more directions. Eventually we stumble on a small deserted strand of sand behind the water treatment plant in Westford. We haul out the beach chairs but only stay for a short time. It seems that swimming in the water supply is frowned upon by town ordinance. Or so a large, red sign says. Officer Krupke might well throw the book at me, if the same wannabee senior scofflaw attracts his attention for the second time in one day! We load our beach chairs back in the car and head for home.

As we tool down the highway, I still have my butterfly buzz.
“Maybe I have been a caterpillar too long. Maybe I should seek personal transformation. Me and all the other baby boom caterpillars.” I feel like Winnie-the-Pooh daydreaming about honey.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see a woman in a white Toyota making a rude gesture.
My head swivels and I realize that she is not flipping me the bird – which is something your average Boston driver is wont to do more frequently then your average Kansas driver. Instead she is pointing and gesticulating toward the rear of my car.
“Your trunk is open!” she yells.

“Holy Hatchback,” she’s right!

“Ohmigod,” yells Rena. “My purse is in the back.”

I pull off the highway at the next exit. Sure enough, on closer inspection the hatch is wide open and the beach chairs are dangling precariously in the breeze. But the pocketbook is heavy enough that it's still inside and the contents are intact. Nothing seems to be missing.

“Now why in the heck ….”, Rena starts to admonish. There’s a slight menacing tone in her voice and I suspect that the blame will fall on me if I don’t think of something quickly.

“The butterflies made me do it!” I spontaneously blurt out.

Now, that’s a conversation stopper. Rena raises one eyebrow quizzically and gives me the stink eye. I quickly batten all hatches and clear for take-off.

“Butterflies made me do it.”
What kind of a psychotic lame excuse is that? Pretty soon I won’t need a fake senior ID. They’ll know I’m old enough for reduced admission by just checking out the way I drive and the weird excuses coming out of my mouth. As the Dunlops direct me into my driveway, the car radio is playing Paul Simon’s ‘Still Crazy after all Those Years.’
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46bkXgxb66E on YouTube)

"I'm ready, I guess," I muse to myself. "Just send for the men in white coats. Only be sure they’re the traditional ones carrying the big butterfly nets on long poles.”


Daktari

Friedensreich Regentag Dunkelbunt Hundertwasser (December 15, 1928 – February 19, 2000)

Kunst Haus, Vienna

Hundertwasser Haus -low income housing

Trash to Electric Power Incinerator

Vienna Trash Incinerator - other side!

Autobahn Rest Stop by Hundertwasser

Friedensreich Regentag Dunkelbunt Hundertwasser. What a moniker!

Herr Hundertwasser is to staid Viennese architecture what Attila the Hun was to the hot springs at Budapest. He really shook up the old neighborhood bigtime! His beautiful, quirky buildings dot the bland Viennese urban landscape like exotic gems. A trash-burning power plant looks like a Russian fairy village. An art museum (the Kunst Haus) looks like Legoland on drugs. My favorite is the Hundertwasser Haus, a block of low income housing flats with no square angles and no two apartments alike. Nine hundred tons of dirt and 250 trees and vines are an integral part of the latter’s design.

Seeing these buildings brings up a very reasonable question, "Why should ordinary architecture be so extraordinarily boring." Also: "Why should't form be fun as well as functional?" Hundertwasser's work reminds me of Antoni Gaudi in Barcelona, but without the heavy religious symbolism. I'll take a fanciful Austrian autobahn reststop over an inspired Spanish cathedral any day. Pass the hot espresso and hold the holy water, Danke schoen.

Rena and I quaff our hot espresso in the courtyard of the Kunst Haus (art museum) and marvel at Hundertwasser’s undulating floors, riotous plantlife, and tiled walls. After the Kunst Haus we walk across the Danube canal and into the Prater - Vienna’s Coney Island. We take the famous Prater Wheel - a Ferris wheel from the 1890’s. The sun's going down over Vienna and the view is Wunderbar. The day ends in a perfect golden glow and we still have the night ahead of us! Time to 'wein und schwein' before we 'rise and shine'.

We finally meet our sponsor at the International Conference of Nutrition: Ms. Alice Wimpfheimer (and her roommate Erly from Campinas, Brazil). They are waiting at the Austrian Conference Center where Bernie has spent the day attending nutricious lectures and presentations. Alice is 77 years old with the energy of a 17 year old. She probably weighs 77 pounds soaking wet! This little dynamo lives on Central Park West but remains Swiss to the core.

After greetings and exclamations, we board a bus to Grinzing for a traditional Austrian pork fest - or as they call it, a Heurigen night. There is pork cutlet, pork roast, pork sausage and, to avoid any clogs in the plumbing, fresh sauerkraut. Being as how we're Jewish by religion and vegetarian by inclination, Rena and I eat very little. But the Apfelstrudel for dessert is great! We drink Austrian red and white wine and sing some Trinkenlieder which I remember from my childhood on the Alsatian border. Alice is impressed!

About 10:30 Rena and I start to fade and decide to take public transport back to the hotel instead of waiting for the tour bus. I ask a local Burger “Wo ist die Grindzinger Statione?”. And I understand enough of the reply to arrive at the busstop just as the trolley car doors open. In 20 minutes we are out of the dorf and back at the K+K for a night of rest. All except Bernie who awakens at 4 AM to worry about the poster. Tomorrow is POSTER DAY.

Daktari