Not your typical travel destination

I've decided that this is on my list of 'Places to Visit Before I Die'.

It's a small deserted island in Nagasaki prefecture in Japan called Hashima. Because of its shape and silhouette, this island is also known as Gunkanjima, which translated to English, means Battleship Island. Used for coal mining for almost a century, it was one of the most densely populated areas in Japan, until Japan made the shift to petroleum and natural gas in the 1960's.

(photos by Yuji Saiga)

How did I stumbled across this island? This photo essay by Mario Gallucci. I was fascinated by his photos and his story behind them and had to learn more. Here are some of his pictures:

Yes, it's deserted and kind of creepy looking. It's also technically illegal to set foot on this island. And yes, walking around in these unstable ruins could potentially be dangerous and possibly even fatal. But I still want to go.


One day.....

Safety first!

On our recent trip to Florida and South Carolina, we saw the best flight safety video EVER.

A few thoughts:
1) My husband and I fly Delta TONS. We've never seen a flight attendant on any of our flights that young, that skinny, or with lips that Angelina Jolie-ish EVER.

2) If all flight safety videos were this funny, more people might stay awake for takeoff and actually pay some attention to it.

3) The real star of the video, the male flight attendant with the million dollar smile. His Emmy-worthy performance reaches its peak at approximately 4:00 into the video. I love him!



Virgin America also has a pretty cool flight safety video, geared toward a much younger and hipper traveler. But still, I'm going to have to pick the Delta guy who grins from ear to ear over the very diverse and interesting cast of pencil sketch characters on the Virgin America flight...

Caving in...

Here's my dirty little confession. This isn't my first blog. I have a terrible habit of starting things, putting them aside with every good intention of going back to it, and then doing the meth mom thing of abandoning it. Sometimes I feel twinges of guilt when I think about what could have been. So this is why I'm starting this new blog with the confidence that I'll make it to the end.

It DOES help to have a few fellow bloggers standing by with a cattle prod to motivate me to keep this thing going....