Chariots and Pierced Tongues: Bisket Jatra Festival in Bhaktapur It takes something special to keep me in the city of Kathmandu for an extra week instead of jaunting off to the mountains of Nepal. I’ve had good luck in the past with festivals in this country, though, whether with Tibetan […]
Albertina Museum: Vienna’s Most Elevated Art House There’s a lot of pun built into that title, but I’m going to be a jerk and not explain it to you till the end. There are just so many museums in Vienna. There’s Freud and Hundertwasser and Leopold and Strauss and Beethoven […]
Snow Leopard Conservation in Kyrgyzstan: Snow Leopard Enterprises Note: this article originally (apart from some minor changes) appeared in the Winter 2015 issue of AUCA Magazine, of which I’m the Editor-in-Chief. See the full version on the AUCA website. If you’re looking for gratuitous pictures of snow leopards, check out […]
Winter in Kyrgyzstan: Snow Camping at Ala-Archa The long frozen Bishkek winter takes it toll on my traditional pastimes. Growing up in Louisiana, deep in the US south, my love for the outdoors has always extended to camping and hiking and multi-day backpacking but given the locale usually only the warm-weather […]
The Museum of Innocence: Love and Madness in Istanbul It’s all an elaborate and precisely constructed lie: a museum built to tell the story of a self-referential book created around the contents of the soon-to-finish museum. A tale of love and loss, but mainly madness, which is entirely fictional but […]
Kumtor Gold Mine: Kyrgyzstan’s Fine Line Between Ecology and Economy Standing squarely at the heart of countless clashes, the Kumtor Gold Mine is equally one of Kyrgyzstan’s most important economic contributors and one of its most controversial environmental and investment considerations. The Kumtor Gold Mine is located high in the mountains […]
Hey there! I'm Stephen, this is my travel blog, and that's me in the poofy hat.
I'm a photographer / writer traveling since 2008, and I've been doing my best to visit amazing places.
My current focus is Central Asia, because for a hiking and camping enthusiast it's as good as it gets.