At Home In The Wasteland Travel Blog

Yes, Venice again. I know it’s quite possibly one of the biggest travel cliches out there, but I adored this city. We spent a few days here during our holidays in Italy, after visiting Rome. This is the Grand Canal, the major water-traffic corridor in the city. You can take either the water buses (vaporetti) [...]

This portrait of “Great Leader” Kim Il-sung and “Dear Leader” Kim Jong-il was hanging in a Pyongyang souvenir shop when I visited North Korea in September 2009. The pervasive cult of personality that surrounded the Kims ensured that every building you set foot in prominently displayed portraits of the two leaders. Now that Kim Jong-il [...]

The above structure is the Temple of Antoninus and Faustina, originally built in the year 141. It is currently in the Roman Forum area in the center of of Rome, and contains a number of ancient structures dating back to Rome’s heyday as an empire. Along with the Colosseum and Vatican, the Forum will certainly [...]

This one of the more amusing panels you will see at the Berlin Wall East Side Gallery. It is a reproduction of a Berlin Wall graffiti painting titled “My God, help me to survive this deadly love” that depicts an actual kiss that took place between Soviet Leader Leonid Brezhnev and East German leader Erich [...]

You are always under the watchful eyes of the “Dear Leader” and “Great Leader” wherever you go in North Korea, including the metro. These portraits of Kim Il-Sung and Kim Jong-Il were spotted in a Pyongyang Metro car in September 2009. While we were only allowed in one metro car (seperate, of course, from the [...]

Completed in 1463, Fort Bokar is a key part of the system of defensive walls that surround the Old City of Dubrovnik. These walls are considered one of the great fortification systems of the Middle Ages, as they were never breached by a hostile army during this time period. Since its founding in the 7th [...]

Taken on a cold winter morning in late December 2009, this photo shows the statues of Saints Cyril and Methodius, two Byzantine Greek brothers who introduced Christianity to the Slavs and invented the Cyrillic alphabet. Prague Castle can be seen in the background.

Situated on the west bank of the Nile across from Thebes (modern day Luxor), the Valley of the Queens is the final resting place for the wives of Egypt’s Pharaohs (who themselves are buried in the nearby Valley of the Kings). The Valley of the Queens contains over seventy tombs from the 18th, 19th and [...]

The above photo was taken at Playa Avellana, during our last full day of our Costa Rica trip in February 2010. Amazingly, however, I almost did not make this trip to Costa Rica due to an airline mishap. Thankfully, however, I had purchased a travel insurance policy when I booked my trip, so that salvaged [...]

Kim Il-Sung, sporting the red scarf of the Young Pioneer organization, watches over the youth of North Korea in this large roadside propaganda painting.