We have just started our latest adventure with Mehmet Özbalci of TurFantastic, this time to photograph five Balkan countries. Mehmet has become our favorite photography tour guide, and we have traveled with him to Iran, Sri Lanka, Georgia, Armenia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkey and other countries. He knows where to go at which time for the […]
Home After Whirlwind 10 Weeks
We are back home, and loving it! Yes, the travel was fantastic. The places were fantastic. The people were (mostly…) fantastic. But our own beds and showers are more welcome after a long trip like this. After 10 weeks covering 6 countries, we did so much that it is hard for it not to start […]
Iran 4 – Shiraz Two
Iranian Local: What do you do? (he meant as a job) Me: I am retired. IL: Are you unemployed? I am sorry to hear this. Me: No, retired. I worked for 45 years, and can now enjoy my life without having to work any longer. IL: But you are not old enough to retire! (discussion […]
Sri Lanka 1 – Colombo
NOTE: Starting with the Thailand trip just completed, I have begun limiting each “photo story block” to only seven images. A few years ago, I was using eleven, but received feedback that the images were too small. I have since been using nine-photo blocks. Some people have commented that they read this block on small […]
Cuba 8 – Farewell from Havana
As we prepare to leave Cuba, it is mostly the Cuban people with expressives eyes that we remember. They have had a hard life, yet seem content. We ended our Cuba photo tour by returning to Havana for one last evening. On the way there, our van got a flat tire with the retread flying off […]
Portugal 9 – Lisbon
Our three month adventure in Europe and Central Asia is now over. This is our 37th and final blog entry covering this trip that has taken us to Italy, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Georgia, Armenia, and finishing with a month in Portugal. On our last day in Lisbon, we decided to check out their zoo. We […]
Photo Tour Travelers
Wow… Five countries (Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Armenia) in six weeks. Mehmet Özbalci organized this tour through his company Fantastic Photo Tours, based in Istanbul, Turkey. We used him in 2016 for a tour of Turkey, and liked his approach so much that we decided to use him again for these countries. I thought we would […]
Kazakhstan 2 – Singing Dunes
While driving to our Kazakhstan destination the next day, we saw a herd of horses standing in a pond not far from the road. As is common with this tour, that meant stopping the bus, and getting out for half an hour of photography. The horses did indeed present wonderful images to capture (bottom). However, we were […]
Kyrgyzstan 1 – Bishkek
We are now in Kyrgyzstan, after completing our tour of Uzbekistan. There have been several cemeteries along the road, but one we stopped at today was particularly special. Looking at it from the top of a hill, it appears to be a small city (center above). It is standard for grave sites to have photographs of […]
Uzbekistan 4 – Khiva
We finished our tour of Uzbekistan by visiting Khiva, a small city of 50,000 people. On our first day, Mehmet (our travel guide) arranged for a private performance of traditional music. Though these trips usually produce some very nice photography, it is sometimes a bit of a scramble as everyone wants the same basic photograph (center […]