And in Viking news, Scotland’s Vikings, in the Shetland islands, want independence….
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/scotlands-vikings-own-way-independence-vote-101706775–finance.html
And in Viking news….
All posts by Mark
My favorite books of 2013
2013 was a year where I spent a lot of time on a plane, with the resulting extra time to read a lot of books. I also built the first version of my experiments with blog-driven book recommendations, which generated a lot of recommendations for things to read.
This year I re-read a lot of old favorites, or works by authors I love that I’d not gotten around to. With The Hobbit Part II coming out, of course I had to re-read The Hobbit (with all 3 volumes of the Lord of the Rings thrown in for good measure). Following on the fantasy theme, I particularly enjoyed Betsy Tobin’s Ice Land, a creative re-telling of the Norse myths, in a parallel storyline to a more historical storyline of medieval Iceland. Great characters, and reasonably faithful to the old norse myths. Heart of the Ronin is a fun samurai fairy tale for adults – if you liked Across the Nightingale Floor, you’ll love Heart of the Ronin. Wrapping up the “medieval” (ok Tudor in this case) stuff, one couldn’t really get away from Hillary Mantel’s Wolf Hall, it was in every airport, in every bit of news about books and so on. I enjoyed it, although I admit I struggled to get through the ending parts. Nevertheless her inside-out portrayal of Thomas Cromwell as “the good guy” was quite enjoyable.
In a more modern fantasy vein, Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore will delight book lovers and geeks both – it combines one of the most interesting bookstores in fiction together with a girl-geek who wields the cloud-computing power of Google to solve a bookish mystery.
I did quite a bit of spy-reading this year. In addition to re-doing Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy yet again, I read for the first time Le Carre’s Our Game, and I think it’s one of his most under-rated novels. In a more recent vintage, I received a copy of The Crook Factory by Dan Simmons as part of Librarything’s Early Reviewers program, and devoured it. Dan Simmons is a fine writer, who seems to tackle few things more than once. Fantasy, Horror, Spy Novels, historical fiction, crime drama…In this case Simmons isn’t channeling the supernatural, just the world of 1940s Cuba and J Edgar Hoover – and yes Nazis and Marlene Dietrich too. Oh, and Ernest Hemingway. Did you know that Hemingway was a spy? Me neither. The Crook Factory will tell you all about it. (separately, Simmon’s book Darwin’s Blade is another really fun book, worth the read). I was also introduced to the pleasures of Mick Herron’s group of loser-spys in Slow Horses, and Dead Lions. Delightfully droll.
Finally, I love reading books about the “real” Hawaii, not the picture-perfect beaches you read about in travel magazines. When The Shark Bites gives a true look into native Hawaiians and some of the history around the Hawaiian sovereignty movement.
A Weekend trip to Monterey, Carmel and Big Sur
Had a weekend free during a business trip to California. I decided to take a weekend road trip down to Monterey. Got up Saturday morning and took highway 17 over the mountains and down into Santa Cruz. Near the summit, I pulled off on Madrone Rd and wandered through the mountain neighborhood of Redwood Estates. Gorgeous views, wonderful Redwoods smell, nice houses and winding near-driveways for roads. Really neat area and made for wandering with the windows down, taking in the mountain air. I followed my nose (and a little bit of Scout, and eventually re-emerged back onto 17.
From there drove down to Monterey, to the Monterey Hotel where was I was staying. Nice hotel, great location, not too pricey, with a bit of a Victorian decor and pleasant folks at the desk. But, Ooomph. 4th floor room, no elevator – beware of that if you stay here. There’s a great coffee shop across the street, Cafe Trieste – spent the rest of the morning drinking good coffee and hacking some code.
I headed down to Cannery Row, I hadn’t been there in about 20 years. It’s been gentrified a lot, some pretty upscale hotels and the usual row of shops. The harbor is right nearby and the obligatory sea-otters were everywhere. I was on my own so didn’t dive into the Monterey aquarium, but if you were there with kids, you’d definitely want to do that. Instead I did lunch at Bubba Gump, of Forest Gump fame. Touristy, but they have great shrimp, Lagunitas on tap, and a great view of the harbor. You could do a lot worse.
After lunch, I went back to downtown area and indulged one of my favorite vices, used bookstores. There are two interesting ones in the downtown area, The Book Haven and The Old Monterey Book Company. Somehow I came away empty handed, but enjoyed a few hours of browsing. There’s a couple of “British” pubs near the hotel, one more British than the other. I had dinner at the “real” English pub, the Crown & Anchor; the food was OK but a good beer selection. I figured I would try the other one to see what was up, the Brittania Arms. It was early Saturday night and the place would seat about 40 people – they had 5 (big) bouncers. Apparently Monterey is a tougher place than I thought. I had a cold beer but there wasn’t much going on, so I went to bed….
Up the morning, had breakfast at the Cafe Trieste. As mentioned, great coffee, and I had the Crab Benedict, it’s awesome. Have it if you go.
Then I hit the 17 Mile road, perhaps the most beautiful (toll) road in the country. Stop at the Lone Cypress. Gawk at the mansions and the scenery. 
Drive through Pebble Beach golf course. You’ll come out the other side in Carmel. Park the car, grab a coffee at the Carmel Coffee House and see the shops. More Art Galleries per capita than any place on earth. (I made that up but it might be true).
After Carmel I decided go south to Point Lobos, so I headed down the Cabrillo Highway. Amazing coastline. I started seeing signs for Big Sur, and I realized the day was still young, so I decided to abandon Point Lobos and head for Big Sur. (Point Lobos is apparently very beautiful too, so if you’re short of time, stop there). I started getting hungry and started looking for a roadside joint to eat at. In 5 miles or so, I ran into Rocky Point Restaurant, which is not a “joint”, it’s a pretty nice restaurant. It’s got amazing views of the ocean, as it’s nestled right on top of a cliff. Grab a burger or grilled cheese, or something fancy (I had the grilled cheese on focaccio, which was great), then hit the road again.
Route 1 is absolutely a blast to drive, and stunning to look at. After a gorgeous drive, I got to Big Sur and stopped at the ranger station. As I got out of my car, I was hit with crisp mountain air with a strong aroma of Redwood and Eucalyptus, with just a hint of ocean….amazing. The ranger station was closed, but they had a photo of the relatively unmarked road 1/2 mile to the south that takes you down to Pfeiffer Beach. You’ll take a narrow, winding country road down to the park (there’s pullouts for when cars pass in opposite directions). About 2 miles down is the parking lot – from there it’s a short walk to beautiful beach with a view of the setting sun. 
Hang out on the beach for a bit, listen to the waves, watch the sun drop, then hit the road back to northern California. It’s about a 2 hour drive, so you can be back in time for dinner if you want, or stretch it by stopping somewhere along the way for dinner.
A day in Marin county and the Palomarin trail
Had one of my regular visits to California for work, and managed to spend a weekend with my daughter and her boyfriend. Friday night we went to a nearby bar in San Francisco (Paragon, a great place), to watch the Red Sox in the NLCS. We were planning on taking a trip to Marin County for some hiking, but weren’t really sure where we were going.
Paragon proved to be a source of many co-incidences. Waiting outside the bar (which didn’t open til 5:30), happened to be someone living in SF but who grew up the a few towns away from where I live in Massachusetts. Shortly they were followed by a horde of red sox fans. Game on! Sitting at the bar, some Detroit fans joined, sitting next to us. We had some friendly conversations – they were actually from Marin County, and recommended we hike the Palomarin trail. I’d been thinking about that as one of many choices but their recommendation confirmed that as the plan. As the game went on the Detroit fans were replaced with a different couple. Turns out, one of them worked in tech, and both my daughter and I had a number of number of mutual acquaintances. Weird. Last but not least, the Sox came through in the end with grand slam by Shane Victorino to win the game and head to the world series!
Next day we headed out to Marin. We drove to the Palomarin trail, about an hour and half from downtown San Francisco. After heading around the Bolinas Lagoon, you’ll drive down a dirt road (passing the Point Reyes Bird Observatory along the way), continuing 10 minutes or so after that to the trailhead.
The trailhead has restrooms (as does the bird observatory). When we were there the trail was well used but not over-crowded (there was what looked like a teen venturing group headed out to camp on the beach as well as many hikers and trail runners).
The trail is about 9 miles total (4 1/2 miles each way). It’s relatively flat, about 600 feet elevation gain over all. We hit the trail around 11am or so. The trail starts in a grove of fragrant eucalyptus trees, then opens onto a mesa with wonderful views of the ocean.
The trail continues to follow the ocean for awhile, then turns inland. You’ll briefly go through a variety of ecosystems including an almost rain-forest like section, pines, another foggy mesa, a rocky pass that would have felt at home on a greek isle, and finally a few mountain lakes (there were some folks swimming the day we went).
After about 4 miles there’ll be a spur trail to the left (there’s a sign) that will take you down to Alamere Falls. The spur is about 0.4 miles long. Other blogs have mentioned poison oak, but we didn’t have any trouble with that.
At the end are a wonderful series of small waterfalls and pools. Then there’s a mildly tricky rock scramble down onto the beach. Then, your prize from your labors. A neat, moss covered waterfall, 40 or 50 feet high. And waves crashing on the beach, seals and birds in the water. A great place for lunch! Then we’re back on the trail and back in the parking lot by about 2:30. On the way back you’ll get gorgeous views of the coastline, you didn’t notice on the way out because it was behind you 8).
From there we headed up through Point Reyes and on to the Tomales Bay Oyster Company. 
It’s kinda out in the middle of nowhere, but well worth the drive. You buy your (raw) oysters from them. Everything else is up to you. There’s picnic tables and grills, you can each your oysters raw, grill them, or both. You’ll want to bring picnic supplies (we brought Brie, crackers, fresh avocados for guacamole, and other goodies. It’s kind of a motley crew there – we bought extra orders from the Sacramento Assassins, a friendly bunch of motorcycle riders down from the day. The staff is friendly and helpful and with a location right on the bay in the sunshine, it couldn’t be more beautiful.
We stopped on the way back in Point Reyes for some book shopping, my addiction, at Point Reyes Books, while sipping on some great coffee from next-door, the Bovine Bakery.
All in all a classic Marin County late summer day.
(more photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/viking2917/sets/72157636783287194/)
The Dark Labyrinth, by Lawrence Durrell
Some time ago I learned of The Dark Labyrinth, a novel set on the island of Crete (originally published under the title Cefalu). I bought a copy a long time ago and finally got a chance to read it, it’s been out of print for a long time. A group of travelers head to Crete to explore the Labyrinth and find the rumored Minotaur.
The early part of the novel has the travelers on an ocean liner headed to the Mediterranean, each for their own reasons. Durrell gradually exposes us to the travelers, their lives and reasons for heading to the Mediterranean. Durrell absolutely skewers the pretensions of the passengers. The first half of the book almost feels like a comedy of manners or an A. S. Byatt novel fifty years early. I found myself laughing out loud, which doesn’t happen to me very often.
As the ship stops at Crete and the passengers sign up for a tour of the Labyrinth and to search for the legendary Minotaur, we enter Durrell’s Greece. The thyme-scented mountains, the stories of the Greek resistance’s mountain hideaways, abbots and monks and peasants, and the natural beauty of Greece come to the fore. The passengers encounter a disaster while in the labyrinth, and each finds their own fate while trying to escape. A bit of Greek legend, and bit of “Lost Horizons” bring the novel to an interesting philosophical close.
The Dark Labyrinth doesn’t rise to the level of the Alexandria Quartet, but it’s good read, particularly for those who are interested in Durrell or the Greek islands.