The Universe House

This is La casa è localizzata (The Universe House for the Gringos), located in Roca Blanca, near Puerto Escondido, Mexico. This home was designed by Gabriel Orozco and Tatiana Bilbao.

The design is inspired by the Jantar Mantar Astronomical Observatory in Jaipur, India. The designers kept the house low to the ground to not obstruct the Pacific view - or even interrupt the rocky coastline. Check out the deck that surrounds the rooftop pool - amazing.

Urban Vineyard

This is a picture of the Vineyard in the Rue Saint-Vincent in the Montmartre district of Paris - named Clos Montmartre.

The Romans decided that this area was the perfect place to honor Bacchus - so a temple was built, and the nuns started growing grapes. War and disease ravaged Montmartre over the centuries destroying all the of original vineyards.

It was a group of artists who petitioned the city government and were granted this small parcel of land in 1933 - and Clos Montmartre was planted. What a great use for this lovely landscape.

Travel for the Cools

I follow several blogs - one of my new favorites is A Cup of Jo, by Joanna Goddard. She is not only a well known magazine writer, she's also a very good friend of my co-worker, Allison.

Her post today was from a recent trip to Palm Springs, CA. She linked to the house that they rented during their stay. The link brought me airbnb - which is a hip, eclectic travel site based in San Francisco. It just screams cool, young and the next wave in travel sites. They definitely need to get more options - as I tried to find a place in Park City, UT for our next photo shoot and they only had two options. But, it's always exciting to see what's new online.....

Blue Beach

This is Blue Beach, on the southern side of Vieques, close to the restricted side of the island. I took this picture - you can see how busy Blue Beach was the day we visited - and remember, this was December 30th! More people did show up as the day progressed, but there was never a feeling of being crowded or annoyed by the masses. The water was so warm and clear - even I had no issues swimming for a cool down...and for those of you who know me - that's kind of a big deal.

Green Beach

I just returned from the island of Vieques, Puerto Rico. Most of the beaches here were named by the US Navy, which had a large installation on the island until 2002. This is Green Beach, the first of many that we explored during our week long vacation. Green beach is located on the far western side of the island, where the Atlantic Ocean meets the Caribbean Sea. From Green Beach, the mountains from El Yunque Rainforest are in plain sight (aside from the ever present rain clouds that blanket the peaks) along with a myriad of marine life.

You will notice in this picture that there aren't any people on Green Beach. We were here during the week between Christmas and New Years, arguably the busiest travel time of the year, and we only saw 4 other people. Amazing. The next few posts will be about Vieques - the beaches, island life and temultuous history that makes this island truly unique. Thumbs way up.