Everyone everywhere is always trying to tell you how to survive plane trips – the problem is, many times those people are not giving you advice you can actually use, telling you things you already know, or pushing products they got for free (and haven’t actually tried them out over and over. Everything can be great once).
So, after logging in thousands of miles, sometimes days in a row on a plane, I’ve decided to do my own basic list… and I can tell you this: don’t get on a flight longer than seven hours without a sleeping pill, drink lots of water (duh), and these six items will change your life if you have to hop on a long, cylindrical metal tube hurtling through the air. Note: I found, bought and paid for all of these on my own and have tried them out on countless trips.
It is possible to look good and stay fabulous when you travel – even on 17 hour trips in seriously questionable conditions, I swear! If you don’t believe me, check out my Afghanistan videos here.
And now, it’s all in video format my duckies – thanks to Maybelline, which hired me to be in their Master Class series. And so, without further ado, here is how to stay fresh and fab on the road:
The island of Molokai is an unspoiled paradise — the last Hawaiian island that has held out against cruise ships and mass tourism — but for 100 years to more than 8,000 people, it was a prison.
On the north shore of the island is a secluded peninsula surrounded by high sea cliffs on three sides and an impassable coastline on the fourth. In the 1800s Hansen’s disease, commonly known as leprosy, became more prevalent. And as there was no cure, countries around the world created specific colonies for the ill people to live in. It was on this spot in Molokai in 1866 that King Kamehameha V created Kalaupapa.
Once a year for four months, the pine and oak forests of the UNESCO-protected Biosphere Reserve, high up in the Transatlantic Volcanic Belt outside of Mexico City, come alive. Starting in early November, on the Day of the Dead, millions of monarch butterflies arrive after their 3,000-mile journey from eastern Canada and the United States to mate … creating one of the most majestic natural wonders in the world.
The butterflies clump together for warmth when the sun is hiding.
It all started in December when I realized I wanted to start off 2016 the way I wanted to end it — traveling and being inspired. I’ve always wanted to see the butterfly migration; when I was a child growing up in Ohio, the butterflies would sometimes pass through on their way to Mexico, and it was awe-inspiring to see football fields full of them — and I wanted to revisit that on a grander scale. I knew I had to go see the migration in Mexico.
My friend Trisha lives in Los Angeles, Jackie lives in Dallas, and I am in New York City — basically, it’s hard to get together. So when Trisha suggested a girls getaway in Ojai, Calif., just 75 miles north of Los Angeles, Jackie and I jumped.
At first I was skeptical.
Ojai has gotten an annoying rap in the past as a healthy, vegan, spiritual hippie hangout.
And there are still some things that make you roll your eyes and giggle a bit. The “No Talking!” signs posted alongside the anti-cellphone warnings at the famed Meditation Mount lookout are a bit much, as are the plethora of signs warning you that everything is organic. (Doesn’t it all become a little like a double negative after a while? Like: “organic organics,” “vegan organic,” “farm fresh organic vegan.” At some point you just want to say, “Come on — I know this is all made from genetically modified cow hoofs!” Except, fun fact, vegans don’t have the most developed sense of humor and probably wouldn’t think that’s funny. Must be the lack of protein.) Or the shops that sell dream catchers alongside crystals and spiritual self-help books.
But I was about to get schooled.
The Ojai Valley Inn is a little slice of heaven. (Photo: Ojai Valley Inn & Spa)
James Bond loves it, Formula 1 loves it, and it just got the coveted No. 1 spot on the New York Times’s “52 Places to Go in 2016” list — it’s official: Mexico City is hot right now.
After years of suffering through a bad reputation — pollution, overcrowding, and crime — the city has pulled itself up by its bootstraps and become a leader in the arts, gastronomy, and cultural excursions. With 150 museums (many of them either free or costing just a few dollars) and four UNESCO sites, Mexico City is a historical culture lover’s dream. Even better, with a strong dollar (the exchange rate is now around 17 pesos to the dollar), it’s more affordable than, say, a jaunt to Europe — or even Los Angeles. And, as of Jan. 1, U.S.-Mexico aviation restrictions, which capped the number of airlines that could fly on the U.S.-Mexico routes, have eased, and carriers like JetBlue are now doing nonstop flights to the capital, making trips easier than ever.
Every now and then New York City gets hit with a mega-storm… There was Hurricane Sandy and this year, Storm Jonas. But, unlike Sandy, Storm Jonas didn’t wreak havoc, it just wreaked fun as the entire city shut down and people every where came out to play in ways that New Yorkers don’t usually play. And so, for your enjoyment, I present, New Yorkers Having Fun…
Yours truly decided to hang with neighbors at Lucky Strike Cafe – where I had a few hot toddies
During a snow day in NYC the only thing to do is indulge in a few *cough* Hot Toddies at Lucky Strike.
And then, while walking home on West Broadway, which looked like this, BTW:
West Broadway like you’ve never seen it – EMPTY – during Storm Jonas/Snowzilla.
Which inspired me to do this:
Hope you all had a lovely Snowzilla as well – let me know what you did in comments!
Earlier this Week, ISIS destroyed at 1400 year-old monastery in Mosul, Iraq, but last year they did their most damage – razing the oldest monastery in the country, Mar Behnam and several others – as well as looting the ancient Assyrian towns of Ninevah and Nimrud, cornerstones of human history.
I visited the biblical city of Nimrud in 2011 and it was palpably magical—made even more so because so few people were ever able visit the site—first due to Saddam Hussein’s government and then due to war.
Built in 1274 B.C., it was made the capital of the Assyrian empire in 883 B.C. and a 5 mile long wall was constructed, surrounding the city and palace. Huge Lamassu, large winged beasts with the body of an ox or lion and the heads of men, lined the palace entry and inside were carved scenes of life painted in many colors. Interestingly, along the outer walls, inscriptions were carved including:
“The palace of cedar, cypress, juniper, boxwood, mulberry, pistachio wood, and tamarisk, for my royal dwelling and for my lordly pleasure for all time, I founded therein. Beasts of the mountains and of the seas, of white limestone and alabaster I fashioned and set them up on its gates.”
“Silver, gold, lead, copper and iron, the spoil of my hand from the lands which I had brought under my sway, in great quantities I took and placed therein.”
“Many of the captives I have taken and burned in a fire. Many I took alive; from some I cut off their hands to the wrists, from others I cut off their noses, ears and fingers; I put out the eyes of many of the soldiers. I burned their young men, women and children to death.”
“I flayed the nobles as many as rebelled; and [I] spread their skins out on the piles.”
Yesterday, ISIS destroyed St. Elijah’s, a 1400-year-old Christian monastery just outside of Mosul – part of their mission to obliterate history and anything that doesn’t fit into their warped version of Islam. Back in 2011, I actually visited St. Elijah’s monastery – and one that was even older, the 1700-year-old Mar Behnam Monastery and Convent – a Syriac Catholic compound also containing a chapel and two shrines and was filled with priceless artworks.
The shrines of the Christian martyrs, Behnam (left) and his sister Sarah (right), mark where the brother and sister died and had stood in various forms on this hill since the 4th century.
There had been a shrine on the hill outside of Beth Khdeda (near Mosul) since the 4th century, built by the pagan Assyrian king Senchareb as a penance for killing his son Behnam and daughter Sarah after they converted to Christianity… until March 2015, when ISIS leveled the place to the ground.
Both shrines – Mar Behnam and Marth Sarah, were blown up by ISIS on March 19, 2015.
The pictures below are all that’s left of what was once was an integral chapter in human history. Inside the chapel and shrines were examples of art and architecture rarely seen anywhere else in the world – carvings that seamlessly blended Muslim and Christian designs and one of the few Middle Eastern examples of Uigher inscriptions, left by Mongol traders and pilgrims as they made their way from China to Europe on trade routes. The walls and artwork were living history – and contained pieces from almost every century since it was built.
The buildings are now gone and the art destroyed or presumably sold off to shady people who may house them in a back room of their many mansions (yes, my imagination is getting away with me, but it’s my website!), but looking at these photographs should remind us that Iraq has been, up until recently, the cradle of civilization. It was a religiously tolerant place where Muslims, Christians, Yazidis and even Jews lived side by side until it erupted into chaos.
Forget curling up with a cat, the most amazing thing in the world is cuddling an orphaned baby rhino. (Photo: Khululu Care for the Wild)
There is almost nothing more heartbreaking in South Africa’s war against rhino poaching than seeing a baby pachyderm standing watch over its dead mother, mourning. Many times the babies, too young to survive on their own, are also doomed; others are rescued — their fate unknown. But now, there is a facility in the north of the country where these babies are, fed, cared for, and ultimately released to the wild — and it’s guests (who pay for the volunteer experience) who are doing it.
It’s the new hands-on wildlife experience.
At Khulula Care for the Wild, situated on the banks of the Vreek, Noord-Kaap, and Queens rivers, in Mpumulanga, South Africa, you can actually cuddle, nurse, wean, and play with orphaned rhino babies whose mothers have been slaughtered by poachers.
According to Ellen Sziede, the marketing manager for African Conservation Experience, which runs Khululu, “there are an estimated 20,000 white rhino and 5,000 black rhino left in Africa. South Africa has by far the biggest population of all African countries, being home to almost 90 percent of all African white rhino. So the current estimated population for South Africa is about 18,000 white rhino and just under 2,000 black rhino.”
Viktor Barkas, who runs the Rhino Protrack team, which patrols for poachers on privately owned land outside of Kruger, in Hoedspruit, South Africa, told me last year that in the small area he patrols there are 2,000 rhinos — 126 of which were slaughtered in the first half of last year, leaving many rhino offspring orphaned.
“it is not a war on rhino,” Barkas said. “It is a genocide.”
The unlucky orphans (from all over the country, not just Barkas’s area) end up at Khululu, where the rhinos are raised and eventually released back into the wild in a program reminiscent of the wildly successful David Sheldrick elephant orphanage, in Kenya.
Volunteers are asked to stay for a minimum of two weeks — although exceptions are made — and during this time they rotate in and out of three teams.
The baby rhinos love feeding time.
Baby Olive loves her bottle. (Photo: Khululu Care for the Wild)
The first team, the Baby Team, looks after the youngest rhinos, which are still fed by bottle. “Travelers in this team spend a lot of time preparing the special milk formula and doing the bottle feeds, mothering the smallest rhinos, as they sometimes need people to stay with them at night when they are very small, and also helping with the veterinary care for new arrivals,” Sziede said.
The babies love a cuddle at nap time.
(Photo: Khululu Wild Care)
After working with the smallest rhinos, guests move on to Team Rhino, which takes care of the weaned animals, including recording feeding behavior and preparing mud baths for the little guys.
And then there’s Team Other — which isn’t as bad as it sounds.
“Care for the Wild looks after a lot of other species as well, not just the rhinos,” Sziede explained. “They currently have two hippos, three lions, several birds of prey, various antelope, a baby vervet monkey, and mongoose. All of these animals need feeding, enclosure maintenance, and enrichment — from playing with the monkey and mongoose to taking the hippos for a swim.”
Look who made a new friend… (Photo: Khululu Care for the Wild)
Sziede added that “This is hard work: Volunteers wake up at around 6 a.m. and go to bed at around 7 p.m … unless they are on the midnight feeding slot.” But the work is worth it.
And while there seem to be a lot of babies around, “There actually should be more babies (rescued),” Barkas said. “The poachers will kill the mother for the horn, and if the baby isn’t scared off, they will often kill it too just to silence it.”
The orphans will take all the hugs they can get.
Costs to volunteer (which include include pick-up/drop-off from Johannesburg Airport, accommodations, meals, and funding) are:
Two weeks: US$3,150Three weeks: US$4,050Four weeks: US$4,800
