Many of you know that Desi and I had a wonderful vacation in Cuba. We were gone for a week, including New Year’s Eve and had a very relaxing and enjoyable time!

We stayed at Costa Morena, about 40 minutes outside of Santiago de Cuba. The resort was only rated at 2.5 stars, particularly because it didn’t have a beach. This didn’t bother us, and instead we were greeted by beautiful displays of crashing waves just off shore. This made for some breathtaking scenery and a few good photos:

I had decided not to bring my camera, and instead brought mom’s tiny inexpensive point&shoot camera. While it always felt limiting, I was able to get some nice photos… proving that it isn’t the camera, it’s the photographer.

This little critter was found near one of the buildings far away from the water, likely to die there if we hadn’t come across it. Desi and I decided to bring it back to the water and give it another chance at life, and with the help of another guest at the resort, named him “Charlie”. We both picked him up, it was one of many spontaneously fun moments in our trip.

We did a bit of traveling on our vacation, to the nearby city of Santiago de Cuba and to a nearby aquarium to watch a display with Dolphins and Seals.  When in Santiago, we traveled with another couple, Katarina and Egor (you still have to e-mail me! ) which was a blast, they are very fun people. We checked out a nearby castle as well, which was great for pictures:

We met wonderful people on our trip, including a delightful older lady named Rosemary, which we weren’t able to visit due to crazy prices for “official” taxis. A shout-out to Leigh and Dennis as well, who were always a source of great information.

I know that Desi and I enjoyed our stay very much. Good food, great people, near-perfect weather and only a few things that we wish were better. There are so many stories, but I’ll let the photo gallery below tell as many of them as possible:

A little while ago, Desi had a wonderful idea. During the Doors Open Toronto city-wide event, many attractions had no admission fee for the day. We were able to take advantage of this and visit the Black Creek Pioneer Village for about an hour after work, and we had a wonderful time.

For those unfamiliar with the place, it is essentially an entire village center with various businesses and workshops all staffed by people in period costumes. The village is circa early to mid 1800s and was simply fascinating to visit. We didn’t have very much time so we didn’t get to see it all, but we definitely want to go back and visit it again when we have more time. They even had a fully-operational microbrewery built to 1850 standards and a blacksmith heating and bending metal with period tools:

Our quick visit to the village was a fun adventure and reminded us both a little of our trip across Europe. Full gallery below:

My cousin James just returned from quite an adventure through Eastern Asia and ending in New Zealand. On these travels we had been in contact via e-mail, and he told me to expect a package in the mail. A few weeks later, a very curious package arrived in the mail:

The package contained something that I was quite happy to receive; inside was a great letter and a wonderful gift from Vietnam – Rose Tea:

The tea is effectively dried rosebuds in a package, such an intriguing idea to use roses as an herbal tea! Interesting fact: Roses are very closely related genetically to apples.

Anyhow, Desi and I decided to try out the tea, and I found it quite crisp and very aromatic, Desi found it wonderful as well – a great tea with a unique story! Desi and I both thought it was a nice romantic gift for us to share.

We also made a cup of it for Desi’s mom, and I think that out of the three of us, I enjoyed it the most – I love these special herbal teas. Thanks very much for the great gift James, I’m still shocked it made it through customs without a problem!

Some of you have commented via e-mail or other means that my blog has been a little dry lately! Well, I have been so busy lately that I haven’t had my usual time to take photos and share them, but I figured I would at least share what I have been up to.

In mid-February, while my photos were still on display at the Barrie City Hall Rotunda, there was an evening when SNAP Barrie  came to take photos of the winners. I stopped in that evening for the photo op, later joined by mom and Walter (thanks for the support!). It was a great little bit of exposure, and I got a copy of the pics to share:

And here is a photo of all the winners that were present that evening. Thanks very much to Mark at SNAP Barrie for the photos. Check them out for cool local community stuff! :

Another interesting thing happened recently. I was approached on Flickr (a place where I also share some of my photos) by someone claiming to have seen my Maple Leaf Flag photo submitted in a photo contest – in Vancouver! I was able to track down the photo store running the contest to inquire about it:

The owner told me that he purchased the photo through iStockPhoto to put up as an example to inspire people for their own submissions. I have had the photo listed in iStockPhoto for some time now and it has given me a constant trickle of revenue over the past year or so. Glad to see it finally out in the “wild”, especially in such a patriotic context (and even more especially during the Olympics!):

Ron, the owner, was kind enough to share these photos with me.

For reference, here is the photo:

I am not sure if the display is still up, or for how long it was up – but I thank Photo Express Foto Source for including me in a very patriotic display. I hope my photo was inspirational to those that saw it.

I have also been working recently on a photography portfolio website! The site is not completely finished yet, but you can check it out by clicking here. A lot of work has gone into it so far, and it is specifically tuned to display on mobile browsers (like the iPhone and soon-to-be iPad) so I can show off my photos on the go, and maybe get a little bit more exposure and possible a few print sales. I’ll be working on this in my free time (ha!) over the next month or so to complete it.

But that’s not all! On February 25th I talked at the Barrie Photo Club and did a presentation on travel photography (from my trip to Europe) that was very well received. I also did a three-hour seminar on photography basics this past Saturday for the photo club as well.

I’ll post again when I have time to take some photos, hopefully this warm weather will inspire me to get out with my camera a little more.

In Eastern Europe there are many cats and dogs that live without homes, and our heart always went out to them. I photographed a few of them in our journey, some with stories and some that we were just passing by. In every case, however, they made us smile.