Another year in New York is about to come to an end
my 13th time since I came to US
Morgan, Lee, Debbie... our old faces cuddle up in our old place, with 7 dishes cooking for 9 people! Happy New Year, I pass out well before midnight, exhausted from joy of cooking.
Erika sews her Christmas gift for her brother and sister
take a break!
by the lake
where Captain Keith teachs Toshiro how to sail
wrapping the gifts can get very creative
Bowman sisters sing Christmas Carol
'I'm distracted.' says Christin, putting her headphones on
next morning the family gather around the tree
Erika watches the sun set in the misty clouds of Shenandoar
Toshiro has slept little
drifted down from New Orleans on the day before Thanksgiving, to the lush green of Zephyrhills, Florida
my micro tent has just enough for me to sleep next to my guitar and the suitcase
any given moment the sky is full of colorful canopies, above the landing area so big that you can hardly land off
2 Japanese girls Kayoko and Yukari practice their 34 way
'we didn't make it!' laughs Yukari
November 24th, I'm a proudly A-licensed skydiver. Now the sky is the limit!
(L-R) Chris gets ready for loading as Marius talks through the dive flow with a new AFF student Steve
3-way exit with Chris and Brian, hang on tight!
shoot I lost them, let's catch up!
okay, time to pull...
the last tent standing! after everyone left to go back to their post-thanksgiving American life
a flock swoops above the pond
flying lead and sinking paper... I manage to fly in the same fall rate with Rob, a dense jumper from Pennsilvania. thank you for all the coaching and fun jumps
Chuck Blue, the world's top class wing suit flyer has become such a sincere and generous big brother to me, at last in the night before I am to leave Zephyrhills
the last night at Z-hills goes wild and late. Chuck and Melanie invite me to their pimped up RV
Matt teaches me how to pack a parachute in Skydive N'awlins, Slidell, LA
Anita, the packer girl sits on Daddy Santa's laps
Santa loads onto Cessna 182
Toshiro finishes his jump #19
Stephen drives our rock-star Altima across the Mississippi, by mistake.
dinner night!
music for dessert
chilling out on the acoustic set in living room
look how this guy leans so far out to feed the alligators
and the turtles older than we all could ever know
gwarrrr!!
cruising the bayou through setting sun
'another one gets hooked.' I introduce Betsy to skydiving, an exciting and expensive sport
Toshiro gets training
Let's go, jump #21
Thank you Matt, for coaching with me, flying with me and showing me how to pack
busted down on Bourbon street
while my comic book princess Betsy lies sound asleep in the passenger seat, Toshiro pulls up on the side of a country road to take a pee. pitch dark night in the bayou land somewhere between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, Toshiro makes one step too far off the shoulder and dives knee deep into an alligator populated muddy swamp
'Do you wanna come to Louisiana and help me shoot this movie?' my west coast friend Kevin asks
straight down the Mississippi from Davenport, Iowa, almost to the Gulf of Mexico
where there's music there can always be new friends
Stephen, my coleague/kamera geek from New York, originally from Bay Area
Cuba Gooding Jr. prepares firing guns in a scene
mixed-coast kamera kats (L-R August, Stephen, Toshiro and Dave) prepare for the fight scene
'You're like a kicker, or relief pitcher.' says Kevin. B-camera pride!
War machine is coming
you got spunk, kid. ....LINE!!?
Kevin Sarnoff, Stephen Buckingham, Cuba Gooding Jr., Stephen Kozlowski (out of focus) and myself at the wrap of 'Way of War'
Erika invited me for a weekend in the capital
Halloween party
by Lake Annie, on the way back from my failed attempt to skydive
Gwrrrr!
Empire State Building peers out of the fog
Subway signs don't make any sense
Andrij gets haircut
rain washes the streets of Times Square
filming continues, for the fourth months
Mike and Mariela chew on lollipops
Smokey, Andrij and I. Wrapping our 5th(?) movie together.
drive along the coast to Monterey bay, some crisp view of Pacific spoils you
King Air at Skydive Monterey Bay will take you up to 15,000 feet in 10 minutes, from where you can enjoy 70 seconds of free fall
Monterey, CA
on the way back as the sun tilts over the ocean
morning practice with Kinko Kyudojo
Lucy tells me to shoot slow. "You don't understand, I haven't shot anything for the last 4 months. I missed this so much!"
Ben swirls a rubbery tube, it's a seaweed.
Ben talks to Frank, 208 years old sea creature. "Drink lot of water."
The longest hike of all week took us 3 hours to get back. (Ben ran the track ahead of me and Dylan)
October 3rd, wake up in a sound cozy bed of Ben's aunt's house in Oakland, CA
Ben talks to his father, his personal nutritionist
crossing the bridge to the city built on rock and roll!
strolling through the memories of Janis and Jerry
world's best record store, main branch in Haight street, San Francisco
Jeff Tweedy appears at free Bluegrass concert in Golden Gate Park
people here bike a lot
my old roommate Dylan comes home
Gillian Welsh and David Rawlings
we wake up in Zion national park next morning. our minivan's getting dirtier
a tarantula wanders off onto the street
VOG in Las Vegas
stars of Death Valley
all morning we drive through this big national park
Independence, CA at the foot of Sierra Nevada
some more VOG
Route 395, flying at 100 mph, almost hit 2,000th mile of the trip. (shortly after this we get pulled over for major speeding)
crossing the Sierra, Katie photographs Mono lake, CA
next morning we start pumping the flat
Buckskin gulch
wild life in the dry sun and cold shadows
flash flood leaves muddy paddle all along the trail
pull yourself out of mud before you sink
wash off all the mud in Kanab, UT. getting ready for big hike tomorrow
Grand Canyon, North rim. September 30th
Jorge is a serious hiker
a wild deer wanders about
Captain George, a mastermind of this whole trip
organic farm in the middle of desert, Cainsville, Utah
'much needed rest stop' says Josh after sitting in the car for hours
next morning shortly after a quick coffee stop in Escalante, Utah, we hit 1,000 miles since we left Scottsdale, just East of Phoenix, AZ on Tuesday
Josh and I pretend to be in Gus Van Sant's 'Gerry'
we got stuck!
from Utah back to Arizona, then back again to Utah...
quick hike up before the night falls
we brought back plenty of fire wood to keep the windy desert night warm
discussing the map in the morning. we'll drive great distance today
sisters of sheep in Rock Point, AZ
Kristan's car reaches 250000 miles!
we enter Utah at the town of Bluff "Toshiro, we're in Utah." "I think you're bluffing, Kristan."
Arches National Park
get to Moab, Utah, a little hippie hide out surrounded by mountains
stop for VOG breakfast
Kristan splits
George picks me up
70 miles East of Phoenix, we find Old Town Superior, a home of The World's Smallest Museum
in San Carlos Indian reservation's junior school, kids go around and pick up trash for their in-school suspension
Kristan joins in the town of Grove, to visit breathtaking mountain range with us
full moon rises over our first camping site by Lyman lake
mountains of red rocks
magnificent clouds in Arizona sky
Mike watches clouds
Mike gets drowned
'I wish I could play chess on my prep day.' says Mariela
Only that we play these huge pieces
Katie makes 'Mini Zavars container'
Kats on John Deere
Jamie, my sumo wrestling buddy
boys on the field
Kristan says goodbye to coleagues
'Nothing else to do around here other than skydiving or smuggling people.' says Brian, somewhere near Mexican border on Interstate 10
a wind tunnel towers out in the middle of desert
German air force team practice canopy formation
Katie practice back flying in wind tunnel
Wow! James and Nathan finishes their first tandem jumps
hanging out with German air force crew. Frank, above left, says 'Our country's politics is becoming very complicated, but at least we get to choose what we like to believe in.' while Garfield, right, calls me Tokyo
emergency vehicle... not a pleasant thing to see in a dropzone. Fly safe!
Katie's rainbow canopy
15 jumps in one weekend... Are you done for the day, Katie? 'No I'm gonna do a few more jumps before I go to work.'
beautiful sunset at Eloy, Arizona
Chicago O'Hare Airport
Goodbiowa, see you in Phoenix
Hey, Dementicalo
Miguel 'Azucar' Santos travels to Uniet States
Shooting film in a live airplane, fun!
Blue Eagle rises to lay justice against Rebels of Angry Babies
Shananananana....!
Army of Blue Eagle occupies John O'Donnel Stadium in Davenport, regains control against Angry Baby's tag attacks
meanwhile A-licensed princess Katie Sky Kat scratches her hair
'I'm doing 10 way.' in Couchfreaks skydiving festival in Ft. Dodge, Iowa
Katie practice the formation
Katie boards an otter, a nice and fast aircraft
Otter takes off to Iowan sky
Katie parachutes back safely, in a jump somewhere between her 60th and 70th.
'People only want to drive nice cars, I only want to jump out of nice airplanes.'
Stevie hangs in a harness for the quiz
Ready!
One last walk-through of the dive flow
she comes back, lands on her feet like it's no effort...
'That was fun!'
my turn!
uhh... my old back...
I'll be right back...
Do you see him?
Yey!
nice butt landing!
Kato watches as Juan gets an altimeter
oh, no... torture
Prop, Up, Down and Arch!!
Kato: 'I don't think you should be doing this, Master...'
'Oh no, my Master...'
Juan successfly deploys his chute at 5,500 feet
'That was awesome!'
up we go, my level 2!
holy cow it's getting dark up there
a bit scared, but this is something I wanna keep doing
another day, another jump, another pull and another landing
seems so easy for Juan it's only getting more fun
my level 3 goes easy
beautiful landing!
Beth 'Janis' Mickle with her Art Band
Toshiro drinks green juice
'There are five kinds of corn grown in Iowa.' says Dr. Smokey
Sun sets over the west
Full moon rises on the east
sleepy-eyed zombies line up in Fun City water slide
as vegan camp food is been experimented
Dr. Smokey's lab uses curtain rails, color gels, power drill and a dimmer to keep the Iowan party night spinning hot and cool
we waste plastic
Dr. Smokey in his golf outfit
we abuse plastic waste
Isreal quietly saddles up
the village has a few streets, several stores, a church with a primary school and no hospital
I'm a stranger here, everybody watches curiously
come to the crossing point of river
many villagers cross river like this
construction workers on the river bank have built a cable troley
so I took it one day
fire in the mountains of Los Quemados (the burnt) in DR 'quemados' also means accademically failed
across the river, through someone's private farm property, there's a waterfall where everyone hangs out
on the way back home, half a mile to the river and the rain came in hard by a colmado
colmado is a general store, sells batteries, soaps, cigarretes, beer and collection of Domnican rum
waiting for the rain to lift, to get back across the river
water is rapid, hold onto each other
Prakash, an Indian national and Dominican resident on a vacation with his French wife Laurence and their lovely 1 yr old, another rare guest in the village of Los Quemados. I get to tag along with them to the Northern city of Santiago, where I flew out of this country, back to the United States, but my Corn Farm Tour continues
zona colonial, a cute old tourist town in Dominican capital
brick stone forts from the wartime era
soldiers at the forts tell you it's the closing time. 'Puedo tomar tu foto?'
hanging with Jorge and Juan in Santo Domingo night
beautifully rusted architecture all over the town
a bicycle kid in the background of trash
typical Dominican dish involves rice and beans, fried plantane and pollo, have it with cold Presidente
Miguel 'Sugar' Santos practices his pitches at Baseball City, Dominican Republic
shoeless children gather by the fence at Baseball City
a goat plays outfield in Consuelo community field, Dominican Republic
thunderstorm of afternoon traps us in the mound
Jooedy and players in a rainy dugout
framingos in display
hush, hush! they are driven out of shades into the shallow luke-warm water to pose in a wedding picture
emerald blue of the carribean sea
sun rises on the touristy resort
with Elisa at the morning buffet
off to Catalina island for snokeling and scubadiving
Jooendy waits for the rain to lift
my guitar. traveling through 7 countries with me.
Smokey dances with Stevie in an Italian restaurant
stop by a nice evening with Teresa Storch's cozy home concert
some cheese and wine, tapping feet, in a cooling Boston night
so we come upon a wide open place with a big white building
as the sun lowers behind the stars and stripes
Nate gives warnings to the rebel Ducks
Katie negotiates with the congress of Duckhistan
on the road again
Nate sleeps under the banner of Team America
Subway to the capital
Virginia is for lovers
'Toshiro is a country gentleman.' writes Danny Clinch on my guitar again at Bonnaroo '07
sunset over the vast site of Bonnaroo music festival 2007
John Paul Jones, ?uestlove and Ben Harper
Junior Brown with his double neck
Wide Spread Panic closes the festival to 120,000 fans
Ann Spooner shows me her home made bee hive
'There they are, the girls.' shortly after this I will be having their hard-worked honey on my breakfast
Together with Ann and Roger we visit Cambodian Temple in outskirt of Madison, WI
where monks build a metal gate
where children are in peace
where plants grow from earth
no chanting, no sermon. we just eat and be happy
Roger joins Sarith for a brief quiet moment
Two of them founded Cambodia School Project, www.khmerschool.com
