Destination: California
Forests to Burn
by Joshua Berman | 02.12.10 | 10:56 AM ET
Photo by Joshua Berman Joshua Berman spent a glorious summer exploring some of America's most beautiful wilderness areas -- with a drip torch in hand
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Yahoo! Buzz‘Fly Girls’: Reality TV at 37,000 Feet
by Eva Holland | 01.20.10 | 5:56 PM ET
Yup, a slice of Airworld is coming to prime time. The CW has picked up eight episodes of the new reality show, which follows five Virgin America flight attendants from the air to their Los Angeles “crash pad” and beyond. The Los Angeles Times describes “Fly Girls” as having “a ‘Gossip Girl’-meets- ‘The Hills’-vibe”—which, I’ll admit, doesn’t have me rushing to write the air dates in my calendar. The same story offers some interesting points about the intersection of infomercial and entertainment on the show.
Kogi Truck Chef Turns Restaurateur
by Eva Holland | 01.12.10 | 1:44 PM ET
Now that his Korean taco trucks have made their mark on the Los Angeles food scene, chef Roy Choi is ready for his next challenge: the restaurant biz. Choi’s new restaurant will open in West Los Angeles in February, but the famous Kogi taco won’t be on the menu. Instead, he tells the Wall Street Journal that he plans to “update the rice bowl.” (Via @JohnnyJet)
Video You Must See: People in Yosemite
by Eva Holland | 01.04.10 | 3:47 PM ET
(Via The Daily Dish)
The Best Travel Videos of 2009
by World Hum | 12.31.09 | 11:14 AM ET
iStockPhoto We watched a lot of travel videos this year to come up with these: the 12 most hilarious, moving and memorable
What Would Los Angeles Look Like Without Traffic?
by Michael Yessis | 11.19.09 | 12:32 PM ET
This series of eerie, terrific photos is an ongoing project from Tom Baker. (via Coudal)
Video You Must See: Mountain Light in California
by Eva Holland | 11.17.09 | 1:11 PM ET
(Via The Daily Dish)
Travel Song of the Day: ‘Lodi’ by Creedence Clearwater Revival
by Michael Yessis | 11.05.09 | 4:32 PM ET
Don’t Bring Your Minivan to Yosemite
by Eva Holland | 10.28.09 | 1:01 PM ET
Why not? Because the park’s resident bear population prefers breaking into the vehicles over other models. Seriously.
Photo You Must See: Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles
by World Hum | 10.27.09 | 11:43 AM ET
REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson A view of the Frank Gehry-designed Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles.
George Saunders Goes to Tent City, U.S.A.
by Michael Yessis | 10.08.09 | 1:04 PM ET
It’s in Fresno, California, and he lived there this April. Saunders writes on his website:
It was a very moving, sort of scary experience, that had the effect of re-energizing certain tendencies in my fiction and in me as a person, I guess, among these: respect for the real; a distrust of the American capitalist juggernaut; suspicion of my own Pollyannaish tendencies; new enthusiasm for the variety and weirdness of the world.
His 12,000-word piece about it—and an audio slideshow—can be found at GQ.
Interview with Bonnie Tsui: ‘American Chinatown’
by Jenna Schnuer | 10.07.09 | 10:07 AM ET
Photo by Matthew Elliott Jenna Schnuer talks to the author of a new book about American Chinatowns and why "broken Chinese is the mark of being Chinese American"
Travel Song of the Day: ‘Los Angeles’ by X
by Jim Benning | 09.01.09 | 3:50 PM ET
Book Passage Travel Writers Conference 2009
by Jim Benning | 08.07.09 | 2:00 PM ET
The annual Book Passage Travel Writers & Photographers Conference kicks off Thursday in lovely Corte Madera, just north of San Francisco. Given the tumult in the publishing world, this year should be interesting, to say the least. The faculty lineup is impressive, as always, including such writers and editors as Tim Cahill, Jen Leo, Rolf Potts, Spud Hilton, John Flinn, Phil Cousineau, Pauline Frommer, Larry Habegger, Michael Shapiro and Wendy Perrin.
I’ll be teaching a three-hour class each morning on Travel Writing in the Digital Age. We’ll cover everything from blogging to producing audio slideshows to writing personal essays and web-friendly articles. And we’ll dig into the business side of things. Jen Leo and Rolf Potts have promised to pop in to offer their perspective.
The Hard Life of Los Angeles’ Street Tamaleros*
by Jim Benning | 08.07.09 | 10:55 AM ET
We’ve written before about the sometimes tough plight of L.A.’s taco trucks. Fortunately, taco trucks these days are ascendant—thanks in part to the mobility patterns of young urbanites.
So let us now turn our attention to L.A.’s Mexican street-food vendors. They’ve never had it easy, what with gang battles sometimes raging around them and the watchful eye of health inspectors threatening their livelihoods.
Public radio’s Marketplace recently put together a fine little profile on the struggles of one tamale vendor who works the tough neighborhood of MacArthur Park.
Tamalero Antonio, who sells tamales out of a box mounted on a tricycle, told the show: “It’s dangerous. It’s very, very dangerous. You have to be careful with the gangs, you have to be careful with the police, you have to be careful with the cars. There are a lot of dangers in the street.”
(Via Boing Boing)
* Update 4:16 p.m. P.T. Speaking of dangers, today’s L.A. Times reports that at least 22 taco truck operators have been robbed at gunpoint in East L.A. in the last three months. (Thanks for the tip, Eli.)