Machu Picchu In the 16th century, Spanish conquistadors waged widespread war against native populations in the New World. In what is today known as Peru, the Spanish attempted to wipe the Incan Empire off the map. The conquest was finally successful in 1572 when the Spanish established the Viceroyalty of Peru. In addition to murdering multitudes, […]
The Galápagos Islands Half a thousand miles west of Ecuador, cradling both sides of the equator, an archipelago dots the Pacific Ocean. In 1535, on his way to adjudicate a dispute between Spanish conquistadors Francisco Pizarro and Diego de Almagro in Peru, the Bishop of Panama, Fray Tomás de Berlanga, was shocked to discover 21
The Galápagos Islands Read More »
The Worst Year to Be Alive During this year the most dread portent took place. The Sun gave forth its light without brightness, like the moon during this whole year, and it seemed exceedingly like the Sun in eclipse. — Procopius of Caesarea As we all know by now, 2020 was a difficult year to inhabit
The Worst Year to Be Alive Read More »
Alex Trebek Today marked the final new episode of Jeopardy! hosted by Alex Trebek. I’ve spent nearly four decades of time on this planet watching Jeopardy! five nights per week. Though I know the game predated Trebek’s involvement and I actually know a person who appeared on the show when it was hosted by Art Fleming, to me, Jeopardy! is synonymous with
WildEarth As much as I enjoy exploring the world with my own eyes and ears, I also love engulfing nature media. Great photography, such as Unnatural Lighting (Issue 94), kindles similar feelings to reading poetry. The same is true with moving pictures. I can watch David Attenborough-narrated films nearly endlessly. My internal globetrotter can devour hours
The North Pole Ho, ho, ho, my friends! Last week we profiled Santa’s transportation critters – Reindeer – and today we’ll travel to the address of the big man’s home base: the North Pole. If you want to mail Santa a letter, send it to North 90 degrees latitude and every possible line of longitude. Don’t send it to
The Winter Solstice Hallelujah! Today marks the Winter Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere. The shortening of daylight is finally over. For the next six months, our sunlight durations will only increase. Despite speaking of the solstice as a date, it is actually a moment. Precisely, the solstice is the moment one of our planet’s poles is
The Winter Solstice Read More »
The Great Conjunction If you’re a regular skywatcher you might already know the two biggest planets in our solar system – Jupiter and Saturn – have occupied the same portion of our cosmic ceiling for most of the year. In fact, in the preceding months, the two have crept closer and closer toward each
The Great Conjunction Read More »
Reindeer “Now, Dasher! now, Dancer! now Prancer and Vixen! On, Comet! on, Cupid! on, Donner and Blitzen! – Clement Clarke Moore, “A Visit From St. Nicholas As we inch toward Christmas, one of the obvious nature connections to our modern celebrations is the reindeer. Oddly, though reindeer are ubiquitous to our knowledge of Santa and his yearly sleigh ride, in North America we don’t actually call
Thundersnow The other day I watched Thunderball, the fourth James Bond film, which released in 1965 and stars the recently-departed Sean Connery as 007. In the film, Thunderball is a code name; sadly, the flick really has no elements of thunder (or, for that matter, balls). If you’re a fan of the series, youtube currently offers 22