Dr. Jack Wheeler
FLASHBACK FRIDAY: A REAL RUSSIAN CHURCH
This is the wooden Russian Orthodox Church in Karakol, Kyrgyzstan. I was here years ago and now again today. It was built in the 1890s when Karakol was a garrison town in the furthermost reaches of the Russian Imperial Empire with China just on the other side of Tien Shan Mountains. In the atheist/communist Soviet Union it was used variously as a school, gymnasium, and warehouse, anything but a church.
After Kyrgyzstan gained its independence with the collapse of the Soviet Union, it was lovingly restored by the people of Karakol. All the various ethnicities comprising Karakol are welcome here – Christian Russians and Christian Kyrgyz, Uighur Moslem refugees escaping Chicom China, ethnic Han Chinese Moslems called Dungans escaping for the same reason, Buddhist and pagan Kazakhs. The interior is lavishly decorated with Christian art and paintings of Christian saints – no Islamic or Buddhist or any other religious art, just Christian. Yet all are welcome to pray in this haven of refuge and peace in their own way.
This is a Russian Church very distinct from those controlled by Moscow run by the Kremlin as a propaganda arm of the KGB/FSB. It is a real Russian Christian Church instead. Come here to feel to the spiritual serenity for yourself. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #221 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
HALF-FULL REPORT 04/19/24
On Wednesday (4/17), the London Economist ran: America’s Trust In Its Institutions Has Collapsed. This is extremely good news. Now add this metric Gallup has to its April 17 report:
So now you can see why all this is such good news: the blame for the current and sudden collapse of confidence falls squarely on the Dems and the electorate knows it.
Like an alcoholic who must fall to rock bottom before he realizes he has to quit, so now have many Latinos, Blacks, Independents, and non-woke Dems realize they can’t vote Dem this November. The best news of all is that this results in such a wide voter disadvantage for the Dems it cannot be overcome by cheating. You know the adage: If the vote isn’t close, the enemy can’t cheat enough to win.
Except for this……
LOOKING INTO A BABY LEOPARD’S EYES
There are not many places in Africa where you can do this, where a leopard mother has no fear of your getting this close to her cub. The best place in all Africa is a region of Zambia called South Luangwa, where iconic African wildlife is in vast profusion yet uninhabited by people. And where you can stay in a safari lodge so luxurious it’s hard to believe you’re way out deep in the African bush.
I’ve been traveling to Africa for 50 years now – since 1971 – and have been to every country on the continent, so I know how unique a South Luangwa safari is. If you have a dream of experiencing an African safari once in your life, you might consider here. I can hardly wait to come here again. Care to join me, to look into a baby leopard’s eyes yourself? (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #117 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE INSPIRATION OF AMERICA
Next to the entrance of The Red House, the Parliament of Trinidad and Tobago in the capital of Port of Spain, there is this marble inscription. It is clear that it is inspired by our 1776 Declaration of Independence and America’s founding principles. Trinidad’s population is 99% either Indian (from India), African, or a mix of the two. 64% are Christian, 21% Hindu, 6% Moslem, others undeclared – and all have these principles as a common bond between them.
Here in the Caribbean’s Trinidad is such a clear example of how America’s founding moral principles are such an inspiration to all humanity, of all cultures, creeds, and ethnicities. They are universal, America’s heritage as a gift to the world. This is the heritage of all Americans – something we need to hold on to and hold dear as we persevere during this current period of our country’s cultural, moral, and political lunacy. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #152, photo ©Jack Wheeler)
AFRICA’S CLUB OBAMA
The ramshackle Club Obama is a shed on stilts above a garbage dump of a beach in Conakry, the capital of the West African country of Guinea. It doesn’t get much business anymore because Obama is no longer popular here. Guineans thought he would flood them with US taxpayer dollars but he didn’t. “Obama did nothing for us,” they’ll tell you.
The sad truth is that Guineans have done nothing for themselves. Independence from France came in 1958, and the place has been run by one party dictatorships, military juntas, and ridiculously corrupt leaders ever since. It’s the size of Oregon, with 12 million people who have a per capita GDP of $800 a year. Yet is has up to half the world’s reserves of bauxite (source of aluminum) and is #3 in world production, has diamonds, gold, and many other resources – which all goes into the bottomless pockets of whoever the ruling elite are at the moment.
It’s the tragedy of so much of Africa writ large. In 1974, after Cassius Clay had his “Rumble in the Jungle” in Zaire with George Foreman, he was asked by a reporter upon his return to America, “Champ, what did you think of Africa?” With wit and wisdom he replied, “Thank God my Granddaddy got on that boat!” (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #84 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE TREASURY OF PETRA
The 2,000 year-old Rose Red City of Petra was the religious center of an ancient Arab tribe named Nabataeans. They didn’t build huge temples such as this – they carved them out of cliffs of rose-red sandstone in their hidden mountain sanctuary east of the Dead Sea in present-day Jordan.
The most famous carved temple is called The Treasury (Al-Khazneh in Arabic), 128 feet high, hand-carved into the vertical rock face. You’ve seen it in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusades and other movies.
One interesting feature of Nabataean culture was the prominence of women. The two principal deities worshipped by them was the male god Dushara, god of the sun and sky whom the ancient Greeks associated with Zeus, and Al-Uzza, the goddess of fertility whom the Greeks associated with Aphrodite.
Al-Uzza was accompanied by Al-lat, the goddess of wisdom, and Manat, the goddess of destiny, as a triad devoutly worshipped by the Nabataeans and throughout all pre-Islamic Arabia. Together, they are the “forbidden goddesses” of Koranic Islam. Which is why their images, along with that of Dushara have been defaced and etched out of their carvings in the upper niches of The Treasury.
Experiencing Petra is on most people’s travel bucket list. Being here, it’s easy to see why. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #292, photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE FORBIDDEN GODDESSES
[Salman Rushdie is in the news today (4/15) with the publication of his new book, Knife: Meditations of an Attempted Murder. As are the terror-masters of Iran with their massive missile and drone attack upon Israel on Saturday (4/13). Thus this Monday's Archive, written on August 17, 2022 in response to the knife attack on Rushdie days earlier on August 12, should be a must-read. For it exposes the great skeleton in the Islamic closet, the “Satanic Verses,” the truth of which drives the Mullahs of Iran and their followers into criminal insanity.
TTP, August 17, 2022
In the 1st and 2nd Centuries AD, there arose in what is now northern Iraq an Arabian kingdom called Hatra, named after its capital city. Made wealthy with the caravan trade from Mesopotamia to the Mediterranean, the Arab kings of Hatra built magnificent temples to their gods and goddesses.
The one you see above is known to archaeologists as The Lady of Hatra as what the Arab Hatrans called her is not known. Three others, however, are definitely known – for they are the Forbidden Goddesses, worshipped and adored by Arabs 2,000 years ago, hated and feared by over one billion people today.
Here they are – Al-Lat in the center, flanked by Manat, and Al-Uzza – the daughters of Allah, the subject of the Koran’s “Satanic Verses.” Funny thing is, almost no one save for scholars on the history of Islam and Moslem fanatics knows what these “Satanic verses” are. So what are they?
FLASHBACK FRIDAY – THE CRUSADER FORTRESS IN THE CAUCASUS
This is the fortress town of Shatili in an extremely remote Caucasus region in Georgia called Khevsureti. It was built by the Crusaders 1,000 years ago. The Khevsur people who live here trace their ancestry back to these Crusaders and until the 1930s still wore chain mail in feud-battles with other towns. I took this picture in 1991.
American traveler Richard Halliburton (1900–1939) saw and recorded the customs of the Khevsurs in 1935. The Khevsur men, dressed in chain mail and armed with broadswords, wore garments full of decoration made up of crosses and icons. They don’t do that anymore, but they proudly retain their Crusader Christian heritage – for Georgia adopted Christianity in the 4th century AD. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #85 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
HALF-FULL REPORT 04/12/24
It’s just too irresistible to start this HFR with the greatest clickbait headline not just of the week, but of modern times. Ready?
Daily Mail, 4/06: Why Sydney Sweeney And Her Double-D Breasts Are Being Hailed As Proof That Woke Culture Is Dead.
“Sydney Sweeney is one of Hollywood’s hottest rising stars, with a recent hit in rom-com Anyone But You, and Spider-Man spin-off Madame Web. Still only 26, Sweeney produces her own films and has unexpectedly become more than an actress.
The all-American blue-eyed blonde with corn-fed curves has become a cultural phenomenon, her unashamed sexuality embraced by America’s conservative Right as proof that woke culture is dying, if not already dead. Movie critic Amy Hamm says:
‘We’ve spent years being chastised for desiring or admiring beauty – because beauty is rare and exclusionary, and to exclude is to hate – or so we’ve been scolded to accept by today’s diversity, equity, and inclusion fanatics. We aren’t supposed to admire Sweeney’s beauty; but we’ve done it anyways. The times, they are a-changin’.’
Yes, they are. From J.K. Rowling’s courageous success against tranny-worship to Sweeney being an unapologetically sexual woman movie star, the culture is shifting rapidly from insanity to sanity. America is becoming normal once again.THE ROCK-HEWN CHURCHES OF LALIBELA, ETHIOPIA
900 years ago, the Church of Saint George (Bete Giyorgis in Amharic) was not built – it was hand carved downwards from a horizontal rock ledge. There is nothing like the rock-hewn churches in Lalibela anywhere else in the world.
Christianity was established in Ethiopia in 330 AD and has flourished ever since. Experiencing the devotion still so very much alive in one of the oldest Christian countries on earth is inspiring. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #26 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE SANDS OF THE TAKLA MAKAN
When Marco Polo crossed the Tien Shan mountains and reached the Silk Road oasis of Kashgar in 1273, he faced an enormous desert of endless dunes called the Takla Makan, meaning “You go in, you don’t come out.”
To avoid this fate, the Silk Road at Kashgar splits in two – above to the north of the dreaded sand sea via the oases of Aksu and Turfan, and underneath to the south via the oases of Yarkand, Khotan, Charchan and Charklik. The two routes came together beyond Lop Nor, the eastern extension of the Takla Makan, at the oasis of Dunhuang.
His father Niccolo and uncle Maffeo had earlier taken the northern route to first meet Mongol Emperor Kublai Khan, but now with Marco they took the southern route. They traveled in caravans of two-humped Bactrian camels, often crossing dunes on the edge – just like the photo you see. In 2008, I retraced Polo’s route along the southern route – part of it by motorized hang glider. He would be fascinated, I’m sure, to see what a camel caravan looks like from the air! (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #13 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE ETOSHA PAN
No, this isn’t the Serengeti. The Etosha Pan is a huge 2,000 square mile salt pan in northern Namibia that has an amazing abundance of African wildlife that flourishes in a desert – lots of elephants as you see, giant eland, huge oryx, kudu with the males sporting their glorious spiral horns, wildebeest, zebra, all kinds of antelope, plus lions and leopards galore hunting them.
They all thrive on the available river and springs water amidst the surrounding mopane balsam woodlands. It’s one of Africa’s least known yet most astounding wildlife spectacles. Come during the dry winter months of July-September when the animals gather around the waterholes. You’ll never forget it. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #291, photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE BIRD THAT CAN KILL A LION
Yes, an ostrich. Ostriches are the world’s largest, heaviest, and fastest running birds on earth today. A full-grown adult male can weigh over 300 pounds, and it’s kick is so strong it can kill a lion. A pride of lions led by lionesses, or a coalition of adult males, can become skilled at taking down young ostriches, but they know to stay away from the adult big boys, for they are truly lethal. This fellow is still growing so he has to be careful on the plains of the Ngorongoro Crater Floor. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #290, photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE MOONLIGHT SYMPHONY
[This Monday’s Archive was first published on July 1, 2005. It has particular relevance today, as America is under assault from predators from within our borders, with the Woke Biden-Soros Left unleashing a horde of criminal rapist murdering illegal aliens, and a genocidal tsunami of Chinese Communist fentanyl mass slaughter, in all-out psychopathic effort to destroy our country. As you know, I just returned from a month in the Serengeti. So I was taken aback on how what was written on safari in Africa 19 years ago applies to America right now.]
TTP, July 1, 2005
MORU ROCKS, SERENGETI PLAINS, TANZANIA, AFRICA. It is at night that Africa becomes most alive – especially when there’s a full moon.
The most restful night’s sleep one can have, it seems, is when you are lulled by the cackling whine of hyenas, the incessant barking of zebras, the coughing of lions, the grunting of hippos, the bellowing of Cape buffalo, the stomach rumblings of elephants, the flutter of Guinea fowl roosting in the trees, and the soft chirp of the tiny Scopes owl. The Moonlight Symphony of the Serengeti.
It is so soothing, perhaps, because these sounds accompanied our emergence upon this earth. The plains of East Africa are where such proto-hominids as Australopithicus and Homo habilis became us, human beings. It is where we came out of the trees, onto the plains, and became predators.
The dominant life form on these plains is mammals, and as you witness their vast numbers divided into a myriad of different species, you see there are two kinds: predators and prey. One way to distinguish between the two is the eyes.
FLASHBACK FRIDAY – WITH THE ANTI-COMMUNIST GUERILLAS IN CAMBODIA
July, 1984. The KPNLF – Khmer People’s National Liberation Front – was the Anti-Communist guerrilla movement fighting the Soviet-backed Vietnamese Communists in Cambodia. When I was first there in 1961, Cambodia was then a land of serenity, with a gentle and tranquil people who were at peace with themselves and the world. Now it was a land of indescribable Communist horror.
It was such a privilege to be with these brave men willing to wage war against that horror and bring freedom to their country. I told their tale in Turning Back the Terror, the February 1985 cover story for Reason magazine. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #20 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
HALF-FULL REPORT 04/05/24
At long last, we are reinstituting a TTP tradition. And who better could the awardee be but the world’s most successful and richest female author, J. K. Rowling, as the HFR Heroine of the Week.
Appropriately on April Fools Day, Monday April 1, Scotland’s fascist Hate Crime and Public Order Act came into force, making it a “hate crime” punishable by years in prison and high fines to purposefully “misgender” men pretending to be women.
Immediately, Rowling posted on @JK Rowling a series of 11 sardonic tweets condemning women-abusing tranny criminals, ending with:
“It is impossible to accurately describe or tackle the reality of violence and sexual violence committed against women and girls, or address the current assault on women’s and girls’ rights, unless we are allowed to call a man a man. Freedom of speech and belief are at an end in Scotland if the accurate description of biological sex is deemed criminal. I'm currently out of the country, but if what I've written here qualifies as an offence under the terms of the new act, I look forward to being arrested when I return to the birthplace of the Scottish Enlightenment.”
In encourage you to read (2 minutes max) her full post linked above. In less than 24 hours (4.02), the Scottish government caved: Bluff Called: Police Scotland Won’t Charge J.K. Rowling over Trans Comments, Author Vows to Stand With Any Woman Who Calls ‘A Man a Man’.And here’s the karmic irony…
MOROCCO’S DADES GORGE
This astounding road is how you traverse the Dades Gorge on the Road of a Thousand Kasbahs in Morocco. Kasbahs are fortified villages of the Berbers, who have lived here since the end of the Ice Ages 12,000 years ago (related to the Lapps of the Scandinavian Arctic, both descending from Cro-Magnon hunters in Cantabria of northern Spain).
The road is rated as one of the most scenic drives in the world. It is in the High Atlas Mountains (once higher than the Himalayas and joined to the Appalachians in the northeast US before splitting apart to form the Atlantic Ocean 200 million years ago). Here you go from the sand dunes of the Sahara to the fabulous kasbahs of Skoura, Ouarzazate, and Ait Benhaddou. The drive is one of the many life-memorable experiences we have in our exploration of Moroccan Magic. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #110 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
SLOVENIA’S VINTGAR GORGE
In a hidden corner of Europe, the Radovna River pours off the Julian Alps to carve out the Vintgar Gorge with crystal clear water. A mile-long walkway with towering limestone cliffs on either side is your access.
Nearby is the gorgeous Lake Bled, with Bled Castle suspended atop a shoreline cliff. The medieval village of Piran, built on a spit of land projecting into the Adriatic Sea and encircled by a white sand beach is a short drive away. Ljubljana is one of Europe’s most utterly charming capital cities.
Most people have only heard of Slovenia as the birthplace of First Lady Melania Trump, but those who have been here understand it is one of the most entrancing countries on the European continent – pristine beauty, spotless environment, friendly and hospitable people, safe and very well-run. Whenever your next visit to Europe may be, try to include a few days or week or so here. You’ll never run out of fascinating things to do. A stroll through the Vintgar Gorge is an example out of so many. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #19 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE HYPOGEUM OF MALTA
The extraordinary rock-cut necropolis known as the Hypogeum (hi-po-gee-um) is the only prehistoric underground temple in the world. For over a thousand years (3500-2500 BC), the temple and burial complex (eventually housing 7,000 skeletons) was carved out and down – dozens of chambers, with rock-cut replicas of above-ground temples including simulated corbelled roofs. (A corbelled roof uses stone slabs that progressively overlap each other until the room is roofed over.)
The Megalthic Maltese learned to cut from the limestone bedrock with tools of stone and antler horn for they had no metal. These folks figured out all by themselves how to build extraordinary temples to their gods and goddesses close to six thousand years ago. Nobody taught them. They were the first. Only one reason Malta is one of our planet’s most fascinating places. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #109 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE CHURCH OF SAINT JOSEPH OF ARIMETHEA IN IRAN
In the early 1600s, some 150,000 Armenians fled persecution from the Ottoman Empire to settle in Isfahan, Persia under the protection of Shah Abbas. There they created an extraordinary trading network that stretched from Amsterdam to Manila, becoming prosperous in the process. This enabled them to build extraordinary Armenian Apostolic Church cathedrals – Armenian Christianity being one of the oldest Christian denominations originating in the 1st century AD.
Here you see the Armenian Apostolic Church in Isfahan, built in 1606 and dedicated to Saint Joseph of Arimathea, the disciple who took Jesus’ body off the Cross. The Armenian Quarter of Isfahan remains populated by thousands of Armenian Christians today who may freely practice their faith, albeit strictly within the confines of their neighborhood and never beyond. Nonetheless, it comes as a shock to see this in present-day Mullah Iran. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #262 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
WHY TRUMP WILL LOSE IN 2020
[This Monday’s Archive was written on March 7, 2019. It was a warning and a solution to no avail. All the main people around President Trump had read this, but in the end, the Dems stole the Presidency in broad daylight and got away with it. Today, they have many millions of more illegal aliens voting illegally to enable them to do it again. Today, the situation is vastly more dangerous, as when an armed electorate realizes the ballot box is fixed against them, they have no recourse but the cartridge box. Our nation is in direst peril. Whatever it takes to have an honest election this November 5th, it must be done.]
TTP, March 7, 2019
This is a real picture, taken by famed French nature photographer Laurent Schwebel. I want you to look at this picture long and hard so it burns into your brain. It should give you nightmares preventing a good night’s sleep.
For this is what the Democrat Party is going to do to America in the November 2020 election – eat and swallow it whole. How can all this be so confidently predicted with 100% assurance? Because the awful truth of Stalin’s observation now guarantees it in America:
“It’s not who votes that counts – it’s who counts the votes.”
Look at that picture of the snake and the bird above – and yes, Laurent Schwebel reported that the bird did not fly away in time, the snake engorged and digested the bird whole. This is what the Democrats are going to do you, to me, to Donald Trump and all of America. And now we know just how they are going to do it.FLASHBACK FRIDAY – THE POTALA
Lhasa, Tibet, 1986. Built in the mid-1600s, the Potala in Lhasa, Tibet was the home of the Dalai Lama as the incarnation of Avalokiteśvara, the Buddhist deity of compassion, until the Communist Chinese colonized Tibet in 1959.
The Potala is one of the world’s great architectural wonders, thirteen stories high with molten copper poured into the foundation to stabilize it from earthquakes, 1,000 rooms, 10,000 shrines, 200,000 statues. I’ve been here several times since 1986, and it’s always such a powerful experience. Yet to Tibetans, this is a “dead” building as the Dalai Lama is gone. It is my hope that someday, the Dalai Lama will live here in a Free Tibet once again. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #114 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
HALF-FULL REPORT 03/29/24
Welcome to the Good Friday HFR! For indeed it is a good Friday for the good folks of America, while not good at all for the wokeists who mean us harm. It is a time for reflection, and while America’s redemption and resurrection remains a ways away, they got much closer to reality this week.
Wasn’t it just a very short time ago that Judge Engoron, Letitia James, and the entire Hate America media were celebrating they had bankrupted Trump with half-billion dollar fines, that they had finished him off politically? Last week in fact.
Then comes Holy Week, and out of seemingly nowhere, POTUS is miraculously saved – by an appellate court slashing his bond by over 60%, while SEC approval vastly increases his wealth overnight… so on Tuesday morning (3/26) we are greeted with this:
Too much coincidence right at this time of year for this not to be Providence? You decide, but the beliefs of many conservatives have been strengthened while those of the Woke have been shaken.
THE WOKE-FREE PARADISE AT YOUR DOORSTEP
There is a paradise of islands of staggering beauty and idyllic weather year round, that’s a tax haven and the cost of living is low, that’s self-sufficient in food and everything grows in abundance, that’s so peaceful and serene crime is virtually unknown and there’s a total absence of wokeism.
What’s more, the people who live here love liberty so much they’ve had this motto emblazoned on their coat of arms for centuries: Antes morrer livres que em paz sujeitos – Rather die free than live in peaceful subjugation.
Oh, you can fly there non-stop from the east coast in a few hours for a few hundred bucks.
Where and what are we talking about? The Azores of Portugal. They, along with the other Atlantic Portugal island of Madeira, are what Rebel and I call Atlantic Paradises.
Our exploration this June 28-July 8 of Atlantic Paradises is for anyone in normal health. We stay in great hotels, enjoy fabulous food and wine, and have a marvelous fun time. Click on the link to enjoy all the photos – and realize you can soon be there.
Don’t you deserve a break from all the woke lunacy washing over all of us now? Escape with Rebel and me to our woke-free Atlantic Paradises. It’s our escape hatch – it can be yours too! Carpe diem – life is short – the time for a life-memorable adventure is now! (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #289)
HADZA – THE LAST OF THE FIRST
Humanity – Homo sapiens – began evolving from our Homo ergaster hominid ancestors in East Africa around a quarter-million years ago. In all that time since, only one group of us is directly descended from those first of us, still living in East Africa, practicing the original nomadic hunter-gather lifestyle of countless millennia, their DNA unrelated to any other people on earth, their language unrelated to any other.
They are the Hadza. It is with good reason anthropologists call them “the last of the first” – for there are less than a thousand of them left as cattle-herding and farming tribes continually encroach on the hunting grounds they need to survive.
The Hadza men hunt with bow and arrows, the Hadza women gather roots, tubers, fruits and berries. They have no villages. Living together in bands of 20-30, they encamp in small shelters of boughs and leaves wherever the men have killed an animal like an eland (their favorite), warthog or some baboons, make a fire (the ancient hand-twisted stick method) and feast on it until it’s time to move and hunt again.
They wear animal skins, supplemented with clothes they trade for with nearby tribes like the Datoga. They love to sing and dance around the campfire. They smile easily and laugh freely. The only metal I saw them have was Datoga-made arrowheads and knives traded for, and a couple of pots for cooking. It’s hard to imagine a more utterly basic and simple existence. Yet they live a far happier, purposeful, and satisfied life than a great, great many of our species elsewhere.
The Hadza live around Lake Eyasi on the floor of the Great Rift Valley at the base of the Serengeti Plateau in Tanzania. It’s in the deep South Serengeti where our Wheeler-Windsor Safaris are during the late Birthing Season of February-March before the Great Migration begins. You witness the most extraordinary wildlife spectacle on earth. Can you imagine seeing 200-300,000 wildebeest stretching across the Serengeti as far as the eye can see?
No picture does that justice, so you focus on the individual, like this mommy cheetah watching her cub’s reflection in a small pool.
Here is where humankind began amidst this primordial scene. And the Hadza have been here since that very beginning. It is such a privilege and honor to be with and learn from them. It is having life-memorable experiences like this that we aspire to give those who go on safari us. Let me know if you’d like to meet “the last of the first" on our Wheeler-Windsor Serengeti Birthing Safari in 2025. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #288, photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE MONSTER OF SEFAR
Charlatans like Erich von Daniken convinced many gullible readers of his books this “monster” was of an alien in a space suit. Real archaeologists know it’s of an ancient tribal shaman, to be found among the greatest profusion of prehistoric rock art on earth over 10,000 years old in a remote plateau of the Algerian Sahara called the Tassili n’Ajjer.
There are no roads – you must climb up here with pack mules carrying your supplies. No one lives up here, it’s uninhabited. You’ll be among spectacularly gigantic rock formations with over 300 huge natural rock arches, so geologically unique it seems unworldly. In the center of Tassili n’Ajjer known as the Tadrart is a vastly deep gorge, like a knife sliced open the mountain. Clamber down to the bottom and you will discover a forest of 2,000 year-old Saharan cypress trees – yes, a forest in the Sahara, remnants of when the Sahara was green millennia ago.
My son Jackson and I explored here in 2003. Perhaps it’s time to be here again. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #28 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE ROCK OF ZANZIBAR
It would be hard to find a more exotic restaurant than The Rock, perched on a coral outcropping off Michanwi Pingwe beach on the east coast of Zanzibar in the Indian Ocean. Start off with what I found to be the world’s best (and largest) piña colada, then tuck in to marvelous fresh caught grilled lobster along with an excellent French chardonnay. Finish with coconut tiramisù and a large cup of great Tanzanian coffee. Rebel and I will always fondly remember our experience here – and so will you should you ever visit the extraordinary island of Zanzibar. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #287, photo ©Jack Wheeler)
NO APOLOGY, NO FUTURE
[This Monday’s Archive was written on April 28, 2005. It could not be more relevant today. Because more than ever, the world at large is recognizing that Putin is a narcissistic psychopath who cannot be reasoned with like a normal human being. Unfortunately, too many Russians have been infected with his psychopathy, such that the dissolution of the Soviet Union will now be the fate of Russia itself.]
TTP, April 28, 2005
Budapest, Hungary, October 1997. It was a gorgeous fall day, the sun sparkling off the Danube, the domed Royal Palace glinting on Buda Hill, smartly dressed shoppers strolling along the Vaci.
Just a few years ago this place had been a fear-ridden Russian colony. Now everyone on the street was chattering away on a cell phone. Back in the Soviet days, only the Nomenklatura – the Communist elite – could get a telephone, and even they were terrified of talking freely.
I was in Budapest speaking to a conference of international business leaders. Another speaker was a Moscow television news commentator well-known in Russia, Boris Notkin. He informed his audience about how humiliated Russians felt, losing their Empire and the Cold War, not winning many medals in the Olympics, and having their Mir space station go belly-up.
He warned of a dangerous anti-Americanism emerging among Russians, who resentfully blamed America for their problems.
A gray-haired gentleman with a Central European accent stood up and asked Boris a question:
FLASHBACK FRIDAY: SMUGGLERS PARADISE
Khasab, Musendam, Enclave of Oman, October 2006. The sharp tip of Arabia, known as the Musandam Point, sticks into the Persian Gulf, separating it from the Indian Ocean. The Strait of Hormuz is only 30 miles wide from Musandam Point to the coast of Iran, and through it passes a substantial fraction of the world's crude oil.
I came here to see the Persian smugglers. Go down to the wharves in Khasab and you will see them piled high with waterproof-wrapped bales of clothes, cases of soft drinks and juice, cartons of children's toys and electronic goods, an entire shopping mall of stuff, all ready to be crammed and tied down into 20 ft. long open speedboats with powerful outboard motors capable of outrunning Iranian Navy patrols.
There are dozens, scores, of waiting speedboats. The run from Khasab harbor to coves on the Iranian coast or the Iranian island of Qeshm takes about three hours. An average night will see dozens of speedboats racing across the Strait of Hormuz smuggling goods into Iran. The smugglers couldn’t have been more friendly to me. They hate the mullahs and are proud they are helping poor people in Iran. I had a great time with them. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #169 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
LION ON A CAT
Ngorongoro Crater, Serengeti, Tanzania. Ngorongoro is one of the world’s great natural wonders, created over two million years ago when the cone of a gigantic volcano collapsed in on itself. The crater floor is over 100 square miles, teeming with African wildlife that includes the densest population of lions in the world. You’re only allowed to drive on certain dirt roads to see them, but lions sometime have different ideas. Here’s a lioness we found sunning herself on the hood of a Caterpillar road-grader, completely unconcerned by our presence. We spend a few days exploring Ngorongoro to cap off our safaris in isolated roadless areas of the Serengeti. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #286, photo ©Jack Wheeler)
WHAT A REAL CANNIBAL LOOKS LIKE
On the remote north side of the island of Malekula in Vanuatu, there lives a cannibal tribe called the Big Nambas. The men wear a penis gourd wrapped in pandamus fibers, and eat “man long pig,” cooked human enemies. You have to trek over mountains of thick jungle to reach them. When I was able to years ago, there were a few men who continued the practice. This gentleman is one of them. I was in no danger as they were very kind and gracious to me.
That wasn’t the case a century ago when the first explorers, Martin & Osa Johnson, reached them. Their 1918 film, “Cannibals of the South Seas,” made the Johnsons famous, and you can see it on YouTube. Today they are far more benign. It is an extraordinary experience to meet a culture of fearsome reputation and realize they are people like you and me. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #103 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
ELEPHANTS IN THE SAHARA
10,000 years ago, the Sahara was green, with lakes, rivers, and such an abundance of animals it was a hunting paradise for people who lived here. You’ll find their petroglyphs carved on to rock outcroppings like this that my son Jackson and I found on a Trans-Sahara Expedition in 2003.
The Milankovitch astronomical cycles that drive Earth’s climate produced a West African monsoon that greened the Sahara back then. When the cycles shifted ending the monsoon, the Sahara turned dry desert as it remains today. Political cycles that permitted a peaceful crossing of the world’s greatest desert have also shifted, making this too dangerous now.
A Trans-Sahara Expedition is one of the world’s great adventures. Hopefully, one will be possible again in the not-too-distant future. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #7 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE MOST BEAUTIFULLY PEACEFUL PLACE IN IRELAND
St. Finnbarr’s Oratory, Gougane Barra, County Cork. St. Finnbarr (550-623) is the patron saint of the city of Cork, now Ireland’s second largest city, on the south coast of the Emerald Isle. He established this tiny church in the late 500s, and has been built and rebuilt on a small island on Lake Gougane, with the one you see finished some 150 years ago.
Gougane Barra is a remote valley distant from Cork, almost uninhabited, of legendary beauty. The oratory or chapel has been a holy place of summer pilgrimage for Christians for fifteen centuries, revered for its complete serenity and peacefulness. Rarely visited outside of summer due to its remoteness, you may have this holy place all to yourself. Here is where you come to rest and reinvigorate your soul. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #218 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
BEYOND THE PALE
[This Monday’s Archive is TTP’s celebration of St. Patrick’s Day with its “nutshell history” of Ireland, first written in 2006. Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all TTPers!]
Ronald Reagan’s origins are even more humble than Abraham Lincoln’s log cabin.
His great-grandfather, Michael O’Regan, was born in a hut of mud and slats in farmland called Doolis near the village of Ballyporeen, County Tipperary, in 1829.
In June 1984, Ronald Reagan came to Ballyporeen as President of the United States. In his speech to the townspeople in the village square, he said, “I can’t think of a place on the planet I would rather claim as my roots more than Ballyporeen, County Tipperary.”
A friend of mine was there as a member of Reagan’s staff. After the speech, the President commented to him, “I really am proud to be from here.” With a wink, he explained: “You see, I’m from Beyond the Pale.”
FLASHBACK FRIDAY – TIGER LEAPING GORGE
Many centuries ago, a tiger was plaguing the Naxi people who live in the mountains where the Yangtse River cascades off the plateau of Tibet. He was eating the goats the Naxi needed to feed themselves. So Naxi hunters chased the tiger into a deep narrow gorge of the Yangtse where they were sure they had him trapped. Suddenly, the tiger sprang onto a large rock in the center of the raging river and from there leapt to the other side and escaped, never to be seen again.
Ever since, where this took place has been known as Tiger Leaping Gorge. Here you see Tiger Leaping Rock. I was first here in July 2002 on our overland expedition across eastern Tibet. Last time 2015. Maybe again? (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #141 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
A VIEW OF MOUNT EVEREST YOU HAVE NEVER SEEN BEFORE
Photo taken at an altitude of 22,000 feet (6,700 meters) in a AS 350 B3 ultra-high altitude Eurocopter on our Himalaya Helicopter Expedition. We are looking into the Western Cwm (valley), West Shoulder of Everest in the left forefront, entire Southwest Face of Everest summit (29,029 ft-8,848m) to base on the left, Lhotse (4th highest on earth at 27,949ft-8,516m) straight ahead, the flank of Nuptse on the right.
The climbing route is from Base Camp to Camp I past the top of the Khumbu Ice Fall (bottom of photo), up the Cwm to Camp II at the foot of the Lhotse wall, scale via fixed ropes to Camp III perched on the wall, then up to the notch between Everest and Lhotse (on the horizon in the photo) that is the South Col and Camp IV. The summit is reached from there via the Southeast Ridge on the other side of the photo.
We’ll be here again in late April-early May next year and we hope you can come along with us (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #91 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
HORSESHOE BEND
Looking down 1,000 feet above world-famous Horseshoe Bend of the Colorado River at sunset is one of most iconic views our planet offers us. It is to be found near Page, Arizona near the border with Utah. Yet in truth, the number of different mind-blowing iconic views is uncountable in this part of the American West.
Close by are the Vermillion Cliffs, and the simply psychedelic Antelope Canyon. Just a bit further is the Grand Escalante Staircase, a little bit further Zion and Bryce Canyons and Monument Valley. And of course, right next door is something called The Grand Canyon.
There are people who have explored this region for years and will tell you there’s so much they’ve yet to see. You can explore the world over – what I’ve done my whole life – and yet there is so much of Creation to be soul-thrilled by just in this one region of northern Arizona and southern Utah – and I haven’t mentioned Moab which is a total mind-blow all by itself.
Take a break from all the worries of the world to come to here. Pick a place that will thrill your soul for a few days. That’s what’s needed now. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #134 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE ITCHAN KALA OF KHIVA
The inner town (Itchan Kala) of the ancient Silk Road oasis of Khiva has been unchanged for centuries. Surrounded by 40ft-high snake walls that writhe around the city, its labyrinth of narrow lanes adorned with blue and aquamarine tile mosaics is a living museum for you to explore.
On the Oxus or Amu Darya River in deepest Central Asia, Khiva was ancient when Alexander the Great seized it in 329 BC. It survived the depredations of Arabs in the 7th century, Mongols in the 12th, Tamerlane in the 13th. The Khanate of Khiva continued to flourish on the Silk Road until conquered by the Russians in the 19th. Today in Uzbekistan, it remains as the best-preserved of the ancient oases of the Silk Road, yet unknown to the outside world. We look forward to visiting this ancient place once again. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #118 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE TOMB OF TAMERLANE
This is the interior of “Gur Emir,” the tomb of Tamerlane (1336-1405) in Samarkand, the great Silk Road city now in Uzbekistan. Tamerlane was the last of the nomadic conquerors of Eurasia, a Turkic-Mongol whose conquests extended from New Delhi to eastern Turkey.
Gur Emir is only one of a multitude of extraordinary sights in legendary Samarkand that make being here a life-memorable experience. We’ll be here on a return exploration of Central Asia. We hope you can join us then. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #59 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
THE MOSLEM MYTH OF JERUSALEM
Mohammed’s “Night Journey”
[This Monday’s TTP Archives feature was originally published on December 3, 2003. "From the river to the sea," the Palestinian battle cry that woke Wikipedia describes as an Arabic "focus on freedom," is based on the lie that Jerusalem is one of the holy sites of Islam. While the libs weep over Israel's "aggression" against the Palestinians "who just want peace," let's take another look at the evidence for the Moslem claim]
It is a commonplace in a story or article about the Arab-Israeli conflict that mentions Jerusalem to repeat the Moslem mantra that “Jerusalem is the third holiest city in all Islam, next to Mecca and Medina.”
You’ve heard this innumerable times — but how come? Just why is Jerusalem so important to not just Jews and Christians but Moslems as well?
The reason is one single line in the Koran. If it can be shown by Islamic scholars that it has been misinterpreted, then Jerusalem ceases to be a holy city to Islam.