Category Archives: International Travel

Central Park Zoo in New York City

October 2, 2016International Travel, New York, Uncategorized, United Statesadventures, animals, bear, birds, central park, Central Park Zoo, city, countries, culture, family, International, lemur, monkeys, nature, New York, NYC, Seal, travel, zoobreanamjohnson@gmail.com

When Central Park was conceived in 1858, it was designed to be filled with all sorts of interesting amusements for everyone. This spirit lives on in the Central Park Zoo, a small animal park filled with creatures you’d never expect to find in New York City.

During my trip to New York City last summer with my family, my parents and I had a single day left in the big city once my sister left town. We could pick one thing to do in the afternoon, so after careful thought, we chose the Central Park Zoo!

We actually got there only an hour before closing time, but we thought it was still a good idea to look around. The tickets were $12 each, which was totally worth it for the hour.

The first thing we saw was this seal. I’m going to wear my emotions on my sleeve here for a bit and tell you that I’m really really sad about how this picture turned out. I had the camera on the wrong setting and forgot to change it back to auto. If it was on the right setting, you would have seen the seal on the rock and the NYC skyline behind him. I tried and waited for another chance at the shot, but the seal got all excited about being watched and decided to swim all over the place instead. As a brief caveat, if any of my readers know how to fix this photo, I would be eternally grateful.

This bear was the star of the zoo. He was an old, mellow bear, and he came right up the the window where all these little kids were pressing their little faces against the glass. One little boy had his hands on the window. The bear lifted his big paw and placed it directly on the little palm on the other side of the glass. It was the most precious moment.

At the center of the Central Park Zoo is a pond surrounding an island. The island is home to snow monkeys, which were cute but less than polite.

The Tropic Zone is the best part of the Central Park Zoo. It’s like a huge tropical enclosed aviary! There are even two floors to it, and an aquarium. It feels so real, like you actually stepped into a jungle or a rain forest. I think that if I lived in New York City, i’d visit the zoo all the time in the winter just so I could get warm and balmy here.

It also has a lot of cool animals, like a iridescent blue poison dart frog and this ring-tailed lemur.

Our hour at the zoo ended much too soon. It’s a pretty small zoo, but we could have entertained ourselves there for hours. If you’re in New York City, be sure to check it out! It’s a nice, inexpensive NYC experience for the whole family.

P.S. Did you see that I added Pinterest buttons to my photos? Be sure to pin a couple of your favorite images before you head out!

A Walk in Maho

September 26, 2016American University of the Caribbean, AUC, Caribbean, International Travel, Saint Martin/ Sint Maarten747, airplane, beach, Caribbean, dog, Island, jet, KLM, Maho, ocean, restaurant, saba, Saint Martin, sea, Sint Maarten, Sonesta, St. Maarten, st. martin, sunset beach, tourism, trip, vacation, walkbreanamjohnson@gmail.com

Maho’s a nice part of Saint Martin, and one I’ve never really appreciated. Shopping centers, the casino, sky bars– not a lot to love, in my opinion, especially when it’s pretty much a fake little tourist village that looks nothing like the rest of the island. Actually, though, it’s a pretty nice to place to spend an afternoon. I took a trip through Maho with my dog today, and I enjoyed the simple pleasures I found.

Maho Village

Other than the huge resort Sonesta, Maho is mostly residential. I’m not sure why you’d call it a village when it’s really a lot of condos, but it’s a pretty nice place to live. Very safe and secure, with a lot of guards and a lot of gates. The one thing that I don’t love is all the big, barking dogs behind those gates. Kito and I decided to leave the resident dogs to their own business and check out the rest of Maho.

Maho Shopping

There’s one main road in Saint Martin, and it runs through Maho. Both sides of the street are lined with spacious sidewalks and places to shop or eat. The boutiques are fun to browse through. There are some nice little souvenir shops with low-priced t-shirts, so it’s a good place to look around if you’re not up for Philipsburg. The clothing stores are beyond my budget, but it doesn’t hurt to window shop.

Maho Eating

There are a lot of places to eat in Maho. A local fave is the pizza shop behind the casino, but I have to admit that I’ve never been there. Three Amigos isn’t bad, but you’ll have better luck at Maho’s best kept secret, Taco Macho. You can find it in the Alegria complex past Sunset Beach. We’ve enjoyed Moomba on a special occasion, although it’s a little pricey. Fig & Bananas is very popular with the wine and tapas crowd, so if that’s your jam, you really can’t go wrong. We’ve also had pizza at Rialto, which is good for a quick lunch. The most popular spot in the area is definitely Sunset Beach Bar, a top tourist destination where you can watch the sun set over the ocean and see planes fly just above your head. Our number one favorite is Gio’s, the gelato place on the corner. Try the cheesecake. It’s delicious.

Maho Beach

To be honest, I’m not sure if it’s called Maho Beach or Sunset Beach, but either way it’s a great place to go. During tourist season from October to May, artificial sand expands the beach to accommodate the hundreds of people who wait for airplanes to blow them away. Yes, Maho Beach is that beach– the one where you can get blasted by a 747 jet or stand a few hundred feet below and landing plane.

Today, Kito and I walked to Maho Beach. I’m not really into the whole jet blast thing, but I do love seeing the planes come in for landing at Princess Juliana Airport. Plus, it was a dry day today, so Saba stood out sharply against a clear blue sky in the distance. I love that view. Kito just loves getting attention from all the tourists. Maho Beach is actually an incredibly friendly place to go. I just walked down and sat on the retaining wall with my dog, and lots of people stopped to talk. A few people gave me a quick smile and paused to pet the dog, and one little Dutch girl who was selling watermelon at her lemonade stand gave me a slice for free, just because. Or maybe because I looked homeless. Hopefully not. A tourist from the Netherlands sat down beside me and we talked about our dogs for a while. She’s an agility trainer and her dogs compete in Belgium all the time. We watched the planes for a while before Kito started getting hot and wanted to go home.

If you have time to walk around Maho, why not take an hour or two to do it? There’s a lot of other great things to see on the island, but Maho’s not half bad.

How to Travel to Anguilla from Saint Martin

September 24, 2016Anguilla, Caribbean, International Travel, UncategorizedAnguilla, beach, Blowing Point, boat, British West Indies, Caribbean, caribbean sea, ferry, Island, islands, Marigot, ocean. sea, Saint Martin, SXM, tourism, travel, vacationbreanamjohnson@gmail.com

Across the sea from Saint Martin, a thin green line is visible on the horizon. This is Anguilla, Saint Martin’s closest neighbor. Today, I spent some time on the beach near Blowing Point Terminal on Anguilla enjoying the clear blue waters of the British West Indies. Here’s a bit about Anguilla and how to travel there from Saint Martin.

About Angiulla

Anguilla is a very flat, very dry (for the tropics) island that is about the same size at Saint Martin. It’s a lot longer and narrower than Saint Martin, and it has only a fraction of its population. At 35 square miles, it only has about 15,000 residents.

How to get there

To get to Anguilla from St. Martin, you have to take the ferry from Marigot, the capital of the French side. The first ferry leaves at 8:15 AM. It costs $5 at the gate for port tax and another $20 on the boat. I have often wondered what they do to you in you don’t have the $20. Throw you to the sharks? I’d rather not find out.

Getting around

As soon as you step off the ferry, you’ll be bombarded by taxi drivers and rental agents. There is no public bus system on the island, so you’ll have to rent a car or take the taxi. A taxi to Shoal Bay Beach at the other end of Anguilla is about $18 per person. I believe a car rental is somewhere around $50-$100 per day. Taxi drivers really take care of their customers, by the way.

What to do

To be honest, I’m not the expert on Anguilla. Here’s what I know, though. The best beach is Shoal Bay Beach. It’s a mile-long strip of white, powdery sand near a beautiful reef. There are other beaches, too, but it you have to pick one then stick with Shoal Bay. You can also charter a boat to Sandy Island or Prickly Pear Cay, a couple of Cays on the back side of Anguilla. If you decide to go to the capital, The Valley, you’ll find a few points of interest, like the museum and some local food.

The cheapest trip ever

Sometimes, it’s just nice to get off Saint Martin and do something different. If you want a super cheap day in Anguilla, walk a few hundred yards from the ferry to the beach right beside the Blowing Point terminal. There’s a thin but beautiful strip of sand right there, and you can relax while the crystal-clear water laps at your feet. The view of Saint Martin is something I could look at all day. After all this time on SXM, seeing it from Anguilla is like looking at the earth from the moon. Your total cost will be $53, and you can even get a snack– there’s a sea grape tree at the edge of the beach. The fruit is ripe at the end of wet season. If your SXM visa is expiring and you need to get a new stamp, this is the way to go.

As much as I enjoy Anguilla, I’m always happy to go back to my home sweet home. Looking at Saint Martin from afar reminds me how beautiful the island is and how much I love it. From Anguilla, all you can see of Saint Martin is how “the chains of mountains green variously in sunlight sheen.” It’s an alluring sight that calls me home. O! I love thy paradise, nature’s beauty very nice.

5 Sweets Shops You Gotta Try in New York City

September 22, 2016International Travel, New York, United StatesCandy, candy store, Cupcake, Hersheys, lolipop, MMs, MnMs, NCY, New York, New York City, sugar, sweetbreanamjohnson@gmail.com

Sugar, sugar sugar… There’s not much I like better! Okay, maybe a deep dish pizza with spinach, but other than that, sugar’s my fave. Take me to a candy store, and you’ll have a happy girl. New York City has plenty sweets shops, and I think I located them all during my trip to the Big (candy) Apple. Here are five in Manhattan that you have to check out.

Sugar Factory boasts a vast spread of celebrity customers from Drake to Demi Lovato. You can join the red carpet crowd for a sweet snack when you stop by for a couture pop or a fancy milkshake. The brightly-colored non-alcoholic goblets were tempting to me, but I decided to save my $25 and stick to a bag of candy from the candy bar.

M&Ms World is chocolate heaven. My sister, Kaylee, and I made it a stop on our Times Square sister adventure. Shockingly, we opted out of draining the mountains of delicious chocolate nibbles. I was more reluctant to leave the store than my sister was, although she used to be the bigger chocolate addict! The line was ridiculously long, so we just took a look around and bought an ID tag for my dog. Which if you think about it is sort of ironic, since chocolate is like cyanide to a dog. In any case, the place is pretty cool, so it’s worth going to even if you aren’t going to buy chocolate– which I’m still kind of regretting, by the way.

Baked by Melissa is the only reason this post isn’t named “5 Candy Shops You Gotta Try in New York City.” It doesn’t sell candy, but it does sell the sweetest little doll-sized cupcakes in every flavor you can imagine. It’s great for counting calories, because just one of these things is enough to satisfy your sweets cravings. You can enjoy a cupcake without feeling guilty about the five cups of frosting that pro cupcakes usually come with. Doesn’t get much better than that. Oh, and did I mention that they’re delicious? Try the cotton candy flavor.

Hershey’s Chocolate World is as much fun on the outside as it is on the inside, with its Godzilla-sized chocolate bars mounted high above the busy NYC sidewalks. I have to admit that I was actually a little disappointed by the Hershey’s store, because my eleven-year-old memories of my last Times Square visit made it seem a whole lot smaller this time. My disappointment was quickly alleviated by free licorice at the door, though.

It’Sugar. This one drew me in with a promise of a free gift for Pokemon Go players. Don’t judge me. I ended up with a free sucker and a couple fake fried eggs that I served my husband a few days later as a joke. (He didn’t buy it.)

As much as I love sugar, I really don’t indulge all that often. The Manhattan candy stores are a huge exception. What I love about NYC candy stores, what draws me in and tempts me to taste, is the charm of it. Sure, you can get the same candy cheaper at Walgreens. But sometimes, it’s the experience that counts. Each one of these sweet shops whisked me back to my childhood and reminded me that often, it really is the simple things that make all the difference.

Battery Park, New York City

September 21, 2016International Travel, New York, United StatesBattery Park, castle clinton, city, clinton, Ellis Island, environment, food, globe, globes, history, national monument, New York, NYC, pier A harbor house, restaurant, war of 1812breanamjohnson@gmail.com

New York City is flashy, trendy, and crowded, but it also has some significant and interesting history. The earliest history is concentrated primarily around the Battery Park area, which is the gateway to the city from Ellis Island and also the site of the city’s earliest fort, Castle Clinton.

Castle Clinton was built in 1811 as a fortification against the British during the War of 1812. After it was no longer in use militarily, it was given to the city as a garden and arts center in 1823. In 1855, the rise of immigration caused Castle Clinton, perfectly placed at the edge of the bay, to become a depot and immigrant processing center. Eight million new Americans left Castle Clinton and embarked on new lives in this great nation. In 1890, the processing center was moved and the building became the New York City Aquarium. In 1946, the castle was returned to its original design, and in the 70’s, it became Castle Clinton National Monument.

Besides the monument, Battery Park has a lot of other statues and memorials to see. My family’s favorite was “Cool Globes,” the collection of large painted globes, each painted by a different team of artists to reflect their idea of a solution to the world’s environmental problems. One idea was for everyone to put on layers and avoid blasting heating and wasting energy. The globe was covered by a giant knitted globe sweater. I liked the one with every nation’s flag painted over the shape of the country. Look– they even remembered Burundi!

There are a lot of great places to eat in New York City, but a few are worth highlighting. One of these is Pier A Harbor House, which is located at Battery Park. We stopped in here on our way to the Ellis Island ferry. It was classically American and very delicious.

I love me some international food, and New York certainly offers the best of the best from round the world. Sometimes, though, it’s nice to get some mainstream-type American chow. Especially if you haven’t been home to the States in a few months. Pier A Harbor house had all the really good New England stuff, like seafood in a sandwich and the best clam chowder I think I’ve ever had.

The ambiance was also really nice. It had a distinctive nautical design, with naval code flags and ship decorations hung tastefully on the walls. As you can see from the above photo, my parents were very happy to be there!

If you find yourself in New York City, be sure to head over to Battery Park. You won’t find any neon or Prada, but you’ll find something that draws deep from the roots of American history. American or not, you’ll discover something that belongs to you: a welcome to all nations from the city that was built by hands from around the world.

Day at the Museum (of Natural History)

September 13, 2016International Travel, New York, Uncategorized, United StatesAmerica, American Museum of Natural History, central park, city, museum, New York, NYC, travel, united statesbreanamjohnson@gmail.com

Night at the Museum is possibly one of the best family movies of all time. I know we loved it, at least, and were super excited when my parents, sister and I got to visit the Museum of Natural History in New York again and look for all our favorite characters.

I was surprised to find that all the displays aren’t exactly like the scenes from the movie. I guess I had mingled my real-life experiences from ten years ago with the footage from the film. We did find a few of the characters, though, and the rest of the museum was way better and bigger than I recall.

It’s amazing how much you think you know until you come into a museum like this. I’ve spent so much time in my life reading about different location and cultures, and still I learn tons of new and novel things every time I visit a museum.

It was especially interesting to me to learn about the history and culture of the Masai and other Nilotic or Bantu tribes in the Tanzania/Burundi/Kenya area of Africa, since that is where Ben grew up.

The South American exhibit was also fun to walk through. There were so many terra cotta statues, like this dog. It’s pretty cute…. for a chihuahua.

The ocean exhibit was also cool. Last time we were here, we missed it because we ran out of time. This time, we took our time through it. Even though I took marine biology in high school, I’ve become so much more educated on ocean life since I live near one. I recognized a lot of the creatures in the exhibits.

It’s tough for me to pick and choose which photos to feature and which displays to highlight; I guess if you want to see them, you’ll have to go check it out for yourself! It’s well worth spending a few hours at the Museum of Natural History.

Breana's Blog

A writer's adventures around the world