Laguna Beach Bikini

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The next leg of my travel is through the American midwest. But instead of flying I took an Amtrak Train from Penn Station in New York City to Cleveland, Ohio. The distance is about 750 km or 465 miles.

The train was the #49 Lake Shore Limited which travels daily from New York’s Penn Station to Chicago’s Union Station. It travels up along the Hudson river in New York State with stops at Croton-Harmon and Albany, New York. Albany is the state capital. Then the train heads west through upstate New York with stops in Schenectady, Utica, Syracuse, Rochester (home to the Great Yellow Father Eastman-Kodak), Buffalo, Erie Pennsylvania, Cleveland Ohio, Toledo Ohio, and South Bend Indiana (University of Notre Dame football) before it reaches its final destination in Chicago.

The train departed Penn Station at 3:45 in the afternoon so I had time to take care of some business in Manhattan in the morning before we left. I was up on Park Avenue which is a very ritzy area. Then I headed back to Penn Station to board our train.

The Lake Shore Limited left Penn Station right on schedule. The view along the Hudson River is quite scenic. In Albany, New York at Rensselaer Station there was about a half hour stopover while we waited for the train from Boston. So there was time to get off the train and stretch our legs a bit and get some drinks and snacks inside the station.

At Albany they hooked up a new locomotive plus a few more cars for the Boston passengers. They also added a dining car. Then they took reservations for dinner. We finally arrived in Cleveland at about 4:30 in the morning, which was just one hour late. I actually wanted the train to be a few hours later because they open the dining car for breakfast at 6 or 7 AM. Having breakfast in the dining car on a moving train is one of life’s grand experiences.

We had coach seats that were very comfortable for sitting, but not so great for sleeping. Tickets cost about $60 or so for coach seats depending on which discount you qualify for. There was a sleeping car, but a sleeper on Amtrak is very expensive. Like hundreds of dollars!

This is one of my complaints about rail travel in the U.S. I take night trains all over Europe and a kupe only costs a little more. Even in Germany which has the best trains in the world, sleeping accommadation adds only 10 or 20 Euros to the ticket price. But in the U.S. it might add $200 or $400 dollars!

I left the former USSR and now I am back in the USSA. I was behind the “iron curtain” for over a year. Now I am back behind the golden curtain–the Big Apple, New York City. I flew into JFK airport in New York and stayed in midtown Manhattan near Penn Station on 34th Street [...]

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I have to take care of some business back home, so I returned to the U.S. on Saturday. I flew on Aerosvit Flight 131 from Kiev, Borispol Aeroport to New York’s JFK airport. Aerosvit flies direct from Kiev to JFK five days a week. I booked the flight a few weeks [...]

I am in Kyiv, Ukraine for about two weeks. Kyiv is the Ukrainian spelling. The Russian spelling is Kiev. (Actually they both use the Cyrillic alphabet.)
Regardless of how you spell it, we are here in Kyiv for photography. We took an overnight train from Lviv. It left at 10:47 PM and arrived the next morning [...]

For most of our time in Lviv, I was staying in an apartment on Rynok Square. Rynok means “market” in Ukrainian and Rynok Square is the main square in the old city. It is where you see most of the tourists.
But I am spending my last day and night in Lviv at the old Hotel [...]

Now we are settled in Lviv for the next month or so. We found a place in the center of the old town of Lviv right on Rynok Square. Rynok means market in Ukrainian. Old building, very interesting. I will try to post some photos.
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We were in Lviv last year and were impressed [...]

Well we left Prague for the summer. On Sunday night we took an overnight train from Prague to Lviv, Ukraine. No, the picture above is not our train. Here is the route that Google maps came up with.
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The actual route we took skipped Brno but instead went through Pardubice, Olomouc and Ostrava. The [...]

Prague, Czech Republic - Here is something interesting that I observed outside the window of my flat in the center of Prague. Up on a 4th story ledge of the building across the street, a bird-of-prey was eating a pigeon that it had just killed. I am guessing the bird is some kind of hawk. [...]

Hurray! Back in Prague for the Spring. Arrived on Wednesday by train from Budapest. The train was the Deutche Bahn fast train from Budapest to Berlin. Beautiful modern train that with all the creature comforts. There was a display screen that showed information like speed. It clocked in at 157 km/hour. We were flying by [...]

We will be returning to Prague, Czech Republic for two months in the spring. Our current plans are to be the in April and May 2009. Our route wil take us through Belgrad, Serbia and Budpest, Hungary (Magyaroszag), Bratislava, Slovakia and Brno, Czech Republic. The distance is 1.286 kilometers. Tomarrow we start the journey and [...]

I am in Plovdiv, Bulgaria for a short visit. Plovdiv is located in southern Bulgaria. The Maritza River runs through it just north of the city center.

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I traveled by train from Sofia to Plovidiv, which was about 2-1/2 hours. From the station I walked along Bulevard Ivan Vasov to the Central Square. There [...]

Springtime is only a few weeks away, and I am spending some time in Istanbul, Turkey.

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The weather is quite warm here in Istanbul. The rug merchants are out in front of their shops looking for customers.
Istanbul is a very old city. It was formerly called Constantinople, after the Roman Emperor Constantine. Before that [...]

It is the middle of winter and I am in Sofia, Bulgaria for the month of February. I will be casting new models from Bulgaria. I set up a temporary photo studio near the city centre.
It is rather cold here and most people are bundled up in their winter clothes, so it is sometimes difficult [...]

Well the summer is over and the Summer 2008 Model Search Tour was a success. We discovered many new faces. Some of the new models will be coming to Prague and eventually going to the Bikini Jam in Spain next year. During 12 week tour we visited cities and towns in nine different countries: Croatia, [...]

Our last stop on the Summer 2008 Model Search Tour is Wroclaw, Poland.

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We arrived by train late in the evening. We crossed the border into Poland at Premysl where we had to go through European Union customs inspections. Then we hopped on the train through Krakow and Katowice to Wroclaw. We found a [...]

The capital city of Ukraine. Many pretty girls here. Our last stop in Ukraine.
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This is a big city with a population of at least 2.7 million. I am amazed at what Kyiv has to offer both in backgrounds for photography and in potential modeling talent. There are many undiscovered diamonds in the rough.

The model search has moved to Ukraine. We are in Lviv which is in western Ukraine. When we got off the train at 11.45 pm it was raining.  I will have to brush up on my Russian. Actually many people speak Ukrainian since that is the official language, but most also understand Russian. In fact [...]

Krakow is a beautiful old city in southern Poland.

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Much different than Warszawa, but also lots of thin pretty girls with excellent figures. We also ate some more lard.

After a rest in Praha we are back on the road again. This time it is Warsaw. Or Warszawa as the Poles spell it. We took a train from Praha and arrived late in the day. Warsaw is a big, capital city with good public transportation–metro, trams and buses

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There is lots to do [...]

Prague is our base in Europe so we are here for just a few days to catch out breath. The Summer 2008 European Model Search Tour is winding down. Just a couple more countries to go after Prague: Poland and Ukraine.