Late at night, lying in the bed of a tent cabin, the entire island of St. John comes alive. Waves regularly rinse the beach. Frogs call out to each other. And somewhere nearby, a spastic iguana slowly crunches through the forest, before suddenly falling off a branch. This isn’t $1000-a-bed resort citadel living. This is Maho Bay Campgrounds, where for 100 bucks you can spend a night in the world’s first eco-resort. Read the rest of this entry »

Playing nine holes of golf with the mystival Shivas Irons Society, who spice up the game with meditation, classical music, and alternative methods of keeping score. Originally published in San Francisco magazine Read the rest of this entry »

Winston Churchill’s baby clothes. A 10-foot-tall toilet. UFO abductions. They’re all part of Ireland’s most eccentric castle.
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The Melting Point
Whether or not you believe in global warming, the fact remains that a vast majority of the world’s glaciers are shrinking.
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I haven’t written much about this era of my life, and I don’t know exactly why it feels time to post a few things about it. Probably because if something isn’t available online, it automatically doesn’t exist for a lot of people. And perhaps because enough time has passed. Anyway, here goes.
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An exclusive inside look at London’s legendary Abbey Road, recording studio for Sir Edward Elgar, Glenn Miller, Beyond the Fringe, Pink Floyd, and some group called The Beatles. A new music television show, Live From Abbey Road, was taped at the studio and premieres June 2007 on the Sundance Channel.
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Big-wave surfer Zach Wormhoudt inherited his father’s love of skateboarding — and his company. Today he’s head of the industry’s top skatepark design firm.
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How did a 40-year-old woman fool the world into thinking she was teenage prostitute and wunderkind author JT LeRoy? As a punk rocker, porn writer and phone sex operator, Laura Albert had been inventing herself for years. This story first appeared in Salon, and was the basis for a screenplay commissioned by the Weinstein Brothers. Not that I got paid anything.
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Inside Vietnam’s remarkable economic renaissance. One reason — lots of catfish.
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Some are for singing, others for fighting. Some tell you the temperature. As a collective bunch, they indicate when it’s time to plow a field. Maybe that’s why the right cricket in China can fetch nearly $13,000.
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