Suitcase and World: June 2013

Sunday, June 9, 2013

Amber.

Many years ago when my parents were traveling through Europe, my mom brought back an amber brooch for me. It's not a fancy piece of jewelry but it's one of my favorites. On my recent trip to Mexico, I had the opportunity to visit a small amber museum located in the town of San Cristóbal de las Casas, located in the state of Chiapas. It was a small museum but they had some wonderful art pieces there as well as on piece that had a very ancient scorpion encased inside. In 2009, on my trip to Mongolia, I learned about the healing properties of amber when I encountered a young girl wearing a large amber necklace. On this trip, I will be traveling to the part of the world that holds the reputation for having the largest and richest amber deposits - the Baltic Coast.

Sunday, June 2, 2013

The Curonian Spit.



Kuršių nerija, known in English as the Curonian Spit, is a narrow strip of sand stretching 97 kilometres (58 miles) along the Baltic Sea in western Lithuania.   The northern part of the Curonian Spit lies in Lithuania; the southern part in Kalingrad, Russia.   The Spit averages just over a mile wide with a single main road running between dunes all the way to the Russian border.