Beth Kohn is a San Francisco-based writer and photographer who specializes in outdoor recreation, social justice issues and Latin America.
cheese and things
26 September 2009
Random things I've seen in the last few days:
- a 20-something hotel desk clerk carving a pietà out of pink soap
- bats buzzing near my head in a dank cave of stalactites
- a shower head covered with mosquitoes
- chickens scratching in the dirt, surrounded by a dozen frenzied chicks
- a dreamy waterfall with no one swimming in it but me
- dozens of men brazenly riding a rusted-out freight train
life with public transit
21 September 2009
Some days I space out over dinner and can't remember where I am or what the hell I did all day. Here's an example from a few days ago:
Reforma Agraria to highway junction (5 minutes)
From the village of Reforma Agraria, a rickety lodge truck drops us back on the border highway. I stand up in the back next to the luggage, watching the ground through holes in the wooden floorboards. The van we're trying to catch passes 15 minutes earlier than usual, but our driver can't get the horn to work and signal for it to stop. We sit down in a cement shelter with a piece of lumber propped up as a makeshift bench, and notice a small cemetery behind us. Waiting across the street is a weathered man wearing tall rubber boots and holding a machete, and we exchange pleasantries. Your van just went past, he says, why didn't you stop it?
death by soy
11 September 2009
After witnessing a mere two specimens walking the streets of DF in face masks, the whole flu thing seems like a relic. At least until you notice the free hand sanitizer sitting on every front desk and building entrance, and oversize street posters with step-by-step instructions on how to wash your hands.
from the zócalo to zinacantán
3 September 2009
Ladies and gentlemen! Dust off that Spanish dictionary and charge up your currency converters! I'm on the road again in Latin America, this time to update the Chiapas and Tabasco chapter of Lonely Planet's Mexico guidebook. Against the backdrop of a well-publicized flu pandemic, intermittent feudal drug war shootouts and the pressure of entertaining my teenage traveling companion, your intrepid scribe will be oohing and ahhing over some of the Mexico's best green places and giving a shout out to all the compas, down south.
high sierra happiness
2 September 2009
I recently finished my first sola backpacking trip, a six day test-drive of the John Muir Trail. But until midway, when I jettisoned an excess five pounds of trail mix and dehydrated vegetarian protein, it was truly a hip-busting trial. In times of high altitude semi-delirium, I kept my feet in motion by humming Blue Oyster Cult's Don't Fear the Reaper and the theme song from the Flintstones. Over and over and over again. I plastered the welts under my waist belt with chunks of moleskin and did my best to look jaunty when I crossed paths with fellow hikers. And I swore not to remember just the phenomenal alpine scenery, but also the times when I wanted to shirk my pack and slink away.