Tag Archives: cruise vacation

February 16, 2026 · 5:35 am

Reaching Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire — The Ivory Coast

The NCL Dawn made port in Abidjan on 21 March 2025, two days after we departed the island of São Tomé. I’m going to be honest with you and say that Abidjan was my least favorite African port of call. That’s not to say I regret our visit to the République de Côte d’Ivoire. I most assuredly do not. For one thing, it helps pad out my list of 107 countries and autonomous regions that I’ve visited. So, what’s not to like? Well, you’ll find over this week and next that there’s not a lot here to see. That’s mostly a byproduct of the fact that Côte d’Ivoire’s per capita GDP is a dismal $2,728 (nominal)/$6,960 (PPP). How poor are things here? Let me show you what passed as one of our first tour destinations on this day. This is the sad remnants of a former colonial house in Grand-Bassam, east of Abidjan:

This historic building is in only slightly better condition:

We walked past these buildings because our guide insisted upon taking us to a local school. As we progressed down this short street, we saw yet another rundown colonial house:

Rundown colonial house in Grand-Bassam, Côte d’Ivoire

Then we arrived to the school:

Groupe Scolaire Bassam 4 Preschool and Primary

View from the Musée National des Costumes (National Costume Museum) of Grand-Bassam

“La Petite Marianne” (The Little Marianne), a bronze statue in the French colonial quarter of Grand-Bassam:

And a preview image of Wednesday’s article on the Palais Royal de Grand-Bassam:

Слава Україні! (Slava Ukraini!)

Comments Off on Reaching Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire — The Ivory Coast

Filed under Photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, vacation

Tagged as Abidjan, Africa, Côte d'Ivoire, cruise, cruise vacation, Ivory Coast, NCL Dawn, photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, travel photography, vacation

November 28, 2025 · 5:35 am

Fun Photo Friday — Karnak Temple Favorites 2

I decided to take my previous advice and do today’s Fun Photo Friday in color-filtered Black & White. Let me know what you think. Meanwhile, today’s entry means we leave behind Egypt and head to our next photo destination on this months-long journey from earlier this year.

Слава Україні! (Slava Ukraini!)

Comments Off on Fun Photo Friday — Karnak Temple Favorites 2

Filed under Fun Photo Friday, Photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, vacation

Tagged as cruise vacation, Egypt, Fun Photo Friday, Jaz Celebrity, Jaz Cruises, Karnak Temple, Luxor and Aswan Travel, Mohamad Salah, Nile, Nile cruise, photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, travel photography, vacation

November 26, 2025 · 5:35 am

Nile Cruise — Exploring Karnak Temple Part 3

One of the things I most enjoyed about photographing Karnak was the way light and shadow played across the numerous columns, highlighting hieroglyphics and bas reliefs. Indeed, I anticipate that many of these photographs will convert very nicely into black & white, especially with some judicial use of color filtering before the conversion. And in case you’re wondering what I mean by that, here are some articles I wrote on the subject: Black & White Photography—It’s All in the Color!, Black & White Filtering After the Picture is Taken (and with FREE Software!) (alas, that “free software” is no longer supported by Google, but I’m sure you can find a substitute), and Color Filtering in Black & White Revisited. But enough with the photo tips for today. Let’s get back to Karnak.

I recently mentioned that among all the other sights here, there are also some obelisks, but so far I’ve not shown you any. Today I correct that. Remember our visit to the Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut? Well, that’s not the only construction project for which she was responsible. Two of the obelisks here at Karnak were constructed for her. And being that Hatshepsut was one of the few female pharaohs, it’s perhaps fitting that she selected pink granite. The second of her two obelisks has since toppled, so the smaller obelisk you see below belonged to Thutmose I. Hatshepsut’s obelisk stands 97 feet/29.5 meters tall and weighs about 323 tons. The obelisk for Thutmose I is 71 feet/21.7 meters tall and comes in at around 143 tons.