Written: October 2010 in London, U.K. Occurred: June 1996 on the Pacific coast of Mexico Last time I was back in California, I stumbled across some prints (remember those?) from a trip I took to Mexico in 1996. I was initially going to place this post in the Travel To “Normal” Places category, but then … Continue reading
In the previous post, I explored how the FLNC came into being, explained a little about FLNC history and visited a number of sites of recent FLNC activity (If you want to see Part 1 again, click here). In this post, I’ll also touch on the FLNC, but will focus more on Corsica and Corsican … Continue reading
The picturesque Mediterranean island of Corsica is half the size of Wales and is home to a population of 260,000. It is also home to a violent separatist group waging a war for independence. The group calls itself the FLNC which is an acronym for the National Liberation Front of Corsica. In Corsican that reads … Continue reading
Perched in the mountains above Lalibela is the small village of Ashetan. After visiting Yemrehanna Kristos, my Italian and I realized that we were quite taken with these mountain villages and opted to check this one out as well. The trail up begins right in Lalibela and it is quite a hike, especially if you … Continue reading
![In The Footsteps Of RYP? [Updated]](https://thevelvetrocket.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/las-geel.jpg?w=290&h=290&crop=1 "In The Footsteps Of RYP? [Updated]")
When my Italian and I visited Las Geel, I took a look at the guest book and noticed this entry by “RYP” from California. I’m a fan of Robert Young Pelton and while there are undoubtedly others in the world with the initials “RYP”, how many of these individuals journey to places like Somaliland and … Continue reading
Despite Yemrehanna Kristos being such an extraordinary site, very few people reward themselves with a visit. And a reward it is for this location is beautiful, the priest is friendly and there are even piles of dead bodies to see. The church is about an hour and a half from Lalibela by 4WD. Yemrehanna Kristos … Continue reading
Las Geel (also known as Laas Ga’al, Laas Geel and Laas Gaal) is arguably Somaliland’s pièce de résistance. Were it not in Somalia this site would immediately be declared a World Heritage Site. Fortunately, with the ongoing conflict in Somalia, it remains a hidden gem (To get back to 2005 in the tiny guest book, … Continue reading
The Velvet Rocket 