Donna and I recently capped off a whirlwind week of travel, to New York City and Washington, D.C., by spending a few nights in Las Vegas to celebrate our wedding anniversary and to check out the re-created The Wizard of Oz , adapted from the original 1939 film for the amazing Sphere. We also visited Hoover Dam, an engineering marvel that everyone should see. The Wizard of Oz at The Sphere We had wanted to see the Sphere version of The Wizard of Oz since it debuted last August. Our son and his wife saw it a few months ago and confirmed it was worth the trip and the hefty admission price. So we decided to make a trip west to see for ourselves. The new Wizard of Oz blew our minds like the original version must have done in its day. We climbed up, up, up to our seats very high inside the Sphere. Far in front of us appeared to be a traditional rectangular movie screen curtain. A live orchestra to supplement the original movie’s soundtrack was tuning up out of view. Finally, the li...
After college, I lived in Washington State in the Pacific Northwest for a time and fell in love with the region’s natural beauty. Forests of towering evergreens that make you feel insignificant cover the landscape. The magnificent Cascade Range, with snow-clad volcanic peaks such as Mount Rainier (elevation 14,410 feet), Mount Baker (10,781) and Mount St. Helens, which famously erupted in 1980, surround you. And the beautiful Puget Sound, which envelops the San Juan Islands, lies within easy eyeshot. A ferry from the town of Anacortes winds through the islands, stopping at a half-dozen ports along the scenic way. All of it is breathtaking. I had not returned to the area since my six-month residency there 47 years ago, but I wanted to visit my brother who lives there and show Donna the drop-dead beauty of it all. We landed in Seattle-Takoma International Airport after a stressful flight, picked up our rental car, and crawled north in bumper-to-bumper traffic during the afternoon r...