Dancers swirling across a floor, a vibe is both country and Texas, and the idea that cultures and borders can and should be crossed through music and through hope.: that’s the picture Tish Hinojosa paints in the title track of her album Our Little Planet. All of those things have been constantly evolving aspects of Hinojosa’s life in music.

Through that life, she’s moved back and forth between country songs and folk ballads, songs with lyrics in English and in Spanish, tales of history, character, and landscape, love songs, and songs of family and home, all framed in images, ideas, and melodies that reflect a musical imagination shaped by connection with the southwestern part of the United States.

Hinojosa grew up in San Antonio, daughter of parents who had moved to Texas from Mexico. In high school “I started to learn chords on the guitar, and it was like I already knew them,” she recalled. In high school people also told her that she sang well. “That was a moment, I think, too, a turning point,” she said. Soon she was singing at clubs along San Antonio’s Riverwalk, but knew she wanted more. She moved to northern New Mexico.

She found Red River and nearby Taos good for her. “There were lots of ways to go up there — a couple of nights a week I was a folk singer in a bar, and then I met few people and we put a band together and I started singing country music. . We were doing stuff like Michael Martin Murphey, Rodney Crowell, Gram Parsons, Rosanne Cash, stuff people would dance to. For me it was like the next chapter. I couldn’t soak up enough or learn enough songs, and I was writing too.” She found a way to try her songs out. “I’d hide them in dance sets,” she said. “Put a two step rhythm to it, and people would be dancing to them.”

A time on the national scene playing folk clubs became the chapter after that, and then it seemed that Nashville might be the next right thing. It wasn’t, but those Nashville days would, decades later, offer the spark for Our Little Planet.

On the way to that, though, Hinojosa and her young family moved to Austin. She released a number of well received albums among them Culture Swing and Destiny’s Gate. Her work drew comparisons to Joan Baez, Emmylou Harris, and Linda Ronstadt (who recorded one of her songs) for her singing, and recognition for her songwriting, too. “I became known as an artist of substance, and I liked that,” she said, “ but the record company people didn’t know what to do with me.” Despite ups and downs with major labels and independents through shifting record market fortunes, Hinojosa continued touring, and continued writing, and continued finding ways to release albums. Though she most often mixes English and Spanish songs in her work, she’s done several all Spanish albums, including the live recording Aquella Noche and the innovative Soñar Del Laberinto. Not long ago, she decided it was time to do another.

“I was working on an all Spanish record,” she said, “and I had some good songs for it, but I just wasn’t writing or finding the songs I needed to finish it.” Hinojosa maintains a strong presence in Austin, where she lived for more than a decade, but she’s now based in Hamburg, Germany. “ I keep traveling back and forth from Austin to Hamburg, and with every trip I clear out more closets in Austin. One day I found a whole box of my old Nashville tapes, back from when I was a demo singer there in the eighties, and was starting to write country songs. There were songs on there that I had absolutely, totally forgotten. They were half finished songs, maybe just a verse and chorus, but I found three or four that were just real gems.” Intrigued, she started writing new material, as well as working on the songs she’d found. “I finished them, rounded them out — I think I’m a slightly better writer now than I was then!” she said.

Those songs, and the whole album, she points out, “aren’t commercial country. We made it more basic, more in a folk or bluegrass vein. I wouldn’t go so far as to say Carter Family, but sort of like that.” Country with a certain Hinojosa vibe, to be sure. There’s a reflection on relationships, connections, and change in Is Time Being Kind, a soulful love song in Spanish, Mi Pueblo, with Austin native Carrie Rodriguez adding duet vocals and fiddle; that swirling polka of the title track, with lyrics in both English and Spanish; a song of journeys both emotional and spiritual, called Roadsongs and Bygones, and eight other equally interesting tracks.

“I decided I wanted to do a record that reflected the simplicity of our show these days — we usually tour with just two guitars, maybe a mandolin, and our voices, real straight ahead,” Hinojosa said. “ The record is all acoustic except for some pedal steel. I’ve got a country shuffle on there, and a polka, some really nice duets, some bluegrass sounding stuff, and a couple of the songs are in Spanish. I’m really happy with it.”

Though she is now based in Germany, Hinojosa is not looking toward writing songs in German, at least not any time soon. She’d like to sing German folk songs for her audiences there, though, and to make her way around town and have conversations. She’s working on that. “Every time I think I’ve got something down, there comes another rule!” Tish Hinojosa said, laughing.
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photograph of Tish Hinojosa copyright Kerry Dexter

“How many of you have a bottle of vodka in your freezer? Well, pour that vodka down the drain—Welcome to Flavor Town!”

We’re about halfway through the Johnnie Walker Tasting Event at the cavernous Harborside Financial Center, located on the western bank of the Hudson River in Jersey City, NJ, and overlooking sparkling downtown Manhattan over on the eastern side. Our host, whose role for Johnnie Walker seems strangely similar to that of the late Slurm soda mascot Slurms McKenzie, has just introduced Johnnie Walker Gold. It’s served in chilled shot glasses brought out on silver trays by the college-aged Johnnie Walker Girls, all black dresses and caked-on makeup masks. There are 75 or so tasters in attendance.

In an evening unabashedly filled with buzz words—during his pitch for each JW label, Slurms actually says he’s going to “throw out some buzz words” to describe them—we’re told the Gold is an “indulgent” whiskey, a whiskey “made for celebration,” and a whiskey that makes for a better shot than that drab ol’ bottle of vodka in the freezer.

Smooth, smoky, and with distinct hints of honey and berry, the Gold was, indeed, the standout of the evening… even moreso than the much-ballyhooed Blue label, which retails for anywhere from $139 – $500 per 750ml bottle. Why so expensive? According to Slurms, of the 7.4 million casks of whiskey that are aging in Scotland, only 1 in 10,000 are pulled and blended into Blue, which also uses rare batches from distilleries outside the JW family—even distilleries no longer in operation and now just running through what they have left of their product.

Categorically Speaking

The evening began in Williamsburg, where me and three friends were to be picked up and transferred to Jersey City via a limousine service I won on a daily tips email. At 5:30pm, however, our hopes for an extravagant cruise in decked-out luxury were dashed when a mid-sized SUV rolled up and the driver asked if we were ready to go. With all four of us measuring at least six-feet tall, we squeezed into the truck and folded our long legs up like crouching spiders.

Hoping for a stocked mini-fridge, tinted windows, and a booming sound system, for the next hour or so we instead settled for a sweet serenade of staticy Spanish language crackle over the car service’s dispatcher CB radio. Stuck in rush-hour traffic in downtown Manhattan as we inched towards the Holland Tunnel, conversation shifted from waiver-wire strategy in our fantasy basketball league, to this week’s NFL spreads, and finally to the game of “Categories”, in which somebody throws out a category (“Movies that have aliens in them”) and everybody takes turns answering until there’s one man left standing.

Yep, a couple of cool guys out for a wild night on the town. All things considered, as we sat there on Canal Street crammed into the SUV, I’m glad we didn’t follow through on our grandiose idea to wear suits and top hats.

Welcome to Jersey City

We met a Johnnie Walker representative at the Harborside entrance, and were told we’d be given special VIP treatment during the evening’s main presentation. That meant a front-row seat in the makeshift tasting room, which was set up convention-style in a big lobby behind tall black curtains. Long, gray, padded benches were set up facing three big projection screens, with three shot glasses (two containing Black Label and one with Red), a glass of water, water dropper, half carafes of ginger ale and coconut water, and a golden Johnnie Walker pin laid out on knee-high JW-branded tables in front of each seat. After that long ride, I resisted the urge to clandestinely throw one of those shots down before we got underway.

Suddenly, the lights were dimmed and Johnnie Walker propaganda a short film starring actor Robert Carlyle (28 Weeks Later, Trainspotting) began:

Following the film and further marketing speak from Slurms, the tasting began in earnest, starting with the Black before moving on to the Red, Gold, and Blue. We first tried the Black without anything added, then with a few drops of water, and finally with our choice of ginger ale or coconut water; the coconut water was a surprisingly kosher match and one I’ll be trying at home. “Water is to whiskey what oxygen is to wine,” said Slurms, as he told us that there was no right or wrong way to drink Johnnie Walker: plain, on the rocks, or with a mixer, it’s up to each individual connoisseur… just as long as it’s JW that’s in the glass.

Whiskey Glow

After the main event, which lasted for roughly 30 minutes, we were allowed to stick around for a few more cocktails at Johnnie Walker’s makeshift bar since we were late for our event’s cocktail party (there were two tasting events scheduled for the evening). We snapped our photo at the JW booth, drank a few Blacks on the rocks, indulged the spread of cheese, crackers, and vegetables… even briefly met Slurms in person!

The warm glow of whiskey in our bellies, along with a lot less traffic, helped make the ride home much more pleasant. Our driver was happy to crank a mix CD we’d brought for the limo’s booming sound system (DMX! Dem Franchise Boyz!), and as we turned onto the Manhattan Bridge, bound for I-278, I looked out the window at the bright lights of the big city behind us, and was caught up in one of those fleeting “ahhhh, New York” moments. Ten minutes later we were back in Williamsburg.

I’m already a whiskey drinker; will the Johnnie Walker Tasting Event influence my next purchase? Maybe, maybe not. I do know one thing, however: from now on, every time I see a bottle of JW the shelf, or put a glass of JW to my lips, I’ll always be thinking “Welcome to Flavor Town”. Good thing, bad thing, I’m not sure.

Tim Leffel is more than just Perceptive Travel’s fearless leader — he’s also a fearless cyclist, particularly when said cycling involves stops for wine and beer. Also he’s written a book called Travel Writing 2.0. And he does many other things of a writerly nature.

In the July issue of Perceptive Travel, Tim chronicles his journey on Missouri’s Katy Trail in  Two Wheels, Two Drinks: Biking Through America’s Heartland. Not that long ago — if you measure time on a cosmic scale, August qualifies –  I had a chat with Tim about his piece and how he does his writing thing. I was not even a little bit influenced by the fact that he owns this site, as my unconscionable delay in running this interview clearly indicates. In fact, since then, he’s had another fine piece in the webzine, Sidesaddle Girls at a Mexican Rodeo.

Two Riders (Neither Tim) Having a Beer Along the Trail, at Augusta Brewery

Alison Stein Wellner: So I really did like this piece, but I have to admit I often get bored when I’m reading stories about a long cycling/rafting/hiking trek. Were you conscious of reader boredom as you were writing this?

Tim Leffel: I get bored of those stories too — unless you’re an avid enthusiast, if you’re writing about a hike, a ride, a rafting trip, it’s important to just skip the irrelevant stuff, and include enough details to give the reader a general impression of what it feels like. And that’s the nice thing about doing something like this –  when you’re out there for multiple days on end, there’s lots of quiet reflective time, where there’s not anything going on. So you can just focus on what’s interesting about the experience.

ASW: Why did you decide to write about the Katy Trail?

TL: I had met somebody at one of these meet-ups, a place where tourism people meet with travel writers and talk about ideas. I didn’t know [the Katy Trail] existed.

For some reason, I’ve always been drawn to stories like this — I like a real journey that happens at human speed. I can feel it, and smell it. I notice more things about a place when I travel through it in this way. The next thing I want to do that’s like this is a kayaking trip from Central Florida to the Gulf of Mexico.

ASW: Was the Katy Trail what you’d expected it would be?

TL: I did know that was there were wineries along the trail, and I expected it to be mellow — not a lot of sipping and swirling and wine snobbery. But this is a conservative part of the country, so I was expecting it to be more sedate than it was. And then there were those brewpubs and breweries — some of them were really amazingly good, and that just surprised me in the land of Budweiser. The ride itself, and the towns along the way — it was a lot more fun than I expected. Of course, as a travel writer there have been times I’ve been on the reverse side of that expectation!

ASW: One of my favorite parts of the story is when you meet fellow cyclist Charlene.  And that made me wonder, how did you take notes when you were busy cycling? It’s hard enough for me to take notes while I’m walking without bumping into things.

“Charlene is riding the whole 225–mile trail, but she’s not your typical spandex–covered road biker with something to prove. Puffing on a cigarette when I pull up beside her, she’s alternating between biking and walking. We chat for a while about where she’s been camping along the way, and the lowdown she’s gotten from one campground owner about which towns to avoid for overnight stays. “I’m not worried about somebody stealing my cart of stuff though,” she says. “I’ve got a loaded pistol in case I run into any trouble.” This seems like a good cue to return to my solitary journey, so I bid her goodbye and she’s soon a dot in the distance behind me.” – From Two Wheels, Two Drinks: Biking Through America’s Heartland.

TL: I pedaled up about a mile in front of her, and then I stopped and wrote it down, Paul Theroux style. In general, I didn’t take a lot of notes along the way — just phrases and impressions here and there. Maybe that’s laziness or maybe it’s convenience. Digital cameras do make things much easier, I can just take a picture of a sign and move on instead of copying down what the sign says.  I generally write down notes when I’m having dinner or at the end of the day — I think about what’s made an impression.

ASW: And I have to ask about notebooks — what’s your pleasure there?

TL: I’m not much of a notebook snob, I use the cheap spiral-bound ones that I’ve gotten for swag.  I have traveled with a Moleskine, but I don’t like them — they  don’t lie flat.

ASW: What kind of research did you generally do for a story before you leave home, and what did you do for this one?

TL: It depends. Next week, I’m going to Chile, and I’m not reading anything, not doing anything, I’m just showing up and seeing what happens. I like doing that when I’m going to city. But for this [Katy Trail] trip I did do research, since there were a lot of logistics involved — I needed a place to sleep each night,  I needed to know where the wineries were along the way.  In this case, there was a great Katy Trail website that was super comprehensive, it told me everything that I needed to know.

ASW: What’s your writing process?

TL: I have certain tricks to avoid looking at a blank piece of paper, to take the path of least resistance: I wrote the factual stuff first, the history, the details about the trail, whatever I knew I could do quickly and get it out there — that was about a quarter of the article. Then I refer back to my notes. I don’t know if I have a clear voice, but I do have a good irony meter — if something makes me laugh know I’ve got to get it in the story, like the part about the corn cob pipe museum, for instance.

“Coasting into Hermann on a bicycle feels perfectly natural: everything is still on a human scale. In Washington, you can tour a museum that’s part of one of the old brick riverfront factories that has been around since the 1800s—Missouri Meerschaum. It’s “the world’s oldest and largest manufacturer of corn cob smoking pipes.” – From Two Wheels, Two Drinks: Biking Through America’s Heartland.

I wrote the story in bits and pieces, I didn’t write it in one sitting.  It was more of a mosaic process. I move things around a lot on the page. I’m pretty brutal about self-editing, I’ll chop [out] three or four paragraphs if they just don’t add to the piece — even if it’s interesting word play. If I cut something and I think I can use it later for something else, I’ll keep it. Although I do think if it’s that’s good, I’ll remember it again.

ASW: And where do you write?

TL: I have a wife and a daughter, and that has a really impacted my writing habits. I do most of my work in my office — it’s quiet in there. I’m like a newspaper or nonfiction writer, I get up every day and log on and do my thing, and then it’s eight hours and I’m done.

ASW: Okay, I have to ask: since you edit the publication you’re writing for, who edits you?

TL: It depends on how tight the deadline is. Sometimes I send it to a writer friend, but usually my wife reads it — she’s a personal trainer actually, but she’s got a good eye — she spots technical problems, tells me that I’ve used the same word three times in the same graf, things like like that. But since I’ve been the editor of this publication five years in January, I’ve developed a pretty good sense about what works and doesn’t. I’ll let some things slide from other people that I wouldn’t tolerate in my own piece. There are good points and bad points about that.

ASW: Any advice for travel writers?

TL: When I was researching my book, the same advice kept coming through. Be a professional, read the guidelines, read what’s in the publication and make sure that what you’re proposing matches. Do what you say you’re going to do. It’s amazing how many don’t do it, but it’s so easy to leap above the crowd by being a professional.

ASW: And how about advice for finding unique ideas to write about?

TL: I think that’s a hard thing to advise people on, since you almost have to have a sixth sense. The important thing is to keep looking for something that surprises you — then you can find a unique angle, but you’ve got to have your eyes open and senses open and look for something out of the ordinary.

How many times have you photographed yourself while traveling?

It’s easy enough to do these days, with light digital cameras and nimble cell phones with cameras.  If you’re traveling solo, self-photography is often the easiest and safest way to document your presence in a destination, — do you really want to hand over your electronics to a stranger? But even when I’m traveling in the company of others, I’ll still often snap my own picture. It seems easier to avoid distracting companions from their own experience, for one thing, and for another, there’s sheer vanity — the typical arm outstretched angle of self-photography is slimming.

I’ve been thinking about photography and travel recently — you may have seen what I wrote about photographing strangers without permission a few weeks ago — and so I’ve been reading up on it as well. Last week, I brushed off my copy of Susan Sontag’s On Photography, which I bought who-knows-when, and apparently only got as far as the page after the table of contents, which I dog-eared.

But I’m absorbed in it now, especially the parts where she considers the camera-wielding habits of tourists.

As Sontag sees it, tourists take photos as  a way of relieving the anxiety of disorientation that comes from being in another place, freed from the constraints of work and routine. Photography, she writes, helps people take possession of a space in which they feel insecure.

So what, then, can you say about the widespread habit of photographing ourselves while traveling — and of course sharing those pictures on Facebook and other social media? You can argue that it speaks to a certain amount of self-absorption — we sure do spent a lot of time looking at ourselves in those digital windows on our cameras and our phones, when we could be looking at the surroundings we’ve journeyed to experience.

But I think we keep looking at ourselves when we’re traveling because we’re insecure about ourselves — about who we really are, and whether a place is changing us.  We photograph a phenomenon to observe it closely, to make it sit still and to see how it changes, from frame-to-frame. And maybe those pictures help us to take possession of our own selves — the terra incognita that we bring with us everywhere.

The Northern Hemisphere might be hunkering down for winter, but here in New Zealand we are looking forward to summer and the promise of sunshine and warm weather. It’s the perfect time to start planning road trips to the various wine regions around the country.

That in mind,  I’ve been flicking through the pages of Michael Cooper’s Wine Atlas of New Zealand, a visually stunning coffee table book that provides an in depth look into the New Zealand wine industry and it’s diverse wine regions.

Starting with a fascinating summary of the history of New Zealand winemaking, Cooper then moves on to discussing the various types of wine produced and the role that New Zealand’s unique climate, soil, and topography plays in developing it’s award wining wines.

Detailed 3-D maps, combined with spectacular photographs and detailed information about local winery locations in each of the nine principle wine regions around the country, make this book an invaluable resource for wine lovers interested in exploring New Zealand’s wine country.

I’ve been using the Wine Atlas of New Zealand to help map out plans to visit most of the wine regions over the next coming months, starting next month with weekend visits to Auckland’s Waiheke Island and Martinborough just outside Wellington.