{"id":1728,"date":"2013-12-01T15:45:33","date_gmt":"2013-12-01T22:45:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/?p=1728"},"modified":"2013-12-02T15:41:02","modified_gmt":"2013-12-02T22:41:02","slug":"i-still-prefer-postcards-but-some-moments-are-best-shared-instantly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/golf\/courses-and-travel\/1728\/i-still-prefer-postcards-but-some-moments-are-best-shared-instantly","title":{"rendered":"I Still Send Postcards, But…."},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Dominican<\/a>

Dominican sunsets at Casa de Campo end a day of the sporting life but bring on Le Cirque dinners.<\/p><\/div>\n

When was the last time you received a postcard? I don\u2019t mean a junk mail postcard touting yard service or a tire sale; I mean a good, old fashioned \u201cWish You Were Here\u201d postcard with, for instance, a photo of a Florida alligator or the Golden Gate Bridge.<\/p>\n

Postcards are losing their place in airport kiosks, souvenir stores or hotel gift shops because so many people, instead, use mobile technology (texting, email and social media sites) to immediately \u2013 and virtually- include their loved ones in their family vacations and business travel. I am \u201cold school,\u201d though. I still like choosing the right postcard, applying an intriguing foreign stamp, and then trying to find a mailbox in places as diverse as Dubai or the Dominican Republic so that the card arrives with an authentic, international postmark on it.<\/p>\n

The most far flung mailbox I\u2019ve come across was on the uninhabited island of Floreana in the Galapagos along the Pacific equator.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The Galapagos “Post Office” turns travelers into worldwide letter carriers.<\/p><\/div>\n

A barrel with a hole sawed in it just beyond the beachhead contained postcards. On it, a handmade sign asked eco-tourists who pass by, having arrived by exploration boats, to look through the barrel and deliver any postcards that happen to be addressed to a location near their home. Now that, fellow travelers, is patience!<\/p>\n

I broke my postcard rule though, recently, at the very classy Casa de Campo: the world\u2019s largest (and yet most remote) residential resort near Punta Cana featuring Le Cirque cuisine in its restaurants. I snapped digital photos of the rugged, rocky coastline along the resort\u2019s dramatic \u201cTeeth of the Dog\u201d golf course and took some elegant shots of a polo match taking place on property not too far from the marina, where I couldn\u2019t help but photograph some of the mega yachts and intricate sailboats. Casa de Campo gives every guest a golf cart to traverse its\u2019 6,000 verdant acres and I made full use of it pursing the sporting life with my lens. I was stopped in my tracks, though, when I arrived at the placid, private beach at twilight. Blasting through a darkening, stormy sky was a blazing, serene sunset on the sea. Slack-jawed, I snapped a photo and, without moving my feet, texted it to a close friend in the north.<\/p>\n

\"One<\/a>

One of the Teeth of the Dog’s smashingly scenic par-3 holes.<\/p><\/div>\n

Moments later, sitting in the sand, I received a return text from Rev. Mark Inglot, a\u00a0Catholic pastor, in Michigan. It read: \u201cSuch beauty and tranquility! Today here we had tornado warnings. The beauty and fury of \u2018Mother Nature\u2019 mirrors the human soul. The image you sent will be in my mind all week. Blessings and sunsets and sunrises, my friend.\u201d Father Mark captioned the texted sunset image with his returned \u201cpostcard of words\u201d and enhanced my travel experience in a personal, immeasurable manner\u2026without even needing a stamp!<\/p>\n

Michigan-based Travel writer Michael Patrick Shiels may be contacted at InviteYourself@aol.com<\/a> or via www.TravelTattler.com<\/a> His statewide radio and TV show may be heard weekday mornings in Lansing on 92.1 FM and Fox 47.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When was the last time you received a postcard? I don\u2019t mean a junk mail postcard touting yard service or… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":1729,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3665,17],"tags":[976609,536,538,3317,976613,5464,537,1846,976607,976608],"class_list":["post-1728","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-library","category-courses-and-travel","tag-galapagos-islands","tag-casa-de-campo","tag-le-cirque","tag-teeth-of-the-dog","tag-mark-inglot","tag-galapagos","tag-dominican-republic","tag-punta-cana","tag-postcards","tag-floreana"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/34\/2013\/12\/CasaDeCampoSunset.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/43"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1728"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1728\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1736,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1728\/revisions\/1736"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/traveltattler\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}