Not that it matters. The twilight round I enjoyed at Skibo is now a
sweet memory as I sit in the drawing room savoring a post-dinner
cognac, the perfect follow-up to a meal of Scottish smoked salmon,
winter greens, and potatoes au gratin.
There is talk among the other guests of rustling up a game of
billiards. But I'm busy relaxing, my feet resting on an antique
ottoman.
My old pal the butler approaches, offers me a cigar.
"Have you decided, sir?" he asks with a smile. "Will it be
golf or
falconing tomorrow?"
Not yet, I tell him.
For now, I just want to sit back and enjoy. My time here at Skibo
is running out. And who knows when, if ever, I'll be back. And then
it strikes me: My flight home makes a stop in New York, which isn't
far from
Rhode Island. Perhaps I'll pay a visit to Carnegie Abbey,
the newest Carnegie Club outpost. Just to make sure it's up to
snuff.
is frequent contributor to
American Way and a columnist for
the
San Francisco Chronicle. His work has also appeared in
the
Los Angeles Times Magazine and
Maximum Golf.
__________________________________________________________________
PERU ON THE RUN
Pack your running shoes and take the scenic route to the lost city
of Machu Picchu.
By Ken McAlpine
To truly understand a place, you must see it through many eyes:
your own, those of your fellow travelers, the locals you meet, and
the locals you never will. Do this, and you may come home with your
perspective forever changed. There you have the magic of
travel.
Keeping your eyes open has practical benefits, too. Say, when you
are jogging along a narrow, rock-strewn trail bordered on one edge
by free-fall space spiraling far, far down to a ribbon of smoky
river that could cradle your broken body and sweep you northward
through Peru until you join the
Amazon, and eventually the Atlantic
Ocean.
Perhaps the only thing more mind-bending than the thought of that
epic journey is the
Inca Trail on which I now jog. Carved into the
side of the mountain, the trail looks out to higher mountains
still. These are covered with snow and here, in late afternoon, are
cloaked in dark clouds shot through with misty gold bands of
sunlight. While the Spanish who conquered the Incas simply coveted
the stuff, gold was, to the Incas, the teardrops of the sun.