Travelmarx Spring 2025 Playlist – Unknownia

36 album covers for Travelmarx Spring 2025 Playlist – Unknownia

For the secondary title of this playlist, we selected “Unknownia”. The word comes from a track in this playlist by Domenique Dumont, a collaboration between Latvian multi-instrumentalist and producer Arturs Liepins and vocalist, ethnomusicologist Anete Stuce.

We are not sure of the intent of the song, but the title resonates with where we are heading in this world: to an unknown state or “unknownia”. This playlist is here on Spotify.

Teens of Style – album “Car Seat Headreat” (2015), song “Maud Gone”
Domenique Dumont – “To Unknownia” (2024)
The Saxophones, Maston – “Take My Fantasy – Maston Remix” (2022)
Dodie – “Old Devil Moon” (2024)
Michael Kiwanuka – “Beautiful Life” (2021)
Yard Nule – album “Yard Nule” (2021), song “Haunter”

Anika – album “No One's There” (2011), song “He Needs Me”
Ora Cogan – album “Shadowland” (2016), song “Too Long”
Arthur H – album “Adieu to Tristesse” (2005), song “La chanson de Satie”
William Z Villain – album “William Z Villain” (2017), song “Anybody Gonna Move”.
Death Machine – album “Cocoon” (2017), song “Disco Blues”
Malena Zavala – album “Aliso” (2018), song “If It Goes”

DJ Tennis – album “DJ-Kicks" (2017), song “Melody Day (Four Test Remix)”
TM Juke – album “Maps from the Wilderness” (2003), song “Just for a Day – Sunday"
You'll Never Get To Heaven – album “Images” (2017), song “Images”
Valerie June – “With You - A Sweet Little Love Song Demo” (2017)
Reptaliens – album “VALIS” (2019), song “Wake Up”
Clark – album “In Camera” (2024), song “Superstar”

Morbo y Mambo – album “Noches de Morbo Vol 1”, song “Nigerian”
Natalie Bergman, Beck – “You’ve Got a Woman” (2021)
DelicTrips – album “Motivated Abstract”, song “Sunset Hills”
Saya Gray – “Shell (of a man)” (2024)
Steve Stout – album “Sunday Stars (demos)” (2023), song “Save It For a Rainy Day – demo"
Westerman – album “Call and Response” (2017), song “Lie”

Nadine Shah – album “Ville Morose/The Devil (2014), song “Ville morose”
Bobby Lee and Mia Doi Todd – “Walking With Trees” (2021)
Slow Pilot – album “Falling Off the Earth” (2024), song “No Man Is An Island” with C Duncan
Anjalts – “Just Stay 4 Awhile” (2025)
WOOM – “Walk” (2020)
Suzanne Kraft – album “Talk from Home” (2015), song “Flatiron”

Annahstasia – album “Surface Tension” (2024), song “Sunday”
Family Time – album “The Golden Years”, song “Ropa Vieja”
Hether – album “Covered in Hether”, song “Smoke Rings”
Kristine Leschper – album “The Opening, or Closing of Door”, song “Blue”
Tunng – album “Love You All Over Again”, song “Didn’t Know Why”
Juniore – album “Ouh Là Là”, song “Le cannibale”

Street Sign Language Lesson LI – A Ski Trip to Pila, Aosta

previous lesson | this lesson

In our 51st edition of Street Sign Language Lesson, we are on the road, headed to Valle d'Aosta. We spent 3 days skiing in Pila (above Aosta). You may notice lots of menus because this trip was definitely about eating as well as skiing. 

First some photos of skiing...

  
Left: Photo of Pila Ski Area in Late Feb 2025 - Pista 1 Chamolé.

Center: Photo of Pila Ski Area - Staring out over Cogne.

Right: Photo of Pila Ski Area - Platta de Grevon with Travelmarx skiing down.

  

Left: Photo of Pila Ski Area - Couis 1 Red Slope with Gasex Pipe for avalanche control.

Center: Photo of Pila Ski Area - View of Pila from top of Chamolé.

Right: Photo of Pila Ski Area - near the bottom of Couis 1.

Now the signs...

Degustazione alla valdostano – Lardo d’Arnad
“A taste of Aosta Valley – Lard of Arnad.“

We saw this menu at Ristorante Al Maniero in Issogne AO. We were on our way to Aosta/Pila and stopped for lunch at this Slow Food recommended restaurant. We always thought degustazione referred to a tasting menu, and it does when the word menù is used with it. By itself, degustazione means a tasting experience. Together with the adjective valdostano, meaning from the Valle D’Aosta, the phrase means a sampling or taste of Valle D’Aosta.

The famous Lardo d’Arnad is a cured pork product produced exclusively within the municipal boundaries of the municipality of Arnad, in lower Aosta Valley, Italy. The lard is produced by curing pieces of fatback in a brine aromatized with herbs and spices such as juniper berry, bay leaf, nutmeg, sage, and rosemary. Perfect for giving you the energy you need to ski.


 

CONIGLIO ALLA CACCIATORA
“Hunter-style rabbit”

This is an Italian dish where the rabbit meat is slow cooked with vegetables and herbs. Alla cacciatora suggests a rustic preparation.

What’s also interesting about these two menus from Hotel Tivet is that it shows how half-board typically works. In the morning at breakfast, you get a list of dinner options, and you choose what you want. (Not on the list was a killer salad-appetizer that could have been dinner in itself.)

We chose Hotel Tivet because it was close to a mid-station of the gondola from Aosta (along the river) to Pila (ski area) and it was easy access for skiing.


   
VALPELLINENTZE (zuppa gratinata di cavolo verza, pane, fontina, brodo)
“Valpellinentze (gratinated soup of cabbage, bread, fontina, and broth)”

Gratinated (au gratin more commonly), in English, means to cook with a covering of buttered crumbs or grated cheese until a crust or crisp surface forms. The soup is from the Valpelline, just north of Aosta. This hearty soup appears on many menus in the Valle d’Aosta area.



AVVISO DELLA CASA DI TOLLERANZA. AI SIG.RI CLIENTI È VIETATO MOLESTARE LE SIGNORINE PRIMA DI AVERE PAGATO LA MARCHETTA. LA DIREZIONE.
“Notice of the house (brothel). Dear clients (men), it is forbidden to harass the young ladies before paying for their services. Management.”

We saw this sign at Rifugio Hermitage, which was our preferred place to grab a coffee, snack, or lunch during our time in Pila skiing. A casa di tollerenza “house of tolerance" is a euphemism for a brothel. The use of the euphemism and the use of la marchetta suggests a formal yet cheeky phrasing suggests it's drawing on older societal norms and attitudes for comedic effect - we hope.



RISCHIO VALANGHE. DEBOLE, MODERATO, MARCATO, FORTE, MOLTO FORTE
“Avalanche risk. Low, moderate, considerable, high, extreme”

Valanga (plural valanghe) is an avalanche. Speaking of avalanches, we often see what looks like a downward facing pipe on steep slopes (see image for one in Pila). These are Gazex pipes, expansion chambers that explosively direct hot gases into the zone at risk in order to set off controlled avalanches.



I percorsi di fuori pista non sono né segnalati né protetti dai pericoli dell’alta montagna dove l’insidia è occulta e nessuno può prevederla in anticipo.
“Off-piste routes are neither marked nor protected from high mountain perils where hazards are hidden and cannot be foreseen in advance.”

We know, we should be paying attention to skiing, but this sign caught our eye, especially the part l’insidia è occulta?

Insidia is hidden danger. Yet occulta means hidden as well. To us, the sentence in Italian seems repetitive. Maybe the sentence could be written as “I percorsi di fuori pista non sono né segnalati né protetti dai pericoli occulti dell’alta montagna che nessuno può prevedere in anticipo.” Don’t you want to come skiing with us to study signs?



Veicolo in panne
“Disabled vehicle”

We rented an MG SUV for the trip. We are not fans. The interfaces were horrible and the vehicle handled poorly.

While playing around with the controls, we came across this screen and wondered why is there would be vehicle in the cream (panna). Jeez.

panna – cream
in panna/in panne – breakdown, more common “panne”

It seems that the phrase in panne comes from French and is a sailing term where you position a sail boat to move forward or backward with the sails in slack position.

Val di Scalve – Hike to to Rifugio Cimon Bagozza, Passo dei Campelli, and Rifugio Campione

Overview | Details | Geography | Photos

  

Left: View over Val di Scalve east toward Presolana.
Center: Three hikers walking on snow near Malga Alta Campelli in Val di Scalve, Bergamo.
Right: Tracks and altitude profile for the Passo Campelli Hike.

Overview

Our first official hike of 2025 and it’s spectacular. We are hiking west of the alpine village of Schilpario, located in Orobie Bergamasche mountains. Schilpario is known for its cross-country skiing trails, which are internationally recognized. During the winter, the village transforms into a hub for skiing enthusiasts, while in the summer, these trails become ideal for hiking and exploring. It’s winter but we still are going for a hike!

Length: 17.9 km (11.1 mi) - out and back
Duration: 6 hours, with breaks and lunch
Elevation: Max elevation 2102 m (6,896 ft) Monte Campioncino, minimum elevation 1220 m (4,002 ft) at parking area
Location: Italy, Lombardy, Bergamo Province, Valle di Scalve

Details

We are not going to try to explain public transportation to reach Schilpario village: there is always is a way but it’s long. For example, in 2017’s hike A Hike from Passo Presolana to Rifugio Rino Olmo to Castione della Presolana, we took the bus to the other side of the pass. Looking at the indications given there should give you an idea of how to do it.

Today, we are with friends in their car. We stop in Schilpario to get some sandwiches made at Alimentari Spada di Spada Daniela (one of many possible places) and then continue on to the parking lot at the location called Parcheggio Fondi partenza sentieri (1220 m).

Today the rifugi were closed, hence the sandwiches. Also, when buying the sandwiches we showed our “American” side when we purchased a tube of mayonnaise to sauce-up those ever so dry Italian sandwiches!

The road from I Fondi in summer continues but is closed in winter so we are walking up today to our first stop at Rifugio Cimon Bagozza. There are enough curves in the road and snow on the road that during our walk we just followed the tracks going up! We saw people walking, sledding, cross country skiing, and ski mountaineering.

After a pause at Rifugio Cimon Bagozza (1600 m), we followed the signs up to our next stop Passo Campelli (1890 m) and then on to Rifugio Campione (1946 m). At Rifugio Campione (closed), we pulled out a portable picnic tables and two benches and set up for lunch. Two of us lazed in the sun and our other halves went up to the nearby peak of Monte Campioncino (2102 m).

We are more or less following the first part of the CAI trail Sentiero 428: i Fondi (Schilpario) to Passo del Vivione.

From the pass to Rifugio Campione there are wonderful views over the Val Camonica, where the previous year we visited rock drawings that are UNESCO designated. See our post A Visit to Parco Naquane to See Paleolithic and Neolithic Rock Drawings in the Val Camonica. From Rifugio Campione, we are looking west across the valley directly at the Parco Naquane.

Finally, relatively nearby is the Diga del Gleno that we visited in in 2019 on our A Hike to Rifugio Tagliaferri via Val di Gleno.

Geography

This hike takes place on the north of the mountain range known as the Gruppo Camino-Concarena within the Eastern Bergamasque Prealps. This range is known for its dramatic limestone peaks and rugged terrain, giving it a Dolomite-like appearance.

According to the SOIUSA (International Standardized Mountain Subdivision of the Alps) the mountain can be classified in the following way:

• main part = Eastern Alps
• major sector = Southern Limestone Alps
• section = Bergamasque Alps and Prealps
• subsection = Bergamasque Prealps
• supergroup = Prealpi Bergamasche Orientali (not the supergroup ABBA or ASIA 😊)
• group = Gruppo Camino-Concarena

To the north of this group is Valle di Scalve (where Schilpario is) and to the south, part of Val Camonica.

Photos

  

Left and center: Approaching Passo dei Campelli in Alta Val di Scalve.

Right: Northside of Concarena range.

 

Left: Approaching Rifugio Campione.

Right: Looking east toward Passo dei Campelli.

 

Left: Panorama near Passo dei Campelli in Alta Val di Scalve.
Right: Hike tracks.

  
Left: Snow mounds in Val di Scalve.
Center: Snow, tracks and blue sky in Val di Scalve.
Right: Soft mounds of snow and rugged peaks and Cimon della Bigozza (2,409 m).

  

Left: Trees in a sea of snow in Val di Scalve.

Center: Winter hikers near Passo dei Campelli in Val di Scalve.
Right: Ski trails leading down from Monte Campioncino to Rifugio Campione.

 
Left: Val di Scalve from just below Passo dei Campelli looking west.

Right: The Gruppo Camino-Concarena are your constant companion on this hike.

  
Left and center: View east over Val Camonica toward Monte Tredenus.

Right: View from the top of Monte Campioncino.

We Be Those People – Airport Rental Car Dropoff to Bergamo Walk

   

Left: A sign on the outskirts of Bergamo near Via Zanica
Center left: A sign with Bergamo and Bèrghem written on it as well as UNESCO designation.

Center right: A building on Via Paglia watched at night.

Right: Train tracks in Bergamo

We hate waiting. We don’t mind walking. We are those people. So, on a recent trip to Pila/Aosta for skiing we had to return the rental car to the airport. (Yes, we are also those people who don’t own a car or a television.)

A little history: In Bergamo, there are a few rental car places in the city, but the best selection and deals are unfortunately at the airport. Occasionally we’ll rent at the train station in Bergamo because it is convenient, but the choice is limited. Once upon a time, you hopped the bus from Bergamo for a short ride, entered the terminal, went to the rental desk, and then walked to your car at one end of the terminal. It all happened pretty quickly. Then, they moved the rental car fleet to a lot dislocated from the terminal, so you still go to the terminal (usually) and then take a bus to get your car. It is decidedly not convenient timewise because the rental car buses don’t seem to run frequently.

Back to this trip: we dropped the car off and it was 5:45 pm with a pretty dusk sky and huge puffy clouds. We were in long line of people waiting for the rental car “navetta” to take us to the airport. From the airport, we would need to catch another bus to the city. At that point, we thought, screw it, let's walk. It took us about an hour to walk back home to Bergamo city center.

How did we do it? From the airport rental location, head to Parcheggio Centro Galassia. Then, follow Via Zanica into the city.

It’s not a pretty walk, but you learn things about a city you live in when you walk the periphery. First, a city can have some part of it (or all it) be UNESCO-designated site but that doesn’t mean there aren’t some ugly parts. Walking on Via Zanica into the city feels anything but UNESCO.

Second, that parking area Central Galassia had a huge tent and infrastructure (bathrooms) set up. At first, we thought it was a temporary circus. Then, we realized it was a mosque. After some digging around, we learned that as of 2016, there was an agreement that this would be one area for prayer for Muslims in Bergamo. Interesting.

After crossing under the train tracks that Via Zanica (ex SS 591) takes you to, we decided to walk up Via Giorgio e Guido Paglia to reach Via XX Settembre, back in familiar territory. We always thought Via Paglia was a nice street because it has Cercis siliquastrum trees on both sides of the street, which in my mind meant there was some money there. But alas, we saw some sketchy behavior going on. People peeping out behind corners and giving signals to others waiting down a side street. How cute, they are playing hide-in-seek (nascondino)? No. The next day, talking with some friends over a baccalà alla vicentina dinner with a Chardonnay (we are those kind of people), our friends mentioned that there was a recent Striscia la notizia episode dedicated to that area of town. Ah, now it makes sense. This show exposes scams with the help of local reporters. Apparently there is more going on those shady streets of Via Paglia than meets the eye.

Aya Goes for Walk and Finds Out Who Owns the Zebra

Overview | Aya | Zebra | Pollyanna

Overview

There is so much being written about AI these days, and in particular Large Language Models (LLM) and Chatbots (oh my). And here goes our paltry contribution.

We will tell you straight off that we make heavy use of Copilot, Microsoft’s AI companion. Half the time it’s the Copilot inside of Visual Studio development environment that we are using. We estimate that we code at least 30 – 50% “better” than without it. What do we mean by better? Copilot brings more ideas to the table, quicker. We are less blocked by coding issues (hello lambda notation I’m talking about you). It helps in debugging. It really is like having a pair programmer at your side. Copilot is not correct all the time, but boy does it help keep you from being blocked. In short, it has been transformative for us.

Outside of Visual Studio, we are using chatbots for planning trips and asking questions that go beyond simple Google searches. Questions that spin off into long conversations that are truly interesting and informative to us. Again, is it always correct, no, but it’s a time saver and it’s prompting us to ask more and better questions, to think before we search for something. And perhaps this last statement is the part we think many of the naysayers miss.

That said, lots of people are worried about AI. In fact, we just got done reading The Coming Wave, Technology, Power and the 21st Century's Greatest Dilemma (2023) by Mustafa Suleyman, Michael Bhaskar. This book examines the transformative and potentially perilous impact of advanced technologies, particularly AI and synthetic biology. The book’s major theme is “the containment problem”—the task of maintaining control over powerful technologies. It’s a sobering read yet, we didn’t feel as moved to action as we thought we might be. Given that AI for us, for now as mentioned in the first few paragraphs, has been a net positive for us, the containment problem didn’t resonate. Maybe we’ll be changing our minds?

Recently, we read two articles on AI, the TechCrunch article OpenAI announces new o3 models and the Quanta Magazine article Chatbot Software Begins to Face Fundamental Limitations. (Quanta has some really good writing!)

One big question that both articles deal with is whether the newest models are approaching AGI or “artificial general intelligence,” referring to whether AI that can perform any task a human can. The TechCrunch article mentions some mathematical benchmarks used to figure that out. The Quanta article mentions the Zebra or Einstein’s riddle.

Aya

The TechCrunch article mentions turning the AI models against the 2024 American Invitational Mathematics Exam questions. I thought, hey, I should try this too and see how I do. (Sort of confirming my humanity?) Confident of a quick solution, I read the problem statement of 2024 AIME I Problems / Problem 1:

Every morning Aya goes for a 9-kilometer-long walk and stops at a coffee shop afterwards. When she walks at a constant speed of s kilometers per hour, the walk takes her 4 hours, including t minutes spent in the coffee shop. When she walks s+2 kilometers per hour, the walk takes her 2 hours and 24 minutes, including t minutes spent in the coffee shop. Suppose Aya walks at s + 1/2 kilometers per hour. Find the number of minutes the walk takes her, including the t minutes spent in the coffee shop.

Six hours later I had sort of a solution! (The time it took me was longer than Aya's walk.) I had all the right ideas but forgot about solving – spoiler alert – the roots of a quadratic equation. It was a humbling experience. The Open AI o3 models o3 scored 96.7% on the 2024 American Invitational Mathematics Exam, missing just one question. I wonder what question was missed?

What’s interesting about this experience, is that I knew at the end I had to solve a quadratic equation but forgot how to so I asked Copilot the details of solving one. Is that so wrong?

Zebra

The Zebra puzzle first appeared on December 17, 1962, in Life International magazine. As the Quanta article says “Also known as Einstein’s puzzle or riddle (likely an apocryphal attribution), the problem tests a certain kind of multistep reasoning.”  According to the article, this kind of riddle requires composing a larger solution from solutions to subproblems, which is not easy for LLMs. But it should be easier for humans I thought. So, I gave the riddle a try and lost another 6 hours of my life! 

 

The riddle consists of 15 sentences describing five houses on a street. Each sentence is a clue, such as “Coffee is drunk in the green house.” or “The Lucky Strike smoker drinks orange juice.” Each house was a different color, with people of different nationalities, who own different pets, drink different beverages, and smoke different cigarette brands (it was the 1960s!). The story’s headline asks: “Who Owns the Zebra?”  Hint: Not Aya.

Pollyanna

What point are we trying to make? First, AI is here to stay and is not going away or going to be easily “contained”. In fact, in the “Coming Wave” book a quote from Chapter 8 said it all: “Today's world is optimized for curiosity, sharing, and research at a pace never seen before. Modern research works against containment. So too do the necessity and desire to make a profit." Bold added by us.

Our second point is that we need to adapt to using these tools and use them to make us better. Just reading about the tools and using the tools has inspired us to relearn things we forgot as well as answer new and more interesting question. We think that this is positive. Perhaps we are "pollyannish" on AI, that is people who tend to be excessively optimistic about it. 

The term Pollyanna comes from the title character in the 1913 novel Pollyanna often by Eleanor H. Porter. Pollyanna is a young girl who remains relentlessly positive and tries to find something good in every situation, no matter how challenging.

Guilty as charged!

In fact, we are not the types who stare at a ChatGPT prompt and ask dark or maleficent questions and then go huh? look at what it spit out. We are always asking positive (for the most part) questions, looking to get to some new higher ground or state, be it in programming or otherwise. And maybe being the Pollyanna types that we are, we miss that some people don’t do this.

Goodbye Skype – Another Zune Moment

The product I loved to hate is going away....and I’m sad and mad. Skype is set to retire in May 2025. Goodbye and good riddance I guess. Sad because it means change and saying goodbye to some data (read on) and mad because of the way it was communicated.

An email arrived the other day saying goodbye and go find another solution! Great, thanks. Some communication annoyances:

• The title of the email was “Important Updates to Skype Paid Services”. Huh? Why not just say clearly, we are killing the service? I guess killing the service is a radical update.
• The email uses “retiring”. The service was tired of working and is now in pension? The word choice of retiring doesn’t make my scramble to find a replacement any better. An unnecessary softening of the message.
• The mail continues “As part of this change, we want to keep you informed about important updates to your Skype paid services and how these changes may affect you.” I’m sorry, when you read the service is being killed, this sentence following it means nothing. At this point as a reader, you are like what is going on!? Affect me? Yes, I’m kind of screwed.
• The email link leads to this official communication that talks glowingly about Microsoft Teams, “our modern communications and collaboration hub.” Leaving aside our use case, which we are not sure is supported, we are supposed to all jump on the Teams train. "Sashay away Skype and Shantay, you stay Teams". "Sure, Jan."

In fairness, the links from the email go to decent info about what to do. But the email is your first notice of what’s going to happen and it could have be better written. If the Skype offering must close for business reasons, so be it, but why can’t the communication at least be more sincere and honest about what people are feeling? It’s strange in this day and age that corporate communication style can miss the mark and be so stilted. Let AI write it I say with the prompt "please be empathetic".

After years of using a virtual phone number from Skype and passing it out as a valid contact to banks and other institutions, I’m left with no good options. I use the virtual phone number from Skype a few times a month and it works well.

The email suggested finding other VoIP providers and just switching over your existing number. It doesn’t work that smoothly or at all without significant money outlay. "That the tea." (Been watching too many recaps of Rupaul’s Drag Race.)

Microsoft dropped the ball again. The retiring of Skype is bringing back bitter memories all the time I spent on Zune and then the Adios! from them. Ooh how could I forget Microsoft Band, Windows Phone, Microsoft Money, and Microsoft Encarta to name a few we also invested time and money in. When will I learn? I guess never. Btw, we still use Microsoft Money because someone wrote a hack for it to keep it working even though it was “killed” long ago.

Technology comes and goes, and we shouldn’t rely on it too heavily. But we do. And it’s annoying when you invest time and money into one and then it goes the way of the dodo. But as a minimal consolation, companies could communicate with a little more empathy.

And finally, it stings a bit because for better or worse Skype was the conduit of different key moments of my life. The last phone call with a loved one who is now gone. We keep these reminders in the recent chat list even if you can’t hear the messages that appear to be there (typical Skype). Just opening the Skype app, reminds us of the time and day and length of past calls that maybe we are not ready to let go of but should. 

Of course, we went to the export page and hoped for the best and were disappointed with what seem likes fragmented images and messages in the export.