After leaving Seattle, I spent the night in Everett, as it was getting late and the weather was turning bad. Then after a lazy, rainy morning, I drove to the North Cascades. I don’t recall if I had been here with my family as a kid but thought I should visit. I was not really feeling excited about the visit, but I was so close, I felt obligated. Fortunately, after a mostly overcast, rainy drive, it cleared off to beautifully…
I only spent a rainy afternoon in Mount Rainer, pretty much driving through, so don’t have a lot to say about it. It deserves more time, but I was driving north from Oregon to Bellingham, Washington, and it was essentially a short detour. I got there a bit after noon, paid $30 to enter, then stopped at the Nisqually Ranger Station to get a map of the trails and talk with a ranger. There are no trails for pets in…
I thought Redwood was “just” another park in the National Park System, but was surprised to find it’s a combination of 3 California State Parks and a National Park. California created their protection for the redwoods in the 1920s but it took until 1969 for the federal government to create a National Park. California fortunately acted “early” to protect these forests saving some of these trees, but outside the state parks, 95%, NINETY-FIVE PERCENT, of the trees were logged before…
I was here many, many years ago with my parents and sisters. I know that from family pictures but really didn’t remember visiting. I’ve been wanting to return to Crater Lake and Oregon for several years. I made reservations at Mazama Campground on the park grounds before leaving but unfortunately they were cancelled when I was en route. They were performing hazardous tree removal and it was taking longer than expected. I found another campground just south of Klamath Falls….
I returned to Denver in late September 2018 to visit my friends Elizabeth and Lauren. We decided to go to the Great American Beer Festival again. We had attended in 2016 and had a great time. So I drove out to Denver a day early and spent the night with them. We did the member session from 12-4 at the convention center and stayed downtown for the night. After all our day-drinking, we returned to Biker Jim’s Gourmet Dogs. I…
Now that my daughter is married, it’s harder to drag her away for a trip. My friend Kelly can only plan one trip a year with me as she goes to lots of horse clinics (she’s quite the equestrian) plus feels like she has to save SOME vacation time for her husband. So, I travel solo sometimes. I’ve been to Canada on my own, visiting Montana and North Dakota on the way home from Banff and Jasper. And I’ve been…
Morocco has been on my must-see list for ages. Kelly and I planned this for a few weeks after my daughter’s wedding, September of 2017. It took us a while to finalize our plans. There is so much to see in this gorgeous country. And all the travel sites and blogs I read about Morocco and lists of “top things to see and do” made it difficult as I wanted to see it all. We both earn a decent amount…
“I’m in Burma.” “Burma?” “You most likely know it as Myanmar, but it will always be Burma to me.” – Seinfeld, Mr. Peterman to Elaine Burma. The Golden Land. Kelly and I went to Myanmar in late February 2017 for fifteen days. We planned our trip using trip.me, a travel consolidator that works with local travel companies in dozens of countries. As we usually do when planning a trip, Kelly and I did plenty of research on our own, determining…
I planned a busy two weeks in Colorado. I was going to attend the Great American Beer Festival with my friends, Elizabeth and Lauren, who lived in Longmont. I wasn’t going to go all that way just for a day of drinking, however, so planned time in Denver and Rocky Mountain National Park, too. I left Thursday, September 29th, for the Quad Cities and had dinner with my daughter, Alex, and her boyfriend, Mike. I spent the night there then…
An African “Safari”! One of many items on my travel wish list. My friend, Kelly, her husband, Manny, my daughter, Alex, her boyfriend, now husband, Mike, and my friend Leslie all went to Africa in October 2015. Kelly, Leslie, and I all worked together and did our research and planning over lunches in the breakroom. After comparing many companies, reading reviews, and comparing routes, we decided to use Wild About Africa. The specific itinerary we booked is no longer available, but…