It seems like ages ago. But it was just six months ago, in mid-May, when we started our national park journey in the mind-boggling desert landscapes of southern Utah. More than 23 national parks later, November marked our return to the great North American deserts in all their varied and …
Lorrie has wanted to visit the Channel Islands National Park off the coast of California since the first time she heard about them 15 years ago. I think it was mostly the prospect of kayaking their coastlines that attracted her, or at least that’s what she mostly spoke about whenever …
Leaving Yosemite, shivering with cold at the higher altitudes and eyes smarting from the smoke in the valley, we pointed our truck south in search of southern California’s fabled warm and sunny weather. We stocked up at REI in Fresno with topographical maps, trail advice, and dehydrated meals-in-a-bag to sustain …
Tall trees. Can you look up at a tall tree from its base or nearby and judge its height? I think I can make a reasonably good estimate up to about 100 feet. But what about trees that are 150-250 feet tall? Or those over 350 feet – taller than …
In Bob’s September 8 blog, he noted that he would be going to Italy and Florida for a few weeks while I stayed in the Pacific northwest. It was strange to be apart after four months of non-stop togetherness, and sad to interrupt our camping and hiking mojo. In particular, …
If you’ve been wondering why we haven’t posted a new blog in over two weeks, it’s because we’ve spent most of that time in the backcountry of the North Cascades and Olympic national parks without our laptop or internet access. We have mostly backpacked, but we also managed to use …
We pulled into Two Medicine Lake campground on the southeastern side of Glacier National Park at 6:30am on August 1 and scored an open campsite! “It didn’t used to be like this,” we heard over and over from veteran Glacier campers. For a week, I had been monitoring the National …
Hopefully you are checking out the map on our homepage from time to time. Each time we go to a new place, Bob “drops a pin” on the map to show where we are. Usually he includes a photo of the place that you can see if you click on …
In preparing for our eight-month tour of the western United States, we loved talking about our plans, gathering suggestions and ideas from family and friends, and waxing dreamily about what we hoped we would do. We inaugurated our trip on May 1, setting out from our home in Bethesda, and …
We accepted a new job:
To visit places that others fought passionately and successfully to preserve.
Explore them, admire them, give thanks.
Push ourselves daily
Then eat ravenously and hope to clean up before dark.
Collapse in our cozy tent bed and sleep blissfully in the outdoor air.
Perform minor …