Denali Highway. This will be a short post, but important just the same. Important you say? To whom? Well, not to you or me, but maybe someone with a lower threshold. Some of the questions I have received about our trip have been about about camping by the side of the road. My bride tells… Read More Alaska (6) Denali Highway – July 2017
Strap in. Denali. It has taken us 45 days and over 7,300 miles to get from TCPC in Crossville, TN to Denali. How can anyone come away from visiting Denali National Park and not feel… changed? Denali is just one of those special places that you could never appreciate without visiting. This post is intended… Read More Alaska (5) Denali NP – July 2017
Chitina-to-Valdez-to-Anchorage-and beyond. This post is going to be all over the map. Emotionally, metaphorically, geographically… you pick. If your choice was emotionally or metaphorically, you probably found my blog in error. Spellcheck incorrectly sent you to this blog when what you tried to type in was travelwithinterestingpeople.com. Spellcheck: preferred by 9 out of 10 sociopaths.… Read More Alaska (4) Iditarod etc. – June 2017
McCarthy Road. I have a close friend Jerry (I don’t really have a close friend Jerry, but it sounds cool) who says my entire blog is subject to low moral standards. He also says my blog has no redeeming value. I love that guy. Finally, someone with integrity! We continue our journey in the Wrangell-St.… Read More Alaska (3) McCarthy Road – June 2017
Nabesna Road. I am beginning to think we may suffer from visual overload on this trip. Driving south from Tok, AK, we arrived at the northern portion of the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve. I will be honest – I had never heard of this national park before arriving. This is the largest national… Read More Alaska (2) Nabesna Road – June 2017
Top of the World. It only took us a month, but we made it to Alaska! Now it certainly didn’t have to take us a month, but we had a most delightful trip, as you may have surmised if you followed any of our previous posts. We could have done this trip in two weeks,… Read More Alaska (1) Chicken – June 2017
Yukon. Does a bear shit in the woods? That, and other timeless questions answered in this post. Or not. You’ve heard of Ice Road Truckers? We’re calling this edition of the blog Ice Road Trailers. Yes, we took Wanda up the Dempster Highway and into the Artic Circle, but we’ll get to all of that.… Read More Yukon: Ice Road Trailers – June 2017
Yukon. We have barely touched the Yukon Territory so far, but it has touched us. This place is great; the views have been spectacular and interesting, and the people have been SOOO friendly and welcoming! We entered the Yukon at Watson Lake, coming out of British Columbia. You might be familiar with Watson Lake as… Read More Yukon – June 2017
British Columbia. You are now entering the world famous Alaska Highway! Yes indeed, we have crossed out of Alberta (which was unbelievable), and entered northern British Columbia (BC) just south of Dawson Creek. Now keep in mind that while I title this post British Columbia, that is inherently unfair to British Columbia because we have… Read More British Columbia – May 2017
Alberta. We exited Waterton Lakes, Banff and Jasper National Parks after four days, but we will be back; these are simply stunning parks that we have at this point only lightly touched. As we left the parks, we were not suddenly faced with unrestrained commercialism; in fact quite the opposite. We spent hours yesterday driving… Read More Road to Dawson Creek – May 2017
Alberta. We left Banff earlier today and traveled on the Icefields Parkway, through Banff National Park and then directly into Jasper National Park. I know this gets redundant, but this place is fantabulous! And, we are no longer virgins! Bear virgins, that is. We saw our first sighting of bears, and we have yet to… Read More Icefields Parkway – May 2017
Alberta. Banff, if you have never been here, is just crazy with views! I say Banff, but really mean the Banff National Park in Alberta (Canada), which area includes Lake Louise, Moraine Lake, Banff, Canadian Rocky Mountains galore, and much more. The views almost seem to get silly, because around every turn is a simply… Read More Banff National Park – May 2017
Alberta. We exited the US at the Waterton crossing – in Glacier National Park, and across into the Waterton Lakes National Park in Canada – Alberta, to be more precise. After dutifully instructing my bride not to answer any questions at the border crossing, we were (surprisingly) admitted into Canada. What were they thinking!?! We… Read More O Canada – May 2017
This will be a short post. We are sitting in a campground in Glacier National Park in northwest Montana and about to transit across into Canada later today on our trip to Alaska. As available we will try to post chapters of our journey. But for now, let’s not forget how unbelievably beautiful Glacier National… Read More Glacier National Park – May 2017
Ever watch one of those National Geographic wildlife films? The images that come to my mind are the mountain lion racing down a poor isolated elk, and a buffalo stampeding on some hapless mountain lion. Mountain lions need a better agent.. Not to go off on a technical rant, but buffalos are found only in… Read More Theodore Roosevelt NP – May 2017
Defining moments. Life is about defining moments. As both of my readers know, we are on our way to Alaska. I have dreaded making this blog a blow-by-blow account of our stops and stays along the way. You know, on Tuesday night we ordered Mexican and Wednesday we drove with the windows down. Fear not.… Read More Michigan, ND – May 2017
Child Unit 1, known to everyone else as our daughter Michela, just graduated from Duke University with a Masters in Public Policy! Boom! But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. As adults, you date and if you are SUPER lucky you meet someone special and then get married. If you are SUPER SUPER GINORMOUSLY lucky… Read More Child Unit 1 Graduates! – May 2017
Yup, we are prepping for a trip to Alaska, making our lists and getting things ready! Just call us preppers. I am not new to this; I used to be a preppie. Pressed khakis? Check. Pink, button down cotton shirt? Check. Penny loafers? Check. Izod sweater? Check. Honey, I think we are ready to go… Read More Alaska Prep – May 2017
In the scheme of things, luck was the least significant contributor. Child Unit 2, otherwise known as our son Drew, just graduated Michigan Technological University (Michigan Tech) with a Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering! He chose to stretch himself, put himself into a completely foreign environment over 1,100 miles away from home, in… Read More Child Unit 2 Graduates! – Apr 2017
Batter batter batter… We recently toured the brand new Atlanta Braves stadium (SunTrust Park), located OTP (outside the perimeter) in Cobb County, a very short drive from where we live. Very cool! Now this is not Wrigley Field or Fenway Park, but SunTrust Park and The Battery have been built for baseball and making the… Read More Home of the Braves – Apr 2017
Twenty-nine years ago, we honeymooned in New Zealand and Australia. What a great trip to the most beautiful place I have ever been and what a great beginning to what has been and continues to be a beautiful marriage. Smootch! We started first in New Zealand where we traveled the island in a campervan so… Read More Time Warp/NZ & AU – Apr 1988
Almost to the day for me, it has been 3 years since I (we) retired. Oh, how I miss those days of quarterly, monthly, weekly, daily, hourly forecasts… And who doesn’t love a well-placed flaming email distributed to the world. After retirement, one is forced to forego the joys and luxury of business travel: cramped… Read More 3 Years Post Retirement – Mar 2017
Let me just start by saying that on Monday morning I will be checking myself into the Betty Ford Detox Center for Barbecue Abuse. Grab a cold beer or two and sit back – this was quite a stop on our journey. We made Austin a destination on our trip for two very good reasons:… Read More Austin SXSW – Mar 2017
It has been years but we revisited San Antonio, home to the Alamo, the Riverwalk – and the Pearl Neighborhood. We used this chance to meet up with friends, enjoy the Riverwalk, and test out a few craft beers and some excellent food. We had heard or been told that the Pearl neighborhood was a… Read More San Antonio – Mar 2017
Bubbling crude… oil that is… black gold… Texas tea… a few of us remember the Beverly Hillbillies. West Texas represents to me a microcosm of some of the many challenges we face today; the tension between growth, convenience, natural preservation and environmental protection. West Texas is an area that encapsulates these challenges perhaps better than… Read More West Texas – Mar 2017
We have checked the Guadalupe Mountains National Park box. Typically when we visit a national park we say to ourselves that we will absolutely have to come back to visit stuff we weren’t able to see. There is much (let’s call that most) of the park we did not see. But for whatever reason I… Read More Guadalupe Mountains NP – Mar 2017
I don’t really do campground reviews, and this is not a campground review. BUT, the Cherry Creek State Park is a most excellent urban oasis near Denver, CO. We were here to act as sherpas evaluating apartments for our son – a freaking abysmal experience I might add; it has been a while since the… Read More Cherry Creek SP – Mar 2017
We knew when good friends of ours gave us a US map that identified the national parks in this country that we were in trouble. Not bad enough, you could identify your personal weaknesses by seeing all the “un-visited” parks we had yet to darken. Carlsbad Caverns National Park, in Carlsbad, NM was on that… Read More Carlsbad Caverns – Mar 2017
This is our second time to see White Sands National Monument in Alamogordo, NM, although it is the first time we were actually able to see it (the first time it was so windy we blew it off – no pun). White Sands sits in the basin of the Chihuahuan Desert, and abuts the White… Read More White Sands – Mar 2017
For anyone who has ever traveled in the desert, you know that 98% of the effort to construct roads (or anything) is to manage flooding. We are talking about an area that might get 6 inches of rain – per year. Death Valley gets about 2 inches per year. Anyway, I mention this because we… Read More Desert Addendum – Feb 2017