Here's why I will never complain about paying the IRS: the National Parks. I learned about South Carolina's only National Park as I was finishing my work at the lovely University of South Carolina in Columbia; the park is only 30 miles south of the capital, and I was on… Read full post »

Tuesday, November 1, 2011 (a.k.a. 11/1/11)

North Carolina State University’s Gregg Museum of Art & Design displays this remarkable contraption, called “The Purr Generator.”

It claims to be the oldest “immersive Sonic-Radionic device” in the world. (I&r… Read full post »

Monday, October 31, 2011

Here are some things to enjoy while traveling for work in 2011:

1. Drop-in visits with children. That’s right, Rosie; you’re a highlight of my season.

2. The Chicago Marathon, featuring Favorite Runner Nicky Ouellet's inaugural marathon.

2. Seamus Heaney&r… Read full post »

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Some months ago, I signed up to receive aurora borealis alerts from the Geophysical Institute at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. We’re near the apex of the 11-year cycle of sunspot activity, and that’s one reason for Rene’s & my timing in going… Read full post »

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Alaska is full of color this time of year. Denali’s ground is red with all sorts of heathers and berries and tundra plants; the spruce are green and thick; and the balsam poplar, just like the aspen in the Rockies, is brilliant gold. We learned long ago… Read full post »

Monday, September 5, 2011 

I didn’t think I could be surprised more by nature than what we’ve already witnessed on this trip. I was wrong.

We entered Denali on Sunday afternoon, after an 8-hour train trip from Anchorage, straight north, through salmon stream heaven and golden co… Read full post »

Near the Hubbard Glacier
Thursday, September 1, 2011

It’s a really big thrill to get close to a massive (4 miles at the base) glacier, where it meets the sea. Glaciers are moving ice sheets, and they drop sections (“calves”) of ice at the edge. These monstrous spikes of ice split wit… Read full post »

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

You have to wonder about the people who responded to the headlines that gold had been discovered in the Klondike, up in the Yukon Territory, in 1897. The U.S. had hit an awful depression, and many people had lost everything, but still…. Getting to the Klondike… Read full post »

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

We’ve spent the day hiking near the Mendenhall Glacier in the Tongass National Forest. These glaciers flow (Mendenhall at a rate of 200 feet per year) from a massive ice field at the top of the Coastal Range; Mendenhall is a wide frozen river (1 mile wide at… Read full post »

Monday, August 29, 2011

There are 700 residents of Hoonah, a village that has managed to replace the diminishing fishing and lumber industries with tourism. It’s quite a site: truly, the town quadruples in size every time one of these leviathan ships pulls into port. Rene and I traded vehicles… Read full post »

Sunday, August 28, 2011

We passed into U.S. waters overnight at 1:45 a.m. I tried to stay awake for it, but …..Girls, you know your dear ol’ mom. However, I was awake at 4 (still on Eastern time) and it was pouring, a sure sign that we’d hit Alaska. When we… Read full post »

Saturday, August 27, 2011

It was the Russians and the English who settled on Alaskan borders back in the 19th century. Russia laid claim to Alaska and the czar, then empress, sent Vitus Bering , a Danish explorer, over to map it in 1741. Well, they got lost, the expedition discovered sea ot… Read full post »

Thursday, August 25, 2011

Vancouver may be the most functional and pedestrian/bike-friendly city yet. It’s new (only 125 years old), and that helps. We toured the city all day on bikes, and never left a bike lane. It’s also surrounded by water and mountains; surely that affects who you ar… Read full post »

Kenyon College mascots are the Lords and Ladies, surely derived from its founding donors, Lord Kenyon and Lord Gambier, who, along with Hannah More, endowed the funds to purchase land and to build a seminary for the Episcopal Church in Ohio in 1824.

 

First, as always, the children. We delivered Rosie to college in Ohio, a road trip that began Friday night, driving as long as we could stay awake.

This is a tough one: our baby grows up. She has her own fears about this new stage. I fear that I haven't… Read full post »

Here's the test: provide pix for the family, send a thought or two sharing the experience, force me to record our travels. Perhaps a step up from our family blog documenting our road trip across the continent in 2000: blog setups have improved remarkably since then.

Last year, I tallied the stat… Read full post »