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This Week on the Road - March 17th-23rd

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This Week on the Road - March 17th-23rd

Hello Everyone! First and foremost this week, I want to say how much my heart goes out to those affected by the tornadoes yesterday in New Orleans and across Texas. The Lower 9th Ward of New Orleans suffered enough for a lifetime with Hurricane Katrina and I’m heartbroken by the images coming from there today. I wish them well with their recovery. As for me, I’ve spent most of this week traveling across the Llano Estacado or the “Staked Plains” of northeastern New Mexico. This is not an area that sees a lot of tourism, but there is actually quite a bit to see out here and I’ve been enjoying it. The winds, however, have been blowing hard at me all week, which makes it hard to drive and since no matter which way you turn it never seems to be at your back, it doesn’t help with my gas mileage. When I pulled into Clayton an hour ago though, gas was at $3.70/gallon, the cheapest I’ve seen in over a month! It would have seemed expensive 3 months ago, but for today it brought a smile to my face. I’ve spent a lot of the week dodging suicidal tumbleweeds which wait until the last second and then make a beeline for my undercarriage. The beautiful pronghorns I’ve seen out in the grasslands have made up for it, though. I’ve actually been feeling really good this week and have been enjoying seeing this region of the state. Even though towns are few and far between and the wind makes me feel like I’m captaining a boat instead of driving a van, it’s been a really good week out here.

When I left you last week, I was on my way out to take some photos around Santa Fe, but clouds had moved in and it was a bit gloomy. I tucked into a little bar and met the most cantankerous person I’ve met thus far in New Mexico. Since he was the bartender and owner, it seemed like a good sign to call it an early night and get a good jump on my Thursday.

I hit the gym first thing Thursday morning and came out to find it snowing pretty heavily out. Since I couldn’t take my camera out in the snow, I went for an early lunch at a spot called Horseman’s Haven which my friend Estilla had recommended. When I got there, I double checked my phone to make sure I was in the right place because it was a little plain-looking spot tucked into the corner of a gas station parking lot. I’m sure glad I didn’t judge the book by its cover, because it turned out to be a really great restaurant. I had some chicken adovado, a New Mexican dish of chicken marinated and cooked in red chili, and I also got a side of their famous green chili which was as good as I had been promised (Anthony Bourdain apparently said it would “melt your face off”). It may be the best restaurant I’ve been to thus far in the state.

From there I headed back downtown and went to see the New Mexico History Museum and the Palace of Governors. The museum was pretty good and set out to tell the history of the state from the earliest Paleo-Indians to the modern day. I must admit my ignorance on a lot of the details of this region. Even though the names were all familiar from guiding tours here for many years, I didn’t have a good chronological understanding in my head and this museum really helped with that. I also enjoyed their in-depth look at the Harvey Hotels, an early chain of hotels and restaurants that grew up with the railroad, of which Santa Fe’s own La Fonda was one. I’ve been to La Fonda many times, and El Tovar and the Bright Angel Lodge at Grand Canyon, but I’ve always been interested in the brand, which was also one of the first big tourism operations in the Southwest. After early run-ins with locally hired employees, Fred Harvey decided to hire mostly young, single women - lovingly remembered as the Harvey Girls. In doing so, the Harvey brand may have had more responsibility for populating the region than they intended by bringing single, adventurous women to the Southwest. The Palace of Governors, which is attached to the museum, has been on the plaza in Santa Fe since 1600. It’s been occupied by the Spanish, the Pueblo Indians, Mexico, the United States and even, briefly, the Confederacy. The building has been altered, expanded, contracted, and was even given Victorian flourishes at one point. When you learn all of this, it’s amazing that this adobe building has survived for 400 years. Sadly, there isn’t much to it on the inside except a bunch of whitewashed walls and I wish they would furnish it from its many different periods. It was still interesting to see and I’m glad I went.

It being St. Patrick’s Day, my next stop was Boxcar – a very un-Irish bar, but seemingly the only game in town for the big day. To be fair, they did try and they all worked very hard to make it enjoyable. There was corned beef, Guinness and green beer…

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This Week on the Road March 10th-16th

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This Week on the Road March 10th-16th

Hello Everyone! Well I’m finally starting to feel more adjusted to the dryness of the desert and the altitude here in Northern New Mexico. It definitely takes a few days to get used to in my sinuses and with just walking around. On the other hand, Shadow Catcher has gotten better gas mileage this week than at any time since I’ve had her, and it is definitely the right time for that. Daylight Savings is back and I’m absolutely enjoying the later sunset – it stretches my day out a bit and I feel a little less hurried. I spent a good chunk of this week in Albuquerque, a city I had only visited in passing before. At first it seemed a little bit seedy, but it really grew on me and I enjoyed it quite a bit and look forward to returning. Beyond that, the weather has been near perfect all week and I’ve continued to really enjoy my time in New Mexico. It’s growing nearer and dearer to my heart every day. I guess they don’t call it The Land of Enchantment for nothing.

So when I left you last week, I was in the small town of Truth or Consequences which turned out to be a neat little town and one of the most photogenic I’ve been through so far. I headed out to Elephant Butte Lake State Park to take some photos and grab a quick shower, but the lake out there is really low after years of drought. I returned downtown in the evening and enjoyed wandering around and taking photos until the sun went down. Then I stopped in for a couple of beers at the great little Truth or Consequences Brewery and enjoyed speaking with the lady who worked there who had moved to T & C from El Paso and never looked back.

I was up and off on Thursday with big plans that I couldn’t quite fit into a day. My first stop was at old Fort Craig, an army fort built in 1854 - soon after the New Mexico Territory became a part of the United States as part of the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo. The fort was established to provide protection from Indians for settlers moving west into the newly acquired territory. It was staffed mostly by recent immigrants, one of whom described Fort Craig as “some lonesome sort of hole on the edge of the hot and dusty desert”. It would become the unlikely site of a fairly important battle (for the Western Theatre) of the Civil War as the Confederacy had its eyes on Colorado and California gold and a Pacific port which would be free from a Union blockade. To get to either, they had to cross New Mexico first, no small feat in the 1860s. Confederate General Henry Hopkins Sibley, who led the charge, planned on providing for his troops by “living off the land”. I don’t think he was quite prepared for the desolate and sparsely populated desert environment he found. Fort Craig, at the time, had tremendous storehouses and provided food and supplies to the entire region, so Sibley set his sights on the small desert fort. The armies met on the Valverde Battlefield, not far away, and the Confederates managed to send the Union troops retreating back to the fort. Sibley then demanded the fort’s surrender, which was probably met by laughter but was definitely refused by Commanding Officer Colonel Edward Canby who saw no reason to surrender his secure and well-armed fort. Sibley didn’t have the ammunition or the firepower to attack the fort, so he was forced to move on in search of provisions for his men further north. Canby left in pursuit, leaving Kit Carson in command in his absence. A defeat near Santa Fe sent the Confederates high-tailing it back to Texas. The fort would go back to serving its original purpose of fighting off the Apache, but was abandoned by the 1890s. Today it is just a collection of ruins overseen by the Bureau of Land Management, but it’s an interesting place. The caretaker told me they average just 8 visitors a day, but sometimes get as many as 20.

After a few hours at the fort, I headed on to the beautiful Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge just up the road. These natural wetlands are an essential stopover for migrating birds, and seeing it helps to show the importance of the Wildlife Refuge System…

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This Week on the Road - March 4th-10th

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This Week on the Road - March 4th-10th

Hello Everyone! It has been an amazing week here in New Mexico as I’ve been out hiking, exploring state and national parks, visiting small towns and soaking in some wonderful hot springs. The wind has been blowing tumbleweed across my path and the roadrunners make me smile. I even popped over to Mexico for a couple of beers this week. I’ve been feeling great and riding on a real high since arriving in New Mexico, and I’m hoping to keep cruising happily along for as long as I can. When I started this journey four years ago, I really wanted to take a deep dive into the Deep South and Appalachia and learn more about the history, culture, music and food of those regions. I had a fascinating time doing just that, but I also wanted to get west and visit old cowboy towns and hike through the desert. I didn’t know it was going to take quite so long to get here, but I’m sure glad I have finally made it. It’s so quiet out here and I’ve been so happy to get on the trail and explore a region so different from the places I’ve been for the last few years. I’ve spent some time out here on tour, but very little in New Mexico and mostly just cruising through. It’s been really great to be here and it’s been a fascinating week.

I know the world is struggling right now, and being partly of Ukrainian descent, I’m very aware of and unhappy with what Putin is doing in Eastern Europe. I don’t think there is much I can do about it, though, so I’m going to keep pushing onward and upward. The price of gas has skyrocketed in the last couple of weeks as a result of this invasion. I paid $2.98 a gallon just a couple of weeks ago in East Texas and today it was $4.49. I have travelled enough to know that that is still cheaper than in much of the world before all of this started, but when I have to fill up my tank every couple of days it hits hard. It means I have to plan things out more to avoid backtracking and make other adjustments accordingly, but I'm not going to let it stop me. It is actually an incredibly small price to pay to support the Ukrainian cause and while I wouldn’t say I’m happy to do it, I’m willing to do it. I’m very grateful to have work lined up for this summer though.

When I left you last week, I had just arrived in Las Cruces. After I finished writing this post, I decided to head down to Old Mesilla and have a look around and maybe grab some dinner. Mesilla is a town just south of Las Cruces which was created after the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (which ceded New Mexico to the United States) as a town for those who wished to remain in Mexico. The border was later moved south and Mesilla officially became an American town. It’s a really cute little place, centered on an old central plaza with plenty of adobe buildings surrounding it. I loved that they had ristras of red chiles hanging from their light posts which brought a big smile to my face. I wandered around for a while and then took a seat in the plaza to listen to the Ash Wednesday sermon coming from the speakers attached to the central Basilica of San Albino, built in 1906. It was a quiet and pleasant sermon and I enjoyed listening to it in the quiet plaza as the sun was going down. When the sermon was over and the sun had set, I dropped into the Double Eagle for a margarita. The Double Eagle is apparently one of the fancier places in the area, and one that families tend to visit on special occasions. The bar area was absolutely stunning and the bar itself was constructed from the old high school basketball floorboards. They made a good margarita and there was a perfect single seat in the corner made just for me. When I finished my margarita, I made my way just down the block to La Posta de Mesilla, the other legendary venue in Mesilla and a restaurant recommended by more than one friend. I loved the piranhas and parrots in the waiting area and soon got a seat at the back bar. I had a hankering for a prickly pear margarita and was thrilled they could accommodate this request. The couple next to me were retired Border Patrol, and they were really wonderful to talk with. On my other side was a gentleman who grew up in L.A. but had moved to Phoenix many years ago. Both were such easy and gentle conversations, maintaining my first impression of the people of the region. My second drink was a chile margarita which definitely had a little spice and kick to it. The drinks and people were great but sadly the food wasn’t very good at all. It was quite ordinary actually and quite disappointing for such a large and historic spot. I had a great time in Old Mesilla despite my tasteless burrito, and decided to call it a very early night.

I was up and at ‘em early on Thursday, though, and on my way out to the Baylor Pass Trail in Organ Mountains - Desert Peaks National Monument. This is a beautiful natural area just north and east of Las Cruces, and I was happy to get out there while the sun was still behind the clouds. The hike up to the pass was steady and moderate, but gained a good bit of elevation over the 3.5 miles to its crest. It took me through prickly pear and yucca and even some sagebrush on my climb…

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This Week on the Road - February 16th-23rd

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This Week on the Road - February 16th-23rd

Hello Everyone! Well, I was hoping for warmer weather when I came south, but I wasn’t expecting it to be in the mid-80s in mid-February. Temperatures are going to drop back to a more normal Texas winter range tonight, but I’ve been enjoying the heat and the sunshine of the last few days. It hasn’t been extremely motivating to do anything but sit outside and enjoy it, but I’m okay with that for a few days too. I’ve made my way about halfway across Texas at this point, and hope to be starting my exploration of New Mexico by the weekend. Once I’m there, I expect to get back to some more normal photo essays, but for now I’ve just been enjoying the ride west. This week has brought me from Lafayette to the Gulf Coast and then into Texas, through Houston and on to Austin and I’ve really enjoyed my time making this crossing. I’ve gotten a few days at the beach, had some wonderful food and seen some fantastic live music.

It hasn’t been all sunshine this week though, and I’ve actually seen a few things which left me questioning what is happening around me. It’s been disconcerting to say the least as I’m pretty open minded and in touch with what’s going on in the country and these incidents left m speechless. Two of them happened on the road and even though I’ve been reading in the news how traffic accidents and deaths are hitting all-time highs in this country, these both kind of shook me. The first happened when I was crossing the bridge between Louisiana and Texas and I saw a car going backwards over the bridge. They were reversing up the bridge in the oncoming lane – at least they were moving in the right direction, but I simply can’t imagine what they were doing and there was clearly no good or reasonable explanation for it. The second happened in Austin where I saw the same thing go down on two separate occasions involving two different groups of cars. In both cases, there were three cars weaving in and out of each other, running red lights and taking up the entire street. For those of you who played basketball, they were essentially doing a three-man weave and others of you can maybe imagine braiding your hair. This was in the early evening on a Sunday night on 6th Street – Austin’s main tourist drag. There is no way I can explain how dangerous this “maneuver” was, but I definitely wondered why there was no police presence on the busiest nightlife street in the city on a Sunday night of a holiday weekend. If this is the kind of “freedom” that Ted Cruz is always shouting about, I honestly don’t want anything to do with it. I agree that there are places where the number of rules and laws have gotten way out of hand (I’m looking at you, California), but you can’t have lawlessness either.

The other disconcerting thing I encountered this week was at a comedy open-mic night here in Austin. These small open-mics are usually pretty bad as people come out to try out their material on a live audience. But it’s usually similar to a night of karaoke where you get a bunch of average or worse performers and a few who are actually really good and it can make for an entertaining evening. And while this was worse than most, there were some funny moments. What I found disconcerting was the number of men who got up and made jokes about beating up women. There are a small handful of topics I find less amusing like, say, the holocaust (which more than one of them got into as well), but I simply can’t imagine who would find domestic violence funny. And you’d think after two or three of them were met with a completely silent room and people’s faces which no doubt looked as sour on these “jokes” as mine did, the others would have gotten the hint, but one after another kept going there. Just because someone is making a joke about something doesn’t mean they are doing that thing and I certainly told my share of off-color jokes when I was younger, but that was in a different time. This simply wasn’t funny on any level and I found it pretty terrible to watch. Thankfully they all bombed hard so maybe they will be humbled by the experience. Anyways, the good of this week definitely outweighed these few bad moments, as it always does, so I don’t want to dwell on them, but I was sorry to witness them as they definitely left me with more questions than answers.

When I left you last week, I did head over to the fabulous Blue Moon Saloon in Lafayette for their Cajun Jam night. There were some really talented musicians there and I enjoyed the music and dancing and had a lot of fun. Thursday morning was rainy and gloomy with bands of heavy rain moving through the area, so I decided to stick around Lafayette for a while and let it pass. I hit the gym in the morning, then filled up my water tanks, enjoyed a delicious shrimp po’boy at the Olde Tyme Grocery near downtown and sent out a king cake to my mother and one to my brother. By early afternoon, it felt like the worst of the weather had passed, so I started heading down towards Rutherford Beach in Southwest Louisiana. I’ve stayed at Rutherford Beach before – it’s on Louisiana’s oil coast so it’s not the most beautiful beach in the world, but it’s quiet and pleasant and you can stay right on the beach for as long as you want (and it’s free!). I stopped at Suire’s Grocery on the way, one of my favorite little out-of-the-way eateries, and picked up their famous turtle sauce picante for dinner which is always a treat. Then I headed south into the huge expanse of beautiful wetlands which cover that part of Louisiana. The road runs right next to the bayou, and if you’re paying attention you will definitely catch a glimpse of dozens of gators as you go. There were also plenty of pelicans, egrets, herons and a dozen other varieties of shorebirds. It’s really quite a nice ride when you’re not in a rush and I pulled onto the beach with about an hour to spare before the sun set. I had time to get a spot and settle in and then crack a beer and watch the sun disappear into the Gulf of Mexico. It was a nice sunset, and as the day turned into night the lights on the oil rigs out in the gulf came on. It’s actually quite beautiful in its own way, and I had a lovely, if also quite windy, night on the beach.

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This Week on the Road - February 9th-16th

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This Week on the Road - February 9th-16th

Hello Everyone! I’ve had a great week soaking up the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of New Orleans, sharing laughs with old friends and just enjoying a few days in my favorite city. I went to some of the first parades of the Mardi Gras season, ate plenty of crawfish and king cake, heard some great music and generally just wandered around the city I called home for longer than most other places in my life. The weather has been warm and sunny and it’s been a pleasant week all around. I have also taken care of some things this week which needed to get done before I moved forward with my journey like getting new tires for Shadow Catcher and finishing my taxes. All in all, it’s been a great week and I’ve had a great time, and while it was tempting to stay in New Orleans for the rest of Mardi Gras, I hit the road today and ended up at a beautiful little café here in Lafayette to write this week’s This Week. We’re supposed to get storms here tomorrow, so I’ll be laying low while they pass through and hope to press on west in the afternoon. I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine’s Day and celebrated the beauty of love, whether with someone or alone, and that you’re all safe and warm wherever you are.

After I finished this post last week, I did in fact make a beeline for New Orleans. There were plenty of places I would have loved to stop along the way, and people I really wanted to stop and see, but my compass pointed me south and I went for it. Had I left 2-3 weeks earlier as originally planned, it would have been a slower drive south but I really need to get moving if I want to see New Mexico and Arizona before heading to California for work this summer. I arrived in New Orleans at about 9:30 pm and had a nice, quiet walk around the French Quarter, parked just a few blocks from my old apartment there. I always feel a little lighter when I’m walking the streets of New Orleans, like the weight of the world is pressing down somewhere else and we’re all just going to suspend our disbelief a little bit and forget about what’s going on “out there”. The history of the city, its Spanish colonial architecture and creole culture really hit me in the heart and soul and I can spend hours just wandering around and looking at the buildings, as I did often during the two years that I lived there. It never seems to get old. There are even smells that will hit my nose which aren’t necessarily pleasant ones but which link to sense memories of all of the wonderful times that I’ve had there. Sadly, the city is in a low place in its omnipresent cycle of ups and downs which stretches back to the very founding of New Orleans. Crime is as high as it’s been in years and the pandemic and most recent hurricane have definitely had an effect on the infrastructure, population and morale of the city. Having lived there during another low point after Hurricane Katrina, I know it will bounce back again, but I was sad to hear so many of my friends, even those born and raised there, talking about leaving. I know it is different living there and I empathize with everything they told me, but it didn’t stop me from having an amazing week in the Big Easy. Later in the evening I wandered into one of the neighborhood bars I frequented while I lived there and it was nice to be greeted by my name 13 years after I moved away and see a friendly and familiar face (thanks Robert).

Thursday I woke early and wandered down to the river, stopping for coffee and beignets and a little street jazz at Café du Monde. I headed down to the French Market to see what the local artists were selling and then all the way down Royal Street to Canal, enjoying the buskers and architecture along the way. The sun was shining and there was music in the air it felt really good to be there. After a nice, long morning walk, I headed out to the gym and then across the street for some boiled crawfish and king cake at Rouse’s Supermarket. I had a wonderful personal tailgate in the parking lot with some good music, cold beer and a whole pile of mudbugs. When I was nice and full I headed over to my good friend Walker’s house which is where I stayed for most of my visit. I met Walker when I first moved to the city in 2007. He lived down the street from me and we hung out often, exploring the bars in the French Quarter and trying to help each other through that first year of classroom teaching. Walker grew up in New Orleans, so always seemed to have the inside track on what was going on around town and I was happy to tag along. While I stopped teaching many years ago now, Walker has been in the classroom since, but is taking a little sabbatical this year to clear his head and make a plan for the future. It’s been great to hang out with him and his lovely girlfriend Megan and her daughter. We spent Thursday night catching up and walking their dogs and having a couple of cold beers in their charming home…

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This Week on the Road - February 2nd-9th

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This Week on the Road - February 2nd-9th

Hello Everyone! I am thrilled to be back on the road after a wonderful two months at home in D.C. It’s definitely tough to leave my folks and my friends, but it’s time to get back to it and I’m very excited for the road ahead. I left on Sunday afternoon and have been making tracks to get south to warmer weather, which I have found here in Northern Alabama where the sun is shining and temperatures were in the mid-fifties today. While I’m sure you all know by now that I prefer the back roads and scenic byways, the interstate is definitely a nice option when you’re trying to hustle. I do love seeing all the exit signs on the way which remind me of some amazing times I’ve had in these southern states. My drive to New Orleans could have taken months, as it has in the past, but I do want to get out west sooner rather than later.

It is always nice to be back in the South, where the food and music are great and people hold doors and wave a ‘thank you’ when you let them in in traffic. I’ve been somewhat surprised at the number of people I’ve seen with masks on, but I’m also well aware of the low vaccination numbers and high hospitalization rates down here as well. It breaks my heart, really, because I know and have met so many good people in these parts who, because of whatever news they are reading, have decided not to get vaccinated. And now so many are getting sick and dying unnecessarily. I wish they knew as many doctors and nurses as I’m fortunate enough to know who could tell them, as they’ve told me, that vaccination is both safe and effective. But I’m not here in this area or here in this newsletter to preach, I just want people to be safe and healthy.

I certainly had a great few days at home this past week before I took off on Sunday. On Thursday my folks and I headed out to the Surratt Tavern in Clinton, Maryland for a tour of this fascinating historic building. My mom and I had been there before when we were on the Trail of John Wilkes Booth Scenic Byway last year, but it had been closed. We were happy to get back and see the inside of the place. Our guide was a wonderfully informative and we enjoyed or conversation with her. She realized that we knew the basics of the story of Mary Surratt and her son John and the role they played in the assassination of President Lincoln. Mary Surratt was the first woman executed by the federal government. Since we already knew most of that story, she wanted to tell us more about the property itself and the role Mary may have played in the death of her own husband. She also wanted to share what she knew about the enslaved people who worked at the tavern and on the property. We were able to take our time wandering around the building and my mother was thrilled to look in all of the closets, nooks and crannies. It is certainly an interesting place and worth a visit if you’re in the area. From there we drove back into the city and made a quick stop at Mount Olivet Cemetery to show my stepfather where Mary Surratt is buried. We stopped for a beer at the relatively new Other Half Brewing Company in Ivy City. Their beers were good, but whoever named them needs a class in creativity and they were awfully expensive, even for D.C. Then we went around the corner for another beer at Atlas Brewing Co., an old favorite of ours. While we were there, the man in charge of their trivia night recognized my mother from her time working with the Boy Scouts. I was really glad he came over to ask because it really made her night. For dinner, we headed over to the Panda Gourmet just down the road. Tucked away in the Days Inn at the corner of New York Avenue and Bladensburg Road, this is the restaurant Chinese President Xi Jinping ate at during his visit to Washington. It’s a pretty great spot although it’s not what it was before the pandemic. I’m sure they’ve been doing mostly takeout and delivery as there was only one person working the front of the house when we were there. The food was still good though…

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This Week Off The Road - January 26th - February 2nd

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This Week Off The Road - January 26th - February 2nd

Hello Everyone! If you’re reading this on Wednesday night, Happy Groundhog Day to you. One of my college friends was from Punxsutawney, PA so I always think of him today. Punxsutawney Phil (the groundhog) did, in fact, see his shadow today, and in so doing he has predicted six more weeks of winter. That can only mean one thing – it’s definitely time for me to head south. This Sunday is the day, if all goes according to plan. I’ve spent this week packing, finishing up what I can of my projects while I’m here at home, and spending as much time as I could with friends and family. It’s always bittersweet to leave and as much as I’m looking forward to all of the adventures ahead, it’s always tough to say goodbye. To help pick myself up, I have contacted a few people who I will be seeing in the beginning of the week, and I definitely hope to be in New Orleans by the following weekend with plenty of friends to catch up with there as well. On a completely unrelated note, our football team here in Washington has a new name, the Washington Commanders, and I wish them well in the coming years. May their moral compass be a little truer than it has been in recent years.

Packing up my van is always quite a project as there is a place for everything and everything needs to be securely in its place. Every time I am home I unpack completely so I can get in and clean the inside out really well and then repack everything with some adjustments where I believe better efficiency can be achieved. I feel as though this time it’s packed particularly well and even though I’ve got pretty much everything loaded up, there’s still plenty of room. I’m thrilled it’s not jam packed and I think everything is going to work out really well with the way it’s loaded. And I’m still days away from taking off which is even better so that I can make adjustments before I hit the road. Omicron has given me a little extra time here in DC and I’ve tried to use it wisely. Meanwhile it’s been particularly cold and icy in the south so maybe it will all work out for the best in the end.

I have made two adjustments to my media strategy this week and I’m feeling good about both of them. As I have been writing about for several weeks, I’ve been (slowly) building my photography storefront on a separate site which I will integrate into this site as much as I can. While it’s still not where I want it to be and has very few photos on it, I’m thrilled with how it is coming and am happy to offer you all a sneak peek. While you can’t connect to it from anywhere on my site just yet, have a look here and let me know what you think. As always if there is any particular photo you would like me to add, please let me know and I will do so ASAP. Secondly, I’ve officially launched my TikTok channel this week, something I’ve been talking about for over a year now but finally went ahead with. TikTok is a neat form of social media which I’ve enjoyed myself for a while now and which is completely driven by video content but in shorter form than YouTube. If you’re on TikTok, you can find me @miles2gobeforeisleep.

I have gotten out a bit this week even though it’s been so busy. Last Thursday my folks and I headed out into the city for a nice adventure. We headed through Georgetown and the Navy Yard to see what’s new in those neighborhoods and then paid a nice long visit to Congressional Cemetery, one of D.C.’s most famous cemeteries and one which was simply too hot to appreciate when we last visited last May.

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This Week Off The Road - January 19th-26th

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This Week Off The Road - January 19th-26th

Hello Everyone. This is going to be another short but sweet one this week. I have been keeping busy here at home which I’ll get to in a minute, but first I wanted to share a couple of things with you at the top of this week’s post. I’ve set a tentative departure date of February 6th and I’m very excited about getting back on the road. I’ve spent a lot of time looking at numbers and data this week and since I’m vaccinated and boosted and generally in good health despite my diabetes, it looks like my chances of getting a severe Covid case which requires hospitalization are extremely low. They’re not zero (and maybe never will be), but I feel like the risk is acceptable to me. My bigger worry is how overcrowded the hospitals are and what would happen if I needed emergency care for some other reason. Those numbers will hopefully be going down over the next few weeks, but I am always cautious and the reality is that I haven’t made an emergency hospital visit in almost two decades so again it’s a risk I’m willing to accept. I will be keeping my mask handy and taking care to avoid crowded places and will likely be moving quicker than I had originally planned to towards New Mexico. I’m comfortable with the statewide precautions they are taking out there and plan on spending more time outside and alone than inside and in groups anyway. I’ll be leaving about 3 weeks after I had initially planned to, but I should still have plenty of time to see what I want to of New Mexico and Arizona this winter.

Leaving here, I plan on heading southwest through Virginia, Tennessee and Mississippi and all the way to New Orleans, catching up with a few friends along the way in whatever capacity they are comfortable with. If all goes according to plan, I will be in the Big Easy the following weekend and able to catch the first few real parades of the Mardi Gras season, which are small but hold good memories for me. Then I’m off to Texas for a week or two on my way to The Land of Enchantment. I’ve made some good plans for my time in New Mexico and I think we’re going to see some awesome scenery together, but if you have any suggestions or tips, I’m all ears.

My second bit of news this week is that I’ve accepted a job to return to guiding tours this coming summer. I’ll be guiding small group, overland trips for a small tour company called Incredible Adventures which is based in the Bay Area. I will be working for the same manager who I worked for at my old company and will be running tours for many of the same brands I’m comfortable and familiar with. My hope is to spend much of the summer in the Rocky Mountains and I’m pretty sure that will be a good possibility. It sounds like a really great opportunity and I’m definitely looking forward to it. While going back to guiding means putting some parts of this project on hold, I need to make some money so I can move ahead and at least I will still be on the road and taking pictures. We’ll see how it works out, but I’m definitely excited about it.

Lastly, I know I mentioned last week that I would be sharing links to my new photography storefront this week, but it’s not quite ready. I’m happy with the way it is shaping up, but I want to give it another week before I let you see it. It’s going to be a constant project going forward, but it will be far enough along by this time next week to be able to give you a sneak peek. That all being said, let’s take a look at what I’ve been up to this week.

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A Look Back at 2021 and a Look Ahead at 2022

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A Look Back at 2021 and a Look Ahead at 2022

Happy New Year Everyone! I wanted to take a few minutes this week to take a look back at the year gone by and a look ahead at what I’m planning for 2022. It’s definitely been a year of ups and downs, but despite the many challenges, 2021 was a pretty good year for me. I’m hoping to build on that momentum and make sure the year ahead is even better. Before I get into the heart of this post, though, I wanted to take a minute to thank you all for your support over the years and especially through this last stretch. I didn’t know how I was going to keep my little travel blog going through the pandemic as I was at home in Washington for well over a year. Publishing this newsletter every week pushed me to try and get out and do something every week as I tried to make the most of the situation. Your comments, notes and emails really helped me through those trying times, and I wanted to say thank you very much. We did get out to see some pretty interesting and beautiful places this summer and fall, though, didn’t we? And hopefully I’ll be hitting the road again soon to even more beautiful places out west. I hope you’ll come along for the ride.

2021 began in the midst of the pandemic. By the time the new year rolled around, I had been home for almost eight months. I even convinced my folks to stay up until midnight on New Year’s Eve for the first time in many years to wave goodbye to 2020 and all of the challenges it had brought us. From the previous July until this past May, I spent my days with my friends’ two year-old son, Mason, going on adventures near their home in Glover Park. He was such a little trooper and we would go outside almost every day, no matter what the weather was like. We had dozens of different routes which took us to hundreds of different places, all within about a mile or two of his house. He was usually one step behind me with a fistful of worms and a brain full of questions. It was amazing what we got into during that time, but we both learned a lot about the world during those 10 months. I’ve done a lot of different things in my life, but the year I spent helping raise Mason was definitely the most rewarding experience I’ve ever had. I will always remember the sound of his little feet in the morning running out to greet me and the feel of his little hand in mine. Meanwhile, my mother and I would try and get out of town every week and go on at least one adventure of our own. We saw more of Washington D.C. than either of us imagined existed and traveled to small towns and down back roads in Maryland and Virginia as well. We watched movies every Wednesday and had parties in the basement every Friday. We brewed beer, played games and cooked all kinds of different foods and I got back to playing the violin after 35 years. I got a new compass and ran some orienteering courses for the first time in 30 years. Both felt really good. At home, we celebrated everything I could come up with, from Christmas in July to Up Helly Aa. Looking back, there are a lot of projects I wish I’d gotten to and a lot of other things I wish I had spent more time on during those pandemic months, but at the end of the day I got to spend a lot of time with my best friends, my family and a wonderfully curious little boy who really needed a friend through it all. They were some of the best days of my life…

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This Week off the Road - December 1st-8th

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This Week off the Road - December 1st-8th

Hello Everyone! It’s been a quiet and lazy week here in Washington D.C. I had hoped it would be more productive, but it’s been nice to get some rest and not worry about anything too much. It’s always great to be home, to spend time with friends and family, to work out at my local gym and to know where I’m going to sleep every night. Those things aren’t as sweet when they are your everyday normal, but after six months on the road they are a welcome respite. I’ve been trying to clear most of my stuff out of Shadow Catcher this week as I plan on bringing much less with me when I depart in January. I definitely brought too many things I didn’t need and didn’t use with me in June and I plan on cutting it down by half over the next few weeks. I’ve also been catching up on my photo editing and I think I’m just about done with my Minnesota photos. This week I hope to get those photos into my existing galleries and into state-specific ones as well. I also started taking a look at the road ahead – at some of the places I want to visit in Arizona and New Mexico and also at where I will be working next summer (as by then it will be time to refill my coffers). The weather has been pretty good this week as well, but again that is less noticeable and less consequential when I’m off the road. I have gotten out to see and do some cool things this week, though, so let me share some of that with you here.

Last Wednesday I went with my friend Carolina to see the Garden of Lights at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton. This is a wonderful holiday light display in an outdoor, walk-through setting. It was much bigger than we imagined it would be and we really enjoyed it. It definitely put me in the Christmas mood and it wasn’t so cold out that we had to rush through it.

On Thursday I headed down to see Bob Dylan perform at Anthem, one of Washington’s newer music venues which I’d never been to before. Before the show, I went to check out another new-to-me spot, the TNT Tiki Bar at The Wharf right down the block from the venue. As far as tiki bars go, it wasn’t great, but it was a nice enough place to stop in before the show. I got some happy hour snacks which were tasty but really tiny and one cocktail which was pretty ordinary. The bartenders were friendly and attentive, though, the atmosphere was pleasant enough and the beers were cheaper than most of the other bars in that neighborhood. Anthem did a great job of getting people in the door, but it was far bigger than I imagined it would be. Washington D.C. is a great place to see live music because we have some awesome mid-sized venues that accommodate between one and two thousand people – enough to attract bigger names, but small enough to still feel like an intimate setting. Anthem seats up to 6,000 and with the standing-room ticket I had, it was anything but intimate. They also had a small army of security staff who moved me along from any spot I found where I could actually see the stage. If it had been a bigger band, it probably still would have been alright, but Dylan just seemed to get lost in such a big place. He put on a good show for an 80 year-old, but it would have been much better in a significantly smaller venue. I’m glad I saw him, but I would really hesitate to go back to Anthem. Give me the 9:30 Club any day of the week. Having spent some time in Dylan’s childhood town of Hibbing, Minnesota this fall, it was great to tie up my summer/fall travels with this show.

Friday evening, my folks and I went to a holiday celebration at Dumbarton House in Georgetown, one of Washington D.C.’s oldest homes. Now owned by the National Society of The Colonial Dames of America, the house has been restored to its early 1800s appearance when the first Register of the Treasury, Joseph Nourse, lived there…

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This Week on the Road - November 24th-December 1st

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This Week on the Road - November 24th-December 1st

Hello Everyone! I can’t believe it’s December, but it certainly is. Happy Holidays to you all. A very Happy Chanukah to everyone celebrating it around the world this week. And Christmas is definitely right around the corner as the stores are decorated and Christmas trees are starting to show up in the windows of peoples’ homes. I really love the Christmas season and am happy to be home for it again this year. It is sweeter for me to come home for it than just to be home for it like I was last year. I’ve spent a lot of Christmases and New Year’s Eves working, either on tour or at a restaurant somewhere, so it’s always nice to not have to work this time of year and I’m definitely grateful. I’m looking forward to spending the holidays with family and friends, attending Christmas events and enjoying it as much as I can. This is going to be a pretty short newsletter this week as I haven’t been doing a whole lot. I spent Thanksgiving and the following weekend with my dad in West Virginia and then made the drive home to D.C. on Monday in one shot. It’s been more off the road than on the road this week, which is fine with me.

It was great to pull into Charleston last Wednesday and see my dad and his partner, Judy, as I hadn’t seen them since before the pandemic started. They’re both well and in good spirits. Unfortunately, my dad’s macular degeneration has only gotten worse so he can’t see much at all which really limits what he can do. That’s just one more reason for me to keep doing what I’m doing for as long as I’m able to. I’m sorry because all of his retirement plans went out the window with his eyesight, but sadly there’s nothing that he or I or his doctors can do about it. I was definitely surprised that their dog, Sadie, remembers me after so many months. Sadie was rescued from a pretty bad situation and basically hates everyone except the two of them. A few years ago, when we were all visiting my brother in New Hampshire, I thought that Sadie looked like she couldn’t breathe and was having a heart attack. Well my dad couldn’t see her obviously and Judy came down on the side of better safe than sorry so we rushed her to the all-night vet. She was having a heart attack and they kept her overnight. We picked her up the next day, she hasn’t barked at me since. This week she actually came and curled up on my lap. I don’t know how dogs know or how they remember, but she certainly does.

It was a quiet Thanksgiving with just the three of us, but we did have a delicious ham, some great sides including a delightful broccoli casserole and of course two varieties of pie. We all slept in in the morning and we all enjoyed an afternoon nap as well. In fact, I slept quite a bit while I was there. Living in my van, no matter how safe a spot I am parked in overnight, some part of my subconscious has to be alert and aware. When I finally get to a warm, safe place I sleep really deeply and really well…

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Happy Thanksgiving From Miles2Go

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Happy Thanksgiving From Miles2Go

Happy Thanksgiving y’all. I know this is an American holiday, but it’s a great day to express how thankful I am for all of the wonderful things in my life. First and foremost, I’m thankful for all of you for helping make this project and this dream a reality. Without your words of encouragement, notes and emails I don’t know if I could have kept going through four years and a global pandemic. I’m thankful for my family who supports this dream and never pressures me to get a “real job” or to “settle down”. They understand that however strange or foreign this might be, it makes me happy and that’s the most important thing. I’m thankful for all of my friends around the country and the world who have encouraged me, put me up, lent me their ear and pointed me in the right direction. I’m thankful for Shadow Catcher, my wonderful van which has been incredibly dependable for a 24 year old vehicle and to all of those who have kept keep it on the road - especially the great guys at Champion Auto Repair in Sterling, Virginia. I’m thankful for all the travelers who came before me who shared the ups and downs of their journey so that I might learn from their mistakes and not repeat them. I’m thankful for all of the businesses who let me stay the night in their parking lots which allows me feel safe and sleep soundly. I’m thankful for all of those people who keep the National and state parks wild, beautiful and accessible, the historic sites open and accurate, the music venues rocking, the tiki bars pouring and the libraries, gas stations, gyms, coffee shops and restaurants open and welcoming. It’s been an incredible four years and two weeks on the road (minus the time I was home for the pandemic), and I’m just getting started. But this isn’t just my journey, but our journey and I’m incredibly thankful for every one of you and for all of those who don’t even know they’ve kept this project afloat. Thank you all.

-Mike

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