Every place has a story. The story of every place is shaped not only by its Physical Geography (mountains, rivers, climate, vegetation, etc.), but also by the people that live there. Human Geography (culture, economics, demographics, politics) is intrinsically interwoven with the Physical landscape, as both affect one another.
Out of the way places interest me, as there is something to learn from every place and something to learn about ourselves and our place in this world. Describing the cultural meaning of PLACE is an interest of mine. Most of the places that I will write about are known to some, but not necessarily popular tourist locations. If there are pristine and undiscovered places that I may write about, I may take editorial license to give them different names to keep them protected. How places change over time or how we perceive them differently as time passes is also an interest of mine.
I am continuing to travel and explore our world. Posts are categorized by location or topic. There are a wide variety of locations to choose from, including Alaska, Oregon, International (which includes trips to Spain, Norway, Bolivia, Uzbekistan, New Zealand, Canada, and Morocco, just to name a few). Topics include nature, travel, and memoir. I invite all of you to come explore and take a geographical journey with us. We hope that you will not only experience new places with us, but also gain new insights about your place in this world.
The geomorphologist in me always wanted to go back in time to the late Pleistocene Epoch and experience what it was like to live about 12,000 years ago near the end of the Ice Age. But since I got tired of waiting for someone to invent a time machine, I did the next best thing and made a trip to Icy Bay, Alaska instead.
The huge, multi-armed bay was totally blocked off by ice at the start of the 20th century. Rapid retreat of the ice since then has opened up a bay that goes back more than 30 miles from the Gulf of Alaska. Icy Bay marks the coastal limit of Wrangell-Saint Elias National Park and Preserve. The Wrangell-St. Elias mountain range is the highest coastal range in the world, a result of the collision of the North American continental plate converging with the Pacific Ocean plate. Mt. St. Elias is the second highest peak in Alaska, rising from sea level to 18,008′. It is truly a wild, uninhabited, remote place that is fraught with all sorts of danger, as well as beauty!
Just getting there is an adventure. The closest town is Yakutat, Alaska (pop. 597), which has scheduled air service from Juneau on Alaska Airlines. The Alaska Marine Highway (ferry) also makes some stops in Yakutat in the summer. In the late 90s, Yakutat made a name for itself when adventurous surfers came to the north country to surf the legendary 25 foot waves of the outer coast while dodging grizzly bears on the shore. But Icy Bay still remained a world away from Yakutat.
Location of Icy Bay, Alaska (Map:Research Gate)
From Yakutat, we loaded our folding Klepper kayaks on board a float plane and made the 30 minute flight to a beach at Point Kageet near the foot of the bay. We were extremely lucky with the weather, as the high coastal range usually blocks the moist marine air which often results in incessant rain. But for the July week that we were there, a high pressure system dominated the weather and the skies were mostly clear.
Point Kageet, with Mt. Saint Elias in the background
Our trip was during a full moon, so after assembling our boats, we had to be careful where to beach them, keeping the 15 foot tidal fluctuation in mind. However, we chose to beach the boats much higher above the high tide line in case of an “event” that might occur. Due to tectonic plates colliding and pushing up mountains, along with glaciers bulldozing their way through those same mountains, the landscape is constantly in flux. Consistently calving tidewater glaciers could cause a wave surge which might push the sea above the normal high tide line. Since the area is so tectonically active, any landslide could cause a tsunami, which could wash our boats away. The landscape could either turn out to be a geomorphologist’s dream, or a kayaker’s nightmare. Time would tell which would be the case…..
We loaded our gear into the Klepper on a calm day and paddled toward Taan Fjord. Taan is the Tlingit name for a sea lion. Bergy bits from calved glaciers were abundant in the bay.
loading the boats
The start of the trip was magical, with the calm waters mirroring a perfect reflection of 18,008′ Mount Saint Elias.
From sea level looking at the 18,008 summit of St. Elias
Soon however, the idyllic scene took on a more menacing feel to it. The ice became so thick that it was impossible to paddle through it. Rather than paddle, we had to shove the berg bits out of the way and slowly pole our way with our paddles through the thick ice pack. At first it seemed like a novelty. But upon realizing that our folding kayaks risked being crushed if the wind picked up and pushed the ice together, we tried to make haste…but to no avail. That was a bit unnerving!
Any wonder why they named it Icy Bay!
Sensing our frustration, a friendly harbor seal tried to help us out. She kept diving and showing up on a different ice floe. It seemed she was trying to tell us, “Hey, it’s easy! You’re doing it the hard way. Just dive under the ice if you want to get there faster!”
A friendly harbor seal giving advice
Seeing that we would never make it through the pack ice all the way up to the head of Taan Fjord, we chose to cross over to Tsaa (harbor seal in Tlingit) Fjord on the west side of the bay. We found a wonderful campsite for our tents on a depositional terrace high above the high tide line. The low light of late afternoon brought out the electric blue in the glacial ice, which was intensified by the purple and blue of fireweed and dwarf lupine. With 18 hours of daylight and the thunder of calving glaciers close by, we wanted to drink in all we could of this glorious landscape, so we avoided sleep as long as we could so as not to miss out on Icy Bay’s magic.
The most magical camp spot!
Later on that day it got a bit cloudier. We made a stop at another beach as the tide was rushing in. I walked out next to some bergs that were stranded ashore from the previous high tide which gave the impression that I could walk on water.
Proof that I used to be able to walk on water??
A couple of decades have passed since we did this trip, so when I show this picture I tell people that I can no longer walk on water at my age.
The following day we chose to work our legs instead of our arms and take a hike over the newly exposed landscape. It’s amazing to see plant succession taking place, with the pioneer species establishing themselves on the barren rock and soil. In time, a dense coastal forest will be here if there is not a new glacial advance.
Fireweed colonizing the barren landscape
On one part of the hike, we encountered stranded ice bergs far above the normal high tide line….evidence that an “event” occurred the prior evening while we were sleeping; probably a large calving event near the time of the high tide which caused a huge wave.
The following day, as the rest of the expedition party was getting ready to launch the kayaks after our lunch break, a couple of us climbed up a hill to take the picture of the scene below. Since the tide was incoming at the time, the rest of the expedition party had to stay with the boats and keep moving them with the incoming tide. None of us could imagine the devastation that this place would experience just a few years into the future.
On October 17, 2015 an earthquake caused a huge landslide (180 million tons of rock) in Taan Fjord which generated a giant tsunami that reached as high as 633 feet above the fjord. It was the fourth largest tsunami ever recorded. Luckily, since it happened in October, nobody was in the bay at the time. But it did end up stripping 8 square miles of forest from the landscape and scattered boulders over all of the beaches used for landing bush planes. Had it happened while we were there, it would have more than seriously ruined our day. It is hard to believe, but we would not have even been safe on the hill we took the above picture from! You can view videos on You tube and Tik Tok which highlight tsunamis in glacial fjords.
I’m sure the bay has changed a lot since we were there. I’m sure it still has a lot of ice. But we are presently in the Holocene epoch, and transitioning into the Anthropocene epoch, where humans have a great influence on climate. But if you want to see what the late Pleistocene was like, you should see it soon, before it is gone. Or, maybe you’re hoping that the invention of a time travel machine is just around the corner!
This week, Lens Artist Sofia Alves (http://photographias.wordpress.com) put forth the challenge to depict day vs. night in photographs. Our perceptions of night vary immensely across cultures. A pensioner in a crime ridden urban area, a coyote in the High Desert, a bartender in Barcelona: they all have vastly different conceptions of the meaning of, and the difference between day and night. Night may be associated with fear, or it may represent freedom. Depending on one’s cultural interpretations, the change from day to night and back to day again can either shrink or expand the scale of our view of the world.
“Life begins at night” : Charlaine Harris, Dead Until Dark
The first few photos I chose were from a previous trip to the Okavango Delta in Botswana. The vibe of the place changed dramatically from midday to dusk to night. While paddling a mokoro midday in the shallows you can view hippos in the main channel.
As day slowly transforms to night, the delta takes on a different vibe.
After dusk, we retreat into our camp inside an enclosure, to feel safe from the wild animals. Although the enclosure may shrink our space on planet earth during the night, the terrestrial radiative cooling of the planet at night chills the surface and the resulting temperature inversion allows for clear skies and the stars to come out. This can result in our universe seeming to be much larger than it does in the daytime. I took this picture of our guide Victor climbing on a termite mound. We used a flashlight to light him up against the dark sky. No longer confined to Botswana, or even planet earth for that matter, we could now travel light years away!
Climbing a Termite Mound at Night
“What hath night to do with sleep?” John Milton, Paradise Lost
Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania definitely has a different feeling by day and night. From Karanga Camp (13,287′), you still have over 4,000 of climbing to get to the summit and the mountain looks daunting.
The view at dusk from Karanga Camp and seeing Mt. Meru peeking above the clouds gave me a feeling of exhilaration.
The final push to the summit takes all night climbing in the dark, with the hopes of reaching the summit by dawn. Not having thought about a photo challenge in my future, I now wish I had stopped to take a picture of the sinuous trail of headlamps below me as I neared the summit.
Why is it that night falls, instead of rising, like the dawn? Yet if you look east, at sunset, you can see night rising, not falling’ darkness lifting into the sky, up from the horizon…” Margaret Atwood, the Handmaid’s Tale
The last two photos are from a late fall camp-out in the Deschutes National Forest east of Bend, Oregon. I felt like I had the whole forest to myself that day.
As night came on, the temperatures were downright frigid! (~19F). My world became much smaller by night…maybe only about 27 cubic feet, as I focused on keeping wood on the fire. I enjoyed the solitude.
Then, when over a dozen coyotes started howling close to my camp, the night took on an ominous feeling. I unbuttoned the sheath to my buck knife. My world expanded a bit again when I turned my back to the fire and let my eyes adjust to the dark. The light from the fire lit up a portion of the forest with a radius of several feet from the fire, which allowed me not only warm myself from behind, but not be as fearful of the new company I had.
I want to thank Sofia for this challenge which made me realize that I shouldn’t put my camera away when the sun goes down. Next time I go camping, I will have the fire at my back and take a photo of how much of the immediate forest I can capture with the reflection from my campfire.
This is my first attempt in answering the call to the weekly Lens Artist Photo Challenge!
For geographicaljourneys.com folks that are unfamiliar with the Lens Artist Challenge, you should know that I follow a couple of photographers who have WordPress blogs. Each week one of them offers up a challenge for people to participate. While my photography may not be quite as professional as theirs, I felt that I had some photos from my travels to contribute to this week’s challenge which features pictures that are dramatic. The places themselves take most of the credit.
It was difficult to pick so few. But Patti Moed of pilotfishblog.com, who posted the challenge, asked us “Where do we find drama?” I find that the most dramatic images come in the power and beauty of raw nature, and how people and animals relate to it. I have had the privilege of traveling to many wild places around the globe, but many of the photos I chose were from my time as a wilderness sea kayak guide in SE Alaska. But I also included a few from some warmer places, and more recent visits.
The Webster’s Dictionary defines dramatic as something exciting and impressive.
I took the above picture while kayaking Endicott Arm fjord in SE Alaska. I define this as dramatic because of how difficult is was to capture my friend seemingly paddling without a boat. The waves darn near capsized me when I only had one hand on the paddle and the other on the camera. Nature seems even more impressive when you are at her mercy.
Some days are better for paddling than others. Southeast Alaska is teeming with Humpback Whales in the summer. While it is illegal to pursue them, it is not illegal to position yourself in a passage between two islands and wait for them to swim by. Being so close to these gentle giants is awe inspiring. The above picture captures the spray from their blowholes as they exhale. Soon after exhaling, they take a deeper dive and the last thing you see are their fluke fins plunging below the surface. Lucky for you, you can’t experience their awful smell while seeing this on your computer!
Icy Bay, Alaska is aptly named. Immediately you are transported back to the late Pleistocene! We had to paddle through dense pack ice to find this wonderful campsite. Because of the density of the ice, when the sun is low on the horizon, the glaciers become an electric blue color. The purple vegetation is from dwarf lupine. Icy Bay lies at 60 degrees North latitude, so the sun is never high in the sky, which makes for great photography in the summer and for long sunsets. Originally this was a slide photo, which I later made a print of.
The LeBlondeau Glacier, which lies north of Glacier Bay, drains into the Chilkat River drainage system. We had to jump a narrow, but deep crevasse to avoid a long re-route up the glacier. I had to jump this crevasse several times to ensure that we might get the most dramatic shot. Lucky for me, of the several pictures that my climbing buddy shot, this one caught me in mid-air, and the ice axe and crampons kept me from sliding back into the crevasse when I reached the other side. At the edge of another deep crevasse, we dropped a heavy rock into it. It was so deep, we never heard a noise when it finally hit the bottom.
Just so you don’t think I only like to experience cold places, the above photo was taken while paddling a Mokoro in the Okavango Delta of Botswana, in Southern Africa. African sunsets are, well…..kind of dramatic. I love the reflection in the water, and the lily pads suggest a serene, and calm environment. That is, if you ignore the sounds of elephants trumpeting in the woods on the shore, or the hippos grunting in the deeper water in the main channel behind you. But when I see this picture, it takes me back to that exhilarating moment in my life.
The Dead Vlei of Namibia looks like something out of Salvador Dali’s art gallery. Several hundred years ago, the shifting sand dunes cut off what little water drained into this ancient swamp, and the trees became petrified in the dry air of the Namib desert. There were people from our group walking around, so I had to position myself where the trees hid most of the people hiking. If you look closely, you can see only two people at the base of the dune in the distance near the center of the picture. Just enough to give one a perspective of how massive these dunes are.
This juvenile Elephant Seal in Saint Andrews Bay on South Georgia Island was a drama queen acting out for the King Penguins in the audience behind her. No zoom lens needed for this one, as the beach was packed with animals, most of whom wandered over to check us out as we landed in our zodiacs. We took this trip with Oceanwide Expeditions.
Bald Eagles are majestic, and I’ve seen a million of them while I lived and guided in SE Alaska. But this shot of one taking off from a rocky island which captured his talons and huge wingspan as he flew over our kayak was a special moment for me (and my clients, too). I had a 300 mm zoom lens and took several shots, but the closer we got I backed off of the zoom which allowed me to include more of the ecosystem in the context of the photo.
Here’s my last attempt at the “dramatic”. Without any explanation ahead of time, what would you say it was?
While leading a couple of Japanese kayakers in the Lynn Canal fjord, a 40 ton humpback whale breached. We sat there with our cameras wondering IF and WHEN it would breach again. It jumped out of the water where we didn’t expect it to, so when I turned around to take a photo, all I got was this huge splash. But without context, it could either be a meteor crashing into the sea or an underwater explosion. Although this shot missed the whale, I vote that it meets the criteria for dramatic!
I first learned about the Lens Artist challenge by following “Travels and Trifles” on WordPress, by Tina Schell. A different Lens Artist Challenge comes out each week. I recommend doing some virtual traveling with any one of the eight hosts.
They say that cats have nine lives. That may also hold true for some people. Therefore, you should not feel sadness while gazing at the tombstone of Mick VII. There is a lesson from his life that can relate to all of us. I can say that because I knew him well. He was my father. I am his son, Mick VIII.
Rest in Peace, Dad
While it looks like he lived a short life of only 24 years, he packed a lot of life into that short time frame. Like the other Micks who preceded him, his life was not only shaped by the genes of his lineage, but was heavily influenced by the people around him and the places he visited. And as with all of us, each stage in his life required him to change to adapt to his changing circumstances. Hopefully, I can learn some lessons from his failures so as not to repeat them, while analyzing some of his successes so that I can have a better life for myself. With each iteration of ourselves in successive life stages, we hope to be a better version of our previous selves, while still embracing and acknowledging imperfection.
Mick VII was a professor of Geography and had a passion for travel and teaching. He was born in 1997. Shortly after leaving the womb he began teaching community education classes for Central Oregon Community College, with courses on New Zealand, Wilderness, and Alaska Travel. We can readily see the influence of his father, Mick VI, who was a Wilderness Guide in Alaska in the 1990s. Later, he became a full time professor of Geography, teaching Weather and Climate, and classes in Regional, Cultural, Economic, and Environmental Geography. But unlike the other Micks before him, his focus on travel became global in nature. Before his untimely death in 2020 (doctors ruled that the Covid 19 pandemic was a contributing factor, but not the ultimate cause of his death), he traveled to 46 different countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, and Latin America. He could say “Thank You”, in over 20 languages. He knew how to be frugal and travel on a budget. He climbed high mountains, including Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania and the Licancabur Volcano in Bolivia. And, during his last year of life, he got to lead a study abroad group of 14 students to Barcelona, Spain! He also started a travel blog called Geographicaljourneys.com .
Mick VII leading his students on a Field Trip at Smith Rock in 2018
But for all of the good that he tried to do, like many of us, he had his flaws. He learned how to work hard, but not always work smart. He was a hopeless introvert who needed a lot of time alone to recover after interacting with people all day. Sometimes he drank too much on the weekends, didn’t get the right amount of sleep, and he could’ve been more proactive about his diet. At times he was a little too quick to judge and could get easily frustrated by other people. And because he taught me, his son, some of those bad habits, I will have to attempt to unlearn some of them.
Now that I am transitioning to a new life phase called “retirement”, I will have to find a new purpose for my life. I also have to live such a life as to set a good example for my own son, Mick the IX, whom I’ve yet to meet. If I’m lucky, I will have one more life change yet to come. But it is important to remember that the consequences of the choices we make today will have an impact on our future selves. That is a concept that we all wish our former selves had learned at an earlier age!
Although I may never travel to as many countries as Mick VII did, I will try to continue some of the work that he started. I will continue to post blogs to the website he started back in 2019. Since he climbed 44 state high points, I will try to complete at least four more to get him close to his goal of 49 of 50. Mount Denali in Alaska was out of his league, and I am too old to attempt that for his sake. I also am still rehabilitating a severe arm injury. Therefore, I may not be able use an ice axe and cross a couple of glaciers to summit Gannett Peak, the high point of Wyoming. So, I hope he won’t be too disappointed if both of our combined high points may only add up to 48.
To honor my father, I also tried to teach part time at the college, but it was clear that they didn’t want me as his replacement. Maybe I can find a way to teach other than being in a formal classroom. Also, I have committed to doing volunteer work at the Giving Plate (our local food bank in Bend), which is something he talked about doing before he died. My focus will include being more involved in my community. I hope that whatever I end up doing will make him proud of me.
All of the iterations of each of our lives may come from the same loaf of baguette (the dough of which we are made). We are who we are. We can’t change our DNA, and we were socialized as young people by our parents and the groups around us. However, it is possible to make a few subtle changes to who were are, or hope to become. Take your life (your baguette) and learn how to make a different meal, depending on which sauces you choose to dip it in. The type of sauce you dip your life into is heavily influenced by the friends you keep, and the environment you are in. Invest in keeping relationships with good old friends. Jettison the excess baggage in your life. Find a good environment to interact with and make a positive contribution to that environment. Although the bread remains the same, each piece of baguette will be a different size. And, when you switch from dipping that piece of bread into olive oil and oregano instead of hummus, you wind up with a slightly different taste.
WINTER is finally here in Bend, Oregon
All of this makes me circle back to how a geographical journey can help to make a new sauce for your life’s baguette. A geographical journey, whether it be actual or virtual, can help you to find a different flavor of sauce to dip your life into. It can help you gain a new perspective on your own situation, or see your current situation through different eyes. If you can’t make a journey to a new place, then take a walk in a familiar place, but take notes on what you see, hear, smell and sense when you do.Read a book where the story is based in another country. Take a cooking class and research the places where the ingredients come from. Maybe begin to learn a new language. Outward journeys can lead to inward journeys, which may in turn result in personal growth.
Maybe like me, you are currently struggling with finding your footing while going through a transition in your life. You may have lost someone important to you, like how losing Mick the VII was for me. Or, you may be struggling with one of the many different kinds of challenges and curveballs that life throws us. Whichever the case, I encourage you to take a geographical journey, whether it be near or far. If you are not able to make your own journey, then I invite you all to take a virtual journey with us in 2024.
In 2024, the first thing we will be doing is a bathroom remodel. We plan to spend a little more time at home, which used to be just a base camp between travels. Now, even our home is going through a life transition. After that, Beth and I hope to ride a bike in three new states, climb Sassafras Mountain, show visiting relatives some sights in Central Oregon, and take lots of local and regional trips. We might even visit a new MLB park. Mick VIII hopes to visit Svalbard, and also do a 75 mile backpack in the Sierras. Between actual trips, we will be sitting in our new hot tub and taking many virtual trips while looking up at the night sky! There’s nothing more we would like than to be able to share those trips with you!
Dear readers, “We wish you health and happiness in 2024 in whatever life transition you find yourself in! Peace be with you….”
Anyone who has ever had their dreams come true have the same thing in common. They all started in the same place, by beginning to dream. And dreaming about travel involves gaining knowledge and being inquisitive about other places. According to essayist Pico Iyer, “the reason that we travel is not simply to escape from the stresses of daily life, but rather as a means to gain perspective and understanding about oneself and the world“.
If you’ve ever dreamed about an exotic vacation half way around the world, then you might want to consider buying a round the world ticket and combine a few more destinations. A round-the-world ticket is a flight package that lets you visit a number of destinations at a discounted price. One of the perks is that you get to book all of the tickets ahead of time at one discounted price, which may be significantly more economical than booking flights for several individual flight segments or separate vacations. And, if you wanted to bundle some different destinations with your dream destination, which ones would you choose?
However, there is a caveat when purchasing a round the world ticket. You must travel generally in one direction (i.e….each destination must be at a further longitude to the east). But for learning about previously unknown destinations and for the sake of dreaming and for future planning, I added one more requirement for a trip of my own. I chose to research alliterative destinations. If it was up to you, which letter of the alphabet would you choose? And what are the must see places on your bucket list that might align with the same letter? If you choose the B’s, would you travel from Bend, Oregon to Bogota to Barcelona to Berlin to Baku? And from there would you then travel to Bangalore, then to Bali, and onto Brisbane, to Burnaby, B.C. before heading back home? Or would you try to fit in Borneo to see Orangutans or go to Bhutan to see the Himalayas along the way?
After much thought, I decided to use the letter M. While I used to work in Manalapan, NJ and dated girls from Matawan, NJ and Marietta, GA, I decided to visit some NEW places that started with M. Therefore, since I’ve also been to Milwaukee to see the Brewers, and climbed Mount Mitchell years ago, those places didn’t make my M list either.
Marquesas Islands: Photo-Paul Gauguin Cruises
However, including a stopover in the Marquesas Islands is a MUST. There aren’t enough adjectives in the English language to describe this remote, beautiful tropical paradise in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Rugged Basalt cliffs reach into the heavens with vertical waterfalls, cascading down through emerald forests before passing through white and black sand beaches on their way to meeting the cobalt blue ocean.
Here are some of the locations that made my initial list, which after examination, some cuts will have to be made before the final trip. Longitudes are listed after the location, with the number before the colon reflecting the degrees of longitude and the number behind the colon equal to the amount of minutes of longitude. While traveling West to East, one would see West Longitude decrease all the way to zero at the Prime Meridian and then switch to East longitude with the numbers increasing until you hit the International Date Line at 180 degrees. From there West longitude starts at 180 and decreases until you reach the Prime Meridian at zero degrees. Dear readers, which of these would you choose to have on the M list and which ones wouldn’t make your cut??
Possible locations for a round the world trip beginning with M and their corresponding longitudes. Pick out a couple of them that sound interesting to you and see if they might make your cut.
Malabo 8:47E, Marquesas 139:31W, Mindanao 123E, Maribor 15:39E (Slovenia), Magadan 150:50 E, Lake Manyara 35:44E, Myanmar (Mandalay) 96:05E, Marshall Islands 168E, Maldives 73E, Maui 156:15W, Menorca 4E , Malta 14:27E, Mozambique 35E, Maromokotro 48:58 E (Madagascar- highest point on the island at 9,436′), Mauna Kea 155:28W, Mocha 43:14 E (Yemen), Murchison Falls 31:41E(Uganda), Machu Picchu 72:34W, Muscat 58:23E (Oman), Mackenzie Mountains 130W (Canada), Melbourne 144:58 E., Manzanillo 77:07W (Cuba), Malacca 102:14E (Malaysia), Mesa Verde National Park 108:28 W, Montreal 73:33W, Manaus 60W, Matanzas 81:31 W, Milford Sound 167:55E, Mumbai 72:52E, Mykonos 25:22E , Malvinas Islands 59W, Masaya Volcano 86:1W, Montenegro 19 E
Nahanni River through the Mackenzie Mountains, NWT, Canada- Photo: Canadian River Expeditions
Now, let’s put those locations in order of longitude traveling in an easterly direction, starting from Maui, Hawaii at 156 West. Pick any five and see how you like your trip!
Maui, Mauna Kea, Marquesas Islands, Mackenzie Mountains, Mesa Verde NP, Masaya Volcano, Matanzas, Manzanillo, Montreal, Machu Picchu, Manaus, Malvinas Islands, Malabo, Maribor, Malta, Montenegro, Mykonos, Murchison Falls, Mozambique OR Manyara Lake, Mocha, Madagascar, Muscat, Mumbai, Maldives, Mandalay, Malacca, Mindanao, Melbourne, Magadan, Milford Sound, Marshall Islands, then back to Maui.
Once you have your list in longitudinal order, you will have to examine it and make some difficult cuts. Some locations will be experiencing vastly different climates at the same time of year due to their LATITUDE. While that might give you the diversity of ecosystems you are after, it may be challenging to pack for a trip that includes tropical locations with Arctic or sub-Antarctic ones. I suggest deciding from six to ten destinations from the list, which should give you enough time to know each place more intimately, while still offering enough variety.
What could you expect visiting the locations on this trip? LOTS of variety and adventure and an eclectic assortment of activities, experiencing different cultures and ecosystems.
These locations offer a lot of variety in not only climate and ecosystems, but in culture. Some are urban and some are rural. One of them is in the only Spanish speaking country in Africa. You can see penguins in another location. Several are tropical paradises on islands. One has an opera house in the middle of the Amazon jungle. Most have beautifully stunning scenery ranging from volcanoes to glacially carved fjords to sandy beaches. One is currently off limits to travel by Americans, but is a generally safe place to go. A few have some dangers associated with them which may call for a short stopover, while others beg you to linger much longer. And the history…..oh my! What an interesting conglomeration of locales in which to learn about world history!!!
Gentoo Penguins in the Malvinas Islands
Things you can expect to see and experience from the list of Ms
Climbing the highest peak on the island of Madagascar and seeing Lemurs and Baobab trees while visiting there.
Speaking Spanish in the only country in Africa colonized by Spain.
Ride a camel and visit a Souk and the Al Alam Palace.
Dive in Crystal blue Mediterranean waters and explore shipwrecks from WWI and WWII.
Visit Penguin Colonies, go bird watching and speak English while doing it.
Visit the second largest city of Slovenia and enjoy one of the fine wines of the country’s wine region in the old town’s Renaissance style town hall, OR enjoy the incredible views while hiking the wine trail.
Stay in a Bungalow overlooking the electric blue waters of the Indian Ocean.
Hike through pristine Arctic Wilderness and see caribou, grizzly bear, wolves, Wood Bison, Moose, and Lynx.
Enjoy a coffee in the port city of Mocha, the origin point of coffee making.
Visit places plundered by Pirates a century or two ago. (OR during the last decade!)
Walk over the U Bein Bridge, the longest teakwood bridge in the world at 1.2 kilometers in length.
Sample exotic cuisines from several cultures on different continents.
Helping the people of Maui recover from a devastating fire in Lahaina, while still enjoying the pristine environment of the Haleakala Crater.
Mocha, Yemen- Photo:Pinterest
For some of us, especially for aficionados of Geography, the trip planning is as rewarding as the trip itself. We not only get to research the nuances of locales we were previously unfamiliar with, but learn about new ones that very well may end up on our actual bucket list. You’ll also learn which airlines have partnerships with one another and the locations that they serve.
It is a cold December night here in Oregon’s High Desert. The moon is almost full and the hot tub is at 104 F. It is cold and dark in the Mackenzie Mountains this time of year, so that destination in my alliterative trip around the world will have to wait until at least June. Located just below the Arctic Circle, the sun barely peeks above the horizon for less than an hour this time of year.
Mackenzie Mountains (Canada’s Northwest Territories) in August- Photo:Mick McCann
And since the Houthi rebels currently have control of the port city of Mocha, my cup of coffee there may have to wait until the Israel-Hamas War is over, or at least until things settle down in Yemen. But my journey around the globe tonight will surely have me visiting Manaus, Muscat, and Mandalay.
Muscat, Oman- Photo:Ootlah
And, if my wife joins me in the tub, we will surely have to make a stop in the Maldive Islands along the way. She has dreamed of going there since seeing pictures of it.
Maldive Island resort- Photo:Flying and Travel
Maybe next month I’ll fly around the world in the other direction using another letter. I’ve always wanted to go to St. Helena, Svalbard, the Seychelles archipelago, and Santiago, Chile! Who knows? Virtual travel may someday lead to actual travel. Years ago I dreamed of going to South Georgia Island and a year ago I was actually there! Even if your virtual trip only remains just a dream, won’t that help satisfy your need to engage in other cultures? In the meantime, look at all of the hydrocarbons that were not used on tonight’s journey.
I invite you all to use this exercise and modify it to suit your own needs to not only kick start your need to begin to dream about travel again, but to also gain perspective and understanding about yourself and the world you live in.
Happy travels (both virtual and actual) and a Happy New Year to you all!
When ghosts you previously ignored end up traveling hundreds of miles to get your attention, you’d better listen to them when they catch up to you again. Even more so, when they end up being famous ghosts from Pittsburgh’s past (Cool Papa Bell and Josh Gibson). Even better than that, they taught a geography lesson to a retired Geography professor! And, if all of that wasn’t enough, the other lessons that they taught me will have an impact on how I live the rest of my life….
Our previous post outlined the many ghosts that we encountered on our trip to Pittsburgh, PA. However, for those who have already read that post, you know that there were two voices that we did not hear at the time, but wished we had. We didn’t realize what we had missed while riding the Great Allegheny Passage bike trail until those ghosts made the effort and finally caught up to us in Kansas City on our way home.
McKeesport sign on the GAP trail. Wished we knew we were in Homestead, PA at the time!
1616 E. 18th St.Kansas City, Missouri 64108 (late September 2023)
We parked near the above address and walked down Buck O’Neil Way and entered the Negro League Baseball Museum. You don’t have to be a baseball fan to appreciate how this museum documents some of the forgotten paradoxical history of our nation. But being a baseball aficionado myself, this visit was doubly important. Many of the greatest players to ever play the game did not get the notoriety that they deserved simply because of the color of their skin and the era of “Jim Crow” laws in which they played. The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum is the world’s only museum dedicated to preserving and celebrating the rich history of African-American baseball and its impact on the social advancement of America.
One of the biggest stars from the Negro Leagues was Satchel Paige, who many believed was the greatest pitcher EVER. He tossed 55 no hit games, but didn’t get to pitch in the major leagues until age 42—the year after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier.
While Paige was the most famous player of the Negro Leagues, he did not play for the Homestead Grays, who were the dynastic team of the Negro Leagues from 1937-1948. That team included such sluggers as Buck Leonard and Josh Gibson. Much of the memorabilia in the museum is dominated by players from the Homestead Grays. But the Grays team of 1931 is considered by many to be the best team that ever played the game, even better than the 1927 New York Yankees.
I had a vague idea that the Grays played their ball in Washington, D.C., but needed to look into that further. After doing some research, I found that they split their time between Washington DC and Pittsburgh, and they took their name from the town of Homestead, PA. A quick Google Earth check revealed that Homestead, PA is on the Monongahela River, just east of Pittsburgh—-a town that we bicycled through just a few weeks ago without knowing it. Homestead was across the river and a bit downstream from the Steel Mill in Braddock. Braddock and Homestead had a lot of similarities in the issues that each town faced….poverty, racism, and a toxic environment from pollution. But they managed to endure….
Just then, I finally heard the voices of ghosts inside of my head…..
“We tried to tell you to stop and explore when you were there a few weeks ago!”, one voice said.
“Now that you are here in the Museum, find out all you can about our team and our lives”, said the other ghost.
During the next hour, I learned a lot more about Josh Gibson and Cool Papa Bell. And, enough about the town of Homestead that I wanted to go back and make a return trip.
A trip from Homestead, Pennsylvania to Kansas City, Missouri is 847 miles by car, IF you travel directly between the two cities. I don’t know how fast ghosts can travel. Did they travel 847 miles in the blink of an eye? Or, did they follow us the whole way as we took the LONG way to Kansas City by way of Buffalo, Toronto, Kalamazoo, Indianapolis, and Henderson, KY?
Cool Papa Bell was the only one fast enough to have followed us the whole trip by way of Toronto. How fast was he? Well, he is said to be the fastest man to play the game, and once stole 175 bases in a 200 game season. He was also clocked at rounding the bases in 12 seconds flat. Satchel Paige said Bell was so fast that he could turn off the light switch in his hotel room and be under the covers before the room got dark! Even Jesse Owens, the fastest man in the world at that time, refused to race Bell.
Josh Gibson, on the other hand, was known more for his power as a batter, and was known as the “Black Babe Ruth”. Those who saw both of them play preferred to call Babe Ruth “the White Josh Gibson”. It is reported that he hit the longest home run ever recorded, nearly 600 feet. Had they lived in another era, they would both be rich and even more famous, instead of suffering the indignities of racism while being barred from playing for Major League Baseball (MLB).
Homestead, PA is also the site of one of the deadliest labor management conflicts in our nation’s history. In July 1892, violence erupted during a strike at the Carnegie Steel Plant, resulting in the death of 12 people. That incident had negative ramifications for the town of Homestead and its residents for decades to come.
I am grateful to Cool Papa Bell and Josh Gibson for taking the time to reveal part of their lives to me. It’s hard to imagine the struggles that African-Americans in Homestead had to face during those days. We will probably never fully know how life was for them. I think of a Marcel Proust quote, “Remembrance of things past is not necessarily remembrance of how things were”. But that makes me want to learn as much as I can about the past to better see how things really were, so that we can avoid similar mistakes in the future. That’s what a visit to the Negro League Baseball Museum can do for a person.
On the mound with Satchel Paige at the Negro League Baseball Museum
With that thought in mind, I went to the library upon returning home and picked out a book that a friend of mine recommended. Then, I went to one of my secret camping spots on the “Road to Nowhere” and began to study how to create “A More Just Future”. While there, in the peacefulness of my surroundings deep within Deschutes National Forest, I reflected on the lives of the Homestead Grays players of the past, and the communities of Braddock and Homestead of today. I thought, “our lives in the present will represent some future person’s past, while also being the aspirational future of some past person”. That realization must certainly have an impact on how you will live your life from this day forward. Then, I resolved to be more analytical and see the problems of today, and then take action with what time I have left on this planet to help build a more just future for all of us. And, if you can’t figure that out on your own, you might rely on some ghosts to help you get it right!
Thankful for a place to contemplate about life
If you haven’t read the previous post about the Ghosts of Pittsburgh, here is the link to that story. Meeting The Ghosts of Pittsburgh
For Further Reading:
Negro League Baseball: The Rise and Ruin of a Black Institution, by Neil Lanctot. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004
Sandlot Seasons: Sport in Black Pittsburgh, by Rob Ruch.
The Pittsburgh Crawfords, by Jim Bankes. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland and Company, Publishers, 2001. (The Crawfords were another Negro League team from Pittsburgh)
Beyond Baseball’s Color Barrier: The Story of African-Americans in Major League Baseball, Past, Present, and Future. by Rocco Constantino, 2021. Rowman and Littlefield.
The Bona Fide Legend of Cool Papa Bell:Speed, Grace, and the Negro Leagues, by Lonnie Wheeler. 2021. New York: Abrams Press.
A More Just Future, by Dolly Chugh. 2022. New York: Simon and Schuster.
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Steel City. Three Rivers. City of Bridges. And ghosts, some of whom we’ve never met before. Many, but not all of them, ended up being friendly. But they all taught us more about ourselves and connected Pittsburgh’s past with the present in a way we couldn’t have done without them.
Our recent visit there was ostensibly to check off a couple of things from our Bucket Lists….A bike ride in another state for Beth, and another Major League Baseball park for Mick. We had expected to meet a familiar friendly ghost or two along the way, but the number of ghosts we encountered caught us by surprise. Two of them even made the trip all the way out to Kansas City to meet us a few weeks later, to chide us for not visiting them while we were in the Pittsburgh area!
Pittsburgh lies in a stunning location. Nestled between the hills of Western Pennsylvania at the confluence of the Monongahela and Allegheny Rivers, it is where the mighty Ohio River begins its long journey of nearly 1,000 miles (1600 km) to meet the Mississippi River near Cairo, Illinois. Nearby raw materials and access to shipping via the rivers made this area a geographic hot spot for America’s Industrial Revolution.
The “Golden Triangle” in downtown Pittsburgh as viewed from the top of the Duquesne Incline
We rented an apartment at an Air BnB on the north side of town, high up a hill with a view of the city. Pittsburgh is very amenable to walkers and bikers, with pedestrian lanes on every bridge we encountered. Although there was a bus stop just a few feet out our front door, we chose to walk downhill and into the city. PNC Park, home of the Pittsburgh Pirates was just over 1.5 miles away. It is an intimate classic-style ballpark, and its location on the shore of the Allegheny River allows for scenic vistas of the downtown skyline and riverfront.
From PNC park looking towards downtown and the Roberto Clemente Bridge
Our first order of business was to see the Pirates host the visiting Milwaukee Brewers. Outside of the park is a statue of one of my boyhood idols, Roberto Clemente. I was fortunate enough to see him play in person at Shea Stadium in New York in the late 1960s. As a dark skinned Puerto Rican, Clemente faced a lot of overt racism in his day. He died in a plane crash on New Year’s Eve in 1972 while trying to bring relief aid to earthquake victims in Nicaragua on an overloaded plane from Puerto Rico.
Clemente was the only Major League player to win MVP (Most Valuable Player) while playing for a last place team. He had the strongest throwing arm I have ever seen. When we witnessed the day he threw a ball from near the 371 foot sign in right field to throw out a Mets player at home plate, you heard a collective gasp from 20,000 astonished New York fans. As he trotted off the field, he got a standing ovation from the New York crowd, who are not known to be favorable to visiting players. My Dad turned to me and said, “Remember this moment. You will likely NEVER see anything like that again as long as you live!” So far, more than 50 years later, he is still right. I still get choked up thinking back to that moment.
Roberto Clemente statue outside of PNC park- communicating with the legend
Clemente was said to be able to bend nails with his bare hands, a feat surely appreciated in the city associated with Steel production. As great of a baseball player as he was, he is even more revered as a humanitarian, for his charitable work and for his passion for social justice. As I reached out and touched the hand of his statue, I thought of all of the Latino players in the major leagues that he paved the way for. For that moment, I felt connected to the man. I sensed his ghost was urging me to become a better version of myself for the sake of humanity. We then started a conversation about that in Spanish. For the sake of most of my readers, I’ll translate it into English.
Mick: “Now that I’m retired, you will be pleased to know that I’m doing a lot more volunteer work in my community”.
Roberto: “Well, I’m glad you finally got around to it.” “What took you so long?”
Mick: “The world is in a much worse place than when you were alive”. “You ought to be glad you are not here to see how bad things have become.”
Roberto sighed. “The World has always been falling apart”, he said. “The only thing that has ever made a difference is for caring people to get involved in being part of the solution to our problems. ” “You need to do even MORE now!”
What else can I say? That was some damn good advice from a ghost!
There were a couple more ghosts I wanted to meet the next day, but they were about 20 miles away in Port Vue, a borough in Allegheny County near the town of McKeesport, where I was born. I don’t remember much about that place since I was barely three years old when my parents moved away from there. But I do have a couple of experiences there that are branded into my mind. Also, I can do historical research. Since both of my parents have passed on, I went there to see where they lived, how they lived, and to ask them more about their lives when they were young. Their ghosts would have to speak to me. I can also ask my kid sister about the memories she had (she happens to still be alive and is older than I am).
We drove up the steep hills to the top of Port Vue and found the street where we lived long ago.
my neighborhood in Port Vue
Port Vue sits on top of a high hill with some of the steepest hills you can imagine being in an urban area. We imagine a delivery driver’s life drive on these roads during a winter snowstorm. Having already done those jobs in Juneau, Alaska, and Trenton, New Jersey and in the North Georgia Mountains, we both agreed that being a delivery driver in Port Vue in the Winter would be worse.
However, there was an advantage of living atop a hill. I never was afraid of the dark as a kid living there, simply because it NEVER got really dark. At night, the northwest sky would glow orange all night long due to the nearby Braddock Steel Mill operating 24 hours. I only learned to fear the darkness after we moved from Port Vue. Also, by living high above the valley where the mill was located, we suffered less from the pollution from the mill.
Our neighborhood in late 1950s Port Vue was a close knit community where neighbors visited each other for coffee, helped each other out, and looked out for each other’s interests and safety. Our good friends Grace, Jerry and Diane lived a few doors down from us. Mom recounted a story about our next door neighbor who I called Mrs. Pee-Pee because her real name sounded similar to a synonym for Pee-Pee. One day, Mrs. Pee-Pee picked up her rotary dial land line and called Mom to warn her about what her son was doing in the front yard, for all the world to see. My two year old self was buck naked and dancing while twirling my training pants around in the air. Freedom and innocence!
Mom’s ghost spoke: “That was the first time we knew you might turn out to be a little too adventurous. We were supposed to live in Port Vue, not Port View!”
According to census data the Port Vue of 1960 had almost double the population that it did in 2020. My parents moved there at the time of the highest % of population growth. In the 1950s, it was a working class neighborhood, with many people working in the Steel Mills. Present day demographics show a population that is overwhelmingly white (about 97%). Some of that can be explained by “white flight” from mixed race neighborhoods and the process of “redlining”, where banks and mortgage lenders denied loans to certain neighborhoods that they designated as high risk, largely due to racial demographics. Regardless of the causes, neighborhood changes accelerated after WWII. While my parents were never segregationists and taught their kids to value all people, they probably did benefit from more favorable mortgage rates due to their race. Since they moved into Port Vue from out of state, they were probably only looking for an affordable place to raise a family, and may have been unaware of what was happening down the hill in the town of Braddock.
The following day was an unseasonably hot September day, but we still had to check off a bike ride on a rail trail. Pittsburgh has so many options, but we felt we had to experience a little bit of one of the most famous rail trails in the nation, the GAP trail.
Point Park-Start of the GAP trail and the intersection of Three Rivers
The Great Allegheny Passage (GAP) Trail starts at Point Park in Pittsburgh’s Golden Triangle and runs for 150 miles to Cumberland, Maryland. Combined with the C & O towpath, the GAP is part of a 335 mile route all the way to Washington, D.C. We have friends that have done the whole thing. However, we would only be on the trail for one day, so our goal was to ride to McKeesport, PA 17 miles downstream on the Monongahela River to its junction with the Youghiogheny (Yocko GAIN’ Knee)River, and then return back to our apartment. We didn’t anticipate meeting any more ghosts that day. Boy, we were sure wrong about that!
View of Downtown Pittsburgh from the GAP trail
Near to downtown, next to the river and the railroad tracks, we passed by many homeless camps. The asphalt trail was cracked in places and covered in spray paint “art”. But further from town, as you pedaled through wooded areas, we saw some “upscale” homeless camps—tidy camps with double decked tents on platforms with nice fire rings in the center. They almost passed for “urban glamping”, until you thought to fast forward the calendar to Winter.
Further upstream the trail was smoother and took us past the Sandcastle Water Park, and then into an upscale retail and restaurant area on the banks of the Monongahela River. Behind a fence next to the trail, a herd of goats were happily eating trail-side brush. Further along, next to a park, a trail sign pointed the mileage to McKeesport. I didn’t know it at the time, but a couple of ghosts were trying to get my attention about something important, but apparently I wasn’t listening. We continued to ride upstream from there. Weeks later, when they came all the way out to Kansas City to speak to me, I realized we missed an opportunity to experience an important historical and cultural site. Had we realized that we were in Homestead, PA (Home of the Homestead Grays) we would have stopped there and explored more of that area.
GAP Trail sign….An important place I didn’t realize at that time
Riding further upstream, we viewed the Edgar Thomson Steel Works factory across the river in the borough of Braddock. That was the steel mill that kept me from being afraid of the dark long ago.
Edgar Thomson Steel Works in Braddock, PA
Just then, a horde of ghosts from different centuries inundated us with stories about this location. This time we listened to them, and not all of it was pleasing to hear.
Long before steel became important to the area, the area where the mill stands today was a site of a bloody battle during the French and Indian War. The ghosts who died in July of 1755 in the Battle of the Monongahela cried out to me. One of them was British General Edward Braddock, who the town is now named after.
The story of the failed Braddock expedition
More than a century after that, Andrew Carnegie and his partners brought their newfound knowledge of the Bessemer process for steel making to Western Pennsylvania and built the Edgar Thomson Steel Works plant in Braddock township. Andrew Carnegie named plant after the president of the Pennsylvania Railroad- J. Edgar Thomson. In 1892 steel workers had a strike and the corporation brought in strikebreakers which resulted in riots between the two groups. 10 people died in those riots….more harrowing ghost stories!
The Thomson Plant is currently operated by U.S. Steel. In 1901 U.S. Steel was founded by J.P. Morgan and other investors and they acquired all of the stock of the Carnegie Steel corp. In the early 1900s the mill was an important pull factor during the Great Migration of African Americans from the South. The steel mill was the center of town and was a vibrant hub of commerce as well as industry. The town had several libraries, shops and bars. It was a center of culture and a thriving community.
Steel production is essential to many industries…auto, appliance, construction and manufacturing. The logo of the company became the logo of the Pittsburgh Steelers football team. The three colors represent the three materials used to produce steel: yellow for coal, orange for iron, and blue for steel scrap.
The Thomson Steel works, one of the longest operating steel mills in the region, has long been a source of pollution in Braddock and other east Pittsburgh communities. Steel from the mill is said to have built the Brooklyn Bridge and other iconic infrastructure. But Allegheny county ranks in the top 2% of counties in the USA for cancer from air pollution. Braddock residents, most of whom today are African-American, did not have the opportunity to leave to safer communities. In the mill, many held the worst paid man-killing jobs, and redlining kept many of them from getting loans to buy homes elsewhere. Most of the African American population in the county lived in an area called “the Bottom”, which is down by the mill. White resident steel workers on the other hand, who lived side by side with their African-American neighbors, got access to bank loans and many moved away to other suburbs. A few moved uphill to places like Port Vue.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the domestic steel industry lost jobs due to foreign competition and even more white residents left the area, leaving behind communities of color even more poorer and isolated.
Present day Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman was once the mayor of Braddock in the early 2000s. The May 14, 2009 issue of Rolling Stone Magazine has an article titled “Mayor of Hell”, which describes the conditions in Braddock at that time.
Local filmmaker Tony Buba produced a documentary of four short films about the town. The film which highlights issues of land access, urban farming, and attempts of addressing the inequalities faced by the residents, is a 50 year arc of the community of Braddock. The informative film is simply titled “Braddock, PA”, and was filmed in 2018.
The plant is still in operation, but I’m not sure if it operates all three shifts. As we paused to take a photo from across the river, we heard the voices of the ghosts who used to work there as well as the ghosts who suffered environmental racism. Having heard from as many ghosts as we could handle in one day, we stopped short of riding all the way to McKeesport. We already had sensory overload. Add that to the suffocating heat and humidity, and we headed back to Pittsburgh.
On the way pedaling back through what we didn’t know at the time was Homestead, PA, the same two ghosts who later followed us to Kansas City shouted at us again. But sadly, we didn’t hear them this time either. However, finally meeting them in Kansas City is another part of this same story; one that we will address in an upcoming post.
Of all of the cities we visited on our cross-country road trip, Pittsburgh was our favorite and the most memorable. In large part, it was because of the ghosts we met who helped us connect the past with the present, and who gave us a deeper connection to the meaning of PLACE. I got to make a deeper connection with my family by visiting and studying the community that molded us in our formulative years. I got to speak Spanish with my boyhood idol. And I got to experience it with my best friend….my wife.
Dear readers, what would the ghosts of the past from your own communities say to you today? And what advice will your ghost give to people who are in your community 50 years or more into the future? And what would you tell them that you are doing now to help create a better world?
Shalom and Salaam…..
for further reading….
Biking through History on the Great Allegheny Passage Trail. by Edward K. Muller (editor) University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016.
“A bird’s-eye portrait of what was once a thriving steel town” PBS Newshour 11/16/15 https://www.pbs.org
Clemente: The Passion and Grace of Baseball’s Last Hero, by David Maraniss, 2007. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1615547449.
The Great Allegheny Passage Companion. by Bill Metzger (book), 2021. Confluence, PA. Three Wheel Press.
This stop in Pittsburgh was part of a much longer road trip which included biking in all of the Midwest States. If you missed that post, here is the link to it. A Bicycle Trail in Every State: Midwest Edition
If you think that Iowa is just a boring, flyover state, with little to offer a traveler….then THINK AGAIN! There’s a lot of variety of interesting destinations to discover, and a whole lot more to the Hawkeye State than cornfields. And, to fully understand and appreciate what you are seeing in the present, you will have to explore both the past and the future!
Iowa is not all flat. The northeast section of the state has a lot of topography for a Great Plains state. While standing atop a limestone cliff and looking down at the mighty Mississippi River below, you might feel like you were in Bavaria looking down at the Blue Danube. A large section bordering Wisconsin and Illinois near the Mississippi River is known as the “Driftless Area”, an area where the Pleistocene Ice Sheets (from 2 million to 11,700 years ago) bypassed and never bulldozed the landscape into a plain. The area lacks glacial deposits left behind by retreating glaciers which is known as “glacial drift”, and is characterized by deeply carved river valleys and limestone bluffs. The picture below is taken from Effigy Mounds National Monument from atop the cliffs overlooking the Mississippi River. Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin is on the other side of the river.
Mississippi River near Pikes Peak overlook
A little further south is the city of Dubuque, which has a funicular (Fenelon Place Elevator) that climbs to the top of the hill overlooking town. It has been called the “World’s Steepest, shortest scenic railway.” The views from the top are magnificent, and you can see three states from the top. It kind of feels like a mini-Pittsburgh, similar to riding the Duquesne incline to get an eagle eye view of Pittsburgh. But in lieu of viewing Three Rivers, you can have a view of three states instead (Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin).
Downtown Dubuque and the Fenelon Elevator
South of Dubuque, you can visit Maquoketa Caves State Park. You would have to go back much further in time, all the way to the Silurian Period of the Paleozoic Era over 400 million years ago to understand the formation of this unique Karst environment. According the the Iowa Geologic Survey, continental expansion allowed for the area to be flooded by shallow seas and receive deposits of limestone. Much later, the land was uplifted. Rainwater slowly dissolves the limestone, forming caves and grottos. A trail system allows you to access many of the formations. The area is usually closed from late October to April 15th due to bat hibernation.
Maquoketa Caves
But there is much more to the Hawkeye State than the Driftless Area. Iowa has more than 2,000 miles of paved trails in the state, and is a Mecca for bicycle tourism. In our quest to ride a bike trail in every state, we couldn’t just stop at one trail, but rode several of them in various bicycle friendly communities. The High Trestle Trail in Central Iowa from Ankeny to Woodward is considered by many to be the shining star of Iowa’s trail system, so that was our first choice for a ride. The highlight of the 26 mile trail is the iconic 13 story high bridge over the Des Moines River valley.
High Trestle Trail over the Des Moines River
We liked it so much that we returned a second day at sunset and rode across the bridge as the artistic steel cribbings on the bridge began to be lit up. The nearby town of Madrid also has a trail-side pub and food service.
High Trestle Bridge lit up
Another one of our favorite bike rides was on the Trout Run Trail around the city of Decorah. Unlike the High Trestle Trail which was a converted Railroad line and relatively flat, the Trout Run Trail gets your heart pumping navigating the 12 miles of undulating hills. On a beautiful day, we practically had the trail all to ourselves.
Trout Run Trail- Decorah, Iowa
No trip to Iowa would be complete without stopping to visit the site of filming for the 1989 movie “Field of Dreams”. We felt like we were on hallowed ground as we reminisced about the movie as we walked the baseball field there. As I disappeared into the corn at the edge of the outfield, I imagined myself to be Shoeless Joe Jackson, a ghost of baseball past.
My Ghost in the Corn- Field of Dreams
One of the iconic moments in the original movie was when Ray Kinsella (played by Kevin Costner) gets to play catch with the ghost of his father and make up for the chance that he was never able to do before his father died. A memorable line in the film was when Ray’s father asked, “Is this Heaven?”
“No, this is IOWA”, answered Ray.
There are balls, gloves and bats available when you visit, so I chose to have a catch with my wife on the infield (while we both are still alive!). Coincidentally, we watched a rerun of the movie on cable tv this past weekend, and relived that magic moment.
The movie site is known as “The Most Magical Place on Dirt.”
Ace hurler Beth McCann
Iowa also has other locales where you can experience the history and culture of Northern Europeans who migrated to the area. A visit to any one of the seven villages of the Amana Colonies in Iowa county will allow you to step into a world of authentic German ambiance.
Amana Colonies- German tradition
Maybe you would prefer to immerse yourself in Dutch culture and history instead. In that case, you might want to make a stop at either Sioux County in Northwestern Iowa, or at Pella, in Marion County.
Downtown Pella- founded by Dutch immigrants
While Iowa has an interesting past and understanding that will help you appreciate the present, you should know that Iowa will play an important role in the future, not only of our country and our planet, but of the galaxy!
Roughly 200 years in the future, Captain James Tiberius Kirk will be born in the town of Riverside, in Southeastern Iowa. That event will not only shape the lives of the crew of the Starship Enterprise and Star Fleet Command, but the ramifications of that event will place Iowa in a key role for the future of the United Federation of Planets. Would the Romulans or the Klingons have an edge in intergalactic control if Kirk was never born in Riverside?
Riverside, Iowa- important in our future!
Now that you have but a small taste of what the Hawkeye State has to offer the traveler, I hope your interest is piqued enough to do more research on your own. May you have a wonderful time when you come to Iowa to explore. And may you all Live Long and Prosper!
Since biking on the side of roads has become increasingly dangerous, we’ve switched to biking on designated biking and pedestrian trails. Beth has now added riding a bike trail in every state to her bucket list, and I am more than happy to assist her in reaching her goal. Years ago, my vow at the altar was for better or for worse. Well, this definitely qualifies for the better category!
Here we will describe some of the best trails we found to ride in the Midwest part of the country. Many of them were explored on our recent 6 week road trip across the USA with our car, carrying bikes on a rack for day trips. Exactly which states qualify as “Midwestern” is subjective in nature. Our list covers most of the Great Plains states and goes as far east as Ohio. We will include links for further research for those interested. The states are listed in alphabetical order starting with Illinois…..
Illinois
Originally, we were set to ride the Kickapoo Trail in the Champaign – Urbana area while passing eastbound through Illinois, but we bypassed it due to all of the hotels being sold out for miles away. However, on our way back westbound through the state, we found the Tunnel Hill Trail out of Harrisburg in Southern Illinois. The trail was paved through town and turned to crushed stone going south. It was a very enjoyable ride and well shaded. The entire trail stretches all the way to Karnak, 45 miles to the south.
Tunnel Hill Trail- South of Harrisburg, IL
The suburbs of Chicago also have a lot of trails, including the 61 mile Illinois Prairie Path and the 15 mile Cal-Sag Trail. There are also good rail trails in the Peoria and Rock Island areas.
Indiana
Indiana has a lot of good rail trials to choose from. We chose to ride the Monon Trail in Indianapolis, as a good friend of ours lives just blocks from the trail. The Monon has a good mix of forest which makes you feel like you are in the country, but due to its urban location, amenities are close by. http://www.bikethemonon.com
Riding with your wife is always fun, but sharing the ride with a good friend AND your wife is even better!
Bridge over the White River in Indianapolis
Right on the Monon Trail is a Farm to Table restaurant with an organic garden next to it. Public Greens is a modern cafeteria featuring locally grown produce. 100% of their profits are donated to efforts to cultivate an equitable future for youth by amplifying the value and power of food. (902 E. 64th street, Indianapolis, IN) http://www.publicgreensurbankitchen.com
Trailside Garden for Farm to Table Restaurant
Other trail biking options in Indiana include the Nickel Plate Trail, a 37 mile rail trail from Kokomo to Rochester, or the Panhandle Pathway starting in Winimac and going 22 miles south. http://www.panhandlepathway.org
Indiana is pretty flat in the north part of the state, but has some topographic relief in the southern part of the state.
Iowa
Iowa has SO many wonderful bike trails and other things worth visiting, that we feel it deserves a whole other blog by itself. The state should be renamed I-O-WOW! Stay tuned for an upcoming blog dedicated to Iowa travel.
Kansas
After visiting the Negro League Baseball Museum in Kansas City, Missouri, we stopped by to see an old friend in Prairie Village, Kansas (suburb of KC). Nearby, we found the Gary L. Haller Trail and rode from the start outside of Shawnee, Kansas. If you thought all of Kansas was flat as a pancake, you’d be very wrong. The Haller Trail was one of our favorite trails. Although it had some hills, the sinuous trail traversed through woodlands, meadows, and several suburban parks….a wonderful ride!
Gary L. Haller Trail- Shawnee, KS
The picture below is a spur trail that connects to the main Haller Trail. One would not expect such topography in Kansas!
This doesn’t feel like the Kansas I imagined!
Michigan
With so many trails to choose from in Michigan, deciding which ones to ride makes for tough choices. Just after leaving Ontario, Canada, the first town we arrived at was Port Huron, on the banks of the St. Clair river, where we did a short 10 mile ride.
Port Huron on the St. Clair river. Canada is on the other side of the Bridge
For a longer ride, we chose part of the Fred Meijer – White Pine Trail starting near Grand Rapids, MI. Curiously, we didn’t see evidence of White Pine trees on our section of the trail, but there was an abundance of Beech, Sugar Maple and Huckleberry trees. The 92 mile trail connects Comstock Park in Grand Rapids to Cadillac, MI. The southern section that we rode was paved and in good condition. We heard the pop, pop, pop of exploding huckleberries on the trail as our tires rode over them. We stopped in Cedar Springs at their local brewery for a tasty lunch, before riding back to Grand Rapids for a 36.5 mile day ride.
White Pine State Trail- north of Grand Rapids,MIgood lunch stop just off the trail in Cedar Springs
Minnesota
Minnesota has one of the most expansive rail trail networks of any state. There are half a dozen rail trails spanning more than 100 miles each. You can find one in any section of the Gopher state. We chose to ride two trails; parts of the Mesabi Trail in the Iron Mountain Range and the Willard Munger Trail out of Duluth. Both were exceptional.
We jumped on the Mesabi Trail at its start in Grand Rapids, MN (Yes, Minnesota does have a Grand Rapids as does Michigan). From the fairgrounds in Grand Rapids, the trail undulates northeastward, through countryside and many tiny hamlets like Calumet, Taconite, Marble, Nashwauk, and Keewatin on the way to Hibbing at mile 43. In between are hills and lakes where you will hear the cry of the loon. Hibbing is where American Folksinger Bob Dylan grew up. After a nice lunch at a restaurant with outdoor seating, we rode back to Grand Rapids, making our longest day trip of 86 miles.
Most of the 135 miles of trail which stretch all the way to Ely in the Boundary Waters Canoe trail are paved. More miles seemed to be added each year.
Map of Mesabi Trail
From Duluth on the shores of Lake Superior, we rode part of the 70 mile route of the Willard Munger Trail. There was one steep section climb through a beautiful canyon to the south, before the trail levels out.
Other great trails in the Gopher state include the Paul Bunyan Trail (119 miles from Bemidji to Brainerd), The Central Lakes State Trail (55 miles from Fergus Falls to Osakis), and the Lake Wobegon Trail (65 miles starting in St. Cloud). The Twin Cities also have many paved trails in their urban areas.
Missouri’s Katy Trail is one of the premier rail trails in the United States. The entire trail is 240 miles long and almost spans the entire width of Missouri.
Limestone Cliffs on the Katy Trail near Rocheport, MO
We chose two different sections to ride; one section near Rocheport which has a tunnel nearby and sections along the Missouri River, and another section further west near Clifton City which has an old train signal still standing on the side of the trail.
Katy Trail near Clifton City, MO
Many people make a whole week’s vacation on riding the entire trail and stopping in Bed and Breakfast lodges each night in towns along the way.
The longest trail in Nebraska is the Cowboy Trail, which runs 195 miles across the northern part of the state from Valentine in the west to Norfolk in the east. Car trouble in South Dakota took us off of this route on our way east, but we managed to come to Valentine on the way back home and experience a little bit of the trail over the Niobrara River bridge in the morning fog after a rain the previous day. The crushed stone trail was in great shape, and we saw more new sections being constructed on our drive west towards Kilgore.
While in the Omaha area, we rode several trails including the Keystone Trail, the Big Papio Trail, and the Bob Kerry Pedestrian Bridge connecting Omaha to Council Bluffs, Iowa.
Bob Kerry Bridge over the Missouri River linking Omaha to IowaState line markers in the middle of the Bob Kerry Bridge
Just a few minutes east of the Montana/North Dakota border lies the short Fairview Bridge and Cartwright Tunnel rail trail from the abandoned Montana Eastern Railway. Built in 1913 to span the Yellowstone River, the route was used by trains until 1955.
Fairview Bridge and Tunnel- Yellowstone River- near Cartwright, NDInside the Cartwright Tunnel- Pretty cool!
Our original plans were to also ride the trails in Grand Forks, on the other side of North Dakota, but we diverted south to experience the Enchanted Highway instead. If you missed our previous post about it, here it is again….Cruising the Enchanted Highway
Ohio
The Ohio and Erie Canal Towpath Trail traverses through Cuyahoga National Park south of Cleveland. If you don’t have your own bike, you can rent one from Century Cycles store in Peninsula which is adjacent to the towpath. The trail is over 90 miles long, with about 20 of that within the National Park. Wonderful to have such beautiful nature so close to urban areas!
Another great trail in Ohio is the Little Miami Scenic Trail which spans almost 80 miles through southwestern Ohio along the Little Miami River. http://www.miamivalleytrails.org
Oklahoma
Most of the bike trails in Oklahoma are around the metropolitan centers of either Tulsa or Oklahoma City. We were pleasantly surprised how much good biking there was in Oklahoma. If you missed our previous specific post on biking Oklahoma city, here is the link to it Exploring Oklahoma City by bicycle
The 109 mile George S. Mickelson Trail in the Black Hills is the most well known trail to people outside of the Mount Rushmore state. But on the other side of the state lies Sioux Falls, which has a 29 mile paved Sioux Falls Greenway Bike Trail that wraps around the Big Sioux River greenway. It passes through scenic urban and wildlife areas.
near Falls Park in downtown Sioux FallsView of Sioux Falls from the bike trail near downtown
Wisconsin
The link below will lead you to a plethora of choices in the Badger state. There are some great options in the Milwaukee and Madison areas. Years ago, I rode the Sugar River State Trail from Brodhead to New Glarus (23 miles). This year we chose the Platteville area and rode the Rountree Branch Trail and the Mound View State Trail. Start at the Platteville Visitor center to access the Rountree Branch trail which follows a creek until you get out of town. The trail is relatively flat until after a few miles after you reach the Mound View State Trail, where you will have some undulating hills. One of the things I remember most about this ride was the insane number of grasshoppers jumping as we rode down the trail. On one section of the trail, it felt like we were pedaling inside of a popcorn popper. Sadly, a few of them committed suicide by jumping right into the path of our tires.
open meadow on the Mound View trail
Wisconsin is chock full of great biking trails all over the state. For a full slate of what the state has to offer for cyclists, check out this webpage http://www.wisconsinbiketrails.com
For more information on specific abandoned railroads which have been turned into bicycle trails, check out the Rails to Trails Conservancy website and click on the Experience Trails button and scroll down to the Hall of Fame link to find the best trails. http://www.railstotrails.org
Beth and I have now pedaled in 38 states. Most of the ones we have left to do are in New England area and the Eastern seaboard. The planning for the logistics of those future trips starts now.
Seeing forty foot high pheasants while driving across the prairie is an enchanting experience. New Mexico may call itself the “Land of Enchantment”, but you will have to travel far, far from there to find the Enchanted Highway.
Geese in Flight-2001
The Enchanted Highway is a 32 mile stretch of highway in Western North Dakota which boasts the world’s largest collection of scrap metal sculptures. The road starts at Interstate 94 at exit 72 east of Dickinson and heads south to its terminus at Regent, North Dakota. Local sculptor Gary Greff began this monumental roadside art project in 1989 starting with his own resources. The above picture of “Geese in Flight” (completed in 2001) is visible to travelers on Interstate 94 and is a wonderful enticement to take a detour south to experience several other sculptures. This sculpture is 110 feet tall and 150 feet wide. Several guy wires anchor it in place to protect it from the harsh Dakota winters.
Every few miles you will find another enchanting roadside installation. The next one is called Deer Crossing, which was completed in 2002.
Deer Crossing-2002
Further down the road you will find the “Grasshoppers in the Field” sculpture, which was completed in 1999. And you thought you had big bugs where you live!!
our Subaru is in the background
One of the more colorful pieces is titled “Fisherman’s Dream”, which was completed in 2006. Much of the scrap metal used for the roadside art comes from recycled oil well tanks and piping.
Fisherman’s Dream
These 40 foot tall sculptures in “Pheasants on the Prairie” were my favorites. We saw these on what would have been my mother’s 101st birthday. She was a bird lover and would have been amazed by them. She died in 1996, which was the year that the sculpture was completed.
Pheasants on the Prairie- 1996
Teddy Roosevelt spent a lot of time in North Dakota and the land had a huge influence on his life. A nearby national park is named after him. This piece of roadside art is titled “Teddy Roosevelt Rides Again”, and was completed in 1993.
Teddy Roosevelt Rides Again-1993
The Tin Family sculpture was the first one completed by Greff, and it is the closest to the town of Regent where he was born and raised.
Tin Family – 1991
At the end of the Enchanted Highway lies the town of Regent, where you can spend the night at the Enchanted Castle and look outside and see a giant dragon and a knight.
If you ever find yourself anywhere near Western North Dakota, take time to make a sojourn down this highway. No disrespect to the state of New Mexico, but we felt like we were in the Land of Enchantment on this 32 mile drive!
Geographical Journeys 