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Archive for the ‘Travel’ Category

By Night

Posted in Beauty, General, Outdoors, Photo, Travel, tagged Beauty, Outdoors, Photos, Travel on March 25, 2014| Leave a Comment »

I have the occasional ideas in the back of my head of things I’d like to try. I don’t frequently voice them and then only to certain people. So try this one out. Get up at 2:15 AM. Meet before 3 AM and travel to begin a hike before 4 AM. Make it a cold, windy morning on an exceptionally rough trail. Add patches of ice that you didn’t know would be there. Include parts of the ridge that are windswept and the trail runs along the cliff edge. Make it your goal to reach the summit at 4.5 miles at sunrise. That describes the first half of our hike from Boones Fork Parking Area on the Parkway to Grandfather Mountain on Saturday. The two guys that I persuaded to go along agreed that the trail was significantly easier by light of day than by light of headlamp. I had to throw out a full half of the pictures because steadying yourself in 30+ mph wind makes pictures a blur. I got back home before noon and spent the remainder of the day with my wife conversing and pruning the apple trees. It was a wild idea but I’m glad I tried it once.

Windy Time exposure

Clouds Obscured Horizon Sunrise

Attic Window Peak

Coming off McCrae Peak

In the Boulder Patch

McCrae Peak from Attic Window Peak

Morning Glow

The Attic Window

Indian Cave on Ice

Hump Mtn “just beyond” the Grandfather Golf Course

Alpine Meadow Rest

Attic Window Peak from Calloway Peak

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Long Distance Piano Delivery

Posted in Beauty, Climbing, General, Outdoors, Photo, Travel, tagged Beauty, Climbing, Outdoors, Photos, Relationship, Travel on December 31, 2013| Leave a Comment »

We had said that when they settled into a house we would give them my father’s piano. We wanted to visit children and grandchildren anyway, but delivering a piano via the back of an open pick-up truck in winter north of the Mason-Dixon Line is a challenge, especially when it is fine mahogany and the forecast calls for intense rain. We made the first leg of trip and got the instrument under cover for two days of intense rain without any hitch, visiting with my daughter, grand-daughter, and son-in-law. We started off on the second leg of the journey from Virginia to Pennsylvania thinking the rain was over and met with some light showers but the covering repelled and the padding softened. It was good to hear it sing again at the hands of my daughter-in-law and their church pianist, albeit out of tune from the long temperature, humidity, and vibrational changing delivery. We had all of the family present but the youngest who was at the a Georgia beach with his girlfriend and her family. The possibility of getting them all together in one place at the same time diminishes as the years pass. On Tuesday my second-born son and I went to Chickies Rock on the Susquehanna River. Afterwards we went down to Muddy Run Preserve and walked around the lake. On Christmas day I ran 9 miles, the most distance for a continuous run I have ever done. I may be able to run a 1/2 marathon in the Spring. The next day we had a totally unexpected snow of 2-3 inches that was only forecast to be a snow shower. That prevented a trip to Gettysburg but we went to Reading Rocks indoor climbing wall in the afternoon. The next day we visited Valley Forge and many of the historic sites downtown in Philadelphia. Before the day was over we collected two pieces of furniture from my son-in-law’s grandmother to take to Virginia on the way back home. On Saturday we had all of the family, save the youngest son as I have said, over for lunch and a visit. On Sunday after church we visited with some friends, a family of 11 children. They are so pleasant and well behaved. In the evening the pastor, who is also my eldest son’s father-in-law, and several of his children came to visit. It was a full but enjoyable day. I was able to run several times over these days and my second son gave me a Garmin satellite watch that I can register distance, pace, course, and time. The watch is fun and allows for further goal setting but all of this technology reminds me how easily we may be watched. I am thankful that my Father up above is watching, directing, correcting, and providing. Submission to such a kind and benevolent Authority is restful and I wander why I ever resist it. I desire to submit and succeed by His grace in the coming year. A blessed New Year to you all.

Chickies Rock

Muddy Run Preserve

Washington’s Headquarters at Valley Forge

Great Blue Herron

Washington Memorial Chapel

City Hall

Christ Church

Ben Franklin’s Print Shop

Carpenter’s Hall

Independence Hall

Liberty Bell

Philadelphia Train Station

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Home Again, Home Again, Jiggety-Jog

Posted in Climbing, General, Photo, Travel, tagged Climbing, Photos, Travel on August 12, 2013| Leave a Comment »

What might the following pictures have in common?

Digital Native

Cornwall Iron Furnace

Busted Bus Replacement

The Angle

Flood Remnant!?

Little Round Top

General Longstreet

Cabela’s

Stroll Forest and Glade

Painting on Turkey Tailfeathers

Proud Grandparents

National Watch and Clock Museum

Firstborn Son

Reading Rocks

The indoor climbing wall in Reading is challenging! I bouldered, topropped, and even led one climb in nearly 4 hours of climbing. The pegboard climb was most challenging, using only arms to move pegs up a pegboard you are hanging from. Surveying the history of time measurement and timepieces and how they work, the difference in time measurement by period and country, and displaying some amazing and rare examples, The National Watch and Clock Museum is a worthwhile destination. Nature art we saw at an art show, I realized, is most amazing and best when it best copies the beauty God instilled in nature. He is the Ultimate Artist we all try to emulate. It is quite the sales strategy to make your store a museum for what your customers love best. Cabela’s draws people in to their museum of mounted large mammals and fish tanks so they are near outdoor equipment they sell. The High Water Mark of the Confederacy occurred at this battlefield. Do you know which one it is? The Cornwall Iron Blast Furnace clearly details the importance of iron/steel in our history, the process of mining it and producing iron stock, and the importance of this particular Furnace and to American history. Electrical work provides a consistent living. You can’t imagine us never needing electricians. What these pictures have in common is our visit to see our grand-babies, family, and sightsee along the way. Adding also a play called “Acts, the Three Man Show” and two church services with excellent preaching, it was a whirlwind tour.

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Double Time March

Posted in General, Photo, Travel, tagged Photos, Travel on July 6, 2013| Leave a Comment »

My wife and I took a quick trip to visit the 2nd lieutenant son at Fort Benning over the long weekend off for the 4th. We spent a considerable amount of time at the National Infantry Museum owing both to its quality and to the incessant rain. The Riverwalk in Columbus is interesting also:

Shoals on Cataloochee at Columbus

Great Blue Heron fishing The center of town is nice, too.

Broadway scene

War is a necessary evil in this fallen world. Consider how the infantrymen have bought and maintained our freedom. They are not the ones deciding we should be in a particular place at a particular time. Look somewhere else to determine or blame for why we fight certain wars.

Civil War era cannon shot

Bradley light armored troop transport

Ranger Monument

What are we using now?

Barracks

Right flank of the Battle of the Bulge is where my father took shrapnel

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Costa Rica

Posted in Beauty, General, Outdoors, Photo, Travel, tagged Beauty, Outdoors, Photos, Travel on June 29, 2011| 2 Comments »

Five students, two parents, and I went on a tour of the natural beauty of Costa Rica from June 17-25. It was a very active tour walking, ziplining, horseback riding, walking, swimming in the ocean and in a lake, walking, swam in hot springs, and kayaking. The walks were never long but the destinations were great. We walked along a forest trail about 1 mile to get to a pristine beach where monkeys and raccoons stole food and backpacks. We walked perhaps 2 miles in the Cloud Forest above 5000′ where full sunlight rarely shines. We walked to town to eat or shop. We walked on the beach at the hotel. We walked and ran through airports. We walked down into a gorge to see a 150′ waterfall. We walked to the rim of an active volcano and looked at the cadera steaming. And we spent a good number of hours each day on a tour bus between events.

One of the many beauties of InBio Parque

Our Tour Director, Victor Carmona

We traveled with two other student groups, one from Nebraska and one from Lancaster, PA. The Pennsylvania group particularly was advanced in Spanish and could communicate or translate with little trouble.

Great Egret

One afternoon we took a boat ride on a river near its mouth at the ocean. We went upstream and saw massive crocodiles and went downstream and saw to a mangrove forest. During the 1 1/2 hour ride I saw 22 different species of birds.

Yellow-headed Caracara

Another day we hiked down hundreds of steps to a waterfall. The rain threatened and sprinkled but as was the case with all but one event, it didn’t rain on us while we were outside. The one event was the planting of trees on a preserve at a high school. For obvious reasons I don’t have pictures of that because it rained hard.

Teacher and students of Escuela Cabella

Kayaking in sight of the Arenal Volcano

The continuously steaming caldera of Poas Volcano

There is a continuous burning place where those who reject God’s provision for sin will go, but there is also a place of paradise where His beloved, those who humbly accept His provision will be in His presence forever. Beauty and peace and joy here are only vague shadows of an eternity in the presence of God. We were made for fellowship with Him.

600 meter zipline

Beach at Manuel Atonio National Park

The variety of what we saw and did made this a very enjoyable trip. Rather than sleep on the bus or just stare out the window, I took in the views but also journaled the events soon after they happened, some 30 pages. Victor was constantly conveying details of a cultural or biological or physical nature about Costa Rica. It is a landscape of tremendous natural resources: water, volcanic soil, tropical climate, a stable government, and people who seem happy and productive.

“Pura vida”, as they say in Costa Rica, or literally, “pure life”. It is there way of saying peace and contentment in all of life’s joys and struggles. May the light of God’s life be given unto you as I hope it might be for the people of Costa Rica.

La Fortuna Waterfall

Everywhere beautiful flowers, butterflies, birds, mountains, beaches

San Jose at night from a rustic resturant

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Paris deux

Posted in General, Photo, Travel, tagged Photos, Travel on February 24, 2011| 1 Comment »

Napoleon III's smoking parlor at the Louvre

I had traveled six years ago to Montana at no cost. As a single income teacher I haven’t much disposable income. The bills are paid and I have no complaint about God’s provision. In fact this is a testimony to His abundant provision. After those six years I began to think over a week’s time about traveling again. So I ask my Heavenly Father if He would provide me with another trip, adding that I would be content if no trip occurred. Less than two weeks later the company I am traveling with to Costa Rica this summer called to sell me on pursuing a student trip since I had e-mailed desire to find out about such things several years earlier. It was obviously a sales pitch from their perspective but I chose to see it as an answer to prayer and an encouragement to my faith. I’m not pushing health and wealth lifestyle but we may ask and God is very generous. Then I find out that the company also has training tours for first time group leaders and that is why I went to Paris. I prayed for and was given many opportunities to testify to God’s goodness, the Gospel, His power, and the need for faith. It was a good trip in many respects. Enjoy the pictures.

Emperor Trajan

Stone of the Catacombs listing martyrs' names and Chi Rho at center

Code of Hammurabi ca.1750 BC

Coffee Shop near the Naval Academy

Birds in the hair are the style, right?

Sword of Charlemayne

The Gardens of Versailles

Hall of Mirrors

Notre Dame Cathedral

Eifel Tower

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Paris!!

Posted in General, Photo, Travel, tagged Photos, Travel on February 22, 2011| 3 Comments »

I just got back from a quick trip to Paris! Leaving on Thursday morning I arrived in Paris at 7:50 AM Paris time. We began tour immediately, meaning I went on about 4 hours sleep in a 30 hour day. We visited all the sites and I didn’t have to pay for plane, meals, sites, or hotel. Looking down the Champs Elysees to the Arch de Triomphe to the west and the Louvre to the east, I was amazed to be there. I ran all over the Louvre in four hours from ancient Greek and Roman statuary to Reformation paintings. I saw the Mona Lisa, Winged Victory of Samothrace, Venus de Milo, statues of the Caesars, winged bulls of the Assyrians, the Code of Hammurabi, the apartments of Napoleon III, Medieval. Renssaince, and Reformation paintings. I went up in the Eifel Tower, down along the Seine River, later in a night boat ride around the islands of Paris and down to the Eifel Tower. I visited three cathedrals, Versailles and its gardens, walked up Montmarte artist district, ate in the Latin Quarter, navigated the Metro, and flew internationally for the first time, and more. Check out a few of my pictures.