When an organization whose Board you’re on schedules its annual conference in Las Vegas, you sign up for the tax-deductible vacation. When you find out an artist you’ve loved for 35+ years has a very rare live performance at the same time, you go early and make it a weekend […]
We pulled into Montgomery, Alabama at the Rosa Parks Library and Museum at 11am on Saturday; a few minutes later, the five of us plus my mother-in-law were inside a city bus simulator traveling through history. We walked through the attached museum and then drove over to the Alabama Department […]
*Thanks to Hanes for sponsoring this post* Colorado has 4 distinctly awesome national parks. I saw 3/4 of them in 1987 when my folks drove my brother and me from Nashville in a two-toned ’83 Suburban, and I’ve wanted to go back with my own family and explore the diverse […]
We woke up early (and cold) in our tent on Friday, April 6. It was my 9th soloversary (I like to remember the anniversary of quitting my job and starting my own law firm; it’s also my late maternal grandfather’s birthday), and we had a very difficult-to-book ranger-led canoe trip […]
We arrived at historic Jamestown as soon as it opened on Thursday morning, exploring the glasshouse and fort buildings before going to the archaearium and visitor center (taking in a 360-degree film there–best NPS movie theater I’ve seen!), where I added a cancellation to my NPS passport book. The guide […]
On Tuesday of spring break 2018, we awoke in downtown Richmond and arrived just after 9am at Tredegar Iron Works to see the national park service visitor’s center, so the children could get yet another junior ranger badge whilst we toured where the CSS Virginia (FKA the “USS Merrimack”) was […]
We’d barely finished our “Easter eggs Benedict” and put away the chocolate wrappers littering the den area rug when the 5 of us loaded up in my car to head up I-85 north for a Spring Break road trip of national parks in Virginia and the Carolinas. We were still […]
We arose at 4:20am, quickly donned winter coats, and headed out for the winding uphill climb to Haleakala Observatory. We parked the car at 5:30am and walked to the observation tower; it was 20-something degrees outside and windy, but we were determined to experience the famous Haleakala sunrise. Unfortunately, the […]
For over 30 years, I’ve wanted to ride in one of those “air boat” (or is it a “fan boat”?) things in shallow water, dodging alligators like a slalom skier with the wind blowing in my face. Last July, we drove from Atlanta to Florida Everglades National Park to do […]
We left Atlanta on December 27th and headed north, stopping for soul food at Southern Star in Chattanooga, our borrowed Kia Sedona packed for 1,000 miles of exploration across the Bluegrass State. A couple hours later, we were peeing at the Kentucky Welcome Center off I-65, and 45 minutes after […]