After nearly a year of abstention from all non-essential travel, with vaccinations in our immune systems, and receipts to prove it, we ventured out into the wilderness of northern Michigan and Wisconsin to take in the stunning coastline of the world’s largest body of freshwater (by surface area): Gichigami, or Lake Superior.
Our adventure began at Union Bay Campground in the Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park in Michigan’s upper peninsula. Danielle and I first visited this park in 2015 while we were en route to Denver from DC. We’ve been back several times since to do day hikes up to Lake of the Clouds and along Presque Isle River’s the waterfalls. But this park, with its 90 some miles of trail, always beckoned us back for a longer stay we finally redeemed this year.
Continue reading “Memorial Day Weekend 2021: Porcupine Mountains and Madeline Island”47.5450527-90.0887262
There’s a certain uneasiness you feel looking out over the walls lining the north rim of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. It’s not unlike the feeling you get when you put you head against the glass of a skyscraper and look down at the street below. Except instead of a street and people there’s rock, a river, and an ecosystem below your feet. Instead of other buildings stretching outward from your vantage point, it’s cliffs, weathered towers, and geologic implausibilities.
Continue reading “A Black Canyon and a beautiful valley”
It’s a shame that a land once open to free movement among dozens of different tribes and nations is now divided by increasingly rigid borders. Long distance trade in ancient America was a massive part of Peubloan life and indeed civilizations across mesoamerica. Evidence of cacao, a tropical tree that gives us chocolate, has been found at Bandelier, Pueblo Bonito at Chaco, and Hohokam communities in desertous Arizona. Turquoise from Puebloan communities has been found throughout Mexico, including at Chichen Itza, almost 2500 miles away. Given the humanitarian crisis at the US-Mexico border, and talks from our president to shut the border down completely, the free movement of people and good across these regions sometimes feels like a relic of history.
Continue reading “A trip to Santa Fe, Nuevo México”
After about 13 hours of labor on Friday, August 24th, László Rivers HarmsBoone was born at 1:09 PM, weighing 6 pounds, 11 ounces. László is pronounced “lahss-low” and we’ll call him Laci (pronounced “lotsy”) for short. His name is a favorite of ours from our days teaching English in Hungary. The Lászlós we knew, one in particular, were helpful, kind, and welcoming to us when we first arrived in Kaposvár and the name took on quite a lot of meaning to us. His middle name, Rivers, was his great-great-grandma Isabelle Petroske’s maiden surname.
Continue reading “László Rivers”
This summer we had the good fortune to get invited to a wedding on the island of Kaua’i in Hawai’i, the islands in the Pacific home to many fine federal judges. We figured, since we were going all the way there, we might as well make a vacation out of it, and we split our time between Kaua’i and the Big Island of Hawai’i.
Continue reading “Hawaii and back”