I'll admit, I'm not the best blogger. I have my spurts of blogging energy and then find myself too engaged with life to take a moment to sit down and reflect (something I should be doing more of nowadays). I am always shocked to see that it has been a month or more since my last post!
We concluded our wonderful road trip adventure a few weeks ago in Blacksburg and as of last week I moved out of town back to my parents in Northern Virginia. I'm definitely going to miss all Blacksburg had to offer, but there are definitely exciting opportunities coming down the pipe.
Here are the pictures from the rest of our trip!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2521270&id=6232754&l=bc9a65b814
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2522629&id=6232754&l=c4a72da1a2
I spent a good 28 hours on a really awesome ~30 minute video putting the entire trip together. Unfortunately there are several copyrighted songs in it so I cannot upload it to sites like Vimeo or YouTube. I threw a version of it on my website (don’t sue me!), but expect it to take a long while to load at 2.2 GB. The quality is regretfully lower than I would have liked, but I ran out of time to compress it appropriately.
A new chapter in my life will start in two weeks with the bound-to-be-quite-crazy adventures of Green Corps, a national non-profit environmental organizing training school. Out of thousands applying across the nation, only 25-30 get accepted... I guess running for town council didn't hurt my chances.
My training starts August 1st up in Boston. Halfway through training I’ll find out where in the nation I’ll end up for my first of several 3-month assignments. I’ve been pushing for Hawaii but I don’t think that’s likely, so I’ll settle (if I can) for something on the west coast. Either way after experiencing the U.S. through our road trip I’m pretty excited to be anyplace new!
Another exciting tidbit- our guest trainers for August include the Executive Directors / Presidents of the Center for Health, Environment, and Justice, Greenpeace, Environment America, and the Union of Concerned Scientists. Quite a lineup!
My goal is to blog a bit more regularly over the next year, so keep your fingers crossed and / or yell at me!
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Monday, June 7, 2010
Facebook Woes
Unfortunately the privacy settings with Facebook won't let me share videos unless you are an account holder. Once I get a chance I'll upload the videos I have on YouTube (likely after the roadtrip).
In the mean time you can check out the third album I've put up. If you really want to stay up-to-date with the roadtrip, follow me on Twitter.
We're headed to Yosemite tomorrow, then Vegas, Bryce Canyon, Grand Canyon and eventually Austin, Texas.
That's all for now!
From San Francisco,
Bryce
In the mean time you can check out the third album I've put up. If you really want to stay up-to-date with the roadtrip, follow me on Twitter.
We're headed to Yosemite tomorrow, then Vegas, Bryce Canyon, Grand Canyon and eventually Austin, Texas.
That's all for now!
From San Francisco,
Bryce
Monday, May 31, 2010
Pictures and a Bear Story
It has been brought to my attention that the privacy settings on Facebook haven't allowed for everyone to view my photos. I believe I fixed the problem now and anyone should be able to see my photos from the trip.
Album 1
Album 2
Twitter
If not, please let me know and I'll work on the settings. Either way, once I get a chance to really sit down (most likely after the trip) I'll upload all the photos and video directly to my website to download. I'll also geotag the real cool ones so you can see exactly where we were (it takes way too much time to upload them when you only have 15-30 minutes of internet every few days).
To keep to blogging I'll say a brief few words (it is now 1am West Coast time where I'm in Portland, Oregon now and I need to get to bed because we have a long day in the city tomorrow!). This trip already has been quite an amazing journey. We've just about crossed the 5,000 mile mark on how far we've traveled. We already slept under the stars in the desert-like landscape of the Badlands, scaled numerous mountains, camped in snowfall, heard wolves howl and coyotes yelp in the distance, seen numerous wildlife numbering aplenty and of those nearly extinct, journeyed to the tops of skyscrapers in Chicago and Seattle, eating delicious cuisine both at the campfire and at mom & pops across the country. On this trip alone I've already camped more than I have ever done before in my life put together.
I haven't found myself able to sleep in the car at all because I've been too excited to see what is around the next bend; afraid that I might miss something. There are similarities across America in the way we live our lives, but there are also subtle differences in design. The green neighborhoods of Portland are vastly different than the sprawling suburbs of Chicago compared to the shanty town in the Indian Reservation we journeyed through-- all of which is in the same country we call home. Often there are McDonalds, Wal-Marts, Safeways, Home Depots, Starbucks, and countless other stores cookie-cut across the landscape-- I was rather startled to see a Safeway layout exactly the same as the one down the street from my house 2,300 miles away in Canada.
There are also differences in how communities find their identity and values and how they want to be known. From tourist destinations such as Wall Drug Store in South Dakota to a rusting 1927 Model-T with a fake skeleton in it parked on the shoulder in a backwoods community in Washington State. This is only a hint of what we've seen.
We're only two weeks into the journey now, and have around 25 days to go. I'm excited to see what else we're going to learn!
-
So far the most interesting story was that we were stalked most likely by a Grizzly Bear in Glacier Park. After going on a 6+ hike up the mountain to Glacier Lake, we noticed huge fresh bear prints over our foot prints that had been following us for at least a mile (you can see the bear prints on the left, I guess grizzly judging by their huge size; bigger than our biggest shoe prints).
Highly nervous by finding this out, we started to hurry down the mountain path only to come face-to-face with another bear:
This is what ensued:
*Note: "Everyone" is supposed to be able to see the videos but apparently Facebook doesn't publicly publish them unless you have an account?
Album 1
Album 2
If not, please let me know and I'll work on the settings. Either way, once I get a chance to really sit down (most likely after the trip) I'll upload all the photos and video directly to my website to download. I'll also geotag the real cool ones so you can see exactly where we were (it takes way too much time to upload them when you only have 15-30 minutes of internet every few days).
To keep to blogging I'll say a brief few words (it is now 1am West Coast time where I'm in Portland, Oregon now and I need to get to bed because we have a long day in the city tomorrow!). This trip already has been quite an amazing journey. We've just about crossed the 5,000 mile mark on how far we've traveled. We already slept under the stars in the desert-like landscape of the Badlands, scaled numerous mountains, camped in snowfall, heard wolves howl and coyotes yelp in the distance, seen numerous wildlife numbering aplenty and of those nearly extinct, journeyed to the tops of skyscrapers in Chicago and Seattle, eating delicious cuisine both at the campfire and at mom & pops across the country. On this trip alone I've already camped more than I have ever done before in my life put together.
I haven't found myself able to sleep in the car at all because I've been too excited to see what is around the next bend; afraid that I might miss something. There are similarities across America in the way we live our lives, but there are also subtle differences in design. The green neighborhoods of Portland are vastly different than the sprawling suburbs of Chicago compared to the shanty town in the Indian Reservation we journeyed through-- all of which is in the same country we call home. Often there are McDonalds, Wal-Marts, Safeways, Home Depots, Starbucks, and countless other stores cookie-cut across the landscape-- I was rather startled to see a Safeway layout exactly the same as the one down the street from my house 2,300 miles away in Canada.
There are also differences in how communities find their identity and values and how they want to be known. From tourist destinations such as Wall Drug Store in South Dakota to a rusting 1927 Model-T with a fake skeleton in it parked on the shoulder in a backwoods community in Washington State. This is only a hint of what we've seen.
We're only two weeks into the journey now, and have around 25 days to go. I'm excited to see what else we're going to learn!
-
So far the most interesting story was that we were stalked most likely by a Grizzly Bear in Glacier Park. After going on a 6+ hike up the mountain to Glacier Lake, we noticed huge fresh bear prints over our foot prints that had been following us for at least a mile (you can see the bear prints on the left, I guess grizzly judging by their huge size; bigger than our biggest shoe prints).
Highly nervous by finding this out, we started to hurry down the mountain path only to come face-to-face with another bear:This is what ensued:
*Note: "Everyone" is supposed to be able to see the videos but apparently Facebook doesn't publicly publish them unless you have an account?
Friday, May 21, 2010
Yellowstone
We're just outside Yellowstone National Park in a public library at Cody, Wyoming. You can already smell a hint of sulfur in the air.
Unfortunately time has been drastically short in terms of being able to connect to the internet on the trip. I've been able to continue uploading pictures to facebook, but haven't had the time to fill in details or geotag the photos on Panoramio.
We're going to be juggling where we are in the next couple of days, but we'll be hitting up Yellowstone, Grand Tetons, Glacier National Park (U.S.), Glacier National Park (Canada), Vancouver, Seattle, and Portland.
Unfortunately time has been drastically short in terms of being able to connect to the internet on the trip. I've been able to continue uploading pictures to facebook, but haven't had the time to fill in details or geotag the photos on Panoramio.
We're going to be juggling where we are in the next couple of days, but we'll be hitting up Yellowstone, Grand Tetons, Glacier National Park (U.S.), Glacier National Park (Canada), Vancouver, Seattle, and Portland.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Quick Update!
We're just west of Madison, Wisconsin today! We've now gone through Charleston, West Virginia; Frankfort, Kentucky; Louisville, Kentucky; Indianapolis, Indiana; Bloomington, Illinois; Chicago, Illinois within the last two days.
Now we're in a straight stretch for Badlands National Park in South Dakota!
Can't talk long because we have to get on the road, but you can check out the latest pictures on Facebook here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2503702&id=6232754&l=92168990c6
Now we're in a straight stretch for Badlands National Park in South Dakota!
Can't talk long because we have to get on the road, but you can check out the latest pictures on Facebook here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2503702&id=6232754&l=92168990c6
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