I had about a week in Utah to visit a friend in Salt Lake City and to visit the some of the National and State Parks. Once again my decisions of where to go were some what based on having dogs, what the temperature would be and if dogs were allowed on trails. I started with Bryce Canyon, which had a high in the low 60s, which made it possible for the dogs to hang out in the car, in the shade while I went on some wonderful hikes. It was my first nights camping by myself and it was wonderful [View Full Entry]

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After a day and a half in San Francisco, I picked up my brother, Craig from the San Francisco airport so that he could join me in a week of my road trip and then fly out of Salt Lake City seven days later. We spent two days driving up the California coast and stopped and hiked in the Redwoods, amazing. We then spent two nights camping on the southern coast edge of Oregon where we hiked on the rocks, got caught in fast moving sand and watched sea otters at play. (If there is a next life, I want to [View Full Entry]

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My road trip started with a lots of driving with 30 hours to Phoenix in two days. The reasoning was that I had two friends who flew to Phoenix to meet me for five days of camping and hiking in the Sedona area. These friends Betty and Michelle were wonderful travel partners and very tolerate of somebody traveling with two dogs.. We hiked each day for 2-4 hours, enjoyed our camp site by the river, they tolerated my premade frozen food, which was then thawed by my camp stove and sleeping in a tent with two dogs. We finished the trip [View Full Entry]

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This was the third time I have been to Brazil and this trip was focused on hanging out with my dear friends Berti and Miguel. I was able to finally have time to relax, read and walk in the beautiful surroundings of Rio de Janeiro. We had a rainy beach weekend at the Oyster River which is a beach a couple hours north of Rio. Instead of days on the beach we had fun playing cards in our room and walking the rocks on the beach. We also went to Tiredentes in the mountains west of Rio for Easter weekend. Tiredentes [View Full Entry]

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I still hope to make it to Kenya to volunteer, however right now I need to focus on a job search, which will hopefully allow me to go after I get a job, but before I actually start. I have been accepted as a volunteer with the Friends’ Africa Great Lakes Initiative as a six week volunteer in with their Peace Center in Lubao, Kenya (Western Kenya near Kakamega). The goal is to build greater understanding and awareness of the situation people are facing in Kenya and to assist both in the USA and as a volunteer in May and June [View Full Entry]

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On the spur of the moment I joined my past traveling partner on her work trip to Guatemala, where she able to add on a couple of days for exploring. We spent a day and a half in Tikal and got to hear the howler monkeys from the highest temple at sunrise, climb several of the temples, walk through the jungle paths watching monkeys swinging above us and investage the amazing ruins of a society that dates back to 700 BC. Most of the pictures are of different structures since there are there were over 4000 structures in Tikal more than [View Full Entry]

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The first US Social Forum was in Atlanta, Georgia where several thousand people came together under the theme of “Another World is Possible and Another US is Needed”. I wasn’t sure what I had to offer among thousands of committed people to social justice, but it was a great place to examine my personal role and what more I should be doing to create a more just world. [View Full Entry]

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The goal was to get away, get to know each other, hike and camp in a very different and warmer location that had cheap flights from Chicago. I was a great trip with a couple of interesting adventures. We started in Tucson with the Desert Museum where we learned how to pronounce Saguaro and see the various amazing living things in a very hot dry place. From there we went to the Organ Pipe National Park where we were the only tent campers and at times the only ones on certain questionable trails. We ended in the wonderful Sabino Canyon with [View Full Entry]

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So today is our last day and we will be spending it in Lima, the city that many told us was only full of crime, pollution and traffic. What we have found is many people looking out for us, a beautiful city center, an amazingly cheap and wonderful hostel in an old colonial house and yes traffic and security issues the same as any city in the USA. One more day and then it is back to having no excuse for not understanding what people are saying, hot summer weather, George Bush as president (we have met no one who likes [View Full Entry]

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Huancavelica and Huancayo We took a night bus from Pisco to Huancavelica and it was probably best that we couldn’t really see where we were going. At times the bus crawled around rock ledges and steep drop offs, mostly on dirt roads, arriving in Huancavelica at 5 am. We spent two days in Huancavelica, a small mountainous town where we were the only foreigners at that time and it made for great conversations while eating our peanut butter in the park, listening to music at a nearby community festival, waiting for buses or being given an extensive tour of the reconstruction [View Full Entry]

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