Anne & Lee

NPHiker

Anne & Lee

Anne and I started our hiking trips back in 2001 and have managed to get two or three trips in each year since. Most of the trips were part of our quest to hike in all of the US National Parks, a quest we completed in 2015 with our trip to Alaska and the Gates of the Arctic and Kobuk Valley parks. At that time there were 59 parks. Since 2015 we have revisited some of our favorite areas and those have been blogged as well. Additionally, along the way we’ve taken a couple of trips to Canada where we hiked in most, if not all, of the Canadian National Parks in the Rocky Mountains. And then there are a few of our trips to several of the Caribbean Islands with our children and their families included. I have not been able to add blogs for a few of the earliest trips and a few others were lost when the older blogging site I was using was removed from the internet. But most of the trips are included here.

The main purpose of creating these blogs has been and continues to be strictly personal. Given that there are a lot of trips and our memories are not always accurate, we want to be able to look back from time to time and see where we went, when we went, and what we did on these trips. A secondary purpose is, of course, to share these experiences with our family and friends if they are interested in reading about them. When we finish a blog about a recent trip, we share the link to the blogs with our Facebook friends as well as others via e-mail. Hopefully no one is offended, bothered, or otherwise inconvenienced by these notifications. If so please let me know and I’ll do my best to see that you are not included on any future e-mail notifications about the blogs.

That said, anyone is welcome to read about any of the trips we have taken. Perhaps they will provide some helpful information about the places we have visited as well as encourage others to visit. Hopefully they will at least engender an appreciation for the beauty that exists in the natural world we inhabit.

Lee

TP PROFILE

Former TravelPod Member: leesneed

Joined: March 10th, 2009
From: lives in Central,United States
Hobbies: Hiking
Bucket List: Hike in all of the US national parks
Profession: Retired - Accountant

Sea Wolf Adventure - July 2023

North America » United States » Alaska » Glacier Bay July 15th 2023

The MV Sea Wolf

NPHiker

Anne and I traveled to Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska in mid July for a week-long cruise aboard the MV Sea Wolf. The Sea Wolf is a converted US Navy minesweeper that protected San Francisco harbor during WWII. Originally built in 1941, she was commissioned as the USS Observer (Amc-91). She was decommissioned in 1947, then through several different owners, was purchased in 2003 by the current owners. Thoroughly remodeled in 2003 and again in 2019, she is now the current small ship cruise host for up to 12 passengers and a crew of 5 or 6. This trip has been on my bucket list ever since our trip to Glacier Bay NP back in 2015. I finally convinced Anne, or wore her down sufficiently to agree, that we should do it before we are ... read more

Southern Arizona, January, 2022

North America » United States » Arizona » Willcox January 8th 2022

Cochise Stronghold

NPHiker

In early January 2022, Anne and I journeyed to southern Arizona for some long delayed hiking in an area we had been to twice before and enjoyed visiting very much. This time we took it fairly easy with no terribly difficult hikes and may have actually learned a thing or two about the history of the area. We flew into Tucson early on a Saturday afternoon and drove to Wilcox where we checked into our motel. With the pandemic still raging, the Delta variant in full force, and the Omicron variant just getting started, we ate breakfast and most evening meals in our room, either getting microwave stuff from a grocery or take out from a restaurant. Lunch was usually a sandwich or snacky stuff on the trail. On Sunday, we drove to Cochise Stronghold in ... read more

South Dakota, Wyoming, & Montana, September, 2021

North America » United States » South Dakota » Black Hills National Forest September 29th 2021

Buffalo herd

NPHiker

In mid September of this year, Anne and I finally were able to get back on the road again and visit a few spots in South Dakota, Wyoming, and Montana to do a little hiking as well as touring a couple of historical sites. We flew into Rapid City, SD, on Saturday, 9/11, and returned from Billings, MT, on Saturday, 9/18. In between, we visited Custer State Park and the Black Hills National Forest in SD, Devils Tower National Monument and the Bighorn Mountains in Wyoming, and the Little Bighorn National Battlefield and Pompeys Pillar in Montana. Arrived around 1:30 PM on Saturday in Rapid City, drove to Custer State Park, and checked out the visitor center. The rangers were giving directions to a place where the buffalo herd had been driven, supposedly to make it ... read more

Death Valley NP & Mojave National Preserve - Dec 2020

North America » United States » California » Death Valley National Park December 24th 2020

Death Valley National Park

NPHiker

In late December, Anne and I traveled to southern California for a bit of hiking in Death Valley National Park and the Mojave National Preserve. On our last day there, we did one short hike in the Red Rock National Conservation area in Nevada near Las Vegas. This will be an abbreviated report just to keep it short and save a brief record for reference when we try to remember what we have done when. On Thursday, Christmas Eve 2020, we flew into Las Vegas and drove to Beatty, NV for our motel. Due to the worsening pandemic in California, we were forced to cancel earlier reservations at Stovepipe Wells in Death Valley and stay at the Death Valley Motel in Beatty. We were there for three nights. On Christmas day we tackled our most strenuous ... read more

Washington state - Sep - Oct, 2020

North America » United States » Washington » Ashford September 26th 2020

Sauk Mountain Trail

NPHiker

In late September, Anne and I traveled to Washington state to do a bit of hiking in the North Cascades as well as the Mt Rainier NP areas. It had been over 9 months since out last trip so we were beginning to get a bit of cabin fever and were more than ready to travel. We had heard that airports were not crowded and that Delta was doing a superior job of managing the cleanliness of its flights as well as mandating mask wearing so we were pretty sure we could social distance as necessary and remain relatively safe from infection by the dreaded virus. And that is what we found pretty well over the entire trip. Everyone in the airports and on the airplanes was wearing masks and maintaining their distance with very few ... read more

The California Coast, December 2019

North America » United States » California » Point Reyes National Seashore December 24th 2019

From the Elephant Seal Overlook above Drake's Bay

NPHiker

On Christmas Eve of 2019, Anne and I traveled to the area north of San Francisco to do a bit of hiking along the California coast. After arriving, we drove from the San Francisco airport to Point Reyes National Seashore where we first stopped by the Bear Valley Visitor Center to get up to date information about the hikes we had planned. After the visitor center, we drove on to our motel in Inverness, the Tomales Bay Resort, which is the closest lodging to the trailheads we were interested in. The “resort” was much more like a motel, but it was clean and comfortable and fine for the two nights we were there. Of course this was Christmas Eve, so not much was open, but we did find a Czech restaurant in Inverness where we were ... read more

Historic Lifeboat Station At Point Reyes

Utah - September, 2019

North America » United States » Utah » Cedar Breaks National Monument September 14th 2019

Kolob Canyon

NPHiker

In mid September, Anne and I traveled to Utah to hike in several areas in the south as well as one hike in the Uinta mountains in the northeastern part of the state. It involved a good bit of driving, but we got it all done in the allotted time. We flew into Salt Lake City on a Saturday, arriving around 2:00 PM, and then had a long, 250 mile drive to Cedar City. On Sunday, we drove about 20 miles south to the Kolob Canyon area of Zion National Park, a section not visited by nearly as many people as the main canyon to the southeast. This area is at an elevation of around 5,000 to 6,000 feet, and we wanted to get somewhat acclimated before the higher level hikes we had planned for later. ... read more

Southern Colorado, Northern New Mexico - July 2019

North America » United States » Colorado » Pagosa Springs July 16th 2019

Pagosa Springs

NPHiker

In mid July, Anne and I traveled to northern New Mexico and southern Colorado to do a bit of hiking. We started in Colorado and finished in New Mexico. All of these areas were at higher elevations than we are used to hiking in, but we decided we’d just take it easy and do what we could. That worked out pretty well but in hindsight we probably should have started in New Mexico at the lower elevations, around 7,000 feet, before tackling the 10,000 feet and up that we found in Colorado. But we were able to complete most of the hikes we had planned on doing. I’ll post some pictures from the three main areas we visited on this page as well as a brief description of the trails we managed to hike. We flew ... read more

14 States on the AT

North America » United States » West Virginia » Harpers Ferry May 17th 2019

The silo and barn

NPHiker

In mid-May of 2019, Anne and I traveled to Pennsylvania by way of Virginia, West Virginia, and Maryland in order to complete a goal of hiking on the Appalachian Trail in all 14 states that it travels through. While we had already hiked the AT in VA, we needed a stopover spot to break up the trip, so we added a couple of nights there to allow us to stay in a pretty unique spot in the VA mountains.. As a result we were able to hike on the AT in all 4 states--Grayson-Highlands state park in VA, Harper's Ferry in WV, the C&O canal towpath in MD, and the Michaux State Forest in PA. Just to keep things simple, I’ll put all the pictures from the trip on this single page. Anne found the perfect ... read more

St. Croix, March 2019

Oceans and Seas » Caribbean March 23rd 2019

Three Generations

NPHiker

In late March of 2019, Anne and I, along with our daughter and her family, visited St. Croix in the US Virgin Islands for a week of hiking, snorkeling, and other touristy things. It was spring break for Maggie, our granddaughter, and for LeeAnne, our daughter, who is a kindergarten teacher. Unfortunately, David and Sonja were not able to get away from work to join us. St. Croix's history is a real mixed bag. Columbus discovered the island in 1493. Prior to that, and for some time after, the Carib and the Arawak Indian tribes inhabited the island. Over the course of the last 6 centuries six nations and one vassal state have governed the island. Spain, England, Netherlands, France, Denmark, the Knights of Malta (at the time a vassal state of the Kingdom of Sicily), ... read more

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