Traveling Fever

**On a side note before I begin...I would like to point out that Liz has a picture of a disgusting piece of Poo on her side.  She disgusts me.

Soon I will be trapped in a business lifestyle that will drastically reduce the ability to travel that currently enjoy in my fancy free, traveling lifestyle.  I had come to terms with that and thought I could handle it, but then I made the mistake of checking out long time blog buddy, Churlita’s, blog and she was posting about planning for an upcoming trip. 

My mind started racing through all the places I wanted to go back to in the region she was headed.  I started dreaming of the days when I drove aimlessly around the country with my two best friends in a Volkswagen Van.  The only concerns were how cold the beer was and how good the steak was. 

When I graduated Nursing school, we managed to convince two of our other best friends to come along as well.  We took five weeks and my new, used Suburban and headed out West...way West, then way North.

We drove clear across to California, headed up the coast and eventually ended up in Alaska.  We drank a great deal of beer and liquor, grilled huge chunks of meat every night, and would entertain each other with amazing feats of flatulence all night long in the tent.  I got so bad some nights that it was not uncommon to take off one’s sweaty wool socks and tying it around one’s head to block out the stench.  It was possibly the greatest time of my life.

I am going to post some photos now, so you can all be jealous.

This one is actually not from that trip.  It is from another trip down to Big Bend National Park in Texas, but it is a great example of the benefits to having one of your travel companions being an artist.

This one is us on a poorly planned attempt to hike around Mt St Helens.  This is mid-June.  I walked with them for about half a mile before calling them crazy and turning back alone.  By the time they came back down they were miserable. 

Here we are in Denali National Park in Alaska.  They say it is very difficult to get any view of Mt. McKinley since it is usually obscured by clouds.  It is supposed to be near impossible to see the peak.  We were there one day.  We saw it all.  (In case you couldn’t figure it out, that is it behind us.)

I am trying to convince Churlita to go to Southern Utah which is probably the most beautiful spot in America with two of the greatest National Parks, Bryce Canyon National Park and the creme de la creme, Zion National Park.

To get even more detailed, Zion has The Zion Narrows, an awesome hike through very high, and narrow, valley.  A lot of it you have to walk in the Virgin River, which is about calf deep, unless there is a flash flood.  Here are some pics of that.

I recommend it to all. 

•   Comments(9)    Posted by killer on 03/26 at 08:17 PM
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