After a week on the beach we took off to drive the Gulf Coast.
We passed through Tallahassee and Pensacola; Mobile, Biloxi, and Gulfport; through the Irish Bayou, and into New Orleans where we spent a few days. Continue reading
Last winter we drove south to escape the polar vortex and spent a week in New Symrna Beach, Florida staying in a tiny condo across from the Atlantic Ocean. Even though it rained for most of our stay, it was wonderful to be warm and to photograph the dramatic sky. Continue reading
Growing up near Buffalo, New York, fall was my favorite season. Fall there is made up of rich hues of red, orange, yellow, green, and brown. I loved the crisp air, playing soccer, watching football, jumping in leaves, and watching nature’s amazing paintings all around me. I spent last fall in New Mexico and the 14 before that in Pelham near New York City.
Last January we left Baltimore and headed south to Savannah, Georgia. On the way I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw one of the two tie-downs (which hold two Rubbermaid bins onto our rear hitch rack) dragging on the road. So we got off at the next exit, Courtland, Virginia, and pulled into an abandoned Knights Inn Motel to re-secure the bins.
In my last post I mentioned that Joshua Tree National Park has nine campgrounds, which are all available on a first-come, first-served basis, and when we visited the park on Friday and Saturday all nine were full. We arrived again on Tuesday and a couple of the campgrounds were crowded but we had a few options in the Jumbo Rocks campground. Many of the spots are close together, so we chose one that had a bit of separation from the neighbors, put our “reserved” sign up, and went out hiking to watch the sunset. 
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Though the Wonder Valley turned out to have an appeal all it’s own, the reason we rented a house in Twentynine Palms, California was its proximity to Joshua Tree National Park.
OK – Taos. All that I wrote about the drive from Pueblo Colorado to Taos, New Mexico was true, except for some specific details, details that I’m not sure need to be covered in a blog more or less about beer. Suffice it to say we left a bar in Pueblo, Colorado around 11pm and drove 35 miles through a blinding snow storm to a rest stop, tucked ourselves into bed in the back of our Element with pie in the sky hopes that the snow would subside by morning, it didn’t. Using a Frisbee (it was early October so we were unprepared for a blizzard) I cleared as much snow off the car as I could and we were off towards Walsenburg, Colorado, where we stopped for coffee, bought bad gas and caught up on email before moving further on towards Taos.
The snow in the morning
The fall after I finished college I jumped at the chance to travel by helping a friend move to France (in reality I’m not sure what help I was providing since I didn’t speak French and she had many of her things shipped, but I digress…) The plan was to spend two weeks in Paris and eastern France with my friend and then I’d make my way back to Paris, meet Pearson, and we’d take a train to Italy. So I left my job, packed way too much stuff, and headed across the Atlantic.
