Today’s post is 2050 words, 2 photos, one video, a 10 minute read. Enjoy!

Greetings and salutations,

Folks, this is my 500th blog post! It’s hard for me to believe that I’ve kept this going since November 14, 2015. My track record is that I start something then get bored and move on to something else. Not with this project!

That first post was an experiment with a website I didn’t have any experience with, I was learning on the fly. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, this blog site grew out of series of nine emails that I sent family and friends when we did a six-week camping trip starting in Madison to the Pacific Northwest in the fall of 2015. It was a grand time and I enjoyed sharing our adventures and misadventures with others. Our daughter, The Eldest, suggested I start writing a blog where I could add photos. It took me a month or two get up my courage and step my toe into the water. Here we are 500 posts later.

This week I’ll share with you some of my favorite posts and photos, a reminisce of sorts. I hope you’ll enjoy the look back and share a comment or two. So let’s get started.

Post 1 Madeline Island Part I

Ok, here’s a link to the very first article I posted. I didn’t know how to include photos in the text so I just added them at the end. I got some very important feedback from one of my photography friends, she advised me to “learn how to use the software!” Click here to link back to that post which contains on of my favorite photos of all time. I was at a workshop on Madeline Island in far northern Wisconsin. The stars were extremely bright for our night photo workshop. A memorable time.

Post 2 France

Shortly after Post 1 went live, I learned about the Paris terror attacks that happened the night of November 13. I was so shocked and dismayed at the brutality and loss of life that I was compelled to write another post about my time in France with The Youngest in September 2013. I wanted to show the side of France that I knew something about. Here’s a link to that post and one of the photos that went with the story. It’s interesting to note that this was the only time when I posted twice in the same day. From then on, my weekly posts have arrived every Sunday at 4 PM or earlier if I accidentally posted without setting the date!

Cuba

In February 2016, my Traveling Partner and I traveled with a group of photographers from Madison to Cuba. Our purpose was photography, we weren’t disappointed. Some of my favorite photos are of the people we encountered during our eight days in the country. Click here and here for two posts on some of the people we met along the way.

Ghana

In April 2016, I spent two weeks in Ghana, West Africa as a volunteer for a Farmer-to-Farmer program to help newly formed farmers associations improve their organizations. I don’t know if they learned anything from me but I sure learned a lot from them. Whenever, I would walk into town from the hotel where I was staying, I’d hear the kids call out “Obroni, obroni” which means foreigner or white man in the Twi language. While I was careful I did snap a few photos of these friendly, curious kids. And there were a lot of them. Click here for a link to that story and more photos.

A Burning Ring of Fire

It was in the fall of 2016 when I began sharing the contents of the emails that I sent to family and friends during our 2015 West Coast Swing. That year the fires out west were creating smoky conditions over half the country. Here’s the link to that post. Hope you enjoy it. The photo below was taken in the Palouse region of southeastern Washington. It’s a photographers dream, picturesque landscapes, small hamlets, and amazing sunrises and sunsets.

Farm Boys

My friends Wayne and I did a photo exhibit together titled “Two Old Farm Boys Go Home.” We each selected ten photos of our respective home farms for the exhibit. I made a couple of posts about that exhibit and included extra photos that didn’t make it to the exhibit. Click here and here to read this two-part series. The first post is acting a little funky, keep scrolling.

Observations from the Road

Sometimes when driving a long distance, I tend to daydream and make up stories from observations of the passing countryside. In this post, I wax on philosophically about the roads, the signs, the small towns. It was a fun piece to write and it only included one photo, not a prize but relates to the story. Click here for a quick read.

Big Bend National Park

In 2018, we went on a two-month excursion of the Southwest during beginning in January and ending in early March. We saw and experienced a lot of great country. One of our most memorable stops was at Big Bend National Park on the Texas/Mexico border. It was awesome. Click here, here, and here for a couple of posts on our Southwest US tour.

The Panama Canal

During the Polar Vortex of January 2019, my Traveling Partner were enjoying the mild temperatures and blue sky in Panama. Our stay began with a Road Scholar tour of the Panama Canal that include a ten-hour transit on board a small vessel that was paired with a larger LPG carrier throughout the six lock, three on each side. It was so much fun and a very memorable time. Below is a photo our vessel, Islamorada, entered the Miraflores Locks behind the Star Laguna. Click here to read about the transit and see more photos.

The Trail to Ukraine

It was a trip of a lifetime, a scouting venture to find our roots in Ukraine. This was before the pandemic and the current war with Russia. We were looking for information and documents about my Traveling Partner’s family that originated in a small village in Ukraine. We got close and hoped to return the following year followup. It didn’t happen. Click here and here to read about our time in Lviv and here for our stay in Kyiv, the capital city of this vibrant nation. Below is one of my favorite photos from Ukraine, the modern and the traditional.

The Trail to Australia

In October and November 2019, I had the good fortune to travel to Australia for three-and-a-half weeks. It was a great time. Click here for the introduction to the trip and below is one photo taken while sleep deprived after a long flight to Sydney. Did you know that Australians of all sorts like their adult beverages? Here’s the proof!

Writing During the Pandemic

Since this is a travel and photography blog, I scrounged for material. Oh, I wrote stories about trees, clouds, storms, new looks at previous trips, and just about any other topic where I had photos in my archives and the creativity to write a decent story. But two stories, one with two parts, stand out. They were about ordinary people important in my life, Carl and Myrtle, a couple that lived down the street, and Clarice, one of the most interesting persons I met in Madison. Click here for the story about Carl and Myrtle. Then click here and here for the two part story about Clarice. I think you’ll agree, they were extraordinary people. I’m thankful that our paths crossed.

Luck Will Be Yours When You Least Expect It

It was a year after the pandemic shut down most of the country, when my Traveling Partner decided to drive to State College, Pennsylvania to visit The Eldest and The Son-in-law. Our plan was to drive straight through, a distance of 700 miles, skipping a stay in a hotel and packing enough food for the trip. As luck would have it, the Red Rider (our F-150) broke down in a construction zone on I-90 in eastern Indiana. First, bad luck then a lot of good luck that follow. Click here to read the story.

Colorado National Monument

In November 2021, my Traveling Partner and I made a month-long driving trip from our home in Madison to Death Valley National Park where I attended a photography workshop with some friends. In between, we spent over two weeks visiting National Parks (Arches, Canyonland, Capitol Reef, Bryce Canyon, and Zion) and many National Monuments. In this post, I’ll feature one of our favorites, Colorado National Monument. We were there in 2015 and were happy to return nearly six years later. Click here to read all about it.

New Orleans JazzFest

I’ve likely written more about my 20 trips to the annual New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival than another topic. I decided that 2023 would be my last year. I enjoyed everyone of those 20 fests, saw many great performances like Jimmy Buffett, Santana, Paul Simon, Tom Petty, Trombone Shorty, and many others. Click here and here to read about my two-series on my last fest. While I have thousands of photos, I think this short video captures the essence of JazzFest.

 

Quebec City

In May and June 2023, we traveled by car to Toronto, Montreal, Quebec City, Canada and Acadia National Park in Maine. We enjoyed everyday of our adventure in Canada where the people are super friendly and kind.

This history, language, scenery, and great food made our time in Quebec City so enjoyable. Click here to read more about this fascinating city.

The Audience

In February and March 2024, we were in Rome, a city we’ve visited before and vowed to return. So here we were. My Traveling Partner scored some tickets to the weekly audience with Pope Francis. It was held indoors in the large auditorium on the Vatican grounds because the Pope had been ill the week prior. Thousands of people packed the auditorium. We were close to the front of the line and missed getting a front row seat by less than 10 seconds. The photo below was purchased from the Vatican website. Whenever the Pope is meeting people there are a bevy of photographers behind him taking photos. We were behind the first row of people, our gray haired heads are poking up trying to get a look. Click here to read about our experience followed by a visit to the Vatican Museum.

Walking the Herriot Way – The Great Shuner Fell

Last year I wrote about our walk on the Herriot Way in the Yorkshire Dales, England. It was a four day walk with a distance of 52 miles. We walked 42 of those miles with one of those days trudging up the Great Shunner Fell, one of the tallest hills in the Dales. While the gradual four mile walk up was challenging, the four mile walk down was done in the rain. Don’t get me wrong, it’s was beautiful, interesting, and unique. It was also memorable, a day we talk about whenever we find ourselves walking up a steep hill, at least it’s not the Great Shunner Fell. Click here for the full story. The photo is of the cairn at the summit, just before it started raining.

El Tuito, Mexico

We were in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico earlier this year and took a guide tour with Sandra to the village of El Tuito. It was an enjoyable day to experience the countryside and see life beyond the city. We sample fruit filled empanadas, tasted raicilla (a cousin of tequila), listed a brick making business, and a couple of art galleries. Plus we did a walkabout the village before enjoying a traditional lunch. Click here for the full story and more photos. 

I hope this gives you a flavor of the posts that have accumulated on this site over the past 10 years. I figure that I’ve written the equivalent of eight books and have posted over 12,000 photos. I’ll end here with a big thank you to my Traveling Partner who does a final edit on this posts. However, any errors, misspellings, missing words, and the excess number of commas are on me, no one else. Also a thanks to my readers, I appreciate your comments, those help to keep me going.

Join me next week for the continuation of our walk in the Cotswolds.

Until then, happy travels!

Tom

PS: Click here for a link to the post about my book “Farm Boy.” Contact me if you are interested in purchasing a copy. Thanks to all have plunked down your hard earned dollars and read the book. TM