Category: Elevation
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Exploring the Mitten, Part 2 (Two Great Lakes)
The upper tier of the mitten sits between two of the Great Lakes: Huron and Michigan. That means the farthest someone needs to travel to hit an immense body of water is maybe 75 miles (120 kilometres). Generally, unless situated directly atop the midpoint, a given location will sit even closer than that to at…
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Sydney Skyline
As Viewed from the Taronga Zoo (October 1997) After twenty hours of flight from the east coast of the United States, we reached Australia, and arrived in Sydney with fourteen hours of jet lag to make up. We took this photograph from the north side of Port Jackson at the Taronga Zoo Sydney. From that…
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Australia’s Blue Mountains
The “Three Sisters” Rock Formation (October 1997) The Great Western Highway left Sydney and headed up through the Blue Mountains. Echo Point laid perhaps an hour and a half from Sydney near the town of Katoomba. This offered excellent views of the Blue Mountains and the “Three Sisters” rock formation (map). Every tourist who travels…
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Atop Mt. Coot-tha
Atop the Summit (October 1997) My wife and I rented a car, and drove the short distance from Brisbane to Mt. Coot-tha. An overlook provided excellent views of Brisbane. It also offered a convenient place to grab a cup of coffee. Later we drove out further to Mt. Nebo, then down through the Samford Valley,…
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Fossil Butte National Monument
Outside of Kemmerer, Wyoming, USA (July 2011) Fossil Butte National Monument may be one of the more obscure National Park Service properties but it’s worth a visit if you happen to be traveling through southwestern Wyoming. It’s particularly convenient to people driving out of Salt Lake City, Utah towards the east along Interstate 80. At…
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The House on the Rock
Spring Green, Wisconsin, USA (August 12, 2002) I am not even sure how to describe The House on the Rock near Spring Green, Wisconsin (map). Is it a house? Or is it a museum? Maybe it’s a cluttered attic on steroids? Did some ancient flea market suffer a devastating explosion and leave its detritus in…
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Tangier Island in the Chesapeake Bay
Accomack County, Virginia (June 2000) For many years I’d wanted to visit Tangier Island in the middle of Chesapeake Bay (map). People have inhabited Tangier for more than three hundred years, making a living from the bounty of the Bay, mostly isolated from their neighbors on the eastern and western shores. This has resulted in…
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Timpanogos Cave National Monument
American Fork, Utah, USA (July 2011) We’d never heard of Timpanogos Cave National Monument prior to our trip to Utah. During our planning we’d asked people for suggestions for fun activities in or near the Salt Lake Valley. A family friend who lived in the area recommended Timpanogos (map). It sounded like something right down…
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Rendezvous Beach
Bear Lake State Park; Garden City, Utah, USA (July 2011) We drove east out of Logan, Utah on Highway 89, the Logan Canyon Scenic Byway through the Bear River Mountains, a branch of the Wasatch Range. We meandered for nearly forty miles along the winding road until we crested the summit and stopped at a…
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Big Bend National Park
Terlingua, Brewster Co., Texas, USA (May 1992) We left San Antonio, passed Uvalde, passed Del Rio, driving through ever smaller and less frequent towns, moving into one of the most remote locations imaginable. We were heading towards that place where the Rio Grande River flows southeast and then takes a sudden jog to the north.…