Travel

Will and I didn’t summit Mt. Moriah yesterday. We’d started late and the weather was turning against us, but I did get this shot of Mt. Washington and the Presidential Range. tags: backpacking, bad weather, climbing, hike, hiking, mount moriah, mount washington, mt moriah, mt washington, mt. moriah, mt. washington, presidential range, summit » about 100 words

It started with The Plastics Museum and Museum of Bad Art, progressed with a visit to the International Bowling Museum and Hall of Fame and continued with a tour of Donut shops in Lowell, MA. Now I can report that the MaisonBisson Weird Travel Archives include the Thermometer Museum, the Edward Gorey House, and the […] » about 100 words

An unconventional panorama in Rockport‘s Pigeon Cove. From left to right stand Will and Corey. Of course, it looks better bigger. Note: this was just a sideshow on our Weird Travel Tour. tags: corey, cove, group portrait, massachusetts, ocean, pano, panorama, pigeon cove, portrait, rockport, rockport ma, seaside, will » about 100 words

It was raining today in Rockport, but that didn’t stop Corey (top) or Will (bottom) from doing a little jumping on the seawall. Note: this was just a sideshow on our Weird Travel Tour. tags: action, air, corey, jump, jumping, massachusetts, rockport, rockport ma, will » about 100 words

My old passport is expired and my wife has never had a passport, so I had to look this up. Fortunately, the US State Department has a pretty good website for it. There are rules of course, especially for first-timers or expired passport holders. You’ll have to fill out a DS11 application form and bring […] » about 200 words

The rains this weekend swelled the rivers to flood stage in south-western New Hampshire. As much as half of Keene is said to be under water. Further north, the small and historic downtown of Alstead has been washed away. This picture comes from the Portsmouth Herald, and reports in the Washington Post from Keene and […] » about 200 words

Chivas, the folks who bring us Chivas Regal scotch whisky and virtual tours of the Playboy Mansion, is looking for a pair of ambassador editors for ThisIsTheLife.com. The deal pays $100,000 to the lucky pair to tour the world making good press and pictures for the brand. You’ve got six more days to put together […] » about 100 words

I guess not everybody in Nevada loves the Test Site as much as this postcard might suggest, but hey, what do tourists know? The image comes from _roberta‘s Flickr photostream, and she doesn’t seem too critical. About 850 miles southeast today, the Trinity Site — where the world’s first atomic weapon was detonated in a […] » about 200 words

Will and I climbed Moosilauke in early August, but it was only now that I got around to stitching the panorama. The view is considerably wider than 360 degrees, composited from 33 photos. The “full-size” version on Flickr contains 8 gigapixels of data. The real full-size version is a over 34 gigapixels. tags: 4000 footer, […] » about 100 words

I climbed the Osceolas with Will and Adam this weekend. It was my first overnight in a long, long time, and their first mountaintop sunrise. I used to do sunrises on Mt. Monadnock, but I’d lost the habit. More pictures of the Osceola adventure at Flickr. tags: 4000 footer, camping, geo:lat=44.006336, geo:lon=-71.547260, geotagged, hike, hiking, […] » about 100 words

From a Reuters story in ChinaDaily: At noon [Wednesday], municipal trucks dumped about 130 tons of ripe, juicy plum tomatoes at the feet of adrenaline-charged crowds in town’s main square. Within minutes the area was covered in red slime, and clouds of tomato sauce filled the air. It all takes place in Buñol, in Spain’s […] » about 300 words

I don’t watch TV, so I haven’t seen many images of the flooding in New Orleans until I found these. Amazingly, The Times Picayune is publishing PDF editions during disaster. The hurricane and flood damage are truly scary, but the worst news is on page five, which tells of widespread looting: Law enforcement efforts to […] » about 300 words

In a popular antebellum Arkansas story, a backwoodsman bought a 5-gallon barrel of whiskey, only to return a week later for another. “Surely you haven’t drank that whiskey already?” inquired the astonished merchant. “It ain’t so much,” replied the backwoodsman. “There are six of us, counting the kids, and we have no cow.” It’s not […] » about 100 words

Jake Halpern’s Braving Home (also in softcover) easily took my interest. Here’s how John Moe described it for Amazon.com: As a cub reporter at The New Republic, Jake Halpern earned the unofficial job title of Bad Homes Correspondent. Braving Home tells his stories of places where people really ought not live and the people who […] » about 500 words

Earlier this year the Idaho legislature passed a bill recognizing the success of Napoleon Dynamite, a film about Idaho life by Idahoan native sons. LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF IDAHO First Regular Session – 2005 HOUSE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION NO. 29 STATING LEGISLATIVE FINDINGS AND COMMENDING JARED AND JERUSHA HESS AND THE CITY OF PRESTON FOR […] » about 700 words

It’s hot in New Hampshire, but on top of Cannon Mountain, 4146 feet about sea level, it’s a little cooler. It’s an easy enough hike, but the aerial tram will save you the sweat. The current tram was built in 1980 and replaced the 1938 tram. The 2100 foot climb from the base takes a […] » about 200 words

I don’t consider myself a Japonophile, but I do find myself reading Mainichi Daily News each day, and when they put up a picture like this, of fireflies near the Yamada River in Ohara, (Chiba Prefecture) I can’t help but notice. Technorati Tags: fireflies, mainichi, mainichi daily news, ohara, yamada » about 100 words

The above image is my followup to my Nevada Test Site Tour post from last month and comes courtesy of Adam Schneider’s very useful GPS Visualizer (you really need to see it full-sized, though). I still don’t have a cable to connect the ancient Magellan GPS I used to a computer, so I manually entered […] » about 200 words

San Francisco is a great city for a conference. It’s also a pretty good place to get lunch. The following is poorly written and incomplete. Well, at least it’s something. Sunday I was a little surprised to find Johnny Rockets on Jefferson St. serving breakfast, but they did a fine sausage, egg, and cheese sandwich […] » about 800 words

Kwajalein Atoll is a part of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, lost in the Pacific Ocean (MapTech makes it easier to find) along with more recognizable locations like Bikini and Enewetak atolls. The military presence is far from gone, however, as Kwajalein is home to Reagan Test Site, where the US Army tests the […] » about 300 words

Found Ron Levine’s Prisoners of Age exhibit at Alcatraz today. Sadly, the website doesn’t appear give the prisoner’s stories, and, though the photos are well done, it’s the stories that hold our attention. » about 100 words