It’s been a cold week out here in southern Utah and the snow which came down on Thursday and Friday has decided to stick around for a while. Despite the cold and wind, the skies have been sunny most of the week and it’s really hard to complain about that. I hung around St. George, avoiding the worst of the snow and then made my way out to Kanab for the Balloons and Tunes Festival. From there I cruised out to Coral Pink Sands State Park and then north to the cute little historic town of Panguitch, where I am writing this post from today. I know it’s only Monday, but I don’t think there’s going to be much opportunity to jump on the internet for the next few days so I thought I would just finish this up today and then next week will just pick up where I leave off.
When I left you last week, I was in the library in St. George. After I finished up with my newsletter for the week, I headed up the road to the old opera house to catch a local performance of the musical Kiss Me Kate. I love the fact that St. George is supporting local theater and even though there were probably only 30 people there on a Wednesday night, the show did go on. There were some parts of this show that are particularly dated, but it was a great performance and all of the actors seemed as though they were really having fun out there. The building itself dates back to the early days of St. George, having been built in 1864 as a wine cellar. It was sold in the 1870s and became a social hall and performance center, and later an opera house in 1886. During the Great Depression the building was used to process sugar beets and wouldn’t be restored to its earlier function as an opera house until 1988. It’s a cool building and I was happy to see the inside of it and I also really enjoyed the performance.
Hello Everyone! It’s been a lovely week here in the greater Lake Tahoe region. The weather has been cold, but also clear and sunny and hard to beat for the middle of January. I’ve spent most of the week catching up with old friends and taking it slow which has been really nice. I did get out for a day on the slopes in South Lake Tahoe while I was here which was awesome and a real treat. It’s about time for me to hit the road again and head out across Nevada, but it’s been a nice break here in the mountains among friends…
Hello Everyone! It’s been a cold week out here on the road with nighttime temperatures dipping into the single digits. While I’m always prepared for the cold and have plenty of warm clothes and blankets, it’s no fun getting out of bed in the morning. Thankfully it’s also been a week of catching up with old friends and tagging along with them on their adventures so my spirits have been high all week. I started my week in Winnemucca, made my way across the top of the state on Interstate 80 and am finishing my week here in Reno, “The Biggest Little City in the World”.
Well, it’s been a pretty quiet week out here on the road. I spent the first part of the week in Boise before heading west back into Oregon on Monday and then south into Nevada yesterday. Today I find myself in Winnemucca, an interesting little town in the north central part of the state. I’ve been traveling through a sparsely populated area so there hasn’t been a lot to see or get into, but I finished my book (The Wide, Wide Sea by Hampton Sides about the last journey of Captain Cook which I highly recommend), got a few walks in and stumbled into some cool little towns. I’ve enjoyed the solitude, the mountainous desert terrain and the peace and quiet…
Happy New Year Y’all and greetings from Boise. I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, Hanukkah or whatever other holiday you may have been celebrating this month. I had a nice time in New Hampshire with my family over the last couple of weeks, with a fantastic Christmas at my brother’s house. The last two days included a long drive back to Washington DC and then an equally long flight back to the West Coast yesterday, so I’m pretty beat. I’ll tell you - it is one thing to gently ease into winter temperatures over the months while living in my van and another thing entirely to have central heat for a month and then glide back into Idaho winter at the end of December. But I’m very happy to be back with my van and with you fine people.
Hello Everyone,
Sorry I didn’t get this post done last week, but it’s been a busy time since I got home at the beginning of the month. I wish I could say it’s been a fun kind of busy, but it has mostly been continuing to clear out my uncle’s house in Virginia and dealing with my dad’s estate (tasks my good friend, Gillian, refers to as “sadmin duties”). Last week I took a whirlwind trip to West Virginia to drop off my dad’s probate papers at the court, go to the bank, pick up some of his things that I want to get to my brother’s house next week and come back. I hit some serious snow in the mountains, but it was beautiful and didn’t slow me down too much. In other exciting news, I’ve also been to the dentist, several doctors and the Department of Motor Vehicles, all thrilling adventures for sure (but thankfully all routine, so I am counting my blessings). I have been able to spend a little bit of time with my friends, gotten together with my Monday night music group and had some good times with my family, so I’m grateful for that. I also took a nice trip to Delaware last weekend which I’ll tell you more about below.
Hello Everyone,
It’s always good to be home. Home is definitely sweeter when you come in off the road, especially when it’s cold and dark out there. December is a great month to be in Washington D.C. and I’m really looking forward to a few weeks of rest before getting back out there at the end of the month. I have plenty to do while I’m home as I need to sort out my dad’s estate, work at my uncle’s house and help my folks out with a number of things, but I’m also looking forward to holiday shows, playing music with my friends and quiet nights by the fire. I’m not going to lie, 2025 was an incredibly difficult year for me and I’m very much looking forward to putting it behind me. 2026 is going to be better. It should be a very busy year and I am looking forward to it very much, so I hope to be well rested by the time it kicks off. I did have a nice week in Eastern Oregon and Boise, though and I want to tell you all about it, so let’s jump into it.
Happy Thanksgiving to all of my friends here in the United States. I hope you get to spend the day with friends and family, good food and cheer. To those of you who will be spending the holiday alone, as I will be this year, I hope you can have a quiet and peaceful day and find a good meal somewhere. I have officially left the state of Washington and returned south to Oregon. My last few days in Southeast Washington were excellent and I was sad to see it fade away in my rearview mirror. I was there for over two months, though, and saw most of what I had hoped to see and it is wonderful to be back in The Beaver State. It’s a little bit warmer and a little bit less expensive here and I’m looking forward to this coming week here before I fly back to the east coast for the holidays. I have a lot of photos left to edit and publish from Washington and I’m looking forward to catching up on those in December and starting fresh and up to date in 2026.
It’s been a busy week out here on the road in Central and Southern Washington. I’ve traveled down some beautiful roads this week, many following winding streams and rivers, and stopped in some really cool little towns. I’ve been listening to a great radio station out here playing real oldies – like oldies that were oldies when I was a kid. I haven’t heard a lot of those songs in decades and my toes have been tapping as I cruise down the road. This is apple country and it’s cool to pass through the apple orchards and see many with fruit still on the trees, while the leaves have turned bright orange with the season. Empty apple crates dot the landscape from earlier picking. There are plenty of grapes out here too as this is Washington’s wine country. The weather hasn’t been great, but it hasn’t been terrible and there have been some wild clouds in the sky overhead much of the week. The days are short, but I’ve been trying to make the most of the daylight I have as I wind up my time in Washington State.
It’s been an interesting week out here in the “Inland Empire” of Washington State. The week started out in deserted ghost towns of the far northeast of the state, took me to the big city of Spokane, led me just across the border into Idaho for a night and finally back towards the center of the state and the enormous Grand Coulee Dam. I’ve passed through a lot of ranch country this week and a handful of railroad-and-grain-elevator towns similar to those found all across the heartland of the country. I caught a lot of live music this week, ate one too many burgers and somehow managed to dodge most of the raindrops in the area. All in all, I’d say it’s been a good week.
I have made it across the mountains and into Eastern Washington and it feels like I’ve landed in another country. While the west of the state is covered in evergreens, this side has a lot more deciduous trees and they are popping with fall colors at the moment. The towns are few and far between and the landscape is more wild west than coastal. I’m liking the change of pace and scenery. Daylight Saving Time has ended and it’s getting dark before 5pm which is always a challenge, but I’m happy it is light earlier and I’m not waking up in the dark. And I turned 50 this past week which I’m actually pretty okay with. It’s hard to believe in some respects, but I feel like I’ve lived several lifetimes in the last half century which is a good way to be. It hasn’t been a super-busy week, but let’s get into what I’ve been doing since I wrote last.
It’s been a tough couple of weeks for me out here. I spent all of last week in Charleston, West Virginia saying goodbye to my dad and trying my best to sort out his affairs. While he had many health problems over the last few years, his death still came as a surprise. It wasn’t something I was ready for at all. While my dad and I were not super close, I will still miss talking with him and visiting with him. I hope he is in a better place and I’m glad he is no longer suffering from any pain or discomfort. My brother flew in for a few days and we were able to spend time with Judy, my dad’s partner of 33 years, and their two Japanese chins Jake and Charlie. I was also really thankful to have a friend passing through Charleston while I was there who took me out to dinner and helped me talk through a lot of my pain. I had another friend drive out from D.C. for my dad’s memorial service which was really something. I’m very blessed to have so many good friends in this life. Since I last wrote, I also turned 50, a milestone birthday which snuck up on me with everything that was going on. I’m glad I didn’t have any exciting plans for it as they probably would have fallen through. Anyways, I am back in Washington State and I am writing to you today from Bellingham in the far north of the state. I’m still sorting out a lot of things in my head, but I wanted to write about my time leading up to my flight to WV because it will be good for me to write.
