Various Ramblings
Michael Nowak
Cha-cha-changes!
Cha-cha-changes!
Various Ramblings
Michael Nowak
Seeing can mean believing.
Seeing can mean believing.

landscape

Stay-At-Home, Week 3 Check-In

I’ve got road trips on my brain, again.
Do they ever leave my brain?

I’m longing for one of those GOOD road trips that involve little planning and maximum adventure. Back in the day my buddies and I would get in the car and plot out some stops and fill in the rest as we went. We made minimal hotel reservations, didn’t know when or where we’d stop to eat, and didn’t much care.

Read about the four trips I did with some best friends as I transitioned from college to real life.

Memorable trips more recently include drives back to Michigan, trips to Missouri, long hauls to the Redwoods and Oregon, and shorter ones to places like Big Bend or New Mexico. I have the Redwoods on the brain today, but who knows where I’ll be tomorrow? Daydreaming is getting me through this time of quarantine.

My Top 5 States (in no particular order)

  1. Washington

  2. Michigan

  3. Oregon

  4. New Mexico

  5. Minnesota

Some honorable mentions are Alaska, Utah, Colorado, Arizona, California, and Nevada. I have yet to truly dive in to Wyoming, Montana, and the Dakotas. I haven’t done much out east, either, and it shows. I am not opposed to the east side, I just love what I find in the west. I think my top five list is based on accessibility - it’s easy to explore in those places, or I have connections. We have family in Alaska, so if it were a top six it would be on there. Alaska is expensive to get to and expensive to navigate if you want to get off the beaten path. The west is best.

I’m so excited that two of the trips I have planned for late summer/fall are to Washington. Some friends and I are going to camp on the beach in Olympic National Park, hike through the forests of Rainier, and anything and everything in between. Then, I get to go back a month later to run my first 10K up a mountain in the same area! Have I mentioned I love Washington?

Travel is clearly my escape. I know it’s a privilege, and it can seem very annoying to whine about canceling trips. I posted a similar statement on Twitter, only to be refreshed at the responses. I hadn’t thought that people, like myself, prioritize trips in their lives over other things and events. I forgot that trips to nature are the literal escape our brains need sometimes and it’s okay to miss it or to have feelings about it overall.

We’ll all get to travel again, when we get a handle on this virus. One way or another, the world still spins madly on. Enjoy some photos from my favorite states.

I'll always be a sunrise guy

“There’s nothing like being on a road trip, driving through the night, and seeing that first sliver of light ahead. As you travel further along, the sky opens up and you’re rejuvenated like the cycle of light you’re chasing.”

For years, I'd stay up all night and sleep through the sunrises not waking until the sun was at a high noon.  It wasn't until back in college when we started doing road trips through the night that I started to appreciate the sunrise.  I've always had trouble sleeping, so staying up all night was never a problem; I always went to bed as the moon began to set.  Driving all night - be it around Lake Michigan for no reason at all, from Michigan to Seattle (a few nights), or anywhere else we went - allowed me to be awake for the sunrise.

I can remember back to sometime my sophomore year of college, or so, that we did a winter road trip circumnavigating Lake Michigan.  We left Grand Rapids, MI and headed south towards Chicago and up through Milwaukee.  The best part, on each occasion this trip happened, was Michigan's Upper Peninsula.  Up there, I remember seeing the best sunrises.  We did the trip three different years, but the first trip was when I realized I'd forever be a sunrise guy.  Below are three photos of the frigid winter sunrise from Michigan's Upper Peninsula from the early 2000s.

In 2007 my buddies and I started doing these spring break road trips that allowed us to see as much as possible in the least amount of time.  Between the three of us, no one had crossed the Mississippi as an adult nor had we experienced the Rocky Mountains (or any mountains) in person.  This road trip involved many stops but I can still remember that moment when the sun would barely peek over the horizon.  That sliver of a sunrise signaled a new day and regenerated me every time.  I tried to find some photos from the various road trips, but most are blurry or through a dirty windshield.  Take a road trip, drive through the night, and let me know how that first sliver of light makes you feel.

As the years went by, road trip sunrises quickly became one of my favorite things.  If you catch a desert sunrise, road trip or not, it's probably going to be one of the best things you see.  Another favorite sunrise of mine was in 2011 at the Grand Canyon North Rim in October, right before they closed for the season.  This was not only my first Grand Canyon sunrise, it was my first time seeing the Grand Canyon in person.  What a way to be introduced to the place - as it wakes up.

On my most recent trip, to Minnesota, I woke up just in time to see the sun rising over Lake Superior.  Everyone was asleep, even the dog, so I quickly got dressed and crept outside to watch the sun come up.  I walked from the house, through the pines, and ended on the beach.  I could hear the ice moving, see the fog over the city behind me, and see a couple of dogs being walked down the way.  It was an amazing moment in time, to stop and take it all in.

Sunrises may be my favorite, but don't think I wont whip out a camera or phone to capture the sunset just as often.  Every beginning has an end and both are beautiful.

 

 

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