Stay On The Boardwalk!

I don’t know about you, but I am totally astounded whenever I see anyone step off the boardwalk at Yellowstone’s hot springs. As a summer seasonal park ranger I see this behavior all the time and can’t help but wonder. What are these folks thinking? 

Last week I came across a perfect example of why it is best not to consider doing anything so foolish. 

Good Godfrey!  Collapsed travertine at Mammoth Hot Springs

Read more ...

Taking My Time

Whenever I travel I want to allow myself the gift of time. What might take three hours takes me six. What might take two days takes me five. There is so much to see along the way, so much scenery and history to absorb in this beautiful country of ours, that it would be a shame to pass it all by with the unrelenting goal of merely getting from point A to point B. 

Bear Lake Valley

Read more ...

A Little Park With Big Views

If you blink, you might miss it, it’s that little. In fact, even if you don’t blink you could easily drive right past it. 

Beaver buddies on the quartz monzonite boulder indicate the path to big views

Read more ...

Tracking The Desert Tortoise

Living in southern Utah and hiking a lot of landscape over the past 20 years, you would think that I’d have seen at least one desert tortoise stroll past my boots. Sadly this has not been the case. The Mojave desert tortoise spends 95% of its life underground. It all comes down to chance, and whether you are looking in the right place at the right time. 

It did not appear that anyone was home

Read more ...

Sequestering The Seasonals

I love my job as a summer seasonal ranger in Yellowstone, our nation’s first national park, the undisputed Mother Ship of the US park system. I’m ready to go back to work with my summer friends, ready to drive through some of the most spectacular scenery on Earth from my winter desert home in southwestern Utah to my summer high–country home in northwestern Wyoming.

Absaroka Range from Avalanche Peak, Yellowstone National Park

Read more ...

How Old Is This Rock?

Whenever I go hiking with a group of friends everyone expects me to know everything about every rock we see. “Hey, you’re the geologist!” they all say. “Well, yeah, but…” I hedge, diffidently twirling my booted toe in the sand. 

These folks can sure ask a lot of questions!

Read more ...

Zooming Into Springtime

It’s been a quiet winter here in southern Utah, which is not at all a bad thing. Much as I would have liked to, I didn’t jet off to Iceland to view the northern lights. I didn’t hop a plane to South America to visit the ruins of Machu Picchu. For that matter I haven’t even (yet!) driven up to Salt Lake City to visit my nephew and see the mummy exhibit at the Leonardo. 

desert marigold

Read more ...

What’s Flyin’ In Zion?

It’s barely nine o’clock on this mid–February morning in Zion National Park. Not much wildlife is out and about yet at this chilly hour (although we did pass the resident wild turkey inhabitants as they busily pecked for their breakfast in a clearing).

Weeping Rock trailhead with river access

Read more ...

Loving Life In The Beaver Dam Mountains

It’s never too late to catch up, is it? And if there is anyone who should know this, that anyone would be me. It’s been a month since my last post! It would be no surprise if people thought I’d fallen off the edge of some cliff. 

Hiking my favorite mountains

Read more ...