Archive for 2009
The Art of Exploration archive is where you'll find my past writings and thoughts. You are currently viewing a list of articles that were published in 2009.
- Clear Blue Sky
- I awoke this morning to sunlight streaming in the bedroom windows. The whole room glowed with warm light. It was the first sunshine to show its face in over a week and despite the icy air outside, I was determined to enjoy it.
- Old School Forest Preserve
- It’s been a real treat to be able to bike outside for so long this fall. I mean, it’s December for crying out loud and I can still ride the 12-mile loop to Old School Forest Preserve and back without risking frostbite or snowblindness.
- November Trails
- I didn’t write much in November. In fact, I didn’t write anything until now but I did take some photographs. Although I didn’t have much to say for nearly thirty days, I now look back and realize there was plenty of beauty to speak of.
- Fall Foliage
- October had its chance to be the best biking month of the year. Instead, it decided to rain. It then proceeded to drizzle, pour, mist and pee down.
- Many Parks Curve
- During the winter, Many Parks Curve is the end of the line for anyone driving eastward through Rocky Mountain National Park along Trailridge Road.
- Independence Grove
- The days are getting indisputably shorter. It’s a race to finish work and get outside before the sun starts to set and the trails go dim. Today, I missed my window of opportunity for getting in a decent bike ride before sunset.
- Middlefork Savanna
- There are suddenly hints of fall everywhere. The morning air is dewy and condenses in the early hours of the day, forming tiny droplets on windshields and rear view mirrors.
- Around Appledore Island
- Despite the stressful, negative aspects of my recent visit to Appledore Island, which I described in detail in my previous post, I also found the island to possess a great and unique beauty. That’s what I’d like to focus on in this post.
- Island Writing
- The gulls own the island. They stand guard over every inch of ground Appledore has to offer—every rock, every patch of grass, even every rooftop tile.
- These Old Houses
- I arrived at the Sheraton in Portsmouth, New Hampshire a day early. Since I don’t have to leave for Appledore Islands until tomorrow, I took this opportunity to relax and explore the town, taking pictures of old houses.
- Lakewood Forest Preserve
- After three months of biking eastward along the North Shore Bike Path, it was time to venture in the opposite direction. The only westbound bike path within reasonable distance of my house was the Millenium Path.
- Whitnall Park
- All of a sudden, I decided I had had enough of biking for a while. It was high-time I hoofed-it and there’s no better place for a walk this time of year than a botanic garden. I set a course for Whitnall Park.
- Kettle Moraine State Forest
- This past weekend I went to Kettle Moraine State Forest Southern Unit to hike the John Muir Trail.
- The Art of Jogging
- I’ve been running a lot recently. I am not a good runner, I am not fast, and I do not derive easy pleasure from the sport. I find it to be painful on my joints, producing kinks in hips and ankles alike.
- Real Easy Italian
- Each spring, when the flowers bloom and break the long color-silence of winter, I start to look closely at nature and I see a tiny world, one filled with pollen grains and petal edges and stamens and anthers.
- Pacing Myself
- Yesterday I spent long hours hammering out words for a book I have to produce for work. It’s mostly a matter of cutting and pasting and cringing at the screen as I go back and forth between windows and click here and there and drag and drop.
- Carn Galver Summit
- Today, we took a short hike to the top of Carn Galver. The two engine houses of Carn Galver Mine. The engine house on the left pumped water from the mine, while the engine house on the right hauled and crushed the tin ore.
- Gurnard’s Head
- I don’t normally get all weak at the knees when hiking along the edge of a steep drop-off. But pretty much all the high-wire hiking I’ve done in the past was relegated to the mountains, where steep slopes offer downcast views of distant rock and miniature trees. Here, the cliff bottoms out in a chaos of churning seas.
- Low Tides and Seagull Skies
- The tide was going out rather quickly. Inside the St. Ives harbor, little boats that had bobbed only a few moments earlier had been transformed into statues as the water drained from beneath their keels leaving them stranded on wet sand.
- Knee Deep
- A few days ago I started going for walks again. Let me be precise: outdoor walks, in the cold. This is an accomplishment considering I usually let January’s subfreezing temperatures and meager daylight confine me to the couch.
