Category: Nature

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Kansas

#TravelThursday continues, and in this edition we visit Kansas. But before we get there let me share this map of the 50 United States. All of the states that I’ve visited are colored green. That includes states that I’ve lived in, spent quality time in, visited, or simply drove through. It does not include states where I stayed inside an airport on a layover and never ventured outside. (I see you California.)

Visited States In Green

By the way you can create your own such map at amcharts.com/visited_states. You can share the final product on social media or download it. I tried to incorporate it into this blog post via the HTML coding, but it appeared to be non-compatible with this blog, so I simply downloaded it and then uploaded it on here.

So you can see that there are 21 states that I have not yet visited – or 42% of them. One of my goals – post-retirement in a few years – is to visit all of the rest of them.

In November of 2013 when I drove 1,003 miles from west of Wichita Falls Texas to north of Cincinnati Ohio I came within about a tenth of a mile of the Kansas state line while driving on I-44 from Oklahoma into Missouri. That’s right – I-44 misses the southeastern corner of Kansas by about 550 feet.

I actually don’t know anyone who lives in Kansas. I don’t know much about Kansas other than the cities of Wichita and Topeka and of course the western portion of the Kansas City metro area. #GoChiefs

I know that there are lots of interesting places to visit in Kansas. I favor museums and parks, so I’ll be researching those and planning a future visit to “The Sunflower State”. I have family living in North Texas, so Kansas is just a little over 250 miles away. A Spring, Summer, or Autumn visit to Kansas sounds good. (I know how cold it can get in Kansas in the wintertime.)

Kansas – particularly the Kansas City area – is known for its slow-smoked barbecue. I’m a fan of it. Actually I’m a fan of any type of barbecue. I pretty much enjoy eating assorted meats cooked well-done on a grill. I could make myself at home at many Kansas BBQs and steakhouses.

Join me next #TravelThursday as we visit another location on the face of this earth.

They keep you safe on your way, and your feet will not stumble. You can go to bed without fear. You will lie down and sleep soundly. You need not be afraid of sudden disaster or the destruction that comes upon the wicked, for the LORD is your security. He will keep your foot from being caught in a trap. (Proverbs 3:23-26 NLT)

All rights reserved (c) 2021 Christopher M. Day, CountUp Ministries

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Blogging Career Driving Home Military Nature Photography Scripture Travel Weather

Home Sweet Homestead

#TravelThursday continues, and in this edition we visit my hometown of the past 34 years – Homestead Florida. The United States Air Force brought me here at the age of 20, and I’ve been working at the airbase next to the city for most of these past 34 years. Hurricane Andrew tore through the city and the surrounding area exactly 29 years and 2 days ago, and almost everything was in ruins. I left the area 4 days later, and I returned to my original home-of-record – the Washington D.C. area (both Maryland and Virginia).

19 months later (in March of 1994) I returned to a partially-rebuilt Homestead, and I’ve been here ever since. I’ll be here for a few more years until I retire and move away about 3 hours north of here.

Homestead (the city limits) is about 5 miles wide (west to east) and 2 to 4 miles long (north to south). Homestead (as an area) extends not too far east and south (due to water), not too far west (due to the Everglades), but well to the northeast.

West to east street numbers begin in downtown Miami at Flagler Street. It’s the “zero street line”. Street numbers increase both northward and southward by 1 every 330 feet. Every 16 street numbers is a mile (5,280 feet). Homestead is located in the lower-300s. 304TH, 312TH, 320TH, and 328TH Streets are all major thoroughfares in the city. Technically that’s about 20 miles south of downtown Miami, but you can’t drive due southward from Miami to Homestead. You have to drive southwestward along Florida’s Turnpike or U.S. 1. It’s about 30 miles, and it’ll take you about 45 to 60 minutes depending on traffic. The Homestead area generally begins south of 232ND Street. Over 175,000 residents live here. New home construction continues to boom.

Homestead is actually located closer to Key Largo than Miami. The “18-Mile Stretch” between the mainland of Florida and the “Overseas Highway” (U.S. 1 through the Florida Keys) begins just 2 miles south of Homestead.

We have lots of local tourist attractions here in the Homestead area. Some of my favorites include Monkey Jungle and Fruit & Spice Park. We are also located in-between 2 National Parks – Everglades and Biscayne. I’ve spent quality time at all of these places over the years – more so recently than previously. I volunteered inside Everglades National Park as a docent at a partially-restored NIKE Missile Site. About a million people from around the world visit Everglades National Park each year.

IMG_2403

That’s my 2015 Honda Civic (at the time) parked in front of the Missile Launch Barn with the restored Nike Hercules Missile on display inside. That was taken at 3 PM on New Year’s Eve of 2016 as I was wrapping-up a busy day of tours. 

Of course our # 1 product here in Homestead is our fine weather – especially in the wintertime when it’s freezing cold elsewhere in North America. A typical December or January day consists of sunny skies with highs in the mid-70s and lows in the low-60s. We actually experienced one of our chillier winter seasons in years in 2020 into 2021 with 9 days when we were stuck in the 60s all day long and 9 mornings when we dropped to the (gasp) 40s !

We’ve experienced rapid population growth here in the Homestead area over the past 20 years. Most of the long-timers don’t like it. They miss the “good old days” when Homestead was a sleepy rural town surrounded by vast farmland. A lot of long-timers have moved away to smaller towns elsewhere that remind them of the way Homestead used to be. Of course the long-timers of those respective smaller towns don’t appreciate their own population growth.

I like the Homestead of today – more so than the Homestead of yesterday. All of the new rooftops have created new stores, new restaurants, and new opportunities – all within about 3 miles of my home.   

Join me next #TravelThursday as we visit another location on the face of this earth.

They keep you safe on your way, and your feet will not stumble. You can go to bed without fear. You will lie down and sleep soundly. You need not be afraid of sudden disaster or the destruction that comes upon the wicked, for the LORD is your security. He will keep your foot from being caught in a trap. (Proverbs 3:23-26 NLT)

All rights reserved (c) 2021 Christopher M. Day, CountUp Ministries

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Blogging Nature Photography Scripture Travel

30 Years Of Cruisin’

#TravelThursday continues, and in this edition we visit the Western Caribbean via cruise ship. Exactly 30 years ago this morning – August 19TH 1991 – I awoke on a cruise ship at sea for the first time ever.

My Mom and Dad asked me if I wanted to go on a cruise with them and my little brother earlier in 1991, and (not knowing much about cruise ships at the time) – I said “YES !”.

They all flew down to Miami from the Washington D.C. area, and I drove up from 30 miles away. (I live in South Florida.) We embarked on the Norwegian Seaward – a fairly-new 3-year-old ship at the time. I believe there were 4 ports-of-call on the itinerary in the Bahamas, Grand Cayman Island, Ocho Rios Jamaica, and Cozumel Mexico (don’t remember the exact order). It was a 7-day cruise, and I pretty much fell in love with cruising during that week.

Ocho Rios stands out the most from that cruise. I remember doing a shore excursion with my family on a boat or a raft from the top of a hill, and we sailed slowly down a lazy river back to sea level as our host / guide sang to us. I always thought that it was Dunn’s River Falls, but you can only walk up and down those steeper falls – you can’t be on a boat or a raft on it. That trip down a river was likely part of a larger full-day coach tour of the island. Of course this was 30 years ago, so I don’t remember everything about it.

Ocho Rios also stands out in that I haven’t been back since on any other cruise or otherwise. I’ve been to the Bahamas, Grand Cayman Island, and Cozumel Mexico many times since that first cruise. I’ve been to Cozumel more than any other cruise ship port (by far).

My first 3 cruises were on Norwegian Cruise Line from 1991 to 1995. I then went on my first of 14 Carnival cruises in 1999. I’ve also been on Royal Caribbean and Disney.

I wrote about my 10TH Anniversary Carnival Imagination cruise in September 2009. Read it here.

I’ve got my 15TH Carnival cruise booked, and it’ll be my 23RD cruise overall. I’ll be visiting the “ABC Islands” – Aruba, Bonaire, and Curaçao.

I had two back-to-back poor cruising experiences on Norwegian in January 2013 and Carnival in May 2014. After those two cruises – I kind of decided that it would be the end of the cruising era of my life. They were my 19TH and 20TH cruises, and I thought that perhaps I’d “retire” after 20 and rediscover Florida and America rather than the Caribbean.

I actually lost my desire to cruise for a few years after that. But that didn’t last long. My brother and sister-in-law invited me to be a part of a short 4-day family cruise on Disney out of Miami, and I said “YES !”.

It was my first cruise in nearly 4 years, and my 21ST cruise overall. It was also a fantastic cruise that greatly exceeded my expectations for a Disney cruise. The food was outstanding, and the entertainment was a lot of fun. I also relived my youth (OK – 30s) out on the dancefloor on that cruise !

9 months later – I was on my 22ND cruise – back on Carnival. I booked it 2½ weeks after I returned home from that Disney cruise. Unlike my previous Carnival cruise nearly 5 years earlier this one was a fantastic one.

So now I have my 23RD cruise booked – also on Carnival. I actually booked it 11 months in advance about a month before COVID swept the world, and it was ultimately canceled, so I rebooked it. I’m so looking forward to visiting the “ABC Islands”. I’ve been to Aruba and Curaçao before (on a Carnival cruise in October 2012), but I’ve never been to Bonaire.

I still plan to continue to rediscover Florida and America in the years to come – particularly post-retirement, but I won’t rule-out cruising. I’d like to take another TransAtlantic cruise in the future. My cruise from Rome Italy to Miami Florida in 2007 (on Carnival) remains as the greatest of all of the cruises I’ve experienced.

Join me next #TravelThursday as we visit another location on the face of this earth.

They keep you safe on your way, and your feet will not stumble. You can go to bed without fear. You will lie down and sleep soundly. You need not be afraid of sudden disaster or the destruction that comes upon the wicked, for the LORD is your security. He will keep your foot from being caught in a trap. (Proverbs 3:23-26 NLT)

All rights reserved (c) 2021 Christopher M. Day, CountUp Ministries

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Blogging Driving Nature Photography Scripture Travel

Skyline Drive + Blue Ridge Parkway

#TravelThursday continues, and in this edition we visit 574 miles of scenic roadway up in the mountains of Virginia and North Carolina.

Several years ago I planned (via Excel spreadsheet) a road-trip that encompassed both Skyline Drive and the Blue Ridge Parkway. It was a very ambitious itinerary that – looking back upon it – is almost undoable. It had me flying-in to Washington Dulles International Airport and renting a car there. I’d get on the I-66 westbound, and I’d take that to Front Royal where I’d spend the night.

On the morning of Day 2 I’d begin my mountain adventure and embark on Skyline Drive – the 105½-mile slow and curvy road that runs near the top of the entire length of Shenandoah National Park in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. I’d visit Luray Caverns on this day. It’s 11 miles off Skyline Drive. I remember a long time ago – sometime in the mid-1970s – visiting this place as a little kid with my parents. I need to visit it again to enjoy it as an older adult. The area has grown-up a lot since then, and the caverns are surrounded by other museums and attractions.

I’d spend my 2ND night of this road-trip in Fishersville Virginia – located in-between the south-end of Skyline Drive and the north-end of the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Days 3, 4, and 5 were quite ambitious in that I would drive the entire length of the 469-mile Blue Ridge Parkway from Virginia into North Carolina (with various attraction and hotel stops along the way). At the end of the 5TH day I’d end-up in Gatlinburg Tennessee on the other side of the Great Smoky Mountains. I suppose I would’ve spent several days and nights in Gatlinburg exploring the area. After that I would’ve turned-in my rental car, and flown back home to sea level in Miami.

So while I extensively planned that road-trip – I never took it. I’ve not lost interest in taking that trip, and I probably will take it in the next several years – early-on in the next chapter of my life – post-retirement. I think I’d eliminate the Gatlinburg Tennessee portion of the future trip, as that’s worthy of its own trip by itself. Me and my little brother visited Gatlinburg for several hours back in August of 1992 – a few weeks after a horrible fire consumed a portion of the downtown attractions district. I remember that it still reeked of smoke some 3 weeks after the fire. I’d really like to spend about 4 days and 3 nights in and around Gatlinburg enjoying all that the area has to offer. I’d really like to visit Gatlinburg with my family (who live in North Texas), but I don’t think that it’s a destination that my brother, sister-in-law, and two nieces would find as much fun as me. They are not “mountain people”. They are “beach people”.

Now the Skyline Drive + Blue Ridge Parkway road-trip – that’s definitely a solo trip. Perhaps I’ll do it in reverse – from south to north – over the course of maybe 10 days instead of 5 – adding more stops for sightseeing, photography, attractions, and good mountain dining and lodging. Of course I’d drive my own car for the road-trip. It’s about 830 miles to drive from my current home in South Florida to the south-end of the Blue Ridge Parkway in western North Carolina. Once I hit Front Royal Virginia (at the north-end of the 574-mile parkway adventure) I’d take more traditional roads back southward, and the Andy Griffith Museum and the Billy Graham Library would be key stops along the way through the foothills of North Carolina.

I think it’s time to start redoing that itinerary (via Excel spreadsheet) so that it’s ready to implement in about 3 to 5 years. I’ll have over 2,500 miles to cover !

Join me next #TravelThursday as we visit another location on the face of this earth.

They keep you safe on your way, and your feet will not stumble. You can go to bed without fear. You will lie down and sleep soundly. You need not be afraid of sudden disaster or the destruction that comes upon the wicked, for the LORD is your security. He will keep your foot from being caught in a trap. (Proverbs 3:23-26 NLT)

All rights reserved (c) 2021 Christopher M. Day, CountUp Ministries