Columbus & Cuyahoga NP

Our dear friend Andrew Walch moved from Austin to Columbus, Ohio a few years ago with his wonderful partner Isabel. He's an incredible athlete and ultimate player, and a loyal lion of a friend, so he helped Mike and I with many projects over the years either by loaning us tools or helping build stuff. We miss him and were excited to see him and get to hang with Isabel, who we didn't get to hang out with enough in Austin due to the pandemic. 

Isabel cuddled up with Hudson and their dog "Timmy", short for Tim Duncan, who Sybil was obsessed with. 

See? Obsessed. But honestly, who wouldn't be? 

Columbus has some great bike trails on green belts along the Scioto River. Isabel and Walch live in a quaint neighborhood called German Village, very near these trails and downtown, so we had a lot of fun on bike adventures around town to nearby parks, kid festivals, and the coolest bookstore I've ever seen. 

It's called The Book Loft, and it consists of a labyrinthine 32 rooms and 3 stories of ceiling to floor books, new and used. We spent a blissful hour there browsing and reading, and could have spent many more. Our family loves books, and hitting up used bookstores is one of our favorite things to do in new cities to keep our travel book stash new and exciting. 

After the bookstore we rode to a free children's festival that they have every summer Friday at a park downtown with the promise of blow up jumpy thingies, face painting, lawn games, and a carousel. It tickles me to watch how much enjoyment kids get out of carousels and I keep thinking they will be over them, but they still love them.

Hudson might have taught Timmy some naughty new tricks, like how to escape their porch enclosure. 

In my Parks & Rec class, we talk about the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland catching fire due to the amount of suspended pollution as an example of the severity of water pollution in the US during the 1960s and 70s. After that I always have students cover the Cuyahoga Valley National Park in projects, so I was excited to visit the only national park in Ohio in person. 

There is a beautiful and mostly forested trail through the park called the Towpath Trail that runs 90 miles total alongside the Erie and Ohio canalways and ends at Lake Erie in Cleveland. A towpath is where they built a path next to the canals so that mules could tow the boats upstream. There were remnants of some locks too.

Walch joined us for our bike ride through Cuyahoga Valley NP! He was very patient with our blazing 4 mph pace and frequent stops. 

Walch wasn't the only champ. The girls rode 9 miles total with great attitudes. 

Parker was on her tiny bike with no gears working 3 times harder than the rest of us. More than once Parker yelled out, "stopping!" and then said, "Can I have a hug?" We would hug and she would just start riding again. Meanwhile, Sybil was blazing ahead with one of the adults, and seemed like she had a few more miles in her. 

More action shots of our littlest rider. I can't get enough of how cute she looks on her bike because it's too small for her so she looks like she's on a tiny BMX bike. 

The coolest part of this trail is that you can ride it one way and take a scenic train back to the beginning! So we hopped on the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad after lunch together at the Peninsula Depot and rode in style back to the car. 

It was so fun to see Isabel and Walch and their beautiful home and life in Columbus. Thanks for your hospitality y'all! I think Columbus surprised both Mike and I with it's charm, artistic and progressive vibe, and access to parks/nature. 

Next up, Niagara Falls and our international destination for the summer...Canada! Get ready Tim Horton's...I'm coming for ya. 

 

Road Trip: Arkansas to Indianapolis

The inspiration for this summer's adventure began with a family reunion in Pocahontas, AR. We lost my Great Aunt Faye in 2020 early during the pandemic and then my grandmother, Granny Bea, in the fall of 2022. I was close with both of them and picked up many life lessons from listening to the stories of their childhoods growing up as cotton sharecroppers during the Great Depression in rural Arkansas. They were twins but different in every measurable way except for their penchant for arguing with each other. 

 

Granny Bea                                     Aunt Faye 

Many of my memories of them happened in the kitchen preparing, making, eating, or arguing about food. 

My mom arranged a family reunion with the surviving family members from Texas, Detroit, and Arkansas, so we honored them with a true Arkansas experience including a 4th of July family fish fry, floating the Eleven Point River, shooting off fireworks in the yard, catching lightning bugs, eating constantly, trading family lore, playing with the youngest cousins, and riding Uncle Hoyt's 4-wheeler around the property. It was lovely.

Floating the Eleven Point River with the whole crew! We spent a morning floating it, and another day splashing and swimming along the shoreline. It was a huge hit with the girls. 

Happy birthday America!

Granny Bea's carport looks onto a beautiful tree covered property with trees. I have wonderful memories playing in the yard and have watched many a rainstorm from her carport. Our last day there, right after we left our final family hang, a double rainbow came out after a storm and I couldn't help feeling emotional due to to the symbolism of the two arcs of colorful bright light. 

P & S glamor shot. 

 

Opa wins the award for most books read to S & P while there.

Fireworks! 

After Arkansas we drove straight to Sheridan, Indiana to meet up with Mike's family. 

We had a delicious lunch with Aunt Beverly (Nana's sister), and Nana's brothers Kyler and Tyler.

Next we drove to stay the night with Jared and Mary, Mike's cousins who live in nearby Kokomo. They have a beautiful house, a great neighborhood for riding bikes, two awesome kids, and an above ground pool so S & P had a blast. They are both teachers so I enjoyed hearing their stories and perspectives, and I always enjoy talking and hanging with them. 

Pool fun at Jared and Mary's house. 

It was really nice to connect with family, both mine and Mike's, after the long break of COVID. Next up Columbus, Ohio to visit Walch and Isabel on our way up to the Upper Peninsula! 

TGIS 2023!

After another challenging year in education, Mike and I were particularly excited for summer and getting to spend some more time adventuring with the girls in CK/Chirp. After blowing it out last summer in Costa Rica and New Mexico/Colorado, we decided to spend some dedicated time in Texas in June before venturing out on adventures farther afield in July. For our longer July trip we used a family reunion in Arkansas and the return of the SNIT (!!) in Wisconsin to design a road trip to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, a place we had heard was beautiful and well worth a visit. 

But first! I had been looking forward all year to my first backpacking trip since having kids. I'd wanted to do a trip in the Gila Wilderness in New Mexico along the West and Middle Forks of the Gila River, and a frisbee friend Maureen "Mo" McCamley, a native New Mexican offered to come along! So here's a photo dump of that: 

The Gila Wilderness was the first Wilderness Area in the U.S. and is celebrating it's 100th anniversary next year! Wilderness Areas have the highest restrictions of any type of protected land in the U.S, so you can't take any mechanized vehicles into them, even bikes. 

The day we got there, the ranger told us that there was a wild fire just a few miles north of the trail, and headed toward the trail. We changed our plans by knocking off a day and switching the direction of our loop, and headed out into the smoky air hoping it would clear up and we would make it past the danger zone in time. Above is the annotated map of our trail with the extent of the fire as of the last day. 

Most of the hike was like the views above, with constant river crossings and the trail winding through high walled canyons. Every time we turned a corner, we would strain our necks to look up in awe and exclaim that it couldn't get more beautiful. We were lucky that the wildfire smoke was only hanging around each day for a few hours, and then would blow off. The first day we hiked 9 miles to Jordan Hot Springs. The second day we did a big haul of 12 miles, and up to the arid pass between the Middle and West Forks, when we could see the wildfire just a few miles away. The last day we had a short 6 miles back to the cars and were fortunate to thumb a ride the last couple of miles back to our cars. 

The next few weeks were a mix of Canyon Lake, Austin, and Houston to hang with friends and family. Photo dump from that time below: 

Summertime Sno Cones at Canyon Lake! 

 

Cousin time at Nana's! 

Doppelgängers Sybil and Aunt Ellen! 

Staying in Austin for a couple of weeks during the summer was definitely the right call for the girls, who spent entire mornings playing Lego, creating fashion shows (above), and playing together. Almost every afternoon involved a trip to a local pool. 

Baby Reid! 

Finger painting turned into body painting for Parker at Canyon Lake.  

Sybil spent a fun week at an Austin Parks & Rec summer day camp with her best friend Harriet, so we got to spend some quality time with Parker and spend some time purging and cleaning the house. After a month of staying around Texas however, we were itching to get on the road and excited to start our road trip to the Upper Peninsula!