Dream A New Dream

2012-02-05T11:36:00.000-08:00

Well... it is time to plan for another* 10,000 mile motorcycle/camping trip.

This summer I will traveling through the south west US on historic route 66, a visit to “4 corners” & Chaco Canyon, and on east toNorth Carolina to be a part of an ordination ceremony at the Spiritual LivingCenter of Charlotte. From there I am planning to attend the 2012 IntegratedMedical, Public Health, Preparedness and Response Training Summit in Nashville, TN. (Iam a member of the Medical Reserve Corp locally here inNorthern California as well as a member of the MRC Federal Cadre which is setup to supplement the U.S. Public HealthServicein disasters & emergencies.

If you want to find out a bit more about theMRC & how it is involved with the PHS check out this video… (my wife Leslie& I were part of the training where the video was filmed have a small role.)

Here are a few photos from our training at Fort AP Hill as a part of the MRC Federal Cadre:

From Nashville I will start north to visit some family in Virginia &Pennsylvania. Then… maybe up into Canada to start my journey eastward or… thisis where you come in.

* My trip in the summerof 2010 took me through Oregon to Crater Lake and then up to Washington tovisit Mt. St. Helens and then over to Montanato Glacier Park,then down to Wyoming to visit Yellowstone & the Tetons. From there I went start across the Great Pains with stops at Mt.Rushmore & Badlands National Park (as well as several other parks) and thenon to Chicago for a CSL conference. From ChicagoI made my way up around the Great Lakes and then headed across Canada stoppingat many National & Provincial parks all the way over to Banff & JasperNational Parks. From there I traveled west to Prince Georgethen over to Hyder, Alaska. I took a ferry from Prince Rupert to Vancouver Island andthen heading south to return home.

Hereis a link to a blog/ride report of my 2010 ride if you are interested:

http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=598289

* My trip last summerfrom Northern California, north to the San Juan Islands, Vancouver Island andthen up to the Alaskan/Canadian highway, then West across the Yukon Territoryto Alaska. After visiting Anchorage & Fairbanks I made the nearly 1,000mile round trip (mostly on unpaved roads) up the Dalton Highway/Haul Road to the “end of the road” (as far northas you can go in the US, about 250 miles north of the Arctic Circle) toDeadhorse & Prudhoe Bay, Alaska. My return trip took me south and east intoAlberta, Canada and then finally south to home.

Hereis a link to a blog/ride report of last summer’s ride if you are interested:

http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=691872

If you want to keep up with me and my blog I invite you to follow me.

2012-02-05T11:08:00.000-08:00

Well I have not made a blog entry for some time. Leslie & I did make it over to the Nor Cal coast, the small town of Albion, near Mendocino, recently enjoying the spring lie weather in late January. We spent a couple of nights in on the coast and had a fantastic drive south to Point Arena to explore the lighthouse there:

And a walk on the beah:

On our way home we managed to find the "way" back road over from the coast to Ukiah:

Then a bit of gravel near Stonyford:

After our coast trip we settled into a couple of weeks of intense focus our publishing company CAT Publishing which publishes college textbooks. Our annual e-mail promotion (will be sending out over 10,000 e-mails) will be deployed on Tuesday February 7th. A lot goes into creating the actual e-mails (four for this promotion) and updating our website landing pages and be prepared our responses to professors who are interested in publishing with us.We are just about done all that we want to do and will finish the last projects tomorrow. AND THEN it is time for some of this:

Next week we are heading south returning to Cozumel Mexico for a week of scuba diving and relaxing. Woo Hoo!!

Spokane Trip Days 9-10: August 25-26

2011-08-30T10:43:00.000-07:00

Leslie flew into Boise on Wednesday afternoon & we spent that evening & all day Thursday visiting family (I have 2 daughters & their families living near Boise including 2 grandchildren) in the area.

Friday 8/26 Leslie had her flight scheduled back home I had planned to take two days to make the trip back home from Boise, a little over 500 miles. I left Boise around 10 am and somewhere around Burns, OR made the decision to just keep on going and make the trip in one day. I did not take many pictures… pretty much just rode but here are two:

On Hwy 395 along Lake Abert in Southern Oregon


Near Burney, CA

I got home around 6pm and actually beat Leslie by about 1/2 hour!

Spokane Trip Days 6-8: August 22-24

2011-08-24T15:45:00.000-07:00

I woke up to a beautiful day in Spokane

I got the bike packed up and headed east across the Idaho panhandle and into Montana. The highlight for the day was a stop in the town of Wallace, Idaho. Obviously mining was a big deal here:

pretty cool life size statue

this is a display of various drills used in mining

these are different sizes of the drill bits


self explanatory!

I ended up spending the night in Hamilton, MT a bit south of Missoula.

The ride south on hwy 93 through Montana was really nice with lots of changes in elevation as you get up into the mountains and plenty of nice twisty sections:

I spent the night at a pretty cool place called Redwood Cabins in Lower Stanley, ID right ion the Salmon River and in the midst of the Saw Tooth Mountains:

Wednesday morning I drove from Lower Stanley, ID to Boise, ID. This was one of the best rides I have had in some time... just fantastic scenery & roads:


the "white line" is the cut into the side of the mountain where the road is

I got to Boise around 2pm

Spokane Trip Days 3-5: August 19-21

2011-08-24T14:56:00.000-07:00

I had been invited by the Center for Spiritual Living in Spokane to offer a spiritual renewal retreat for them over the weekend and this was my reason for the journey to Spokane. The retreat went very well and it was a true pleasure to have the time to get to know some of the folks from the Spokane Center.

Spokane Trip Day 2: Thursday August 18

2011-08-21T18:31:00.000-07:00

I left John Day around 8:30am and headed north on 395. Just a short way from town you climb in elevation and go through some very nice forested areas. There are many fantastic views and the road is in excellent condition with lots of sweeping turns that are perfect for motorcycle riding.

If you look closely at the photo an you see sweeping turn through the trees

As I got closer to Spokane the landscape became more one of rolling hills and a seemingly endless vista of wheat fields, many being harvested as I was driving by.Once I arrived in Spokane I discovered two wonderful things about the city that I did not know:

They have excellent Thai food

They have beautiful tree lined neighborhoods

Spokane Trip Day 1: Wednesday August 17

2011-08-19T15:20:00.000-07:00

I am heading up to Spokane, WA to present a Spiritual Renewal retreat for the CSL church there this coming weekend.

The drive was very pleasant with clear skies, moderate temperatures (the highest was the low 90s) and interesting scenery. I drove east on hwy 44 from home, went by the north entrance to Lassen Park, then turned on hwy 89 and went through the Hat Creek area and even though I have visited this area on many occasions it is always a beautiful drive. From hwy 89 I took hwy 299 to Alturas and then got on hwy 395. I have not been on hwy 395 as it enters Oregon, so this was a new road for me… always a pleasure to see a part of the world that I have not seen yet.

The highlight for today was the area around Lake Abert and the Abert Rim (you can click on the links if you want to see more information). Very interesting geographical area:

While I was walking around I found a survey marker:

From Abert Lake I stayed on hwy 395 and spent the night in John Day, OR. A nice smaller town with a good “home town” feel to it.

James's New Blog

2011-08-16T11:50:00.000-07:00

I decided to create my own unique blog rather then use the ADV Rider website that I have used in the past to share my adventures, primarily on my motorcycle. If you want to catch up on my previous blogs posted on the ADV rider website, here are the links:

My 2010 Trip to Toronto and across Canada

My 2011 Trip to Alaska