I was trying to come up with some intelligent way to describe the incredible sense of awe that I feel when walking along a mountain ridge that overlooks a cold, blue alpine lake or the sense of serenity that accompanies a visit to a northern Wisconsin lake as the leaves of October color the banks. Unfortunately, I couldn't come up with anything on my own, so I decided to steal a couple of quotes from people a lot better at expressing themselves than I am.

Nature is the art of God.         -Sir Thomas Browne

Nature is full of genius, full of the divine; not a snowflake escapes its fashioning hand.         -Henry David Thoreau

Both of the pictures above can be found on this web site (the one on the left was taken at Cathedral pass and can be found below; the one on the right was taken along the south western coast of Ireland and can be found under the Travels section). The world is full of thousands of sites at least as spectacular as these and as you can tell from looking at the relatively small number of links below, I have a lot more traveling to do if I'm going to see them all.

• Backpacking at Mt. St. Helen's - 2008
  After spending 30 days kayaking around an island in Alaska, my friends Kris and Leslie still hadn't had enough of the great outdoors. So when they arrived back in Seattle, we jumped in their car and headed south to Mt. St. Helens. Three days and 26 miles of mountain hiking later, I had experienced one of the greatest outdoor adventures of my life: Almost dieing of thirst in the 100 degree heat, eating wild blueberries as we hiked, getting bitten by little black flies, amazing views, walking over huge snow fields (still in 100 degree heat), and getting to spend 3 days with some great friends. Amazing!

• Neah Bay, Washington - 2008
  When the temps soar in Seattle, the place to go is Neah Bay - the most north westerly tip of Washington and the United States. It's a bitch to get to, requiring a ferry ride and another 3 hours driving on super curvy roads, but it's totally worth the effort. You will find yourself on a virtually deserted, beautiful white sand beach surrounded by the ruggedness of the Pacific Ocean's coast line. It's amazing!

• Trip to Yellowstone - 2006
  One great thing about having a hot, fun girlfriend is that, well, she's hot and fun. So fun in fact, that she's willing to ride in a car for a straight week with me, hike into a Grizzly inhabited wilderness, go three days without showering (at which point we could say I had a hot, fun, and smelly girlfriend), and laugh at my horrible jokes the entire time. How lucky am I?

• Wallace Falls
  This is a short and fun hike - especially if you're doing it with a hot, Italian brunnette. I highly recommend it to everyone out there. One thing to note, though: you have to find your own Italian - I'm not sharing.

• Camping at Sunday Lake
  This camping trip took place my first summer in Seattle and is just now making it to my web site. For once, though, this is not due to my rediculous penchant for procrastination, but, rather, the result of some friends penchant for procrastination. Those friends would be the same people that took me on this camping trip - Luke and Miakke. And what an awesome trip it was: great scenery, total seclusion from civilization, and fresh caught trout for dinner and breakfast the two days we were there. Oh yeah, and, even though I didn't get any pictures of it, as many fresh blueberries as you could pick growing all around the camp site. It was awesome!

• Camping on Saddlebag Island
  Saddlebag Island is an awesome place to camp! I say this for a few reasons. First, there were the really nice people that decided to leave right as we got there and gave us the last camp site on the island. This is good because we had no contingency plan for what to do next. Second, the crabbing was incredible. We pulled up over 20 legal crab in 2 days. Lastly, the views. Nothing like camping in the midst of a bunch of islands, water, and mountains. Absolutely spectacular.

• Cathedral Pass
  My second hike with the Mountaineers club turned out to be the most fantastic hike I've been on yet. We were in the eastern part of the Alpine Lakes Region of the Cascade Mountains and surrounded by majestic peaks, pristine alpine lakes, and beautiful meadows teeming with wildflowers. It turns out that the mesquitoes were also out enjoying the great weather and magnificent scenery but by finding a nice windy ridge to eat lunch on we were able to avoid becoming lunch ourselves. This is a highly recommended hike - just remember the bug spray.

• Hoh Rain Forest
  The one nice thing about being a lousy fisherman in the Pacific Northwest is that the rivers are in such amazing places that you really don't mind too much that you're not catching anything. This is especially true of the Hoh River in the Olympic Penninsula. It runs straight through the middle of the Hoh Rain Forest and it is spectacular. Not a lot of mountain views, but the forest is incredible. The trees are huge (proving once again that size really does matter) and the forest floor is covered by beautiful, plush green carpet of moss and ferns. We also took a quick detour on the way home to see the Pacific Ocean so there's a few shots of that in here as well (proving that the motion of the ocean is also important).

• Lake Blethany
  My first trip to an alpine lake in Washington state. It also doubles as my first camping trip in the Pacific Northwest. The whole thing was fantastic - except for the part where I lost the trail on my way home and had to bushwack through a dense forest filled with lions and bears (and tigers, oh my). Fortunately, my Danial Boone like insticts guided me safely home.

• Thunder Creek
  This was really my first major hike since living in Washington and it was beautiful. There aren't a lot of mountain views on this 12 mile hike in the Northern Cascade National Park but, as you will see in the photos, there are a few spots on the trail where you get a glimpse of a couple of snow capped peaks. The real beauty of this trip lies in the forest itself. The trail follows a gorgeous river and winds its way through a lush blanket of green ferns and moss. Definitely a great first hike.