The Working Wanderer

Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
So a few years ago I took a promotion at work and it changed a great deal in my life. I was previously a retail store manager, tied to a single location 65+ hours a week with a just a few weeks of vacation a year to "get away". Unfortunately I believe many people live this type of life, existing within their place of work and having a brief respit of time at home each evening or on the weekend with family and friends. The promotion I took has me traveling for my company and overseeing construction/remodel projects across the US. Due to the nature of these projects I have windows of time where I'm able to get out and explore the areas I'm working in. On top of those small breaks I have a week or two off between projects to enjoy time with family, friends and have a real life at home. It's simply amazing.

I started documenting my travels on another site and have decided to transfer that report here as well in hopes of reaching a larger audience and gaining more insight into the areas I'm in. I'm just going to recap here to begin with since the time frame from the other site won't mesh with posts here, and then I'll update both simultaneously going forward.

First a collection of photos and locations from my first year of travel. These are a bit out of order and I'll go back and comment on locations and details as I can.

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This is close to home for me, just downstream from Raven Cliff Falls in NE Georgia. Took my daughter here on a hiking/camping trip during her summer break from school.

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The lake a Laura Walker State Park in south Georgia. I was camping overnight on a trip into Florida for work prior to taking my promotion. Little did I know at the time what was to come.

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Exploring Tate City in NE Georgia with another adventure bike rider. This road dead ends at a trail head that goes over into the Standing Indian area of North Carolina. This road in from Georgia is the only way to get there from the south side of the mountain.

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Laura Walker State Park again.

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Trying to avoid the rain while on the motorcycle in southern Alabama.

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Exploring on the bike near home and found this old structure.

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One of my first trips in my new position had me traveling to Puerto Rico for a project. Had the opportunity to hike in El Yunque, the only tropical rain forest in the national parks system.

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Near Crystal River Florida I was chasing the sunset one night.

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Raven Cliff Falls near home.

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More Raven Cliff.

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Snake near Raven Cliff.

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Not all my trips have me exploring nature. On a project in Manhattan I got to see a lot of the city. Here's the Brooklyn Bridge.

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A trail near home.

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Boyhood rock near John Burroughs home outside Roxbury NY.

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John Burroughs home outside Roxbury.

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Near home again.

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Very cool beach in Puerto Rico where the water rushed through a small inlet into this cove. The volcanic rock was sharp and jagged where I was standing.

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Another Puerto Rico beach.

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The remnants of an old structure in Puerto Rico.

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In El Yunque again.
 

Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
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A cave (sort of) in Puerto Rico. Quite a few bats on the ceiling

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Another view of the cove beach in Puerto Rico.

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More Puerto Rico.

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El Yunque.

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Took a ferry from Puerto Rico to another small island off the coast and spent the day on this beach. One of the most perfect places I've ever been.

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Sunset on the ferry ride back.

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Bacardi Factory tour in San Juan.

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View from high up in El Yunque.

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Cathedral in San Juan.

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After Puerto Rico I had a project in Detroit...in February. Different weather for sure.

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Camping at Raven Cliff.

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Raven Cliff with hammocks!

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A beach in Florida...not to sure where.

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Hotel room in New Hampshire that overlooked the outfield of a minor league field. Double header that night.

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Camping and fishing in Tate City.

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2 minutes from my front door. Love where I live.

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Space center in Houston.

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Manhattan again.
 

Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
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A building shaped like a duck on Long Island.


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If you drive all the way to the end of Long Island this is what you'll find.

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While exploring Manhattan I came across this sculpture of "eyes". That's not what I thought they were. :ylsmoke:

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On a work assignment in Texas I snagged a Jeep Wrangler as a rental and went exploring. Some beautiful countryside in Texas and I loved the Wrangler. Bought one the day I flew home from this project.

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It gets cold where I live in NE Georgia. Winter put on quite a show and partially froze quite a bit of the Chattahoochee River.

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Dinner during a camping trip.

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Houston Space Center again.

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Exploring the national forest near home
 

Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
Last year I ended up on a project in Santa Monica that allowed me to explore Death Valley and the Sequoia National Forest. Fell in love with the natural side of California during that trip. LA living however is not for me.

The most important decision at the beginning of my projects is selecting the proper rental vehicle:

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After that it was time for some exploring...

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Or sitting in LA traffic. One of the two.

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On the east coast the interstate system winds through some country side, but it's mostly views of trees. Not out here in California!

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On the way into Sequoia National Forest.

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Some serious peaks come into view the higher you go.

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And the trees get huge!

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The required "Stand in front of the big tree" shot.

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Beautiful out here.

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I found a path that lead to the Lincoln Tree, and grabbed these shots on the way up:

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Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
So I should stop here and talk about my hike to the Lincoln Tree. I had pulled over to take some tourist style photos of a grove of sequoia trees along the side of the road. While getting the above "Stand in front of the tree" photo I noticed a trail leading back through the grove and up the ridge. Upon exploring it further I came across a sign that indicated the trail went to the right 6.5 miles and picked up more of the trail system into the park, and went left 1 mile to the Lincoln Tree. I should state here that I consider myself a somewhat experienced hiker. I've done plenty of solo hiking, overnight hiking/camping and back country exploring. I know better than to hike alone when I'm 2000 miles from the closest person who knows where I am in an area that I have little knowledge of. However, I allowed that tiny distance of 1 mile to lull me into a sense of confidence and it could have been bad.

I returned to the 4runner, grabbed a bottle of water and hit the trail. The view from the top of the ridge was amazing.


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After spending some time at the top of the ridge and possibly seeing the Lincoln Tree (it's the 3rd largest in the world, but every tree up there was huge and I didn't have a tape measure). I began heading back down to the 4runner. I came across 6 or 7 Mountain Grouse in this thicket of scrub brush:

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They were putting on quite a show darting around and grabbing bugs up while calling out to one another. I enjoyed watching them for a few minutes and then continued my climb back down to the 4runner. As I came around the edge of this scrub brush and stepped up onto a rock ledge and caught a glimpse of movement off to my left. It was a bear. :Wow1: Normal hiking protocol would have had me making noise as I hiked to ward off such an encounter but I guess I had stood quietly long enough watching the grouse that this bear hadn't heard me coming. The bear had not seen me, I was down wind and a safe distance away so I simply stood still and watched. The bear was heading perpendicular to the path I needed to take so I planned on letting it go on it's way and once it reached the top of the rise off to my right I would continue down the path. As I watched the bear cross over the path and head down into the small ravine to my right and caught another glimpse of movement off to my left. A baby bear cub. :yikes: Now I was hiding behind the rock outcropping I had just stepped up on and was praying baby bear would follow mom and they would go on their way. Baby bear crossed over the path but did not go down into the ravine like mom did. Instead he began playing on a dead log off to my right. As I watched I could hear mom making noises to coax baby bear down to her and baby bear would protest and continued playing on the log. Baby bear did eventually grow tired of playing with on the log...and began heading right for me. This is when I decided to do the other thing you're never supposed to do when hiking, I left the trail. I had my bearings and knew where the 4runner was parked through the trees so I quietly made my way back to the other side of the scrub brush and struck off through the woods and back to the 4runner. I didn't get mauled by a mother bear so I consider the hike a success.
 

keylay

Adventurer
Keep it coming, please. These are great! You're 2 minute view from your home is gorgeous. I live in a suburb of Houston, on the Northwest side. From your visit, you can imagine that for the most part, my 2 minute view is different. Sure, i can drive 10-30 minutes and find some inner city mountain bike trails, or 1.5 hours to Galveston or a National Forest with few 4x4 trails, but beyond that, its SO far to get into the wilderness.
 

Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
I continued to explore California during this trip, heading up the coast an into the San Bernardino mountains.

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Did some more solo hiking, but was pretty sure the vegetation was sparse enough out here I would see a bear coming.

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Great hiking out here!

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Cool seeing nature fight back from a fire.

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Some great views.

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Even found some shade.

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Higher up the views kept getting bigger.

Later that week I made my way up to the Big Bear area with a co-worker. Little did I know I'd be back in Big Bear to do a project less than a year later.

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The lake.

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Outside of Big Bear we found an alternative route for going back to Los Angeles.

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This is the side of California I love.

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Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
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Love the sunsets in the Big Bear area. California can sure put on a show in the evening.

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A little later during this project I hit up Death Valley. Very cool place.

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Saw some wind power being made on the way out.

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Reminded me of this comic from XKCD:

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Dirt, asphault, whatever...I love driving in this part of California!

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It's like another planet out there.

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If Mars had plants it would look like that.

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So many roads to explore!

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Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
Followed this road up into an old mining operation. The caretakers had just come back from getting groceries in town so I didn't bother them for a tour.

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I love California! (except LA...and the gas prices...and the real estate prices...and the food prices...) But this is awesome:

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Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
Keep it coming, please. These are great! You're 2 minute view from your home is gorgeous. I live in a suburb of Houston, on the Northwest side. From your visit, you can imagine that for the most part, my 2 minute view is different. Sure, i can drive 10-30 minutes and find some inner city mountain bike trails, or 1.5 hours to Galveston or a National Forest with few 4x4 trails, but beyond that, its SO far to get into the wilderness.

Having been the Houston multiple times now I can say the view is certainly different. Not a bad part of the state, but it is quite a ways to get out to the exciting stuff. Thanks for following along!
 

Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
Now we get into some serious adventure stuff! I signed up for a project in Kalispell Montana just outside of Glacier National Park. I arranged to stay a few days longer and had some buddies fly in to knock off some hiking bucket list items. Let the show begin! I'm copying and pasting from my report on the other site so some of the timing below will seem off:

I hit up Hungry Horse reservoir in the early evening. What a fantastic area! In the two weeks I have left here I'm definitely going to go back out there for some more exploring. First I checked out the dam. Construction began in 1948 and was completed in 1953. This dam blocks the flow of the Flathead River to form the Hungry Horse reservoir.

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The reservoir is surrounded by recreational areas, boat launches and campgrounds. A very cool place.

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Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
After a temporary closing I discovered they had re-opened the Going to the Sun Road in Glacier National Park after completing some road construction. I jumped at this opportunity to make a complete run of the road! Words don't do justice to the magnificent views inside the park so I won't even try.

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Some snow higher up.

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Didn't see much wildlife inside the park but when I exited St. Mary's on the east side and headed down Hwy 2 I spotted this guy grabbing some last minute lunch off the side of the road.

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Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
Packed up the morning of Oct 7, 2015 and decided to hit up the West side of Glacier. I had intended to check out the Quartz Creek campground but unfortunately Inside North Fork Road was closed on the south end at Camas Creek and at the North end outside of Polebridge. Drove up to Bowman Lake instead and looked at that campground and the lake. Absolutely beautiful. On to the cell phone photography!

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The park describes this road as primitive, rough and potentially dangerous. They should come drive some of the dirt roads in North Georgia. This road is like new asphalt by comparison!

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These were taken from the bridge that crosses Camas Creek. The road was closed just past the bridge. When I reached Polebridge via the Outside North Fork Road the road was closed at that end as well and some large equipment hauling trucks were coming out. NPS must be working on the road now that it's the off season.

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More fantastic roads!

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Bowman lake is gorgeous. This side of the park doesn't have many marked attractions on the visitors map other than Bowman Lake and Kintla Lake. These lakes seem to be off the beaten track and probably something that most visitors never bother to venture out and explore. Only about 1/2 the lake is visible in this photo, it continues around the bend on the horizon of the photo.

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After admiring the sites I jumped back on Outside North Fork Road and headed for Columbia Falls. I came across a late model GMC truck that was limping along down the road. As I pulled up beside I saw that the front drivers wheel was at a horrible camber. The driver explained he'd been traveling down the road at speed when he heard a horrible noise and the truck jerked to the side. I offered my assistance (with no tools in the rental truck I'm not sure what I could have done) but the driver said he was just going to limp back into cell phone range and call for a tow. I wished him luck and continued on my way.

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Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
Video of Bowman Lake.


My friends flew into Kalispell during my third week there and we took in more of the sights. First up was a return to the Hungry Horse Reservoir to do a little more exploring.

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We headed up Lost Johnny Creek Road to the top and did a little climbing around while watching for bears.

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After that we headed over to Glacier National Park and went up Going to the Sun Road to the Logan Pass Visitor Center. The remainder of the road is now closed for the season. We stopped along the way and took in the sights.

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Gallowbraid

Where's that road go?
We headed down late in the day and were treated to some great color from the setting sun.

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The following day we headed back up into Glacier and hiked the trail from the Logan Pass Visitor Center down to Hidden Lake. We were hoping to see some wildlife but only managed to see a ferocious chipmunk.

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My friend John trying to look majestic.

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Some of John's photos:

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My friend Jeremy and I admiring the hill where the herd of bears would stampede down from to devour us.

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