“I imagined my life like a beer commercial . . .
I knew where I was going- everywhere!  
I wanted to do everything,
go everywhere,
meet everyone,
and I wanted to do it now.  
And to my great pleasure,
it was all happening.”
- David Hatcher Childress

Mine is a story of restless nights.  Of glorious and oft painful mornings.  Of starting over -  again and again.  Of too much dreaming in an internet age.  Of waking up to home not being the same as the place you happen to be from.

A story of the fleeting friendships passing in opposite directions.  Of forgotten cities and vast urbanscapes.   Of miracles of man and Earth seen by too few and by so many.

A story of a blue bag stitched with Summit, small notebook computer, and the erewhile Michigander who carries them through the world for as long as they all might last.

I hate the cliche of ‘come and follow my adventures’.  But that’s just what this has become for me; an adventure.  The is my travel journal; my story so far.

“It seems fitting to start a story with no foreseeable end at a quite literal fin du monde.”

• At Land’s End, A Beginning: Copper Harbor
• Roads through Forgotten Memories: the Keweenaw Peninsula
• A Second Try in Houghton
• A Detour: Ontonagon and Rockland
• Life in the Northern Micropolis: Marquette, MI
• The Marquette Micropolitan Area
• A Crossroads In Seney
• The Straits of Mackinac
• The Road Home: Grand Rapids, Michigan
• Downtown Grand Rapids
• But Home In Nowhere

“. . . by far the smallest airport I have ever been to, as evidenced by a pilot sleeping under the shade of his plane’s wing.”

• A One Way Ticket: San Juan, Puerto Rico
• Back In the City: San Juan, Puerto Rico
• My Accidental Trip to Old Town, San Juan
• The Decaying Beach Resort: Isla Verde
• A Bar and a Beach, the Condado Experience
• Welcome to Culebra, Puerto Rico
• Life at Sea; Culebra to Massachusetts Aboard the Wanderbird

“There is something immensely satisfying about rediscovering someplace that you remember in what is likely such an embellished visual memory, only to have it live up to everything you expected.”

• My Landfall in Gloucester, Massachusetts
• The Unknown Road
• Hub of the Universe: Boston, Massachusetts
• Visiting the Peace Corp
• Onward to Downtown Boston
• On and Off the Freedom Trail: Boston’s North End
• America’s Stonehenge: Megalithic Ruins, Ancient Sailors and . . . Alpacas
• City Driving ≠ Fun (Day One)
• City Driving ≠ Fun (Day Two)
• My Perfect Backpack Setup

“Calling it a night . . . the City winning out on the title of the One who Never Sleeps.“

• New York Nights: Spider-Man and the Key of Awesome
• New York Priority One: Chinatown Food!
• Walking The “Real” New York
• A Lesson in Eerie Tranquility: Coney Island, NY

“‘One of a kind.  Unlike anyplace else in North America,’ were among some of the things I was told about it.”

• Crossing the Border. Maybe.
• No Canada Like French Canada

• Pre-Thailand Chores; Informations and Vaccinations
• Visa Run, Chicago
• Humans, the Lonely Gods: An Essay on Our Artificial Oversoul

“There was no real question about it; I should have gone to bed the second I set foot in that hostel in Bangkok.”

• Lessons From My First Night in Bangkok.
• Waking Up in Bangkok – Part 1
• Waking Up in Bangkok – Part 2
• A DMV Abroad: The U.S. Embassy of Bangkok
• Oh, there’s a red light district around the corner? I probably shouldn’t go there.
• Getting Tuk-tukked Over on ‘Buddha Day’
• Through Floods and Foggy Mountains to Chiang Mai.
• Chiang Mai Walks in Pictures
• To the Mountaintop Temple: Wat Doi Suthep
• The Eightfold Path Underground – the Forest Tunnels of Wat Umong
• Into the Northern Mountains: Chiang Mai Trek – Day 1
• Into the Northern Mountains: Chiang Mai Trek – Day 2
• Elephants, Troubles, and the World’s Biggest Buffet: Surin, Thailand
• Elephants Aren’t the Only Wild Animals in Surin
• Nang Rong: A Detour
• Phanom Rung and the Great Motorbike Adventure
• Udon Thani . . . meh
• Pasts Forgotten in Isan – Ban Chiang, Thailand
• Back to Bangkok – the American TESOL Institute (ATI)

“. . . considering we were convening at the tail end of one of Thailand’s largest natural disasters in the last century.”

• American TESOL Institute (ATI) Review – Pre-Course Experience
• American TESOL Institute (ATI) Review – In-Course Experience
• American TESOL Institute (ATI) Review – Post-Course Experience
• American TESOL Institute (ATI) Review – Overall
• Moving to Work in Thailand
• First Day of School, Thailand

“I restarted my life, twice, in different parts of the world.  I’m hoping this second one takes.“

• Phuket.  ‘Paradise’.  At Night.
• Phuket’s Other Side – An Island Cruise
• Thailand’s Western Frontier Town – Kanchanaburi
• The 7 Tiered Waterfall – Erawan National Park, Thailand
• Angkor’s Last Outpost – Prasat Muang Sing
• A Walk Along the Death Railway
• New Year’s Eve in Bangkok
• 14.02.2012 – Bombings in Bangkok, Life Goes On As Normal
• Learning “Skål!” in Hua Hin
• Down the Elephant’s Trunk
• From Bikers to Monkeys – Prachuap Khiri Khan
• Phun Phin: A Detour
• Khao Sok Park – the ‘Getting There’ Problem
• Khao Sok National Park – a Hike in Pictures
• Khao Sok Park – Nightlife in the Jungle
• Cry for the Moon – Koh Phangan’s Full Moon Party
• A Michigan Island in Surat Thani?
• “Don’t go there. You’ll get blown up!” – Hat Yai, Thailand

“Less than an hour in Malaysia and I was left on the side of the major highway that runs along the northwestern coast.”

• Crossing the Malaysia Border at Sadao
• Lore of the Dragon Valley – the Ruins of Lembah Bujang
• Sundown in Penang
• Getting High in Kuala Lumpur
• The Batu Caves – Riding Out the Storm
• A Melaka Introduction
• A Melaka Night
• A Melaka Day

• Singapore: At the Elephant’s Snout