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Brno, Czechia 2025

I was in this area was a little under 10 years ago during our world trip but I don’t recall learning about Brno and I don’t recall meeting anyone who has traveled to Brno. I think it’s because Brno is centrally located between Prague, Budapest, Vienna, and, Bratislava. It’s unsurprising Brno is overlooked given that line up. I had a wonderful time playing tourist and I want to bring Jac and Miriam to the area sometime soon.

Brno has all the quintessential ‘Old European City’ features like: a castle, a river, at least one cathedral with many churches, and, at least one public square. I’m glad I was mailed here because the city was neat, the countryside was beautiful, and, the tourist activities were quite a bit of fun. I often found myself alone or one of a few people at the different tourist activities. Despite the solitude, I was told repeatedly ‘a lot of tourists come to Brno’.

Just like my trip to China a bit over a year ago, I was surprised with how much things have changed in the decade since I’ve visited the area:

Traveling was easier. I did zero planning due to my season of life and the short notice for this trip. The ratings feature Google maps, ‘open hours’ feature, and, step by step walking / driving directions in parts of rural areas simply didn’t exist last time. The younger American coworker I was traveling with was dumbfounded Jac and I somehow managed to travel AND have a good time without knowing exactly where things were located, what their hours were, or how much fun the activity / site may be.
There are wayyyyy more American brands around beyond McDonalds and Starbucks. I was surprised to see Popeyes in the Brno old city center and even stopped at a food truck selling “South Carolina Beef” which was neither beef nor tasted like anything I have had in South Carolina.
I was able to buy tickets online for the various tourist activities so I don’t have to wait or be surprised with which tour I purchased due a lack of translated tour information.
Cellular data and my mobile phones worked seamlessly. Setting up an esim took two seconds and was super easy.
I was mistaken for German more often than not and quite a few people seemed surprised I was an American. I wondered if it’s because Brno isn’t a common destination for Americans or if it’s because I’m quite a few pounds lighter than the last time I was in this part of the world and look more European-ish.

A handful of items remained the same:

People are still people despite the cultural differences. Americans can be a lot warmer / kinder to random people on the street than most places in the world but everyone everywhere is helpful to those in need (for directions, suggestions, chit-chat, whatever) and are warm / kind to strangers once an actual conversation starts.
Germanic orderliness is still present – I was in a hurry and tried to order my dessert with my meal in Vienna only to be told “no, you will order dessert after you eat your meal” by the waiter. I thought nothing of the comment but my younger American coworker was surprised since we’d never hear something like that in the US. Even crossing crosswalks out of turn is still quite the faux pas.
I, just like last time when I was a tourist, still did things that do not happen in other parts of the developed world, like, manually ring a 15,000lb bell in a cathedral tower for all the citizens of Brno to hear during a tour at 1:27pm, or, touch bats in a cave while on a tour in the Moravian Karsts. I’m not sure if ringing cathedral bells or touching bats are common tour activities, I just asked the guides and they said “sure”. These ‘extras’ make being a tourist in places like the Czech Republic even more fun.
The food was great and the costs were lower than the US. I was introduced to an amazing dessert called venecek which is sorta like a donut sliced like a bagel with a light whipped frosting between the top and bottom. I was very happy to see the Czech Republic is still a good deal.
Most processes are still hot garbage – getting rental cars, checking into / out of hotels, going through airports are still needlessly complex and time consuming. The various big companies in USA have streamlined sooooo much of those processes which makes traveling / checkin / check out / checking of luggage / rental cars 1,000% easier. We are spoiled in the US.

Overall, it was a great trip and I was happy I was mailed to Brno even though it was on fairly short notice. It was amazing to experience the differences and see what’s the same. I am excited to go back but this time with my family 🙂.

Enjoy the photos!

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Florida 2025

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We ended up going somewhere completely different for our winter trip – Florida. It turns out we are a Florida family – wonderful weather, wonderful food, wonderful sites, and, just a wonderful time. I had no idea Florida would be so great!

We’ve been a lot of places in the USA and most of our trips revolve around hiking but we’ve struck out the last few winter trips due to bad weather: last year was the ‘atmospheric river’ that completely ruined our time in Las Vegas and San Diego. It rained for five days in Las Vegas, something I didn’t realize could happen!? It’s also been cold, hiking in 0% humidity in the 50s is sorta chilly. So we decided to do something completely different which was go to Florida!

The beaches were great. We went to Paradise Beach on the Atlantic near Cape Canaveral and Clearwater near Tampa. Both beaches were great for different reasons and both beaches were made FARRRRR better once we discovered we could rent tents and chairs. It was fabulous to lounge on the beach, swim, and, collect seashells. What was shocking to us was the fact that Clearwater had sooooo many shells. There was a nice fluffy / poofy layer of sand and about an inch below was solid shells. It was neat!

I was shocked at the amazing food in Florida. We found some hard-to-get items like Char Kway Teow, a Singaporean delight, that was actually delicious and not crap, and some really fun things like tempura banana with vanilla ice cream. Of course, no warm area of America would be complete without a bunch of NYC style pizza and Florida didn’t disappoint; we found a delicious NYC style pizza place near where we were staying in Tampa that had the tagline “I AM BROOKLYN”. Not “BROOKLYN PIZZA”, just “BROOKLYN”. The pizza was amazing. I think the person who was bold enough to write “I AM BROOKLYN” was not joking. We also had some delicious BBQ from a random trailer parked at a random corner in a distant Tampa suburb and finished with some amazing soft serve ice cream made from freshly squeezed local oranges. It seemed like it was impossible to get a bad meal in Florida.

We went to Disney EPCOT and Disney Springs and both were fun. Disney Springs suffered from the crush of humanity, holy buckets were there so many people there! We enjoyed the Irish dancing and music at Raglans but that was about it. EPCOT was a lot of fun, it wasn’t all that busy and a whole lot of fun. We hadn’t planned on going to EPCOT and did so on a whim. It was a pretty expensive impulse purchase :). I really enjoyed the different pavilions and we spent quite a bit of time near the China / Japan / Italy pavilions – the food and activities were wonderful.

The nature / natural parts of Florida were super cool!!! We saw a huge alligator and enjoyed walking through the mangroves / swamps. It was way cooler than I would have guessed. The weather was also quite warm, we had a couple of mid-80s days and it felt amazing, especially after leaving Minnesota in the middle of a snow storm.

Driving in Florida sucked. Like not a little bit, but, totally sucked. The number of people driving 10-20mph under the speed limit was equal to the number of people driving 20-30mph over the speed limit. It was a total mess. Add in the fact that there are a million stop lights that don’t seem to be timed to anything in particular and it’s a recipe for a very difficult driving experience. I don’t think I saw anyone pulled over by police officers at all.

There were some strange parts of Florida. SOOOOOO much of Florida reminded me of mainland China: lots of traffic, tons of stoplights, lots of gaudy decorations on things, and a whole lot of beautiful new buildings intermixed with complete dumps. The other thing that was strange was the fact that all the public spaces run by the government were oldish, antiquated, and, not super nice. A remarkable difference compared to Minnesota city and state parks. Florida definitely felt like the USA but it still felt foreign. The other part that struck me about Florida was that pretty much everything was ‘pay to play’: lots of toll roads, fairly expensive beach parking, nothing about Disney was low cost, and, so on.

Overall, it was a great trip. I had no idea it would be so great. I’m looking forward to going back next year!!

Enjoy the photos!

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Phoenix / San Francisco 2024

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I managed to engineer another break in my jobs and decided it would be a good time to make a solo trip to Phoenix and San Francisco.

Why? A few reasons:

To hike!
To get somewhere warm; San Francisco is warm even in the ‘winter’.
I have a boatload of American Airlines points and wanted to travel somewhere, anywhere, for free. Phoenix and San Francisco required very few points.
To get a decent bowl of ramen and other delicious, hard to get in the twin cities, Asian foods. This means heading west is best.

Phoenix:

I decided I wanted to hike Camelback in Phoenix which broke my rule: don’t do hikes where people die. I’m not the smartest person on the planet, and, I’m rather “accidenty” so I feel like I have an above average likelihood of injuring / dying while hiking dangerous hikes. Regardless, I’ve been told by numerous individuals that Camelback “isn’t that bad” so I decided to go for it.

Overall, it was a neat-ish hike. I started before sunrise and reached the top three minutes before sunrise. I was mostly alone on the hike and was surprised that I, a flatlander fresh off the plane a day earlier, was able to keep pace with a younger couple who hike the mountain multiple times per week. I found myself mostly alone on the top after sunrise and it was neat to sit and take in the sights / watch the color change even if the Phoenix metro area is a bit fugly. I finished the hike and fully understand why so many people need rescue. That hike was not easy, it felt like it was straight up, and, the danger is ever present.

The rest of my time in Phoenix was quite fun! There were lots of plants flowering and the air had a sweetness smell to it! I had a chance to hike around the Phoenix Preserve, one of my favorite hiking areas, visited the Frank Lloyd Wright Museum, had the most delicious donburi meal at H-Mart, and, went out to the reservation to eat some delicious flat bread tacos and dessert from a literal shack called “The Stand” that very much matched the types of places we bought meals in third world nations.

San Francisco:

I picked San Francisco because I wanted to go hang out with the redwoods outside of San Francisco, and, I wanted to walk across the Golden Gate Bridge. It just so happened that the weather was near perfect and all the clouds / fog moved on the morning I arrived. Walking across the Golden Gate to Wagner Battery in the Marin Headlands was a wonderful experience. I was surprised by the shear number of people walking / biking / running across the Golden Gate on a Wednesday mid-day. The number of bicyclists hauling ass without regard for pedestrians was shocking. That said, there is something quite nice about the fresh smelling sea air on the bridge and the same smells mixed with the smell of the lush grasses and forest on the Sausalito side.

I originally planned to drive to Muir Woods National Monument but had a former coworker tell me about Armstrong Redwoods State Park. The state park was bit further drive but was absolutely worth it. I showed up well before sunrise only to find out the park doesn’t open until sunrise. While figuring out what to do, I encountered a park employee and asked him; when I asked him what I should do his reply was hilarious: “I don’t know, no one shows up this early.” I decided to go find a cup of coffee and wait for sunrise. Once I started hiking I found I was one of the few people in the park on an early Thursday morning. It was incredibly cathartic to walk amongst the towering trees on a foggy and calm morning. The smells were incredible, the sounds were incredible. It was wonderful to be in the forest by myself.

One very kind person recommended I head to the ocean since it was a 14 mile drive from Armstrong Redwoods State Park. I’m glad I did, I had the beach to myself and the sun was just right to make rainbows in the mist from the wave – I’ve never seen anything like it!

My hotel was in Chinatown and I spent the rest of the time in San Francisco walking around Chinatown, walking to Coit Tower, and, the very famous pier. The weather was fabulous. Finding a decent dim sum restaurant and ramen place was quite the treat. I didn’t realize San Francisco was so small, in many ways the walkability reminded me of Boston or Portland.

On the flight back I happened to sit next to some other travelers and we had a wonderful chat. One person asked me for recommendations on solo traveling and I was a bit surprised. I’ve never thought about solo travel being its own category of travel, and, since I’m a dude, the number of precautions I need to take is very different than a woman traveling by herself. It was a tough question to answer! After some thought, the only thing I could come back with is: “do you enjoy your own company?” I greatly enjoy and appreciate time alone and time spent in quiet areas. I don’t need to see people, I don’t need to interact with people. Pondering it further, it makes sense that solo travel is pretty easy for someone like myself 😊.

Overall: 10/10 trip. It was awesome.

Enjoy the photos!
Chris W.

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Sabbatical 2024

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We went on sabbatical again!

Our sabbatical was just under four and a half weeks and we covered a lot of different places! Trip breaks up into five sections:

The Carolinas from Charlston to Charlotte
Southern Appalachia from Ashville to West Virginia
Upland South from Louisville to Nashville
Texas from Houston to San Antonio to El Paso
San Diego

The reasons for the hap-hazard-ish route were pretty simple: I’ve visited the Carolinas, Upland South, and parts of Texas numerous times over the last 10 years for work and wanted everyone else to experience the semi-interesting things I have seen for a decade, and, some of the places are in the middle of nowhere. As examples:
– Congaree National Park in South Carolina is a National Park but it is largely a swamp. It’s a very nice swamp, nicest I’ve visited, but it’s still a swamp.
– Big Bend National Park in West Texas is near nothing. It’s a nearly seven hour drive from the nearest big airport. No way I’d spend that much time traveling to and from a destination on a week long vacation.
– West Virginia is West Virginia.

Our timing seemed very good, we traveled the Carolinas and a good chunk of Southern Appalachia during the peak of shoulder season so no one was around; there were a few activities and places we visited where we were the only people. Everything combined over a good chunk of time at a lackadaisical pace makes for a pretty remarkable trip and wonderful experience. We don’t know anyone who travels these areas for vacation unless it’s to go to the beach in the Atlantic or Gulf of Mexico. So this meant the trip was geared toward the things I had experienced plus whatever else we could find along the way. It turned out great!

It rained on us nearly every day wherever we were and we drove through a storm which killed multiple people. We became pretty good at working around the rain. About a week and a half into the trip we figured out we weren’t going to be able to travel like what we had originally planned so we restructured the trip in the middle of the trip. I spent a couple of hours in rural West Virgina redoing all of our reservations like adding Nashville and taking time away from Texas since Texas was stupid hot and suffering from severe storms.

The major highlights:
– North Carolina is a stunningly beautiful state and the western part reminded me a lot of the Smoky Mountains.
– South Carolina was wonderful to visit. Congaree National Park, a swamp, was surprisingly popular with everyone.
– West Virginia was beautiful, surprisingly so. The dilapidation and destitution next to beautiful homes surrounded by gorgeous scenery was discombobulating.
– Nashville was a lot of fun for all of us. I didn’t realize music would start so early in the morning and so many families would be out and about watching the various bands and musicians.
– Big Bend National Park is one of the few places I’ve been where I felt isolated from humanity. BBNP is not below a flight path and there were no signs of humanity other than the road or trail I was on. It was weird.
– We visited 10 caves. Jac’s favorite geographical feature is a cave. Caves in Texas are hot (70F+) and humid (95%). Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico was absolutely stunning followed by Natural Bridge Caverns. Mammoth Cave NP was surprisingly uninteresting.
– This trip allowed me to visit all 50 states in the union, my last state to visit was West Virginia!
– We went to so many children’s museums we became sick of going to children’s museums.
– We ate so much BBQ we became sick of eating BBQ. Best ribs were found at Skinny’s in El Paso, Texas. Very close second was at Mission BBQ in Louisville, Kentucky. Best pulled pork was found at Bu-cee’s Truck Stops in Texas (not joking). Best BBQ dessert was the banana pudding at Luella’s in Ashville, NC. Best brisket was at Noble Smoke in Charlotte, NC.
– Tex-Mex food is amazing. Best Tex-Mex was a tossup between the food we found in the tiny little town of Ozona Texas in someone’s house and Moreliana’s in Houston, Texas; a place that serves home made Tex-Mex of every type plus home made ice cream and other home made horchata.

I’ll write about five segments later. The album below shows the highlights from the overall trip. Enjoy!

Chris W.

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Sabbatical – Appalachia 2024

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We were surrounded by beauty during our time in Appalachia. Central-ish southern-ish Appalachia was remarkably beautiful and there were a surprising amount of fun things to do. We were super lucky to hike in areas where wild rhododendrons, azaleas, and other beautiful flowers were in bloom; what a neat experience! We also seemed to have found where Christmas trees come from? Despite being rained on pretty much every day we found ways to be outdoors and found enough indoor activities to do.

I always forget how neon green the scenery is in the Carolinas and Virginias. Minnesota is green but the Carolinas and Virginias are green. There is also a sweet smell to the air with the various trees and bushes in bloom. We stayed a few days near Sugar Top Mountain, NC, and it was fun to watch all the clouds go above and below us – it was easy to lose track of time watching the clouds. The place we picked is a huge building made in brutalist architecture built on top of a mountain which screamed: “I don’t care about nature or neighbors and WTF is a ‘zoning?'” but gave us a wonderful view and some fabulous sunsets and sunrises.

We drove a lot of country roads in the rural areas of the Carolina’s and Virginia’s. From what we could see, the locals are split between a lot of have nots, a handful of have somes, and, a tiny amount of have very much lots. There were many have nots and Miriam would call out “there’s another burned down house” while we traveled through the beautiful scenery and small communities of Appalachia. The dilapidation and destitution was remarkable and shocking. I had looked at real estate in West Virginia prior to our visit and I wondered how a four bedroom home on two acres could sell for $150k but it became immediately obvious once I visited. I’ve been to a lot of places and a lot of West Virginia reminded me of the reservations in South Dakota and other profoundly underdeveloped places we’ve visited around the world.

The small communities reminded me of where I grew up and what I’ve seen on the iron range in Minnesota – these places used to be something but whats left are the abandoned and shuttered buildings, Dollar Tree / Family Dollar / Dollar General, a small amount of folks supporting tourism, a small number of those who don’t need to leave for one reason or another, and, people who are vacationing. I was surprised with the similarities between the run down towns of South Dakota / Minnesota’s Iron Range and rural Appalachia, it felt like someone copy-pasted the communities.

New River Gorge National Park was interesting. I’m glad we didn’t make a special trip to see it, it’s terribly small and is kind of surprising it’s a national park considering there isn’t much to do or see. Around this area is were we started encountering park rangers who took the JR Ranger program very seriously and we spent a considerable amount of time completing the Jr Ranger home work to earn a badge. JR Ranger: very serious business, I guess.

The Blue Ridge Parkway ending up being a ton of fun. I’m not sure if it’s because we were visiting during peak shoulder season but it was very easy to get around and the views were fantastic. I grew up all around windy mountain roads and it usually takes about 10 seconds to get stuck behind someone going 15-20mph below the speedlimit; this didn’t really happen all that much on the Blue Ridge. Maybe it’s because commerical vehicles are prohibited too? The small taste we had makes me want to drive the entire Blue Ridge Parkway now!

Overall, I’m happy we took the effort to drive the Blue Ridge Parkway and spend time exploring rural Appalachia. We didn’t know what to expect since we don’t know anyone who travels to this portion of America for vacation – we want to go back!

Enjoy the photos!
Chris W.

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Sabbatical – Carolinas 2024

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The Carolinas were a treat!

We flew into Charleston and our path was through the center-ish of South Carolina before we ultimately ran into Charlotte, North Carolina. After Charlotte we headed to Appalachia. So, ultimately, we didn’t actually see that much of the Carolinas. The parts we did see were quite wonderful and we’re all excited to go back and see more.

Our time started in Charleston, South Carolina. I think the only way I can describe the actual downtown tourist area of Charleston is “weird”. It’s like higher end art shops, clothing shops, and, other similar type shops. People just kind of walk around. It’s these narrow-ish colonial streets with colonial buildings but higher end shops. It was just strange probably because we don’t really shop. The permanent city market was pretty interesting but was geared toward tourists.

The beaches outside of Charleston, Sulliavan Beach and Folly Beach, were fantastic and we had a fabulous time. Of all the beaches we went to on the sabbatical, these two beach areas were the best. They were clean, warm, and, the prettiest.

From Charleston we headed toward Charlotte, NC stopping at Congaree National Park along the way. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to walk the entire path in Conagree because of flooding but we were able to get a substantially different view than the last time I was there since the flooding on and around the boardwalk made for some very beautiful scenery. Once again, this area was neon green just like the rest of the Carolinas and Appalachia.

Charlotte was so much fun. It’s a biggish city with lots of amenities but it’s super easy to get around. There were an immense amount of things to do for the family. I loved bringing my family to the places I’ve been: Noble Smoke, Latta Nature Preserve, Tony’s Pizza and others while experiencing new places like the UNC Botanical Garden, Mint Museum, and, Daniel Stowe Museum.

We visited Chimney Rock which is a bit outside Charlotte. When thinking about categories, I’m not sure if it’s a ‘Carolinas’ or ‘Appalachia’ category since it’s the foothills. Either way, it was a lot of fun to visit and had a lot of things to do – like hike, activities, and, animal viewing. I deeply appreciated the elevator that brought us from the parking lot up to the top of the mountain. America :).

Enjoy the photos!
Chris W.

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Sabbatical – San Diego 2024

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Our sabbatical ended in San Diego and it was a wonderful way to end the trip. San Diego is paradise and the company we had while in San Diego was absolutely spectacular.

We arrived at just the right time – the Jackarandas were in bloom and the beautiful purple flowers were everywhere. It was wonderful to see and we were so lucky.

We went hiking and found a neat place, Potato Chip Rock, with a super cool rock formation. It ended up being a 10/10 rock :).

As always, Ocean Beach was a lot of fun, great donuts at OB Donuts, great burgers at Hodads, and amazing fish tacos at Johnny Mananas. Unfortunately, the pier is now closed due to disrepair and dilapidation. Maybe someday it’ll be repaired.

Enjoy the photos 🙂
Chris W.

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Sabbatical – Texas 2024

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We flew into Houston and flew out of El Paso so we drove across all of Texas and saw a bit of New Mexico to visit Carlsbad Caverns National Park, Guadalupe Mountains National Park, and, White Sands National Park. We learned an important lesson: Texas is not very close to Texas, and, a lot of Texans driving lifted trucks seemed to want to drive over us. During our travels through Texas we had four-ish surprises:

– Caves in Texas can be warm and very humid which makes being in the caves quite hot and sweaty.
– During a long day of driving toward Big Bend National Park we needed to eat and picked a highly rated restaurant in the tiny town of Ozona only to find out the “restaurant” was in a house in a neighborhood. Food was 10/10, it was 100% worth the stop.
– Buc-ee’s is amazing. The merchandise, the foods, the size, and, everything else made it absolutely awesome. We visited as many Buc-ee’s as possible. The best pulled pork we had on the trip was from Buc-ee’s hands down.
– The biggest surprise by far was when we visited Big Bend National Park and I quickly realized there were no other signs of humanity other than the trail / road we used to get to where we were – no buildings, no signs, no power poles, no fences, and the big one that is everywhere, no planes or contrails overhead. I don’t know if we have ever experienced anything similar.

It was awesome to see NASA and visit the Gulf of Mexico near Houston. Seeing the Saturn V in person was AMAZING, so cool to see the loudest thing humans have ever created. The Houston area is also the first time everyone was able to visit a Buc-ee’s – an absolutely amazing place to visit with wonderful products. I think we settled on describing Buc-ee’s as the Costco of gas stations, absolutely a 10/10 experience. In the Houston area is where we came across a Tex-Mex place that also made all their own ice cream and horchata which was another wonderful surprise. Even though we have a large latin diaspora in Minnesota it is impossible to get Tex-Mex or anything similar to what we had in Texas.

After Houston we visited San Antonio. I was surprised the shortness of the riverwalk. A person can walk the entire riverwalk in like 30-40 minutes! The riverwalk was pretty. I appreciated the buildings, the water, and lighting. I walked the riverwalk in the evenings and in the early morning. Walking in the early morning was really neat because the lights were still on yet no one was around. The caves outside of San Antonio were beautiful, probably the most beautiful we had visited other than Carlsbad Caverns.

I’ve wanted to visit Big Bend National Park for some time but it’s in the middle of nowhere and takes forever to get to. Only because of something like the sabbatical did it make sense to take the time to visit the park. The park was pretty OK. It was hotter than blazes and the mountains were fairly pretty. Missing signs of humanity was pretty wild. Even in desolate places in the lower 48 and Alaska there were always planes or contrails overhead – pretty much everywhere in the lower 48 and Alaska is a flight path. I think the little part of Texas that is surrounded by Mexico on three sides makes it a bit more to be a flight path since nearby airspace is in a different country. All that said, if I were ever to go back it would probably be in the middle of winter when it was a bit less than 110F out.

After Big Bend National Park we headed toward Carlsbad Caverns National Park. We drove through West Texas oil country and it was surprising. Pop up cities, restaurants / groceries in the middle of nowhere, and oil fields as far as we could see in every direction.

Carlsbad National Caverns is probably one of the more incredible places I’ve ever been in my entire life. Just like Mammoth, we were able to have a self guided tour so we could take our time going through the incredible formations and massive rooms. I don’t think there is anything similar I’ve ever visited in my entire life, it was well worth the visit. Nearby Guadalupe Mountains National Park was interesting. Miriam picked up a random rock that had a fossil and shell imprint – she thought it was sooooo cool.

Before leaving Texas, we decided to add in White Sands National Park since we had enough time the morning before we flew out of El Paso. What a super neat area! It was crazy bright, I couldn’t actually see my screen on my phone because it was so bright out. It was hot. Oddly, we could dig an inch or two down into the sand and the sand was cold. After about 30min playing around in the dunes I noticed Miriam was laid out and Jac said she needed to rest. We decided to leave and it was clear both Miriam and Jac were affected by the heat. We later learned the sand reflects 90% of the heat energy, which explained why the underside of my widebrimmed hat felt so hot, and that the dunes are so dry it is easy to forget that it was like 115F on the dunes.

Overall, we’re glad we went to Texas. The sites were good, the Tex-Mex was amazing, the best BBQ ribs on the trip were found in El Paso, and, Buc-ee’s never disappoints. But, we’re happy we left and we’re happy we significantly shortened our time in Texas. I’m not sure we’d go back since there are other places we can visit that require less driving.

Enjoy the photos!

Chris W.

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Sabbatical Upland South – 2024

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One of the major reasons why I wanted to bring my family to this region of the USA was so they could experience the warmth and kindness of the people in the area. It’s unlike anything I’ve experienced and is entirely different than the fake-ish “Minnesota Nice”. It is impossible to describe and has to be experienced. I didn’t realize most of interactions with locals would happen in the Louisville KY / southern Indiana / Nashville area when we set out but it’s where the family was able to see and experience the locals. The rest of the areas we visited, like Nashville, the Mammoth Caves National Park area, and, Louisville were a lot of fun and we want to go back.

First, I’ll write about the non-people part of this area.

Louisville is a fun place and well located! Louisville Slugger Museum was fantastic. The sights and smells were identical to all the different furniture factories I’ve visited in the area. It was neat to see all the bats used by all the famous baseball players and I’m sure it would have meant even more if I followed sports or understood baseball. Some of the best BBQ we had was in the Louisville area. Mission BBQ stands out as having some of the best BBQ, and, it’s a chain! We had no idea a chain could make good food! The caves / caverns around Louisville were super neat too, one of the caverns had a boat ride and that was a lot of fun!

We were told there was bad weather coming the morning we left Louisville, even the hotel we were staying in had linemen from the power companies staying in the hotel in anticipation of the need to restore storm damaged power lines. We didn’t think much of it and made our way to Mammoth Caves / Nashville. During the drive we encountered severe, like bad, weather. Trees started being disassembled and blown on the interstate. Fortunately, we were fine and made it to our destination. Nearby folks weren’t so lucky as four people died due to the storm and storm damage. The trend of “bad things happen to the people around us in the areas we visit” has continued :(.

Mammoth Cave National Park was OK. It is giant but it’s dead. There aren’t a whole lot for formations. On the bright side, the tour was self guided so we just wandered around and had a lot of fun! Next to Mammoth Cave was Diamond Cave and that was spectacular and the formations were incredible. We learned about the cavern wars and had a wonderful time in the cavern; 10/10.

Nashville was awesome. We didn’t realize music started so soon in the morning or that Miriam liked listening to live music. It was fun to walk the streets of downtown Nashville and listen to the various bands play, Miriam danced a bit, and she was super excited to see women guitarists and drummers. One of the bars was serving Mellow Mushroom pizza by the slice so I had a chance to share the Mellow Mushroom love with those who hadn’t experienced it! Nashville was also a quirky place. One of the more memorable meals on the entire trip was hot chicken slathered in some chinese five spice sauce served on a boa bun, and, I’m pretty sure Nashville is the only place on the planet where the instructor for a science demonstration at the childrens museum will given an unsolicited guitar outro as all the children leave.

As for the people – they are very kind. Folks who stop to chat seem to be curious and genuine. We went to the Star Valley Strawberry Festival and had an awesome time. I struck up a conversation with some of the organizers and learned a lot about the area. There are lots of children and families in the area so the community invests in family amenities like the largest outdoor children’s playground I’ve ever seen, and, a lot of folks make pretty decent wages in the Louisville area while living out in the sticks. One of the organizers ended up buying me a shirt and we had we all had a great time chatting.

The genuineness is very different than the “Minnesota Nice” which is rather superficial, and, often quite empty. Many folks were curious why Minnesotans would be wandering around their neck of the woods and most folks were happy to share their thoughts and history in the area.

Probably the oddest thing about the area is the shear number of businesses and signs declaring their faith or beliefs. It was wild to see the portapotty company with “In God We Trust” next to their logo. It was also around Nashville where we burned out on BBQ. We had fabulous BBQ throughout the trip but it was time to eat other foods. It turns out, it is possible to eat too much BBQ.

Overall, we loved the Upland South. We’d love to go back!

Enjoy the photos

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China 2023 – Shanghai, Suzhou, Beijing

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Vast changes in Chinese society occurred between December 2014 and December 2023. So much so I felt I was visiting an entirely different country because nearly none of my memories or recollections from 2014 matched my experiences in 2023. I had a very positive experience in China and would love to go back; this is basically the opposite of my feelings in 2014.

I spent time in Shanghai, Suzhou, and, Beijing for work, about a week total across all three. What I found was remarkable: what was once a very dirty, gross, crowded, loud, rude, and, overly difficult place to travel in 2014 became a clean, polite, appropriately-loud, and, mostly easy place to travel. Of all the big changes it was good to know KFC was just as delicious as before and I cherished the opportunity to eat KFC three times – which is about three more times than what I’ve had KFC in the USA for the last nine years.

The most remarkable differences between 2014 and 2023:

I didn’t see physical currency the entire time I was in China. Alipay and WeChat was used to pay for everything.
I saw blue sky in Shanghai for the first time! It was beautiful! The pollution smell was mostly the same but the amount of air pollution was profoundly less.
On-the-fly translation devices like Google and whatever is used in China makes communication a breeze.
There are fewer young people and ever fewer kids.
I saw more “American / white people-esque” activities like lot’s of Chinese people running for exercise outdoors.
China was just a gross place in 2014. Lots of bodily sounds like coughing, spitting, and, throat clearing and lots of very loud voices. That all seems to have gone away, at least in the urban areas.
Far fewer taxis, way more electric vehicles, zero honking. It looks like ride hailing like Uber is now the defacto way of getting around instead of taxis and there are a massive amount of electric vehicles on the road.
I did not encounter any other foreigner engineers the entire trip, and, there were few foreigners in general.
My cellphone worked the same in China as the USA, except Apple News, but facebook, snapchat, and, all the other sites worked just fine.

So I don’t know what happened in China to make China what it is in 2023. The shear scale of change is absolutely staggering to a point where it was a bit discombobulating. It greatly enjoyed my experiences this visit, certainly compared to the prior visits.

The entire journey actually started in November when I needed to get a passport and a Chinese visa. I didn’t have either and needed to expedite both – what an incredible learning experience. All I know is I am lucky to have a passport office in Minneapolis and that was the lynch pin of getting everything sorted so quickly.

The trip over went well. My plane left Minnesota at sunrise and I landed in Shanghai right around sunset. Overall, I had about 22hrs of sunlight since I was flying the same direction as the rotation of the earth. Pretty neat for winter in the northern hemisphere!

Traveling around China for work the first couple of days was shocking. No honking. None. Plus, everyone was going exactly the speed limit, no one too slow and no one too fast. I asked about this and I learned honking was banned and there are so many cameras around that speeders get caught immediately. What a huge difference from Minnesota where speed cameras are constitutionally banned!

At some point China stopped using physical currency – like no bills and no coins, everything through Alipay. I read as much before I left so I didn’t exchange any dollars into RMB. This is the very first time I’ve traveled to a country and NEVER used local currency. It was WILD! Using Alipay was surprisingly easy and easier than Applepay. Scanning QR codes to buy things turned out to be absolutely fabulous and is now my preferred way to spend money!

The air pollution was wayyyyy better in Shanghai, Suzhou, and Beijing. I actually saw blue sky multiple times in Shanghai! It was surprisingly beautiful and only added to Shanghai’s stunning urban scenery. The air still had a pollution smell but the air taste was gone entirely. I can distinctly remember tasting the air on the 200+ AQI days but I never experienced anything like that this time!

It was super easy to communicate in China – I could use google translate and they used whatever program they used. It was amazing to speak to my phone and it translated on the fly. Last time, it was a bit tougher to communicate which made traveling harder. No so much this time!

I saw more Chinese doing activities common in the USA – like going for a run to exercise. I also encountered a person who gets gout – a diet related aliment typically relegated to the western world. Last time in China I definitely felt “othered” but there were far more similarities than differences this time.

Another of the biggest shocks was the fact I didn’t encounter many foreigners and encountered zero foreign engineers. Even Nanjing Street and the Bund were overwhelmingly locals / Chinese. Even the stores in Nanjing Street turned over to appeal to the change in demographic – what once was a shopping district littered with shops selling memorabilia like chopsticks, tea sets, scarves, and, other wares have been replaced by high end clothing shops, jewelry shops, and, such. Afterall, what Chinese person needs chopsticks, tea sets, scarves, and other memorabilia since all that stuff is made in China and available across the country anyway?

Overall, 10/10. Great trip.

Enjoy the photos!

Chris W.

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