Sabbatical Recommendations (Baseball Stadiums)

[LHG]

Sleep!

I have two more domestic bucket lists:

1) National Parks (63): already visited (27) Arches, Badlands, Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Crater Lake, Death Valley, Denali, Gateway Arch, Glacier, Glacier Bay, Grand Canyon, Grand Teton, Great Basin, Isle Royale, Joshua Tree, Kings Canyon, Mammoth Cave, Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Olympic, Pinnacles, Redwood, Sequoia, Teddy Roosevelt, Voyageurs, Yellowstone, Yosemite, and Zion.

Will most likely not make it to American Samoa, nor the ones in Hawaii, nor the Florida parks (Everglades, Dry Tortugas, etc.) though I skirted the north edge of the Everglades driving from Tampa to Miami and almost was tempted to take an airboat ride. Almost.

2) Presidential Libraries/Museums: have already visited the Carter Center and FDR Museum. Alas, all my time in SoCal and never visited Nixon nor Reagan Libraries.

Sleep is the never ending quest, isn't it?

And Stokes, I knew that there was a reason I liked you but wow, so many reasons - Giants' fan, minister, lives in the San Joaquin Valley, and now, national park and history lover.

Around 2017, my desire to visit as many national parks as possible have been stoked (see what I did there). I've made it to 19 so far: Bryce Canyon, Channel Islands, Crater Lake, Death Valley, Grand Teton, Great Smoky Mountains, Joshua Tree, Kings Canyon, Lassen Volcanic, Mammoth Cave, Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Olympic, Pinnacles, Redwood, Sequoia, Yellowstone, Yosemite and Zion.

Since 2021, my dad, my eldest son and I have been doing road trips at least once a year to visit new parks. My parents got a lifetime pass when my kids were younger but now it is just the 3 of us traveling (mainly because my mother, brother, wife, and two younger children are not interested or can for help reasons). In fact, we are planning a trip for the 1st week of October to hit the remaining Utah parks and the north rim of the Grand Canyon. I am excited.

I see that you have gotten to many of the Alaska parks. How old were you when you visited and how good were you in physical condition? I'd love to go to those someday but, as I get older, I do wonder if I'll ever be able to go.

I also thought Hawaii was out of the question but early last year, I got an email from Delta on some decent rates for early March/late February. I couldn't swing a visit at that time but assumed that they may offer it again since that is "slow" season for the islands. And now, I hate to say, with the fires on Maui, I wonder if rates will be even lower. I have been saving some money over the years, and miles with Delta, to take my wife to the Virgin Islands but her health makes that unlikely so I am diverting those funds to something closer.

The only Presidential Library I've visited is Nixon's due to proximity (same county). I've been wanting to go to Reagan's for a long time but not made it a priority. Back in 2019, I was in Atlanta for a work convention and saw that both Carter's library and MLK Jr's historical park were close by. I was too cheap to pay someone to drive me to either and chose King over Carter because I could walk there more quickly. It was a worthy choice, but still meant that I've only gotten to one Presidential library.

 

[Stokes1931]

Sleep is the never ending quest, isn't it?

And Stokes, I knew that there was a reason I liked you but wow, so many reasons - Giants' fan, minister, lives in the San Joaquin Valley, and now, national park and history lover.

Around 2017, my desire to visit as many national parks as possible have been stoked (see what I did there). I've made it to 19 so far: Bryce Canyon, Channel Islands, Crater Lake, Death Valley, Grand Teton, Great Smoky Mountains, Joshua Tree, Kings Canyon, Lassen Volcanic, Mammoth Cave, Mount Rainier, North Cascades, Olympic, Pinnacles, Redwood, Sequoia, Yellowstone, Yosemite and Zion.

Since 2021, my dad, my eldest son and I have been doing road trips at least once a year to visit new parks. My parents got a lifetime pass when my kids were younger but now it is just the 3 of us traveling (mainly because my mother, brother, wife, and two younger children are not interested or can for help reasons). In fact, we are planning a trip for the 1st week of October to hit the remaining Utah parks and the north rim of the Grand Canyon. I am excited.

I see that you have gotten to many of the Alaska parks. How old were you when you visited and how good were you in physical condition? I'd love to go to those someday but, as I get older, I do wonder if I'll ever be able to go.

I also thought Hawaii was out of the question but early last year, I got an email from Delta on some decent rates for early March/late February. I couldn't swing a visit at that time but assumed that they may offer it again since that is "slow" season for the islands. And now, I hate to say, with the fires on Maui, I wonder if rates will be even lower. I have been saving some money over the years, and miles with Delta, to take my wife to the Virgin Islands but her health makes that unlikely so I am diverting those funds to something closer.

The only Presidential Library I've visited is Nixon's due to proximity (same county). I've been wanting to go to Reagan's for a long time but not made it a priority. Back in 2019, I was in Atlanta for a work convention and saw that both Carter's library and MLK Jr's historical park were close by. I was too cheap to pay someone to drive me to either and chose King over Carter because I could walk there more quickly. It was a worthy choice, but still meant that I've only gotten to one Presidential library.

My daughter gave me a national park pass for some birthday. 62? 65? Can't remember. Have not put it to great use, other than the annual spring pilgrimage to Yosemite/Hetch Hetchy.

Most of the parks I/we/family have been to were when the kids were young. As you can tell, we have seen most of the parks in the west, particularly California, Oregon, Washington. We really liked the North Cascades National Park, and found it strangely uncrowded. We also took a boat north on Lake Chelan to Stehekin, which is just inside the southern border of the NCNP, and only reachable by boat of float plane.

My wife and I took a cruise to Alaska in 2005 (our 25th anniversary). We cruised north from Vancouver to Anchorage, and then took an additional three days to tour Denali. Alas, it was cut short as the plane from Anchorage to Fairbanks held 80 passengers, and there were 200+ signed up to go to Denali. So we stayed in Anchorage for the night, and flew (1st class) for 45 minutes to Fairbanks the next day. Alaska Airlines gave us two complementary round trip tickets for our troubles! We saw Glacier Bay on the cruise, and Denali by bus. Stayed overnight (missed a night) in Denali. The mountain was clouded over, which is true about 90% of the time I am told. Still, Denali was spectacular.

We have been to Arches/Zion, but not the other three parks (Bryce, Canyonlands, and Capitol Reef). We'd also like to do the North Rim.

I am probably going to retire in two years (if pastors retire at all, and most of my colleagues seem to retire only to take on a needy church in the area!). I am still walking 10 miles a day, and hope to keep that up as long as I can. I am also donating platelets, (started when my younger brother had a brain tumor, of which he died years ago at the tender age of 52), and am at 150 lifetime donations, which in the Red Cross measuring is in excess of 50 gallons.

Back when we were younger, my wife and I dreamt of hiking the Wonderland Trail around Mount Rainier. Should have done it pre-kids, and pre-getting older! I think we could handle the hiking, but I am not sure we could handle the sleeping in tents!

May you be granted your wishes on seeing the national parks with your dad and son. What great memories. BTW, have you seen this?


BBC World Service - Weekend, Grandma and grandson visit all 63 US national parks

BTW, our favorite national park is Yosemite. One of the perks of living in the Central Valley is our proximity to it, and we see it as often as we can. We also are fond of Pinecrest if we can't make it all the way to Yosemite.

 

[LHG]

My daughter gave me a national park pass for some birthday. 62? 65? Can't remember. Have not put it to great use, other than the annual spring pilgrimage to Yosemite/Hetch Hetchy.

Most of the parks I/we/family have been to were when the kids were young. As you can tell, we have seen most of the parks in the west, particularly California, Oregon, Washington. We really liked the North Cascades National Park, and found it strangely uncrowded. We also took a boat north on Lake Chelan to Stehekin, which is just inside the southern border of the NCNP, and only reachable by boat of float plane.

My wife and I took a cruise to Alaska in 2005 (our 25th anniversary). We cruised north from Vancouver to Anchorage, and then took an additional three days to tour Denali. Alas, it was cut short as the plane from Anchorage to Fairbanks held 80 passengers, and there were 200+ signed up to go to Denali. So we stayed in Anchorage for the night, and flew (1st class) for 45 minutes to Fairbanks the next day. Alaska Airlines gave us two complementary round trip tickets for our troubles! We saw Glacier Bay on the cruise, and Denali by bus. Stayed overnight (missed a night) in Denali. The mountain was clouded over, which is true about 90% of the time I am told. Still, Denali was spectacular.

We have been to Arches/Zion, but not the other three parks (Bryce, Canyonlands, and Capitol Reef). We'd also like to do the North Rim.

I am probably going to retire in two years (if pastors retire at all, and most of my colleagues seem to retire only to take on a needy church in the area!). I am still walking 10 miles a day, and hope to keep that up as long as I can. I am also donating platelets, (started when my younger brother had a brain tumor, of which he died years ago at the tender age of 52), and am at 150 lifetime donations, which in the Red Cross measuring is in excess of 50 gallons.

Back when we were younger, my wife and I dreamt of hiking the Wonderland Trail around Mount Rainier. Should have done it pre-kids, and pre-getting older! I think we could handle the hiking, but I am not sure we could handle the sleeping in tents!

May you be granted your wishes on seeing the national parks with your dad and son. What great memories. BTW, have you seen this?


BBC World Service - Weekend, Grandma and grandson visit all 63 US national parks

BTW, our favorite national park is Yosemite. One of the perks of living in the Central Valley is our proximity to it, and we see it as often as we can. We also are fond of Pinecrest if we can't make it all the way to Yosemite.

I still have not made it to Hetch Hetchy, despite growing up in Fresno. In fact, I wasn't much of an outdoors person growing up. I did like camping, I did a few camping trips in versions of Boy Scouts that our churches had. But I wasn't too into the whole "seeing the different landscapes" idea that comes with national parks. Too bad, as one thing that is great about that area is the adundance of parks close by. You should make it up to Lassen Volcanic sometime, it is quite beautiful and probably 5 hours from you (south entrance is just northeast of Red Bluff). And Channel Islands is a fun boat ride to a set of islands. Both are a lot more sparse on crowds, just like North Cascades. We did the boat ride to Stehekin (via Lake Chelan) last year. It was quite fun although we were saddened to learn that we just missed apple picking by about a week. We hope to make up for that at Capitol Reef. That is a big reason we are going in early October, to get a chance to pick some fruit off the trees.

I didn't see that story but I did buy a board game at Joshua Tree's visitor center last December (we stop at all the visitor centers to get t-shirts. Its my collection I started when I first got the bug to visit these parks). The board game creators told a brief story about their parents taking them to all these different national parks and how they finally made it to the 65th park (I believe it was American Samoa). It is quite a goal to get to every one. I think the parents were in their last 60s/early 70s when they finally visited the last on their list.

Yes, I'm not sure pastors really retire. They just go elsewhere to minister. It is a very unique vocation.

Sorry to hear about the loss of your brother. I haven't had to deal with that loss so I cannot relate but have to think that is very difficult to go through.

 

[LHG]

@Stokes1931 , I read this article and the part where it talks about the guy going on road trips to baseball stadiums reminded me of your sabbatical.

San Jose Giants honor life of Minors devotee Lampe

There are a lot of ways to love baseball. Chris Lampe practiced just about all of them. A passionate fan since he was a kid, he grew up to become part-owner of a Minor League team, then a front office employee and the California League’s official historian -- all on

www.mlb.com