Arctic Dreams: The Polar Bears of Churchill. PART I Dec 1, 2011
Arctic Dreams: The Polar Bears of Churchill. PART II Dec 8, 2011
Long-Haul Travel: A Frequent Flyer’s Survival Guide. PART I Feb 19, 2012
The Road Less Travelled Jan 27, 2012
Is this it? Discovering Yellowstone National Park Oct 8, 2011
No, I’m not at all done with talking about Italy but I thought I would mix it up a little, keep things interesting. Besides I am just too excited to keep it to myself any longer.
I am in Iceland!
This is a dream come true for me. Iceland has been on my travel radar for years and it’s still a little surreal that I am actually here.
Even the name excites me. Iceland. A land of Ice.
I am told Iceland is a place that you fall blissfully in love with and keep returning to, again and again.
This tiny island that floats on the edge of the Arctic has intrigued me for years. Its vast open spaces; the rugged natural beauty; iceberg choked lakes; thundering waterfalls; the largest ice cap outside the north and south poles; the elusive northern lights…who wouldn’t be intrigued by Iceland?
But I never imagined going there alone.
I’ve had such an incredible year and now 2012 is approaching so fast it’s making my head spin.
The first half of 2011 was pretty quiet for me on the travel front, but the second half certainly made up for that! I travelled to some of North America’s most spectacular places this year, I redesigned my blog and my readership has increased dramatically over the past six months. So thank you so much to all of you who have made that happen!
There were some very definite highlights from my travels, so these are the places and experiences that had special significance and are the best memories of my adventures in 2011.
There are no words to describe the feeling you have when your face is only a couple of feet away from a polar bear: so close that you can imagine the heat of their breath.
Of course, if this happened away from the safety of the hulking polar rover, there would be no imagining necessary. These polar bears have been living on a diet of berries for months now. They are carnivores. They are starving. I rest my case.
“When you are driving your bus across the tundra through a snow storm and you can’t see the windscreen wipers…you know it’s going to be an interesting day”
Rhonda: bus driver in Churchill, Manitoba
Things can get pretty wild this far north. And I’m not talking about the nightlife. But for today at least the weather is behaving itself. It’s minus 13 degrees Celsius with wind-chill out on the sub-Arctic tundra near Churchill, Manitoba but the skies are clear and the barely-there dawn light is perfect.
I feel like I have been driving forever.
Since that first nerve-wracking drive through Anchorage over two months ago I have driven nearly 4000 miles (6400 km) through Alaska and the western states of the USA. I was sure I would never get used to that uneasy feeling of driving on the right-hand/wrong side of the road, and yet now I feel as though I could do it in my sleep.
Arctic Dreams: The Polar Bears of Churchill. PART I Dec 1, 2011
Arctic Dreams: The Polar Bears of Churchill. PART II Dec 8, 2011
Long-Haul Travel: A Frequent Flyer’s Survival Guide. PART I Feb 19, 2012
The Road Less Travelled Jan 27, 2012
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