The Times and Travels of Nolan
Documenting trips I’ve taken and places I’ve seen.
There’s something about a close college football game that just is unmatched by any other sport. The tension of a one-score game with 6 minutes left to go in the middle of a regular season game with a middle-of-the-pack opponent? I live for that. At least, I do so when my team emerges victorious. From …
Continue reading “Counting Down My Undergrad OU Games: 24-21 – Close Calls”
First of all, I apologize for how long this post will inevitably be. We’re about to take a trip through one of the most magical drives in the continental United States. I took a billion pictures. When I go through the pictures, I wish I’d taken 10 billion. There’s basically no way to shorten the …
Continue reading “Glacier National Park: Going-to-the-Sun Road, East Side”
Before I get much further into this blog series about Glacier, I think it’s important to mention the geography of the national park and how it shaped the week Elizabeth and I spent there. When you’re planning for a trip, all you have to go off of is YouTube videos and maps. Those two things …
Continue reading “Glacier National Park: Understanding the Geography”
Down at the bottom of the two valleys I mentioned in the last post, at the head of the Many Glacier Valley, a large lake sits at the foot of Grinnell Point. This is one of *the* iconic photos from Glacier National Park – the big mountain that somehow looks exactly like a rocky Dorito …
It was 7:00 p.m. mountain time on Tuesday, July 12. We’d been up since 5:00 mountain time flying halfway across the United States, hunting down groceries and a cooler, and then driving halfway across the state of Montana to the doorstep of Glacier National Park. One would be forgiven for thinking Elizabeth and I were …
Continue reading “Glacier National Park: Moose Spotting at Fishercap Lake”
“I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.” -Andy Bernard, The Office There are things that you dread in life. Someone calling to give you the bad news about a family member. Getting let go from your job. The last time you get to …
The first days of trips are often magical simply because they’re the first days of trips. Everything is still laid out in front of you. Fatigue isn’t a problem yet. You and your traveling companions aren’t annoyed at each other over minor things that accumulate in a car. It’s easy for the first day of …
Continue reading “Glacier National Park: Arriving in Glacier Country”
Elizabeth and I have been to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware for her family reunion in 2017, 2018, and 2021. Each year was somewhat different. The first two times, we only went for a weekend while Elizabeth was taking summer classes. I got to meet family members and see the hits of Rehoboth Beach, and that was …
Continue reading “Rehoboth Beach 2022: A Writer’s Retreat Begins”
Montana! It was a hot and hazy day in Great Falls, but the heat wasn’t going to get me down after the Oklahoma heat wave I’d escaped. Elizabeth and I had a pretty sick car and a cabin waiting for us just a few hours away. In fact, the process of leaving the airport had …
Continue reading “Glacier National Park: Great Falls, Montana”
By 7:00 a.m. on July 12, 2022, Elizabeth and I had already survived a last-minute tortuous debate on how best to get our two suitcases under a combined 100 pounds. We had gone through the checklists to make sure nothing got left behind. And most importantly, I had a plan to get both food and …
