There are about 3,000 miles between Middletown, Conn., where I have lived for several years, and Portland, Oregon, where my middle daughter lives in a floating home on the Columbia River with her wife and their animals (two dogs and a fish), surrounded by marine and aquatic wildlife.
I will cover all 3,000 this year.
There and back.
Six-thousand miles in three months, or about 500 miles a week, or 100 miles a day with weekends off.
I’ll be returning to Middletown every so often for medical appointments and pressing business and to spend time with my East Coast family, including two daughters and my two fabulous grandchildren.
In between those visits, I’ll be on the road searching for attractions to photograph and write about: national parks, state parks, town and city parks, mountains, meadows, rivers and streams and canyons and waterfalls, ghost towns and tourist towns and urban and rural and waterfront communities and farms and factories, new and old — anywhere that speaks to me in the moment, that I can burrow into and chronicle, that I can weave into my narrative as I travel this great land.
I’ll also be stopping in places my ancestors lived and died, in a campaign to supercharge my genealogical research to add to what I know of their stories in Chicago; Jackson, Mich.; Kingston, Ont.; Cape Vincent, N.Y.; among other stops.
How long will all this traveling continue? When will I look to settle back down, find an apartment, maybe sell the van? After a year of traveling? Two years? Three? I’m making no predictions. I’ll play it by ear.
Until then, happy trails! — John F Ward