Travel Logs

On Friday morning, I woke up early to meet about six other members of our group. How early? 5:15am early. We met in the lobby of our hotel at 5:45am and proceeded on a 20-minute walk into the Old City to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The morning light was already up as we […]

After the wonderful day in Galilee, which I wrote about in my previous post, we woke up for our second and final morning at the Sea of Galilee. When I looked out my window, the sun was shining down through the clouds into the water, like one of those Biblical scenes where God is talking […]

On Wednesday, we woke up at the Leonardo Plaza Hotel in Tiberias. As I mentioned in my previous blog post, this hotel is situated right at the Sea of Galilee. When I woke up in the morning, I opened my window from my room on the 10th floor and walked out onto the balcony to […]

As I mentioned in my previous blog post, I am traveling here to Israel as part of a trip with the Israel Collective. There are about 25 or so of us on this trip, plus a few of our guides, Josh and Raj. We boarded the plane for Israel at the JFK airport on Monday […]

“Everything is going to change.” These were the words of Josh Ahrens, director of the Israel Collective, the organization that invited me and 25 other people for an all-expense paid trip to the Holy Land. He said these words to us as we gathered in a meeting room at the Crowne Plaza Hotel by the […]

It was July 4th and we awoke in Keystone, South Dakota. After the crazy thunderstorm the night before, the blue skies opened up and temperatures had cooled off slightly. We drove just a few minutes down the road from the Holy Smoke Resort to “downtown” Keystone and found a traditional American diner breakfast at Peggy’s […]

On Tuesday, we woke up at the Badlands Inn and started our morning with the free continental breakfast. By 8:00am, we were checked out and made our way over to the Minuteman Missile Site, which is just north of Badlands National Park – and on our way out of the area as we would make […]

We woke up on Monday morning at the Badlands Inn, which is situated less than a mile from the entrance to Badlands National Park and its Visitor Center. After eating the free continental breakfast at the hotel, we took the quick drive over to the Visitor Center to talk to a park ranger and get […]

On Sunday, July 1, my friend Marshall and I left Denver, where we stayed with my friend Sean the night before (and me, the two nights before) and headed north towards South Dakota. We would first drive through Nebraska. We stopped at Panera Bread in Denver for breakfast, and pulled out of there at precisely […]

My first visit to Yosemite National Park in Central California is complete. Yet, there is nothing about a visit here that leaves you complete – or incomplete – but in a new state of wonder and awe at the beautiful creation around us. The first thing that is amazing about Yosemite is the sheer size […]