Trees and Travels

     Recently, you may have seen  this video  on the news, in which a grizzly bear named Grazer quickly gets in the water when her three cubs fall down Brooks Falls in Alaska's Katmai National Park. This video was nice to watch and added a little nature flair to the nightly news, but how many people know that they can view this webcam all the time during the summer months? What is Explore.org?       Explore.org  is a website that you can watch numerous live webcams of animals and nature ranging from  baby service dogs  to  hippos in Africa . Keep in mind when viewing these cams, that they are in real time. If you're an American night owl, most of the U.S.-based cams will be off or too dark for you to see. Right now, it is about 8:30am central time, so it is still dark on my favorite Katmai National Park cams since they are three hours behind central time right now. No matter the time of day, there will always be cams to wa...

     On September 4th, I went to a very cool place for my cousin Allie's 18th birthday. It's called Go Ape in Western Springs, Illinois. It's a treetop adventure place. Adventure in Store!      The place has five areas which you go through. Each one requires you to go up a ladder, travel through several obstacles up in the air, and ends with a zipline. Some of these obstacles include a Tarzan swing onto a net, traveling across a gap by putting your feet in rings, and various tricky bridge obstacles. You're hooked up to a harness the whole time, of course. Although there may be points when you get a little scared, it is very safe. The last zipline is about 40 feet up, I think. That was the only spot where I got a little tripped out, but it was the most awesome zipline there. The place might be a little spooky for those who are afraid of heights, but with its level of safety, Go Ape is a great place to try to overcome a fear of heights! Is it Worth the ...

     As a first time visitor to New York City, you could certainly say I mostly went to the most touristy spots in the city. With that said, I had a very action packed day in New York City.     Navigating      We made parking reservations ahead of time at a garage northeast from Times Square and other attractions in that area. Once we parked, we headed down to the subway to go to toward Battery Park. The subway experience was new to me, but pretty simple. We did get a little bit of help from a worker when she saw us staring at the map for a while. She gave us good directions though, and we were able to get on the right train. First Thing's First       The first area we visited was the World Trade Center and 9/11 Memorial. The new World Trade Center is is beautiful work of architecture. Its appearance does a wonderful job of serving as a symbol of rebuilding post-tragedy.      There is a 9/11 museum here, b...

     Today I had an orientation at Starved Rock State Park in Illinois to volunteer on the weekends sometimes. It went very well! I'm very excited about it. It seems that sometimes I'll be working at the information desk, and sometimes I will be leading hiking tours. The guided hikes are particularly what's got me excited. I have a lot of learning to do though before I can give a good tour! Hopefully I can be leading my first hike within the next six weeks or so.      I plan on going back two weeks from today to learn a bit more before I start signing up for my own shifts. It's also important for me to observe a couple more hiking tours before I lead my own. This should help me figure out what kinds of things to say and what points of interests I should include.      Anyway, I'll have more updates to come about this in the coming weeks!

     Just a little video about my visit to Lake Renwick Preserve in Plainfield, Illinois yesterday. My mom and I didn't catch any fish here, but luckily we did later at a different spot! Anyway, I feel like I've been neglecting the blog a little. Not only have I been quite busy, but I also have been getting more into the video editing stuff. It's time consuming, you know! I'm hoping to have up a video about my adventure today at Go Ape. I plan on posting my NYC video and blog post on next Sunday.