Though I did not visit the American West until I was 25 years old, I had imagined living there since my early teenage years; deep blue skies, colorful rock formations, mountain vistas and "exotic" wildlife beckoned from nature films and calendars, instilling a fascination with that region of the country. When I finally visited, traveling through most of the Western States, I was hooked and eventually moved to Colorado at the age of 31. Since that time, though I have family and many friends in the Midwest, my soul has never left the West, nourished by sunshine, dry air and spectacular landscapes; the fact that they come with spring snow and parched soil is of no consequence to me.
Today, my wife and I leave for our Colorado farm. This time, our stay on the farm will be brief since we plan a road trip to Northern California, one of the few regions of this fabulous country that I have yet to visit. The journey will take us across the Rockies and Colorado Plateau, through the Great Basin, into the California Cascades, down the Pacific Coast and through the heart of the Sierra Nevada. We anticipate a wealth of majestic scenery, many species new to us and two weeks of adventure that will surely bring many unexpected and unforgettable encounters.
No doubt, there will be plenty of fodder for blog posts, which I hope to provide on a daily basis, but it may be impossible to adequately express the emotional impact of our journey. Going home again, to many places yet unseen, is to heed the will of the soul.
