August 16, 2026. Nine hikers get lost near Indian Staircase in Red River Gorge. This report by Wolfe County Search and Rescue Team indicated that students from Indiana and Kentucky had hoped to watch the sunset from Indian Staircase but became disoriented by the numerous user trails. They sent a text to the rescue team,…
Sometimes your real superpower is realizing that you’re no longer a young man or young woman and then realizing that there are things that are better left for younger people to do. I’m sitting on the backside of the Cirque of the Towers in the Wind River Range, Wyoming. Quite a view. I woke up…
I’m 70 for exactly 12 months, and I’ve planned some adventures during this period. Adventure #1 I’m writing this at Gate 15 at Chicago Midway Airport on a layover to Colorado Springs. I’ll be there a couple of days and then go on to the Wind River Range in Wyoming for a five-day backpacking trip…
Two sobering things happened to me this week. The first was my Garmin watch announcing that my fitness age is 60. It uses my average resting heart rate, which has been 53 BPM, my body fat percentage, and the number of vigorous minutes and vigorous days I spend exercising. Turning 60 on my 70th birthday…
Forty people plus one. That’s how many took care of me this past week. Let me rewind 10 days. Monday, June 8 My wife and I were doing our regular after-dinner walk. You know, to help regulate our blood glucose. We walk three loops in our neighborhood, which is about a mile and a half….
“I wouldn’t want to be any other age than I am right now!” That’s what my mother said when she turned Seventy. I echo that. It really doesn’t seem that old to me, now. My Garmin watch says that my fitness age is 59.5 years old, but regardless I’m 70 and I’m learning to embrace…
I walked 3.5 million steps during the past 12 months. The most steps in one day: 31,240. The most in one week: 113,443. The most in one month: 426,784. The longest streak of 10,000+ days: 16. The last three records were from September 2025. I walk a lot. I’m writing this episode at the Muhammad…
You need a map and a compass. And, you need to know where you are right now on the map. Use a compass to orient your map to the north. Line up the edge of the compass along the imaginary line to where you’re going. This gives you a bearing. If you’re in the woods,…
January 16, 1991, 4 PM EST I was sitting in my living room, watching on TV the beginning of the Gulf War. As a young teenager in the late 60s, I remember watching news clips of the Vietnam War, the death count for the day during Walter Cronkite’s Evening newscasts. But the Gulf War was…
I was asked to do several eulogies, as a young Baptist Minister, in the one-church town of Coahoma, Texas. I was asked to say some nice things for the recently deceased that were unchurched. This was during the bust of the 1980s and the joke was, “What do you call a Geologist in Midland?” Answer:…
