I Support the Seven Principles of the Campaign for the Future of Higher Education! You Should Too!



Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Back Home in Montana




Greetings All,

I’ve been negligent in writing to let you know of my activities recently, and to let you know of upcoming plans for my research.

The family and I returned from our overseas sabbatical travels in mid-April. Our destinations included Ireland, Wales, Scotland, England, France, Spain, Israel, Beijing, Tokyo, and New Zealand. The travels and research went very well! We camped the majority of the time except for about 2 months out of 9 during the winter (in Spain, Israel, Beijing, and Tokyo). I tried to keep up with this blog most of the trip, though updating it frequently was a challenge due to time and technology constraints. I hope to get back to it as I wade back into the writing component of the research.

After arriving back in the US, we spent a week in Seattle at the annual conference of the Association of American Geographers. I gave a paper there on the sabbatical research, saw some old friends, and made a couple of new ones too. Then we spent a month in Oregon visiting family, I worked on research, Rio on his online high school courses, Ari on his homeschool projects, and Gret for her sister on her organic farm near Dallas, OR. I returned to Montana in mid-May to attend a faculty workshop on integrating sustainability into the university’s curriculum, did some committee work with students, and spent a week or so in the field collecting more data for the research project [Pics are of Upsata Lake in the Blackfoot Valley, Holter Dam, and the mighty "Mo" (Missouri River) below Holter - all in mid-to-late May].

I moved back into our house on June 1, and Gret and the boys returned on the 8th . We’re now fully ensconced back in the house, have the dogs and cat back, are back at work, and missing the tents! Western Montana has been experiencing high river discharges and floods ever since I returned, and it will still be another couple of weeks until the rivers are safe to float and fish. Just yesterday a woman drowned on the Blackfoot River – one of many such incidents this summer. The high waters are a result of the best winter snows since 1996-97, I’ve been told – there is still snow at moderate elevations in the mountains around town and across the state!

It is good to be back home and into the routine again, and we look forward to being able to get back outside to some outdoor activities soon. Western Montana is simply beautiful, and should you get a chance to come and see for yourself – take it! And let us know you’re coming of course.

Well, if I visited with you in connection with the research project or academics in general during our travels, many thanks for your time and hospitality! I will be communicating further with you in the very near future as I work on fully developing the research project’s case studies. For the fellow travelers we spent time with during the trip – we hope you are all well and enjoying whatever place you are in at the moment. We hope you stay in touch and we will try to do the same. You can always find me at the University of Montana’s Department of Geography (http://www.cas.umt.edu/geography/).

So, until later, Peace All!