Blog

Ithaca is Gorges, Cornell & More

It’s amazing how much there is to see and do in Ithaca, New York, and how relatively little I saw and did as a Cornell student, busy as I was with my studies and fraternity parties. Last week, while back in Ithaca with my husband (also a Cornell grad) and daughters (future Cornell grads?) for

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Wetter Than Ever in Yosemite

Over the course of California’s current “water year” (measured from October to September) epic amounts of rain and snow have fallen throughout the state, prompting Governor Jerry Brown to declare an official end to California’s five-year drought on April 7. In the northern Sierra Nevada, including Yosemite National Park, this has been the wettest water year on

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If Everybody Had an Ocean

Maybe it’s in my blood — my parents both grew up by the sea — or the alignment of the stars when I was born — I am a Cancer — but for whatever reason, I have always been drawn to the ocean. I had never lived near the ocean, however, until I moved to

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Third Grade Field Trip to Angel Island

Growing  up on the East Coast, I knew about Ellis Island, where my great-grandmother arrived alone in 1907 as a nineteen-year old Polish immigrant, but I had never even heard of its West Coast equivalent, Angel Island. When I moved to San Francisco with my family nine years ago, however, Angel Island soon burst onto my

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My Mount Davidson Walk

In a city famous for its hills, San Francisco’s highest peak, 938-foot Mount Davidson, remains largely unknown to both city residents and visitors alike. Yet for those of us living in the patchwork of residential neighborhoods that cluster around it, collectively referred to as “West of Twin Peaks,” Mount Davidson is a familiar part of

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