Jackson Hole, named for its placement down in the valley of the Teton range, was our last stop on our trip, and a good one! Known for its quaint downtown, as well as its many outdoor offerings, there was no shortage of things for us to do. On our first morning, we decided to take…
Tag: family
The Kintzes Go To Camp
I have a friend in Nashville named Brandon. He was so encouraging over this past spring, as Towles and I began sharing our travel plans with friends. When he learned our itinerary would take us to Vancouver, he said, “If you can swing it, you have to see Malibu!” He was referring not to sunny…
Touchstones
When someone asks us how things are “really” going, I find it hard to say for sure. The kids seem to be rolling with the transitions from place to place pretty well. We encounter the occasional meltdown over fish sticks, wasted water (some of us are becoming very Eco-conscious), or the lack of elephants at…
Portland
We thought Bend, Oregon needed another day or two of exploration, but the road called and we were excited to head to Portland, where my (Andrew’s) cousin Geoffrey, his partner Anna and their beautiful four-year-old daughter, Elise, awaited us. Before departing Bend, we enjoyed one of our best breakfasts of the trip at Cafe Magie,…
A Big Preference
Sometimes you need to try something to know it does not suit you. And sometimes vastly different experiences create strong preferences. Our family learned we prefer what God made over what man made In just one day, when we awoke beside the South gate of Zion National Park, drove to Las Vegas for an afternoon…
Denver
So far, Bessie has taken us from Nashville to Kansas City, Missouri, through the great, flat state of Kansas, to Denver for Memorial Day weekend with Andrew’s sister, Jenn, and her family. In the past, we’ve somehow only visited Denver in the dead of winter, so it was really nice to experience the city when…
The Way Back to Liberty
Is it possible to enjoy giving up control? I ponder this question as we begin the second drive of our great adventure, from Kansas City to Denver. I am not driving, and giving the wheel to anyone else is extremely unpleasant for me. For years, a number of experiences have convinced me that great things…
On the Road
A couple of years ago, Mary Laura Philpott wrote a series for the New York Times’ Motherlode column about her family’s move from Atlanta to Nashville. Recently, I ran across her essay “And Then The Dog Died,” again. It’s about all the stuff that got in the way of maintaining routine in the midst of…
Saying Goodbye
Partly because of the full lives we lead, and partly because we’re slightly scattered and kind of like to procrastinate, we have always been last minute packers. A week before a trip, we will consider the glories of getting out the door at 7:30 in the morning, kids fed, van packed and ready to go;…
Sabbatical
John Muir, the author, scientist and renowned conservationist, was an absolute fanatic about nature. He climbed trees in gale-force winds to see what it might feel like to be the branches; he stood at the precipice of waterfalls to sense what the water might be feeling before its plunge. He thought nothing of walking fifty…
Who’s Bessie?
Bessie is our car. Since we’ll be driving her over eight thousand miles this summer, we had to name her. This is a job we left to the kids, and their brainstorming session was pretty hilarious. We suggested that they consider names from good books they’ve read, or that they had some other connection with, but they…
Bessie Breaks Away 