The Traveling Widower

Tag: nature

  • MacGyver, Forest Gump and hiking – Huh?

    This is going to be one of those very strange posts….just a heads up. I need to vent about something which is marginally related to travel. Strap in, here goes. It will all make sense at the end.

    Dictionary

    Definitions from Oxford Languages · Learn more

    verbINFORMAL•US

    verb: MacGyver; 3rd person present: MacGyvers; past tense: MacGyvered; past participle: MacGyvered; gerund or present participle: MacGyvering; verb: McGyver; 3rd person present: McGyvers; past tense: McGyvered; past participle: McGyvered; gerund or present participle: McGyvering

    1. make or repair (an object) in an improvised or inventive way, making use of whatever items are at hand.
      “he MacGyvered a makeshift jack with a log”


    When my wife and I first moved into our house in Gold River, it had a 25 year old heat pump. For those of you who have never had the pleasure of owning one of these wonderful HVAC units, a heat pump is basically an A/C unit that also blows out slightly warm air in the winter. Sort of like having a large hair dryer heating your house. But I digress as usual. The compressor unit vibrated violently when running, and you could hear it from a few blocks away. We were given one of those useless home warranty deals when we bought the house and after reporting the problem, the company sent out one of their technicians who spent hours trying to balance the fan. No matter what he tried, the unit continued to vibrate. So he had a great idea. He pulled up one of the large landscape rocks in my yard and placed it on top of the unit. A miracle – it stopped vibrating. For about an hour or two, when the rock vibrated off the unit. He said he would talk to the managers once he got back to the office. Then I received notice that the case was closed – problem solved! 

    Problem Solved!

    This is what my wife called a MacGyver solution (I never watched that TV show). Sort of like fixing a broken muffler or a leaking pipe with Duct Tape. It’s ugly, but works for a while. 

    So what’s this got to do with anything related to my travels? Earlier this summer, I decided to try and do something about an annoying medical issue – drop foot. Walking is a complex mechanical process, with a lot of moving parts. As you step forward, a small muscle in the shin keep the foot pointing up so that you step onto your heel first, and roll forward on to the ball of your foot. If the nerve controlling that muscle is not firing correctly, your foot flops forward, making a loud slapping noise on the ground. Aside from the sound, this is also a potential tripping problem for walking on uneven surfaces – hiking for example. Something I like to do on my trips.  

    After a couple of years living with this, I finally went for help, and wound up with an appointment with the UC Davis Neurology Department. This did not go well:

    1. They put me through an EMG test, where they stick acupuncture needles, hooked up to monitors, into the leg and shock you with a small cattle prod. Results confirmed that I had distal neuropathy. No kidding. I already knew that from prior tests.  
    2. Then they ordered all kinds of obscure blood tests to see if there were any underlying issues. Oops. One test was way out of bounds and was an indicator of multiple myeloma – blood cancer. Kind of ruined this summer.
    3. Next I was referred to another department, Hematology, to deal with what was likely myeloma. I was not overly thrilled about having to visit the UC Davis Cancer Center again. That was where my wife was treated for 11 months. No thanks.
    4. Fortunately the blood test was a lab mistake – I had them take another sample and it came out normal. Phew! Bad news for whoever they mixed up the test results with.

    So the end result of this exciting sequence of events was that I still have drop foot, which is what I wanted to solve in the first place. The neurologists had kicked the can down the road, and I have to wait a few more months to meet with another doctor to talk about the neuropathy and drop foot. Grrrrrrr.

    Now for the MacGyver solution. I had done some research (Google of course) on this condition, and found references to a brace designed specifically for drop foot. I spoke to my primary care physician who scheduled a reference to the orthotics department. I now have a carbon-graphite contraption that fits in my shoe, wraps almost comfortably on my calf, and keeps my foot from flopping. MacGyver rules! It would be perfect if it used Duct Tape to stick to my leg. This hopefully will not be a long term solution, but for now I can take long walks, workout on a treadmill without that annoying slapping sound, and hike (already tried it out) without worrying about tripping. Maybe I’ll use it as an excuse for early boarding on flights….you poor old man. Nah. Not my style. 

    And who cares if I look like Forest Gump wearing a leg brace. 

    Bring on the Manitou Incline!! 2700 steps, here I come. See, I told you I would tie this all together.

  • What Drives Me: Where I travel & why

    A friend of Jan’s (and mine too) recently asked me in a chat what drives my choices for the trips I’ve been scheduling. I seem to be all across the board on locations and activities. Mexico, South America, Utah, Alaska, whales, bears, hiking, kayaking. What next? Space travel?

    There is some method to my madness, and no, I am not using a dart board to select my trip (but it might be fun to have one).  It was a good question, and made me think a bit on where my wandering through the grief wilderness had led me to.

    I think my interests in photography and nature were the initial drivers for most of the early trips – I love being outdoors, and photographing scenery and wildlife has always been a hobby of mine. Some of my choices are just places I’ve always wanted to visit – my bucket list has always included Alaska and the Galápagos Islands,  both of which also met my criteria for photo opportunities.  Alaska has glaciers and bears, eagles and whales. Jan was never interested in going there, and gave me a trip for my birthday once, that I never used. The Kodiak trip will be the most adventurous of my trips so far – sleeping on bunk beds on a fishing trawler, getting up close and personal with giant grizzly bears. No lions or tigers but lots of bears. Oh my! 

    My trips to the Baja peninsula are all about the whales, but I fell in love with the incredible scenery, and the culture as well. Jan would have done that first National Geographic cruise – doubtful about the upcoming “glamping” trip in February. Antarctica is about the overall adventure, plus photographing penguins and icebergs. For Jan, that would have been a definite “NOT”.  Patagonia is all about epic landscapes, and visiting someplace remote. And then there is Iceland – many years ago,  I traded with Jan a trip to the Wimbledon tournament, followed by a bus tour around Iceland. Jan really did not care too much for the Iceland part of the trip, and was probably not disappointed that it was cancelled when Wimbledon was cancelled for COVID. I’m really looking forward to the one I recently scheduled – a lot of really weird geology, a lot of landscape photography, a few caves, and the possibility of photographing active volcanos. Woo hoo!

    Jan was always more into cities and people – we both compromised to share our interests on our trips. She would have enjoyed the National Geographic cruises since they have outdoor activities, photography opportunities, but also have cultural focused activities which I know she would have loved. She would have been up on the stage dancing at a festival we went to in Baja on one trip.

    My domestic trips to Utah/Nevada/Arizona are not so much focused on hiking but more on my fascination with the incredible scenery in these places – the canyons, peaks and rock formations in national parks like Zion, Bryce Canyon and Arches are fantastic. My inner geologist loves seeing those things, plus the landscape photography is incredible. I have a long list of parks, slot canyons and strange features that I want to see, mostly in Utah and Arizona. The Wave is still on my list, and I’ll do that if I have to use a walker to get there. 

    And then there are all the touristy things I’ve been doing, like the five caverns I visited this summer, and the bizarre Donner Tunnel hikes. No reason for these other than the pure fun of it, and the opportunity to try out some different photography techniques as well. I’ve got a few more planned this year – more caves, dark sky photography, and a hopefully successful attempt on the 2700 step Manitou Incline.

    Manitou Incline (Colorado)

    I have had to slim down my choices due in part to the fact that I’m ancient, alone and no longer in the same shape as I was when I was 30 – age creeps up on you.  I’d love to do more scuba diving trips, but my cardiologist told me no more diving. I’d really love to do a trek in the Himalayas, but I’m just not in shape for anything like that anymore. I do review the detailed itineraries in the catalogs for each trip before scheduling – I’m not looking for anything with long, strenuous hikes or climbing. I hear Jan’s voice saying – “please be careful”, or sometimes “are you out of your mind?”. 

    OK, so this post is longer than I was planning on to answer a single question. In summary, the top selection criteria for my adventures are (drum role please):

    1. Fun! It has to be something I enjoy doing (duh…why would I do something I don’t enjoy). Seriously, there are some trips I’ve looked at but realized there were activities I don’t enjoy. I seriously considered a Christmas trip to Banff, but realized after reading the itinerary that there was nothing in it that I really wanted to do. And it’s incredibly cold there in January.
    2. Reasonable Adventures! No sky diving, shark dives, rock climbing, or 18 mile, 3000’ elevation gain hikes. See #1. It has to be fun, not an epic event. I’ve done enough of them in my life. 
    3. Fascination! There are so many incredible places to go in the US and world. My list keeps growing.Bryce Canyon and Kanab just whet my appetite.
    4. Comfort! I’m past the point where I’m interested in sleeping on rocks, slogging through mud in mosquito infested swamps, or ending an exhausting day at a crummy motel with no hot water. I’m getting used to the National Geographic/Lindblad model of travel – do all kinds of crazy stuff, come back with someone waiting with a nice adult beverage when you get out of the Zodiac. 
    5. When all else fails, resort to the dart board.