The only Silicon Valley CEO who answers my e-mails — Joost Schreve of EveryTrail.com — lobbed a minor bombshell in my in-box this morning with news that he’d sold EveryTrail to TripAdvisor, a subsidiary of the travel giant Expedia.com. Getting…
Featured, Latest Posts, Piedmont Environmental Center
First hike at Piedmont Environmental Center
by tom • January 16, 2011 • 2 Comments
Coming home with nice pictures changes the whole complexion of my hikes. Case in point: I hiked just over 11 miles Sunday on the trails of Piedmont Environmental Center, about 30 miles east of my doorstep. The hiking’s just bumpy…
Crowders Mountain State Park, Latest Posts
First look at Crowders Mountain State Park
by tom • January 9, 2011 • 6 Comments
Weekends usually put the crowd in Crowders Mountain, the state park closest to Charlotte (metro area population 1.7 million), but the trails tend to be clear on January mornings when red’s all but gone from the thermometer. I started out…
Hanging Rock State Park, Latest Posts
First Hike of 2011: Lower Cascade Falls and Cook’s Wall
by tom • January 2, 2011 • 2 Comments
My New Year’s resolution is to hike a new trail every weekend. But coming up with a resolution was about as ambitious as I got Sunday morning, as I was satisfied with a jaunt to trusty ol’ Hanging Rock State…
Hiking
The right time to ping your rescue beacon
by tom • January 1, 2011 • 1 Comment
This little news item from California reminded me there are right and wrong times to ping your rescue beacon. Scenario: Two guys go out winter camping, get caught in a white-out almost immediately. Snow covers their tracks and they get…
Blogs
Long overdue tweaks
by tom • December 31, 2010 • 0 Comments
It must be time for Web 4.0 by now because I’ve finally gotten around to Web 2.0, where earnest Web publishers integrate tools such as Twitter and Facebook into their sites because, you know, everybody else is. Actually, though, lately…
Mangan's memoirs
Taking a break till after the holidays
by tom • December 7, 2010 • 3 Comments
It’s getting too busy for blogging these days but the ol’ cabin fever should set in quickly after the first of the year so it should be back to blogging as usual. See you after the big ball drops. (I…
Eno River State Park
First hike: Eno River State Park
by tom • November 28, 2010 • 2 Comments
We’re back to our late-November color pallet of dirt, bark and dead leaves, which, frankly, is a welcome break from Leaf Season and the one-hike-a-year crowd. Leaf Season was on my mind yesterday at Eno River State Park, which is…
Tanglewood Park
Festival of Lights, minus the lights
by tom • November 21, 2010 • 0 Comments
I figured anybody could take snazzy nighttime snapshots of the Festival of Lights, which happens every holiday season at Tanglewood Park. The fest is one of the biggest light shows in the Southeast, which means the roads past our neighborhood…