Banff National Park

(Epic.)

One of the resounding epic photos that I will always remember seeing is a shot of Moraine Lake at Banff National Park. Just take a look at the photo below...there could not possible be a word to describe how unspeakably gorgeous that place is. Sublime? Picturesque? Those don't even do it a justice!

Anyways, Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada is home to some of the prettiest mountains and forest land Canada has to offer. It is also home to Lake Louise, a small hamlet where the famous ski resort of the same name is located.

(Lake Louise with the glacier in the background. I remember what it used to look like years ago but how much it has moved! Just kidding.)

Now that there are roads built throughout Banff National Park, a majority of this gorgeous place is now accessible to anyone willing to travel 80 miles west of Calgary, the capital of the central western Canadian province of Alberta. The 2,564 square miles of forest, lakes, rivers, mountains and wildlife are waiting to be explored and discovered by the adventurous type.

Wanaka

Located in the heart of New Zealand's South Island, Wanaka is a quaint resort town with an array of both summer and winter outdoor recreational activities available. Residing in the state of Otago, and 75 miles from Queenstown (one of the only bigger towns or cities in the greater area), Wanaka has a tremendous outdoorsy feel and a calming isolation from the hustle and bustle of everyday New Zealand life. I have a good friend from high school who attends college at the University of Otago in Dunedin which is over 100 miles away, but her family has a house in Wanaka and she spends a lot of her summer (and New Zealand's winter) skiing. There are four ski areas in the Wanaka region that are easily accessible including Treble Cone, Cardrona Alpine Resort, Snow Park and Snow Farm.

(Hiking to the summit of Treble Cone. Great looking snow shot. Imagine slaloming down that powder!)

Now I realize the last few posts have been solely about skiing but that is not completely what I am about. There is a ton of hiking, mountain biking and bungee jumping to be done in New Zealand and the South Island is where there is the heaviest concentration of outdoors. There is also a lot of geological attractions in New Zealand because of neighboring active volcanoes.

(A quaint cafe in Wanaka. Check out those sublime mountains dominating the background.)

The town of Wanaka is located at the south end of Lake Wanaka, New Zealand's fourth largest lake, and is completely surrounded by mountains. There is a lot of swimming, fishing and water sports available on the lake and through the various resorts located around the lake and in the town of Wanaka.

(Yup. That's about right. Epic.)

Sochi

This Russian resort city was selected to host the 2014 Winter Olympics. Despite a more mild climate than one would expect from a Russian city, Sochi, located on the Black Sea, is expected to be a prime location to host the Olympic Games. While temperatures hover above freezing in the city, the Caucasus Mountains looming in the background will provide the skiing and other outdoor ice sports venues. (Looks like a prime spot for the winter games, or just a nice cruise.)
Certainly a shocking selection by the IOC, the Sochi Games are expected to be a great success with construction already underway. The plans for Sochi's Olympic Park are to have all of the indoor arenas be within walking distance of one another to promote fan friendliness.

(Unfortunately they have snowboarders in Russia too...not that I wasn't expecting it from them.)

As for the skiing, the events will be held 37 miles away at Krasnaya Polyana, a posh ski resort offering a wide variety of chalets, hotels and restaurants. Krasnaya Polyana made its name in the 1990s because of the heli-skiing it offered. With a vertical drop of over 5,500 feet, there is a whole bundle of terrain to explore.

(Yea, I'd hit that. Notice the guy climbing up towards the bottom? What a boss.)

Portillo

When my brothers and I were younger, my father used to always entertain the idea of spending a few summer weeks skiing in Chile. Though he never followed through on the idea, my desire to ski during the summer months has not wavered. The only problem with summer skiing is that there are very few places to ski and most of them are quite hard to get to. In the early summer months there are a handful of glacial ski areas that offer June skiing such as Whistler/Blackcomb and Mt. Hood but the amount of ski-able terrain is limited. That leaves me with the Andes in South America and New Zealand. In terms of convenience, Chile seems like the much more suitable destination.



When my dad used to talk about Chile, my brothers and I ended up researching a few places. The most famous of which is Portillo. Portillo is located nearest to Los Andes, about 100 miles from the Chilean capital city of Santiago. The Andes are the world's most rugged mountain range and have the most unpredictable weather of any mountainous region. Portillo is no different. With a top elevation of 4020 meters (well over 2 miles) the mountain is battered with over 25 feet of snow a season. In fact, a majority of Northern Hemisphere skiers use Portillo as a summer training mountain including the national ski teams of the United States, Italy and Austria.



Offering luxurious resort/spas, unbelievable terrain and a very modest 450 skier/day limit, Portillo is a prime location for shredding up the summer months.

Petra

The stone-cut city located on the slope of Mount Hor in Jordan has been something that has captivated me since I first saw it in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. It lies in a basin among the mountains that form the large valley between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba. Petra is one of the New Seven Wonders of the World and was designated a World Heritage Site in 1985.

Archaeologists have determined that Petra was constructed by the Nabataeans, around 100 BC, as their capital city. The western world did not even know of its existence until 1812! While the history of the ancient city of Petra is amazing and worthy of it's own post, I can not move past the stunning beauty and the incomparable architectural feat. Considering the tools and technology available over 2100 years ago, the fact that this city was able to be completed is nothing short of miraculous.
Maybe I am enthralled with Petra because I always dreamed of being Indiana Jones, or at least his sidekick. Damn you Shia LaBeouf! I just can't imagine anything more epic than approaching Petra down this narrow canyon while riding on a camel and having my head wrapped up in a bedouin.

Seychelles

When I was in high school, my older brother asked for and received The Travel Book for Christmas one year. It was the most comprehensive traveling book I have ever seen in my entire life. It had a profile for every country and territory in the world along with travel tips and different sights and cultural activities that the authors recommend.

Anyways, the first place that truly captured my imagination was the island nation of Seychelles, located in the Indian Ocean equidistant from East Africa, the Arabian coast and India. The Seychelles are a popular vacation spot for Europeans because of the picturesque beaches and the world class resorts. Seychelles also used to be a British territory so the national language is English.

I spent years trying to convince my parents to let our family vacation to the Seychelles but the reality is that it is a very remote location and hard to get to...especially for Americans. Hopefully one day I will be able to say that I have been to the Seychelles because it is certainly a major goal of mine and currently the top of my list of places I want to see before I die.

Take the Road Less Traveled

As part of my Technology and Communication class, we are tasked with creating a blog. The content is completely open-ended, we just have to post at least five times throughout the quarter to get credit for completing the assignment. I took some time to think about what I would want to blog about considering I have no real prior blogging experience. Blogging about sports was what I had originally planned but I found it to be a bit cliche as well as too boring. I would not be breaking any news through my blog, neither are my opinions that important and mocking different players or teams would just make me an asshole. I decided to voice my opinion on traveling and different places I have desire to see. Do my opinions matter? Of course not. Do they have any reason to be taken at face value? Probably not, but if you are here you at least have a slight curiosity as to where I would place value in traveling too.