Nostalgia

Seventeen of the best places that I have been (not a complete list by any means)

• Every part of Ticaboo. Every single part
  
• A certain street in San Francisco de Macoris that for me sort of sums up all of the Cibao region of the Dominican Republic, except for the coast – I found that on a 30 km bike ride from Villa Vasquez in the northwest to a place… I don't even know its name – it is about 30 km from Villa Vasquez. It is near where Columbus first landed in the "New World". Why he didn't stop and stay there I will never understand; but, then again, here I am – not there.
  
• That fishing pier on base in Orlando. It seemed totally forgotten and I would go there to read on the weekends but the reading usually gave way to staring at the fish below the pier. More than one time a couple of otters stood up on the beach end of the pier and stared at me staring at those fish
  
• Red Rocks, Nevada
  
• There is a part of Phoenix, just north of the zoo – Hunt's Tomb – at night
  
• A running trail along a low cliff between Two Harbors and Cherry Cove at Catalina Island. The Garibaldi looked amazing in the ocean below
  
• Muley Point. Near Mexican Hat, Utah. What a view!
  
• Naranjal, Veracruz. We could have died there – not from the lack of water but from the water itself. If you know, you know – you know?
  
• There is a path on BYU's campus that follows a canal or a stream or something. Plumbs and wild grapes grow there. A father can hold his little son out to pick the grapes across the stream. There is a mouse on an old stump there and lots of obsidian in a sand box down the hill; at least there used to be; if you don't find any of it, you can ask my father about it.
  
• The back end of a boat in San Carlos, Mexico. Becky was in the water beginning to enjoy snorkeling. I had Gabe who was beginning to enjoy the ocean and the back end of boats in San Carlos, Mexico
  
• Oh, yeah – how could I have forgotten…? The first day it snowed in northern Utah in the fall last year I was at Snow Bird Ski Resort for the wedding of my great friend Frank in Salt Late. Wow. WOW
  
• Can the inside of a building make on my list? How about a bathroom? Well, have you ever been to the Bellagio in Las Vegas? I think that it can be on the list. The bathroom, that is.
  
• Since we are allowing for buildings – the welcome center at the first rest area heading into Minnesota. The other states should be taking notes. I suppose that Minnesota is doing what it can with hospitality to keep people considering that the cold is doing more than enough to drive people away
  
• I climbed to the top of Mount Timpanogos in 2002. I took a largish, roundish, very smooth, blood colored stone, not just red – really, really red. You can decide if this one is the rock or the mountain top
  
• Monkeys, morpho butterflies, sloths, iguanas, and sea turtles – all at one single beach in Costa Rica. I look forward to going back with Becky someday. Maybe back is the wrong direction for something that is still in the future…. I don't think that I will ever really go back
  
• I caught a new species of dragonfly near a stream on a hillside in a mountainous village whose name is impossible to say in Hidalgo, Mexico (not just new to me either)
  
• El Espinazo del Diablo, Mexico on "the fourth best day ever." We saw military macaws flying territorial circles and we found sapphire looking dung beetles on the shoulder of the road. I put this one on the list more out of respect for the others present – I was too busy puking on the roadside to really appreciate it like the rest.
  

MERRY CHRISTMAS!