Taking time to smell the roses
One thing that had been driving me crazy lately is the fact that when I travel for work, I never actually get to see the place I’m visiting. I normally start working almost immediately upon arrival and then I get down to business. Even offline time inevitably gets consumed by work.
After leaving the fine city of Boston last month without getting to see anything, I promised myself that I would give myself at least one day to look around the next time I went someplace. As luck would have it, that place was Bozeman, Montana — a destination within spitting distance of Yellowstone Park.
National parks are possibly America’s greatest contribution to the world’s cultural heritage. Many countries have excellent national parks now, but Yellowstone was the first, and it remains an embodiment of the concept at its best.
Great parks like Yellowstone help us renew our bonds with the planet and remind us that we are all just a small part of something much greater worth preserving. They demonstrate what we sacrifice when we develop areas without conscience. In the day and a half I was there, I saw bears, wolves, bison, antelope, and other wildlife too numerous to mention. The variety of plant life is amazing, and the natural wonders are simply awe inspiring.
There is even something for people compelled to think of priceless intangibles in terms of countable money. Yellowstone attracts three million visitors requiring a wide array of services every year, and you don’t have to go far beyond the park’s boundaries see how much value is left after the lands have been logged, mined, and relegated to low cost development.
I typically don’t take many photos when I travel, but I made an exception this time. You can either see all of them in my photo database or you can see the short version posted to my facebook page.