Category Archives: Camping

Jun2

Þingvellir Park (pronounced Thingvellir, vaguely)

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Monday, 13-May-2024, a bit of Tuesday, 14-May-2024, and a little bit more on Friday, 17-May-2024


Silfra Fissure isn’t the only thing to see in Þingvellir park.

I know, shocker right?


After my friends had headed out to get checked into their hotel, I took a bit of time to wander around and take in the scenery of Þingvellir. I walked the nature trails, looked at signs, and appreciated the views and the lovely (absolutely staggeringly lovely) weather. It was cool (but not cold) and sunny (but not overly bright), and thankfully there weren’t too many tourists clogging the trails.

I’ll let the placards speak for themselves, but the summary is this: Þingvellir means “Assembly area” in Icelandic. Which makes sense, since it’s where the Icelandic chieftains would assembly for their annual parlament, the Alþingi. Pronounced, vaguely, “Allthingy”.

I’ll include a wikipedia link at the bottom, but the short summary that I learned is that the Chieftains would convene for as long as it took to discuss laws, review cases where laws had been broken, and pass judgement. They’d trade during that time, or their followers would, and they’d reside in smallish houses that they’d build each year for that express purpose.

Not even considering the history, it’s an absolutely beautiful park. Adding that history in, and… well, that’s really cool.

(Yes, I was able to fly the drone around a bit! Drone flights are limited to before 9am and after 6pm, though, so… thanks to Iceland for forcing me to fly at golden hour!)

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Wikipedia Links:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9Eingvellir
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Althing#Historical_background

May10

The blaze of the past lights my way

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Sunday, 21-April-2024


I am a sentimental creature, by nature. This is the culmination of that sentimentality.


I assign meaning to little things, overthink gestures and comments and actions, and see memories in the smallest of things. I save postcards and greeting cards – I’ve got a huge stack of them, going back 7 or 8 years, in fact. Yes, if you’ve sent me a card anytime since I’ve been in Oregon, there’s a good chance it’s flying to Ireland right now.

Some of the things I save have deep meaning. A faucet handle from when I was in a Brazilian detention center, for example, has deep meaning. Some of the things I save do not have deep meaning. A neat looking snail shell that I’ve had on my desk, for counter example.

Some things have deep meaning that needs to be left in the deep. Consigned to the past, and not carried forward into the future… regardless of how deep the meaning may be. Anchors to that which came before, that simply don’t aid in the fact that this ship is no longer anchored there, and is instead heading out to sea.

<Editor’s Note: One of Ben’s favorite quotes is from someone named John A. Shedd – “A ship at Harbor is safe… but that is not what ships are built for“. It seems appropriate to include here, thanks to his current metaphorical course>

Burning anchors is hardly advised, but in this case that’s exactly what I did. A box of Memories that shouldn’t be kept was carried with me, along with some firewood, camp chairs, and an axe, to Collins Beach out on Sauvie Island. The sand was prepared and cleared of anything flammable, a nice log cabin fire was made, and memories were shared before the physical memories were burnt. Old love letters, paintings, drawings, and other things that reminded me of a different life that I’d lived… hopes that I’d had for an alternative course that my life could have taken.

The memory sharing didn’t go quite as well as I’d hoped, but it was… almost cathartic. I learned an important lesson (that I’ll keep personal, for the time being), and had the opportunity to grow as a person… even if it wasn’t in the manner that I’d hoped for when I set this plan in motion.

It was an ending, in any case, with all the memories safely disposed of and left as buried ashes in the sand of the beach.




Link to the history of the “Ships at Harbor” quote – it’s interesting, and involves some very impressive persons!

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/12/09/safe-harbor/

May9

Wilsonville’s night sky

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April, 2024

Just a quick post, but a fun thing that not many people know about my home in Wilsonville – I can see the stars from my bedroom!

Well, okay. They’re not really stars, they’re those cute little glow in the dark stars that you can put up on the ceiling.

But you know what? It’s the little things in life that make the biggest difference. The fun of the mundane, and the simple good that we experience and pass on. For me, getting to fall asleep every night staring at constellations only visible from this one vantage point was one of those simple goods.