Uprooted, an eco/travel blog

Durham’s tobacco fields are disappearing under miles of roads, but its Southern manners and natural beauty hold strong.

August in Maine: foggy, grey and serenely beautiful.

If you care about climate change, now’s the time to get involved. Find out why the time is now–and what you can do to help.

Turkey Run State Park. Yep, that’s what it’s called. There aren’t really any turkeys here: they were hunted to near-extinction in this area, and now you’d have to be pretty lucky to find one. But local history tells of a time when wild turkeys would flock in the deep canyons. Hunters would then chase the [...]

When we last saw her, Jessica was stranded in Hot Springs, Arkansas. Read on for the inspiring next installment…
(3) …In which Things Get Better.
Till now, I’ve left out an important part of the story: Pete. He’s a Hot Springs resident, and a couchsurfing.org member. My main goal in Arkansas was to camp and hike alone, [...]

(1) …Our narrator arrives.
I’ve always wanted to visit Arkansas. Maybe it’s just the name. Maybe it’s the backcountry, down-home Americana imagery associated with that part of the world. Probably it has a lot to do with the Ozarks, that oddly-named bed of mountains promising lush greenery, clapboard shacks, crawdads and moonshine. Whatever the reason, once [...]

It’s beautiful in Austin: Texas hill country, with low rolling treebanks as far as the eye can see. The Colorado River rambles through the middle of town, and scores of springs bring forth cool water even in the hottest months. You can hear great music wherever you go, and there’s art on every corner. But [...]

Last night a huge storm rolled through Austin.

According to the neighbors who were out on the porch watching the weather with me, storms like this aren’t out of the ordinary. I’m like, really? Lighting and thunder every couple of seconds, funnel clouds, quarter-sized hailstones, and two inches of rain in half an hour— that’s normal?
But [...]