trip

CASPER, Wyo.--Each year, when I plan for my annual Road Trip project, I coordinate both a long list of destinations to visit and a big box full of tech gadgets to test out. Plus a car.

Some of those gadgets get used once or twice, and then get put away again. But others, for better or worse, become integral components of the trip.

Over the next week or so, I'll be posting my (amateur) reviews of all these gadgets, in each case talking about what I thought of them, and how they fit into the trip. In most … Read more

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK--If there's any doubt that more visitors to this treasure of nature check out Old Faithful than anything else, all you need to do is compare the size of the world-famous geyser's parking lot to that of any other place in the park.

But while Old Faithful may be synonymous with Yellowstone geothermal activity in most visitors' minds, it is, in fact, just one of hundreds of geysers, hot pools, mud pots, hot springs, and steam vents scattered throughout the park. And on Road Trip 2009, I set out to explore the lesser-known members of the … Read more

BUTTE, Mont.--When you visit a town whose current (though not historical) claim to fame is hosting one of America's biggest Superfund sites, it's hard to know what you're going to experience when you get there.

But when I was planning Road Trip 2009 and discovered that this Continental Divide city had once been known as the "richest hill on Earth" due to monumental mining wealth, but was now a city trying desperately to recover from the poisons the mining left behind, I knew I had to check it out.

Instantly, upon reaching the historic … Read more

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo.--During the course of Road Trip 2009, I've covered more than 4,000 miles, been in seven states, and seen some pretty amazing things.

But entering Yellowstone at the West entrance today--later in the day than I should have, admittedly--I thought I had finally met my match: a traffic jam that seemed, based on my map, to stretch nearly 15 miles to the first visitor center. It promised a horrid day of waiting hours to get anywhere and not even being able to park at some of the more popular destinations.

I was ready to … Read more

GLACIER NATIONAL PARK, Mont.--I'm kind of awestruck. For four years I've been doing CNET Road Trip projects, and every time I've hit a new thousand-mile milestone, I've stopped, photographed the odometer and the surroundings, and then blogged about the spot.

In almost every case, that new set of zeroes on the odometer has come at some nondescript location. There have been a couple cases where it happened near something incredible, but I'll be honest: I've cheated a little bit and, say, driven back and forth across a parking lot to have the milestone … Read more

Note: All information in this story, unless otherwise noted, is from the National Park Service's pamphlets on and in-park signs about climate change and Glacier National Park.

GLACIER NATIONAL PARK, Mont.--The small graphics on a single sign, deep inside this incredible natural treasure says just about all you need to know about the drastic effects of rapid and intense climate change on the park and what's inside it.

"With warmer temperatures and changes to the water cycle, Glacier National Park will be glacier-free by 2030," the sign reads. "These changes will also have consequences … Read more

MISSOULA, Mont.--If you're going to decide how to fight fire, then you'd better know as much as possible about how it works.

That's the idea behind FireLab, a U.S. Forest Service program at the Rocky Mountain Research Station here, where scientists spend their days studying, among other things, the dynamics and behavior of fire, as well as ways to better predictively model how fire might spread.

And while, as scientists, the folks here don't set policy, it is their job to give those whose jobs is to set policy the best data possible. The … Read more

COLUMBIA FALLS, Montana--For the past three-plus weeks, I've been driving around states like Colorado, Utah, Idaho, and now the Big Sky state, writing stories and producing photo galleries and videos as part of my Road Trip 2009 package. Almost everything I've done was pre-scheduled and coordinated long before the trip started.

But for some reason, a few things on the agenda seem to have fallen through in the last few days, and I find myself, among other things, looking for a perfect Road Trip story to do in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

And this is where you come in. … Read more

MISSOULA, Mont.--There were two points Sunday when I had absolutely no idea what time it was. It wasn't that I didn't have any timepieces. Rather, I had several, and they were all telling me different things.

The first time it happened, I was on my way up to the top of the Hells Canyon National Recreation Area in western Idaho at 7,400 feet above sea level, as part of Road Trip 2009. From high up there, it is possible to see four states: Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington. Down below, in Riggins, Idaho, where I'd … Read more