What location or vista chokes you up?

I have 3 places I have been to that brought tears to my eyes.

1) Mountain climbing in Colorado. Part way up the mountain I turned around and looked at the rolling valley. The slow change of the woods into grass giving way to the rock of the mountain. Then turning to look up in time to see the clouds boiling over the top of the mountain after they had picked up enough pressure to pass over the height. The clouds spilling into the valley was like nothing I had ever seen before.

2) Stratford Ontario. The Shakespeare festivals. Sitting on the bank of the river watching couples stroll along as petals fell amoung the swans churning their way down the river. The scent in the air made the moment one of perfection. Art and nature together entwined and comlimenting each other perfectly.

3) Boston Harbor sitting at a dock. There were ancient wooden ships docked along side glistening modern steal marvels. The distance we humans have come exemplified in one location.


So what locals or views have made an impact on your life? What place gives you hope?

Haven't been there since the late 1980s. Should go back one of these years.

You should go back...it's just as beautiful and welcoming as ever.

Some of my favorite places are the Gap of Dunloe in Killarney,Beara Peninsula in West Cork as well as Bantry Bay. West Cork is my favorite part of Ireland...I particularly love the towns of Skibbereen and Clonakilty. I feel so renewed and happy over there...I'm already planning my next trip:)

Vietnam Wall in DC. It's just fucking overwhelming. The wall is so huge and the names are so small.

Any veiw from any part of the John Muir Trail in the Sierra's

Northern Californa/Oregon/Washington Coastline

Drive from San Francisco South toward Santa Barbara.

Wow.

1) St. Ignatius is a 19th century Jesuit mission at the base of the Mission Mountains just north of Missoula, Montana on the Flathead Reservation. It's right next to the National Bison Range and it's breath-taking.

2) Good ruts along the emigrant trails.... The still pristine Parting of the Ways where many families split up never to see each other again or the lonely grave of Mary Homsley up on the bluffs above Fort Laramie. Once when I was there, the wind blew me over and I lay there watching a bald eagle ride the currents over my head.

3) Kalaloch, Washington in Olympic National Park. (Actually, I think the lodge I'm thinking of is on private land surrounded by the park.) It's the wildest, most pristine beach I've ever seen in the United States.

Place with some of the best ghosts???? Little Bighorn Battlefield.

in Boulder Junction, WI. My parents took us there every year for vacation when I was small. The smooth-as-glass lake, the loons calling in the night, the secretiveness of the pine woods. Utter peace.

in Dunnellon, Florida. Had my first taste of the forbidden fruit there!

Grand River, Ohio, saw my first herd of deer crossing the river. Took the herd 15 minutes to clear! Awesome display!

I feel very peaceful there-almost a spiritual connection. I adore the place.

Overlooking Harper's Ferry on the Virginia side of the river right on the Appalachian Trail.

There are several but a few that stand out.

Yosimite Valley is tops. As over crowded and as much as we have seen it documented photographicly, it still mind blowing when you enter the valley and you are so close to massive monoliths, booming falls, forests and roaring rivers. I've always been a huge Ansel Adams fan and when I saw Yosimite, I truly understood how it inspired him.

Cape Cod and particulary Province Town. I love the massive dunes, the bay and ocean beaches and how the tip of the Cape winds to a narrow point and the ocean and bay meet. Bathed in the renown Cape Light, it's obvious why so many artists are inspired with that region.

The third is the Green or White Mountains in autumn. I have gone every October for the last eight years and yet to become bored with seeing the explosion of red, yellow and orange that the aspens, maples, beech, birch and others burst into and how they dot the mountain landscape.

It will always remind me of 9/11. It was such a beautiful morning; such a dreadful day.

As you approach the Golden Gate Bridge. There is no better view of "Baghdad by the Bay". Ironic eh?

One of the great corniche drives in the world.

Especially as Lincoln Park fades away and the skysrapers come close in, and the John Hanckock and Palmolive Bldg loom closer, with the lake and the beaches immediatly to your left.

Really impressive...gives me goodbumps of excitement. Just a city kid, I guess.

For scenic vistas, Foothills Parkway in the Great Smokey Mnts...little known...but fantastic views...two the right a panorama of the Smokey Mnts, to the left, a spectacular view over the 'Great Valley; with the blue wall of Cumberland Mountain waaay off in the distance....this view is esp. spectualar in late evening on a clear day as the sun is getting low and setting...the Great Valley disappears into the sunset to the southwest....

This is a valley outside Nashville. It is on a property I used to do landscape maintenance for-- this overlook is at the back corner of the property. I happened to have my camera handy at just the right time.



I also love looking out over the Grand Canyon, and driving through the Painted Desert. The other place I really enjoy is looking out across the ocean from the shore (the location isn't important-- the ocean is equally impressive no matter where you stand!).

The views from Iroquis park overlook south towards the Knobs, and some of the views from up in the Knobs themselves...vistas back down the hollows and valleys opening up towards Louisville and the bluegrass country ..with outrider hills like Finley Hill, Kenwood Hill, etc...sitting out in the vallye like extinct volcanoes...

And towards the Indiana Knobs, the long high ridgeline along the Ohio River, heading north of the river towards Pigeons Roost....on a clear day you can follow this excaprment for 30 miles north...

The Kentucky Knob country has plenty of vistas like this....Berheim Forest near Bardstown, Indian Fort Mountain near Berea. The scenery is almost like out of those oriental watercolor or inkwash paintings....

My family and I got back from vacationing in South Dakota a few weeks ago. We saw Mt. Rushmore by day but also came back for the lighting ceremony. The lighting ceremony consists of a video on the four presidents featured on the mountain, then the audience sings the national anthem. It was really moving to have a thousand people all singing along, without any false patriotism--just real love for our country, in the quiet of twilight. The rangers timed the lighting just right--as we all hit the last note, a spotlight lit up the monument. I wasn't the only one sniffling in the crowd!

San Francisco....driving over the Golden Gate bridge from Marin into the City. The view never ceases to amaze me. :-)

I was completely unprepared for the power and emotion that the simple but overwhelming wall exudes. I'm not a vet, but standing in that gash in the ground, I cried for every name on the wall and for every person forever scarred by that horrendous war.

mmmm....wish I could be there...

My Wife and two daughters had plane tickets for 9/14 to go see my Mom and Dad. Our youngest daughter was just months old and my mother had not seen her yet. Obviously when 9/11 hit there was no way we could fly. We packed and drove cross country from High Point, NC to Coeur D'Alene Idaho, we only counted 5 planes in the air. As we went through a town in NorthWest Iowa, we saw a bedsheet tied to an overpas that said "WE WONT FORGET YOU!". After 2 days of listening to NPR REPORTS (which won a PEABODY by the way) I couldnt stand it anymore. Just the sight of seeing the country miles and miles of it, made me choke up, crying is more like it. LAter in July 2002 my parents came for a visit and we drove to The Flight 93 Crash site. There really is nothing there but a few makeshift memorials and a wall to write on. But something about it was overwhelming. While all those pissants in first class on the other planes wet themselves when the hijackers pulled out boxcutters. Something just struck me about the "DEAD is DEAD" courage of those men and women on that flight. In a MASADA like battle they stole from the Terrorists the only victory that they (the terrorists) could have gotten. They died, sure, but they killed the terrorist and that still chokes me up.

Tough memory.

I actually camped outdoors the night of 911. It was plans I had made already about two weeks before. There was a lot of goldenrod, since it was early fall, and it was very much a September landscape, but there were no planes in the sky. I looked up at the sky that night. It was a clear sky, and very quiet, with a few crickets in the background. It was different than anything I had ever experienced. The world was totally different from what I had experienced for more than 30 years.

I still remember the drive I made up to the place where I camped and how time had stopped.

It just goes on, and on, and on.

Overwhelming. You look at it and make deals with God that you'll do something to keep it from filling up any further...

One time back in the early 1980s I was on top of a mountain in Griffith Park overlooking L.A. in clear air overlooking a pall of smog. I cried because it was so filthy below, yet I stood by myself, for a moment, up above the filth.

I knew that the mountains were a very special place, and that nature is something that must be obeyed and respected.

Kenai Fjords.

I won't post pix or links - google 'em and prepare to be awed.

Coming face to face with a glacier at Kenai Fjords, Alaska

Seeing Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Yosemite, Mesa Verde, Bryce Canyon, etc., for the first time.

Black Mesa, Arizona

Shiprock, New Mexico

Monument Valley, Arizona

Athabasca Falls, Alberta

Quebec and Vermont in the fall

The sheer emptiness of the Great Plains west of Abilene, Kansas

Glancing out an airplane window to see the Mt. Fuji "island" floating on a sea of clouds

The nuked remains of the old Hiroshima City Hall (will make it to Nagasaki some day)

and my favorite...

Watching awestruck as thousands upon thousands of ducks were skimming the surface of Lake Chicot, Arkansas, on a cold wintry morning

overlooking Deer Island, by the Biloxi smallcraft harbor. At night. Just kills me. I visit it sometimes like a pilgrimmage. Don't know why.

Some runners up-- Enchanted Rock, near Fredricksburg, Texas. The Mississippi River from the bluffs of Vicksburg. And Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

NOT from the entrance, but from the Glacier Point Overlook, taking in Yosemite Falls, Half Dome, Nevada and Vernal Falls, and the twisting ribbon of the Merced meandering over the valley floor .....

Wow .....

I once jumped the barrier, and stood on the overhanging rock ...

(Yes: .. THAT overhanging rock: ... which John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt were photographed upon ... ) ..... 3250 feet from the bottom ......

I was 16 then: ..... I just sauntered to the edge and bent over, looking down as if I were on a small bridge .....

I did it again at 30 ...... and dropped to my knees, and CRAWLED to the edge .... peeking over for a second then SCRAMBLING to back away ......

I am now 46: ... Ill cannot imagine EVER doing that again ....

Absolutely breathtaking .....

At least you didn't do a handstand ala D. Fairbanks. :D