Uncharted

Trying to Get "Le Grille" Working Again

2011-09-07T22:05:00.001-06:00

You may have noticed (in fact, we hope you have; that means you’re a regular Uncharted visitor) that we’re having a little difficulty at Uncharted.net.

Our photo uploader works, well, kinda, and you have to treat it like an old pickup, whapping it here and turning up the radio to drown out the noises there. The story uploader, well, that isn’t working at all.

We’re sorry.

We’re working on a solution that includes rewriting some of the programming that lies behind Uncharted.net, and doing so on a shoestring budget. We’ll try to do a better job of keeping you up to date on our progress so your visits to Uncharted.net are fun, not frustrating. Although sometimes it’s fun to watch someone be frustrated, as Homer Simpson here:

Rest assured that the experts we have working on Uncharted.net’s woes are much better at their jobs than Homer is at masonry.

In the meantime, we’re working on a few solutions that’ll keep us all sharing our photos and adventures until we’ve got the site working as we’d like.

1) The photo uploader is still working, but you just have to be patient with it. If you get an error message, just reload the page, or open up Uncharted.net in a new browser and try again. Most of the time (and trust me, I’ve done a lot of trial and error on this ) your photos will be there, waiting for more to join them or for your muse to help you write captions.

2) If you’ve got an itch to write a story, simply post it to your blog, on Facebook, Google+ or whatever space you’ve got and send us a link at Uncharted’s Facebook page, which you can find here.

3) If you’d rather leave the hosting to us, contact us via our Facebook page and we’ll work things out.

4) If you have any suggestions, want to make a donation so our site upgrade goes faster, absolutely let us know.

Thanks for your patience. We love seeing your photos and reading your stories. We hope this interim solution in keeping your enthusiasm alive will, well, keep that enthusiasm alive. Let us know what we can do to do better.

An Oil Change's Worth of Stories to Come

2011-08-03T22:06:00.000-06:00

View Larger Map

We just finished traveling over 3,000 miles, mostly on interstates but a lot – notably in Wyoming, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Iowa – on more minor roads, on our annual vacation. That’s an oil change’s worth of traveling.

Lots of Uncharted stories to come, obviously. Not necessarily stuff off the beaten track, but some stuff, I believe, well worthwhile to future explorers who want a little advice on whether or not to take the road less traveled. And we certainly did hit some less-traveled roads. If it hadn’t been for that one slow truck we got behind while winding down out of the Big Horn Mountains on US 14 through central Wyoming, for instance, we wouldn’t have seen another soul on that trip. Well worth it, by the way – spectacular views of the mountains, the valleys, lots of snow still on the ground and, at the top in that odd little alpine valley, a roadside spring for refreshment.

And more to see. Now that we’ve traveled those roads, we’ve got more reasons to go back when we have the time and the inclination. Maybe that’s the magic of Uncharted: Knowing where you’re going to go next.

Global Vomiting

2011-07-12T23:54:00.011-06:00

Students participate in a press conference with the cast of "Sister Act: The Musical," on Broadway in New York City. (Photo by Alan Murray/Uncharted)

I'm an expert at throwing up.

I have an extensive resume of losing my lunch in various settings around the globe.

There's that time when I was doing some aerial photography from a small plane. We had only been in the air for a few minutes when I realized that my stomach was the stage for a people's army revolting against my choice of breakfast, a pair of strawberry Fruit Roll-Ups.

I warned the pilot. There were no vomit bags. He opened the window, rolled the plane slightly to the right and told me to empty myself over a small unsuspecting section of an equally small and unsuspecting town, unaware of the chemical warfare about to be unleashed onto its quiet, clean streets as reddish goo fell from the sky.

Then there was the canoe. And there was the amusement park ride and the racquetball courts, all rather far from any type of bucket or other suitable container for such contents.

And most recently, a New York City cab as it weaved in and out of traffic towards JFK Airport to catch my flight home to Salt Lake City after an intense week teaching online reporting and writing at Columbia University for the Columbia Scholastic Press Associations' summer journalism workshop.

The workshop, held each year, brings students from around the world to study a variety of topics, anything from photojournalism to design, to writing and multimedia.

This was my first experience teaching several hours each day for an entire week. The organizers invited me to teach a writing and reporting workshop focused specifically for the web, a first at the event that has been running for some 30 years.

I wanted to teach my students things that would not only help them become better reporters, but skills and techniques, albeit somewhat indirectly related to journalism, that would enhance their reporting.

At Uncharted we have a motto that each of our staff is taught to apply. "If you do things in ways that have never been done before, you attain results that have never been achieved before." It was with that concept that I entered my preparations for this particular workshop.

I asked myself, "What are some things that have never been taught in a reporting class focused on the web?" Answering this question inspired a whole section on teamwork and asking Uncharted's Director of Presentation, Andrew Clark, to join us as a guest speaker via Skype to discuss with my class how reporters can work in teams with designers and other visuals staff to enhance their reporting.

And Uncharted's Internet Coach, David Densley, connected in from Oregon to share with students some techniques reporters can employ to bring more readers to their stories. Given the state of the industry, with possible jobs diminishing due to cutbacks and media owners becoming more and more concerned with web traffic, a reporter who knows how to get people to their story will have more job security than the one who, despite high quality reporting and writing, knows nothing about teamwork, interacting with an audience and taking personal initiative to get readers to the story.

Students worked in an online newsroom brainstorming ideas, submitting their assignments and receiving feedback and editing that simulates a professional working environment, very similar to the one we work in at Uncharted. And Brian Davidson, Uncharted's Editor-in-Chief, volunteered his time as a guest editor to provide the class with another point-of-view slightly different than their teacher. It was a packed week with little time for sleeping.

The Columbia Scholastic Press Association does a fine job providing students and teachers with resources, ideas and opportunities to grow through attending their educational programs. CSPA's administration and staff are incredibly passionate and dedicated to making a difference in the lives of every student. It was an honor to be invited to participate in such an incredibly well organized educational program. For more information on CSPA check out their website at http://cspa.columbia.edu.

By the end of the week I was completely exhausted as I exited my cab and scrambled to catch my flight, hoping for a somewhat less eventful trip than my cab ride to the airport.

Alan Murray is the President and Executive Director
of Uncharted. He's currently driving across the
country in an attempt to find Buffalo Bill and UFO sightings
in Iowa. Feel free to contact him at alan@uncharted.net

Alan Murray: Detecting Gorillas All Week Long

2011-06-19T17:51:00.003-06:00

Within the next hour and a half, Uncharted's Alan Murray will be detecting gorillas. Much better than Dr. Bunsen Honeydew here.

Gorilla detecting is a good metaphor for what Alan is doing this week. In case you've forgotten, Alan is teaching a week-long writing and leadership seminar at the Columbia Scholastic Press Association's summer workshop series. The gorilla detecting comes in as Alan teaches his students that we have to go beyond the obvious and stretch ourselves as writers and communicators to succeed in any kind of writing endeavor, not just journalism. (I wish I'd realized the importance of the communication part when I was a journalist; that would have helped avoid several unpleasant problems.)

We've had a busy month, getting Alan ready for this week's adventure. And we're not done. Andrew will work as a Skyped-in guest speaker on coordinating writing with visuals, while Dave will also Skype in to talk about SEO and other ways to generate web traffic. As Uncharted's director of creative content, I'll be working with Alan all week as well, offering feedback on his students' writing. It's going to be a challenging week.

Alan is up to it, through. He's good at detectoring gorillas.

It's Just This Thing I Have . . .

2011-05-09T08:13:00.000-06:00

I don't know what it is with me and ghost towns.

Back in the late 80s, a Dutch exchange student we were hosting wanted to go pan for gold. He'd gone to the local army surplus store and bought an authentic gold-panning pan -- they have everything at our surplus store, except the gold -- and wanted to try it out. I figured, why not go gold-panning where the prospectors had found gold years before?

So we headed to Stanley, Idaho.

Stanley itself is nto a ghost town, though it is almost. Nearby, however, is the ghost town of Bonanza, which sounded as a likely spot.

We camped, made a fire, monkeyed around as high school kids will do, then went panning for gold. Didn't find a single flake. But we had a ball poking through the old buildings at Bonanza, wondering who lived there, why they left, and why in the world they used such splintery wood for the seats in their outhouses.

Then on out, I was hooked.

I've been through ghost towns in extreme southern Idaho, where they built their homes out of stone because trees were scarce. I've been through several in central Idaho, where the roofs have crumbled and trees are growing up through the buildings.

And I've been to Gilmore, Idaho, time and again, hoping against hope that on the next journey, I can convince my wife to buy a lot there. They're for sale, you know. Owning part of a ghost town. How cool would that be? Read more about it here.

Gilmore, Idaho, from the surrounding hills. Photo by Michelle Davidson.

Uncharted Gets another CSPA Invite

2011-05-06T20:15:00.001-06:00

Well, we're officially in at the CSPA. Here's what Alan says about our repeated invitation:

Here is the link to the workshop I will be teaching. The Columbia University people told me that the reasons they are having me come teach this summer are because I come well prepared and get really good reviews with class numbers increasing. The words they used to describe the sessions were things like innovative and attention-grabbing. They also like that we cross train and deal with small staffs. This invitation would not be possible if it were not for the team effort that goes into helping me prepare for these events. Each of you have played a key role in this and I appreciate it. When I go to these things and am successful it is only because of this team. You should all take credit for this. Thanks.

That makes us feel pretty good. Here's the link he mentions.

App Review: iSurvival

2011-03-21T11:50:00.002-06:00

The time hasn't come yet that an iPod Touch is the first item I think of when I'm compiling a list of wilderness survival essentials, but a friend of mine recently recommended a survival app that just might change my mind.

It's called -- maybe this won't win points for originality -- iSurvival. But as I mock the name, I have to say that for an occasional wilderness wanderer like me, it's got some handy stuff, though I'm hard-pressed to way when, in the future, I envision myself becoming lost at sea. Published by Utah-based Fishington Studios, the app is billed as a "military grade" wilderness survival manual. And considering the friend who recommended the app worked as a paramedic and in California and follows military minutia as he has a son who is a soldier, I have to believe that this app lives up to its billing.

Wilderness Survival, ten-year-old style

There are small tells throughout the manual that reveal the text in iSurvival wasn't originally written for the leisure wilderness crowd -- the chapter on shelters, for example, advises that you choose a place to build your shelter that "provides concealment from enemy observation" -- but, in general, the tips therein echo those I've read in more expensive manuals, including a few I've got lying around the house because I haven't yet gotten around to getting lost.

Though I've poked fun at the manual a bit, it's certainly something I'd have at my side if I were wandering off into the wilds. The app's clear textual presentation, accompanied by clear, useful illustration of survival techniques ranging from shelter-building to identification of edible wild plants.

The link provided above says the app is available for $1.99. I searched iTunes and got it for free, though perhaps the "free" was a short-time promotional price.

The only fault I can see in this app is obvious -- run out of power for your handheld device and the app is locked away forever. Perhaps they've included a chapter on locating current bushes . . .

Fixed the Photo and Story Modules

2011-03-14T17:12:00.004-06:00

Great news! We successfully fixed the "share" function of the Uncharted website so that you can once again share your photos and stories from your adventures! Feel free to use your Explorer account to sign in and publish away on Uncharted's website. Invite your friends to do the same by sharing this link with them so they can become an Explorer too: http://uncharted.net/account/register

We look forward to seeing whatever you have to share with us as you continue exploring the uncharted and keep shooting for 2011 Explorer of the Year. For 2010 we gave away a nice Uncharted t-shirt and a couple bumper stickers to the winner, and well do the same or better this year, so share your adventures often!

Now we are working on new upgrades to the site and we will have some more news, tips and information to send to you again soon. As always, if you have anything you'd like to share w/ the whole Uncharted audience or have feedback, we welcome you to send it to feedback@uncharted.net. You can also keep in touch with us at our page on Facebook or Twitter. In the mean time, all the best!

What We Learned

2011-03-14T11:36:00.001-06:00

Whew.

The workshop is done. I'm feeling a lot less stress now. I'm used to giving presentations, but I still get that stage fright right before it's time to go on.

And that's what we'll do with the writing workshop offered through Uncharted: Go on.

The March 4th presentation was a good experience. I used about 50 percent of what I had prepared and built the remaining 50 percent on the spot, drawing on what I know works when you've got a bunch of photos, sound clips and souvenirs on hand but you're staring into that blank screen maw, waiting for inspiration to strike.

The next Uncharted writing workshop will be better than the first. And then they'll keep on getting better as more people attend and as more people tell us what they'd like to see in this workshop, and in other workshops we've got in the works.

What did I learn from this workshop?

There's a lot of talent out there. My Uncharted compatriots, shy about sharing what they write, can write some magnificent stuff. Maybe they're lacking a little bit of confidence, or a road map or plan on how to begin. I'm hoping with what I taught them about outlining, making lists, making story diagrams and other such stuff helps them find that confidence and those road maps. I'm expecting great things from them. And you, too. Toddle on over to http://www.uncharted.net/ and show us what you've got.

Uncharted Workshop: Reconnect to Your World

2011-03-01T21:41:00.003-07:00

One of the best things about visiting a place – unless you’re one of those secretive fishermen types – is telling the rest of the world about what you just saw. And felt. And smelled. And ate.

But when you sit down to write it all out, do you get that proverbial writer’s block?

Me too.

But by using a few simple tricks and exercises to get your writing juices flowing, you can get past that writer’s block beast and reconnect yourself to the places you love through the lively art of writing.

What to bring:

– Computer or notepad and pencil for note-taking
– Your sense of adventure
– Photos, video clips, souvenirs, sand from your shoes – anything to act as a memory trigger

Who is Presenting:

Brian Davidson, workshop presenter, spent ten years in community journalism followed by nearly five years in technical writing at a nuclear waste dump in Idaho. He babbles a lot on his blogs and has written “Considering How to Run,” a novel he aims to publish before he’s dead.

What to Expect:

Expect to have one Uncharted-publishable story done or well underway by the time the workshop is over, with a clear path on how to write more. Also, some of Brian’s blue nuclear glow might rub off. Don’t worry. It’ll fade with time.

When and where:

March 4th, 2011, 5pm – 6:30pm in Logan, UT at the Cache Business Resource Center (CBRC) Room 1901.

Best thing of all:

This is a free workshop. Come be Brian's guinea pigs and help him make the next workshop even better. Though that shouldn't be hard.

New for 2011 - Cross-Culture Skills Workshop

2011-01-18T17:25:00.009-07:00

We are happy to announce Uncharted's first ever Cross-Culture Skills workshop! We will present the workshop in Kalamazoo, Michigan on Saturday, 9 Apr 11 from 9:00am until 12:00 noon at the Kalamazoo Valley Museum.

For those who attend, the Cross-Culture Skills workshop will help you gain useful skills in adapting to new or unfamiliar cultures while travelling, working, or volunteering in another country or culture, or it will help you while hosting visitors from another culture. The training will help you avoid some of the common mistakes travelers, expatriates, and hosts make when interacting with people from other cultures, and it will also help raise your own self-awareness to your personality and traits which either help or hinder your effectiveness when adapting to another culture. You will also leave the workshop with helpful resources that you can reference long after the workshop is over.

We are excited to provide this opportunity and hope it can serve as another useful tool to you in your efforts to explore the uncharted.

You can register for the workshop online and get additional details at http://kzoocrosscultureworkshop.eventbrite.com/ and the workshop's event page on Facebook where we will continue making updates as the workshop date gets closer.

The registration fee is $30, but Uncharted Explorers will receive a $10 discount reimbursement at the workshop. Anyone can become an Explorer for free by signing up here.

If you are going to attend and would like the instructor to emphasize a certain culture, region or aspect of training, please don't hesitate to reply to this post with that information. We want to make this as useful to you as we can!

If Kalamazoo is to far away for you to attend, but you are still interested in having this workshop brought to your area, reply to this post to let us know of your interest. We are considering holding other workshops in 2011 and if there is enough interest coming from a location we might be able to make it happen. Also feel free to let us know if there is another workshop topic you would like us to provide.

Looking forward to seeing you at the workshop if you can make it! If you have any questions or need additional info, please feel free to reply to this post or make a post on Uncharted's Facebook page.

Your friends in the journey,
"GeoJoe" and the whole Uncharted team

Explore. Live. Feel.

Uncharted Explorer of the Year 2010

2011-01-12T10:45:00.004-07:00

Uncharted is happy to announce the winner of the 2010 Explorer of the Year!

The Explorer of the Year is recognized by Uncharted's editorial staff as having made the highest quality, most innovative, and most influential contributions to Uncharted and the community of Explorers through the course of the year.

We are happy to announce Explorer "Lisa M Dickson" was selected as the Explorer of the Year for 2010!

Lisa's content was endorsed by the Uncharted staff and featured on the http://www.uncharted.net/ homepage in 2010, in particular her story, "Italy - A Permanent Etch Into My Heart". She has also posted content from her discoveries in the past at the following locations: Bahamas, Tetons (Wyoming), Alaska, France, Niagara Falls, and Switzerland, just to name a few. Now that's an Explorer! Head over to her profile to see where else she has been and drop a line to congratulate her. We are very impressed not only with her photo and writing talent, but also her continuous commitment to explore the world. Congratulations Lisa! And thank you for everything you have contributed so far.

Lisa will receive an Uncharted T-shirt and bumper sticker, and she will be featured in our blog, facebook page, and historical archives.

There were many other excellent contributions from other Explorers, and we wish we had the ability to give something to everyone who contributed. Just about every story or photo we get from each Explorer inspires us and motivates us to reach higher, so thank you again to all Explorers.

We will continue recognizing the Explorer of Year winner annually, and hopefully we will get to the point that we can provide even better incentives not just to the winner, but to all Explorers. In the mean time, we wish you the best in your journeys and encourage you to "shoot" for Explorer of Year in 2011!

All the best,
The Uncharted Team

Explore. Live. Feel.

Happy New Year! The journey continues in 2011.

2011-01-04T13:01:00.001-07:00

Happy New Year to everyone, including our fellow explorers, friends and families! All of us with Uncharted want to wish you the very best at the start of your 2011 journey.

In the coming weeks we will reveal new Uncharted tools, content and opportunities that we hope will help make your start to the new year even better. But before that, and more importantly, we will announce the Explorer of the Year award winner for 2010!

We also continue working on fixing the photo uploader "share" functionality on the website. We apologize to anyone who was affected by the problem. Once we get it fixed we will let you know and it should run even better than before, so don't stop taking photos you can share with the rest of the audience once it is repaired.

We can't thank all of you out there enough among our friends and fellow explorers for the shared adventures, advice and support since we published our first website content about two years ago. Special thanks also to everyone who took the survey and provided the great feedback which will help make the website even better. The website was only a beginning in our journey to explore the uncharted. 2011 will bring new firsts in this journey, and we look forward to sharing them with you soon!

GeoJoe and the rest of the Uncharted team

MSNBC Featuring Andrew's Pink Bunny Suits Sunday Morning

2011-01-01T22:58:00.011-07:00

Uncharted's own Andrew Clark, our Director of Presentation, will be making an appearance on MSNBC's "Your Business" show Sunday morning, Jan 2nd, at 7:30 am to talk about his experiences as an entrepreneur in the pink bunny suit manufacturing industry. Yes, that's right, the pink bunny manufacturing business! Let's just say that we are lucky to have such a creative go-getter with us. Here's the show's website: www.openforum.com/msnbc

Following is a preview from MSNBC:

"It's a classic holiday movie enjoyed by families every year, but "A Christmas Story" has actually been the source of inspiration for some small business owners. Find out how Brian Jones went from selling "leg lamps" in his garage to purchasing the actual house from the movie and running a full-scale retail operation with a licensing deal with Warner Brothers, and see why Andrew Clark, seller of bunny suits, has chosen to avoid licensing deals."

Check out http://www.pinkbunnypajamas.com/ while you're at it. Chances are you know someone that would just love to receive one!

Photo Uploader Getting a Fix

2010-12-06T16:11:00.003-07:00

Hold off on uploading photos for bit. We are working on some fixes and upgrades to the website. Once we're done with that, we should have the photo "share" uploader fixed and an upgraded slide show application operational. Hope this saves you some hassle and our apologies if the photo uploader has caused you any frustration. Thank you for your patience with our tinkering!

We are very excited to get this done because once it is finished we get to start working on making some of the improvements many Explorers suggested through the recent survey. A big "thank you" to all who provided such great feedback. More to come on that later.

Conferences, Hair, and Teaching

2010-11-11T23:24:00.008-07:00

There was no doubt in my mind they’d be sitting by me. The moment they entered the plane I knew it was destiny. Even from the distant vantage point of my seat in unlucky row thirteen it was obvious I would be seated by yet another set of eccentric travelers.

Aisle seating on airline flights always seems to yield unusual travel companions. Some of you may remember my encounter with the vomit puppet and a quarrelsome married couple on a flight out of Ohio. Others may also be familiar with my encounter with Nestor the Argentine Ninja (a story for another blog) en route to Buenos Aires.

Today I am pleased to introduce yet another entertaining inflight experience as I traveled home after my recent trip to Columbia University in New York. It was likely the pink hair that caught the attention of passengers as my two travel companions walked down the aisle and took their seats next to me complete with matching pink wardrobes. I did my best to hold in laughter as they raised their arms high in the air and screamed roller coaster-style as our plane took off.

Setting all things pink aside for a moment, I return to my recent trip to Columbia University to represent Uncharted at the Columbia Scholastic Press Association’s national journalism conference.

Every six months, students and advisers from various publications gather on campus to learn from each other and the many qualified instructors who come from around the country to serve at the conference. These instructors come from a variety of disciplines, teaching anything from reporting to photography, to design and leadership. And they all do it for free, donating their time, money, and resources to make the event a success.

This time, Uncharted participated by teaching on the Power of the Huddle, a leadership and organizational session designed to help students and advisers faced with low funding to work effectively as teams and save time, money and resources.

Uncharted is made up of many professionals and students from a variety of career paths and employers who have benefited personally from similar organizations such as CSPA. We are committed to any opportunity to help students as they prepare for their careers, just as others have done for us. It’s a cause worthy of attention and we are honored to participate.

So speaking of causes, you may have noticed a lot of pink around lately, usually in the form of ribbons displayed on clothing, a tactful but sobering reminder that there are well over 200,000 cases of breast cancer diagnosed each year in the United States alone.

And, of course, hair salons have joined the fight as well, sending out armies of pink-haired patrons to support the fight. So while my two roller coaster-riding pink-haired aviation marvels provided an unexpected diversion near the end of a long trip, it should be noted that their efforts reached beyond entertainment and reminded this weary traveler that it’s important now and again to take up a good cause.

Alan Murray is Executive Director of Uncharted
He likes snowshoes and seahorses, traveling,
taking photos and getting away from home.
You can contact him at alan@uncharted.net

Thanks, Aunt Betty

2010-11-03T21:28:00.000-06:00

When I was a kid, my Aunt Betty Saltzgiver of Salt Lake City, who knew people who knew people who worked for Morton-Thiokol, the Utah contractor that built the solid rocket boosters and main fuel tank for the United States' space shuttles, had them send me a bunch of photos of the shuttle, the rockets, and just about everything to do with the shuttle, including a little patch I had Mom sew onto my jacket.

I literally wore those photos out looking at them, poring over every detail, wondering what it would be like to be one of those astronauts flying up into space in that magnificent black-and-white bird.

One thing led to another, as life often does. I went on to a career in small-town journalism, followed by another career as a technical writer at a nuclear waste dump. But space always remained that final frontier.

Now Joseph Burkhead, Uncharted's resident pilot, has taken me on a voyage to a shuttle launch -- one of the few remaining launches before what's left of the fleet is retired in 2012. Thanks, Joe. Read his story here.

And thanks, Aunt Betty. I've still got those photos somewhere.

That Mad Accursed River

2010-10-13T20:54:00.000-06:00

I'd love to go do this, as John Milligan says, before I don't.

There are problems with that: I tend to fall out of boats. A lot. My wife Michelle says she'll go with me, but only in a complete body wetsuit with a plug-in heater.

I do have one thing going for me: I can pass the Ed Norton Test necessary to get a job alongside him in the sewers: I can float. So maybe, just maybe -- when the kids are older, our oldest in is Scouts and the Scouts want to go do this -- I'll get to go.

Until then, I'll live vicariously through Alan Murray's wonderful story and photographs on the adventure he, John, Mike and others had rafting down the Snake River in Wyoming. You can read the story and see his photos here. Enjoy.

Uncharted, meet Android

2010-10-04T21:21:00.001-06:00

From what I hear, smartphones are all the rage. They’re the latest thing. They’re – I think the word is – keen.

I’ll tie an onion to my belt and take your word for it. And John Milligan’s. He successfully used his Android smartphone to take a photo and upload it to his personal profile at www.uncharted.net.

Big deal, you say. Folks have been doing similar things since the time we called nickels bees and could say nonsensical things like “Gimme five bees for a quarter.”

But this is significant.

We want our Explorers to use our website through a mobile world. Why be tethered to a desk to make an update to your profile, upload a photo, or even a story, if you’re good at touchscreen or itty-bitty keyboard typing? We expect our Explorers are mobile now, and will only get more mobile as the future unfolds.

John’s shown us it can be done. Huzzah for him, I say. He makes me want to replace our circa 2001 T-Mobile cameraless cell phone with that nifty little bowling game on it for something newer. Tell me, do they make a smartphone with dials now? I like to make sparks when I place a call . . .

Growing up in Coal Country

2010-07-27T00:18:00.009-06:00

I grew up in the Coal Region. In my hometown of Pottsville, Pennsylvania, there are abandoned coal shafts under the high school football field. There are pieces of anthracite coal scattered throughout the mountains where our cross-country team used to train. There are sink holes left over from mining throughout those hills and mountains where we also camped and hiked as Scouts. Coal is all over the place. And it was my job each day to shovel coal into buckets to be dumped into the furnace heating our home. You didn't have to go far to find lumps of anthracite to put in Christmas stockings for a holiday practical joke.

There's also the Necho Allen Hotel, now an apartment building, with mosaic blue and white depictions of mining life on its outer walls. Necho is the legendary discoverer of anthracite for the county. And there's the Henry Clay monument, named after the Kentucky statesman beloved for his friendship to the coal industry, towering high above the city on an ivory white pedestal, his hand stretched out, welcoming visitors to this town full of history all tied to anthracite coal.

And there's the Pottsville Maroons, a former NFL football team put together with coal miners and college stars by its eccentric owner. The team went on to win the NFL championship back in 1925. And while the title was later stripped, the Maroons put the then fledgling NFL on the map. There's even a book by ESPN's David Fleming chronicling the rise and fall of this team composed of breaker boys.

Mining is also in my family heritage and hits close to home. My grandfather was a coal miner and his brother was killed working in the mines. We even went to great lengths to feature anthracite in our high school yearbook. I remember our staff acquiring a huge section of anthracite which we had professionally scanned to give some historical texture to our cover. That cover went on to garner national recognition.

So anthracite coal was something I simply took for granted. It wasn't until my senior year of high school that I began to appreciate this unique form of mineral coal when my photography teacher took our class on a field trip to Pioneer Tunnel Coal Mine in nearby Ashland.

I remember the thrill of my first coal car ride into the mine. I remember wondering how I was going to take photos in such dreary light. And I remember the spark of appreciation that was kindled for men and boys like my grandfather and his brother who labored beneath this unique world of coal.

Memories like those led me back to Pioneer Tunnel for Uncharted's latest feature, Pennsylvania Diamonds. And while I'm a little more experienced in photographing dim conditions and cameras no longer use film, the mine has remained unaltered by time, providing an authentic glimpse into our past and the lives of those who pioneered its dark caverns.

So, if you are up for an adventure that will take you beneath the surface and teach you a little bit of history, check out Ashland, Pennsylvania and it's unique world of coal. For more helpful information on places and events in Schuylkill County, go to www.skookevents.com, a locally owned social media site that has helpful information about news, events and places in the area.

Alan Murray is Executive Director of Uncharted.
He likes sea horses and snowshoes and
and frequently has the urge to leave the country.

Dancing, Dancing, Dancing.

2010-07-11T19:58:00.000-06:00

It's almost time again this year for the folks at the Idaho International Folk Dance and Music Festival to roll into Rexburg, Idaho, completing one of the many invasions this small university town witnesses each year (the others involve influxes of students at random times during the year in which they pillage the local Wal-Mart; and hordes of Sunbirds fleeing the Arizona heat and coming here in search of, among other things, rhubarb).

Uncharted's got the poop on this year's festival, at least as much poop as can be delivered. Go here to read all about it.

The Milligan-Wiser Method

2010-06-24T10:12:00.002-06:00

John and Mike, Intrepid Explorers

There is something to be said for planning.

Pick a destination. Go to Google Maps. Plan a route, taking in the scenes along the way. But keep that final destination in mind. In the eye. And on schedule.

There are, of course, other schools of thought. Take John Milligan and Mike Wiser’s approach to climbing a central Idaho mountain peak, which started with Google Maps but ended up with he and a friend using their climbing gear to build a raft so they could paddle around on an icy Idaho alpine lake with the unclimbed mountain pouting in the distance.

Both methods make for fun vacations. Both make for spontaneous vacations. But the latter method, hereafter known at Uncharted as the Milligan-Wiser Method, is the one that holds the most appeal to me as a guy.

So go read about John and Mike and their adventures in Idaho’s central mountains. Then go and don’t plan a vacation just like it.

Goonies Never Say Die

2010-06-11T10:11:00.001-06:00

Most of the catchphrases I use come from two movies.

The first is Ghostbusters. The second, well, let’s see if you recognize them:

Something goes terribly wrong and I’ve discovered the evidence. I say: “It is Chester Copperpot.”

One of my kids has wandered off, but I can see a trail that might lead me to them: “Follow them Size Fives.”

A child o’ mine has to go to the bathroom in a place that’s less than sanitary: “This isn’t the kinda place you wanna go to the bathroom. Because there might be daddy longlegs . . . and DEAD THINGS, Mikey! KILLER dead things!”

Someone’s having trouble getting something, anything, to open: “Let go of the handle, Francis!”

Mom wants the kids to do something they’re reluctant to do: “Trust your Mother, boys! Throw ‘er into four-wheel drive!”

Any helpless, innocent person is instantly named Missus Rosalita.

Every time I encounter a dead bird in the yard or a dead mouse in a trap: “IT’S A STIFF!”

You Goonies understood. Immediately. Even before I mentioned Chester Copperpot. Because the best catchphrase is in the blog post title – which I use whenever I’m asked to do something difficult that I don’t want to do.

Last year, I got to go to Goonie Astoria (and nearby Cannon Beach) before the hysteria of the 25th anniversary of the film’s release hit the town this year and swelled its population far beyond its ordinary 10,000. I found Mikey’s house and saw where Chunk performed the Truffle Shuffle.

I saw Chunk’s bowling alley. I walked on the pier where Steph went bobbing for crabs. I saw Mikey’s Dad’s museum, the County Jail, and other Goonie landmarks as I took my family on our own Goonie adventure through northwest Oregon.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/06/AR2010060603590.html

The most heartbreaking thing I learned as I read about the film’s 25th anniversary: This from the Washington Post:

According to Sean Astin, who played Goonies leader "Mikey" Walsh, he was allowed to keep the treasure map used in the film. Several years later his mother discovered it, thought it was just a crinkled piece of paper, and threw it in the trash.

It hurts just thinking about that.

But I’ll tell you what doesn’t hurt: My wife’s a Goonie, though of the Andy variety (real Goonies will know what I mean). I’m so glad she is. My kids are Goonies, because, hey, what kid wouldn’t want to be?

I can easily see my kids doing this same thing. Riding off, getting into trouble, manufacturing and using fake puke, then expecting a Domino’s pizza after it’s all over. Especially my five-year-old. He’s dangerous.

I have my sister Chris to thank for turning me into a Goonie. She saw the film in the theater and insisted the rest of the family had to see it. We didn’t believe her. Later, when it was out on video, she rented it and made us watch it. Now, almost every time we see each other, well, you know:

Watch Out -- He Knows Karate

2010-05-19T10:13:00.000-06:00

In the Sandra Bullock film "While You Were Sleeping" -- hey, given that this film features Michael Rispoli as the hilariously innocent yet lecherous Joe Fusco, Junior, this counts as a guy movie -- Bullock's character Lucy Moderatz wants nothing more than to spend her honeymoon in Italy. She does eventually get to go, but not with the man she intended.

Explorer Lisa Dickson harks back to that wonderful 1995 film as she takes us on an Uncharted tour of Rome, Florence, and other points in Italy, showing off the romantic and Romantic splendors of these ancient cities. Makes me want to go there in a terrible way. Also, I want to visit Maude Larrabee's house in Tuscany. She does have one there, you know.

Can You Improve Old Faithful?

2010-05-12T21:06:00.002-06:00

If you’ve got a snazzy idea to improve one of the United States’ premier tourist attractions, now’s the time to do it.

Planners at Yellowstone National Park want your help to improve the developed area around Old Faithful, the park’s most famous geyser. The developed area encompasses everything from the Old Faithful Inn to the boardwalks through the geyser complex to the acres and acres of parking lots that spread south of the geyser itself.

The park is also looking for ways to preserve the geyser area for future generations, protect wildlife habitat and more quickly respond to changing visitor and resource needs.

The comment period is open now, and closes at midnight, June 7, 2010. Comments will be accepted electronically through the National Park Service’s Planning, Environment and Public Comment website at http://parkplanning.nps,gov, by hand-delivery at the park’s headquarters at Mammoth Hot Springs, Wyoming, or by mail at the following address:

Comprehensive Planning & Design
Old Faithful Area Comprehensive Plan
P.O. Box 168
Yellowstone National Park, WY 82190

You can deliver your electronic comment using the link here. The perk service isn’t accepting comments by phone or via direct e-mail.

The park service will also host three open houses on the plan starting in just a few days:

May 17, Old Faithful Warming Hut, 6-8 pm
May 18, Yellowstone Association Headquarters, Gardiner, MT
May 19, Visitor Contact Station, West Yellowstone, MT

All open houses will take place from 6-8 pm.

The trick will be to balance what sound like good ideas with what makes for a wonderful Old Faithful experience. Some kind of stadium seating, for one, might be handy, as crowds around the geyser can be thick and seats are scarce – but then who wants to swim through a stadium to see a geyser, or have stadium seating block long-distance views? Maybe just a few levels?

And picnic areas. Old Faithful needs more of them. They’re always at a premium, so finding a spot that’s not already occupied by someone else is difficult.

I agree that parking at the geyser is ugly, not only from an acres of asphalt perspective, but simply for trying to navigate through the parking lot to get to the geyser. Better directional signs and marked pedestrian paths would be helpful, especially if those paths crossed as few roads as possible.

I’m sure you’ve got better ideas. Send them on.

Cannon Beach Bliss-Out

2010-05-05T12:13:00.005-06:00

To think I used to be a homebody.

As a kid, we never went on vacations. Oh, the occasional trip to Salt Lake City for the day, but rarely anything beyond that. We did do the camping thing in Yellowstone National Park. We did fly to San Francisco. But that was it.

Then I got married to a globetrotter. Within a year, she dragged me to Washington, D.C. Within five years we'd visited England and France, not to forget to mention a cross-country road trip in the USA and many, many other smaller, yet still grandiose, vacations, including a cruise to Alaska.

Read here about our latest adventure: A trip to Cannon Beach, Oregon, where we stayed for days under the cloudy -- but never rainy -- Oregon sky and enjoyed playing on the beach with our kids.

Cannon Beach is a wonderful place, and not only because its famous Haystack Rock was featured in The Goonies, one of my favorite films. We visited in the off-season, which I highly recommend. The beaches weren't crowded. The hotels were less expensive. There were fewer people about, so we were able to enjoy the solitude and beauty without having anybody else's laundry flapping in our faces. Go during the off-season, before mid-June and after August ends. That's when Cannon Beach is a wonderful place.

Airport security pointers for US travel

2010-04-30T09:18:00.004-06:00

Ahhh, the life of an explorer. Discovering new places is a great way to live, but it comes at some cost, and I'm not talking about just the airline ticket price. Making your way through security at the airports can be a downright messy process, and on more than one occasion has contributed to me missing a flight. In my many travels, I've noticed that many complications in the security line could be reduced if travelers knew a little more about what to expect at the checkpoint. Those of us who come prepared probably won't be "that guy" who halts all 200 people behind us in cue because security has to stop us to tell us to take out our liquids. If we know how to avoid such hiccups at the checkpoint, we breeze through, on to the anxiously awaited destination less stressed, while also helping those behind us enjoy their own travel adventure just a little more. In light of that, be sure to check out the TSA Travel Assistant web page before your next trip in the US. It has some great pointers and might save you some hassle. Happy travels!

Doing a Little of A Lot in Moab

2010-04-21T22:56:00.006-06:00

And on the eighth day he created Moab. In fact he’s still tweaking it!

Named after the “Plains of Moab,” which are spoken of in the Bible and are found along the Dead Sea beside the Jordan River, Moab, Utah is located on an ancient sunken salt pad adjacent to solidified sand dunes beneath the towering Volcanic LaSalle Mountains entertained by the nearby Colorado River.

Moab is a surreal, geologic oddity that yields some of the most scenic and challenging whitewater rafting the West has to offer, the world’s most legendary slick rock that is a Mecca for bikers and jeepers, and is completed with high alpine lakes accompanied by peaks that are upwards of 12,600 feet, not to forget national parks and abandoned movie sets.

This strange land has an almost spiritual aura that seems to have an affinity to artisans, miners, soul-searchers, and adrenaline junkies. This makes for a dynamic, shifting, almost transient population. Few stay for good in Moab; most just move on through. In fact, it seems most just squeeze what they can out of it, then go. Some enjoy Moab in a hurried race, never to return.

But Moab is one of those places that you should return to. I have been returning since I first went mountain biking there as a boy scout. I returned again last Spring for biking, and again in the Fall to go rafting with my sister Brenda, who is one of the lucky few who “eddied out” in Moab, racking up 15 years guiding the river. I have done a little of a lot of things in Moab, but the thing that I keep going back for is the mountain biking. And if you’re planning on going there for biking, the latest story at www.uncharted.net is one you should read.

A Mighty Mean Fowt Fight

2010-04-07T13:13:00.002-06:00

I am, it has to be said, a war buff. World War II, if you want to get specific, though I'll read just about anything about any war, from World War I to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

The Civil War, too, is of interest, certainly because of brave men like Abraham Lincoln and Robert E. Lee, insitgators like Harriet Beecher Stowe, characters like John Brown, and the shame of Jim Crow. So to walk these battlefields -- Gettysburg, Arlington, and others -- is solemn. Introspective. And fills one with thankfulness that all is quiet at these sites today.

That's what Uncharted staffer John Milligan discovered in Missouri, exploring the battlefield at Bloody Hill, Wilson's Creek, Missouri. Men died there, where groomed grass and placards stand. Men fought there, where the visitors center stands and where the flag flaps. It's holy ground. It's part of our uncharted legacy.

Waiting in lines and name-calling

2010-03-25T22:08:00.029-06:00

I’m good at waiting in lines. I have a lot of experience. During language training, I studied Spanish vocabulary while in line for breakfast, lunch and dinner. That’s a lot of vocabulary.

I stood in line at a hospital in Argentina once. I spent most of my time just being hungry.

And then there’s Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida, with lines wrapping around entire buildings, spiraling upwards to the entrances of a variety of theme park rides. Thirty minutes into our wait, we stood in one such line only halfway to our destination on a tower above a waiting crowd.

In boredom, one member of our group leaned over the railing and shouted to someone he seemed to know in the crowd below whose name was Bill. In unison, everyone named Bill looked up curiously to see who it was that knew them so well so far ahead of them in line. Soon, we were calling out more names such as Bob, Mary, Jane, and Jim. Each time, they looked up when their name was called. Time passed much more swiftly after that.

Dale Carnegie once said, “Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.” And while there are no lines, entry fees, or hecklers shouting out random names on Uncharted, you will likely find some pretty interesting nomenclature among the ranks of our growing band of explorers, now scattered around the world, each sharing their own set of adventures.

Take Yellowpaws for example. She’s from Marysville, Washington and has lived in New Jersey, Michigan, and Nebraska. Before she dies, she wants to go to Africa, Egypt, and dive with Great White sharks. You can see one of her most recent adventures, dogsledding in British Columbia, now featured on our home page. Yellowpaws writes of her adventure, “Our time for the sled ride finally came and I have to say - 45 minutes felt like 10 minutes. The beautiful day and surrounding scenery held your eye, while the rush of the wind and pull of the dogs kept your heart beating hard!”

Then there’s Arati, from Kathmandu, Nepal. She likes travel, books and photography. Arati shares a variety of scenic photos from her homeland. You can learn more about Arati on her own explorer page.

Of course, members of our Uncharted Staff, sometimes those who aren’t necessarily professional photographers and writers, are working hard to share with you their own adventures as well. They do this all on their spare time. This time is no exception as our communications/marketing director shares his family tradition of making maple syrup in Eastern Michigan.

So, you don’t have to be a professional to share and you don’t have to stop at just reading stories or viewing photos. If you’re a member of Uncharted, (it's free) you can post comments, link up with explorers and staff and message them through Uncharted email. And it’s just possible that one of your adventures will catch our eye and end up featured on the home page. That’s what Uncharted is all about. We’re a community of friends looking to bring the world to you and you to the world one journey at a time.

Alan Murray is Executive Director of Uncharted.
He likes sea horses and snowshoes and frequently
has the urge to leave the country. To contact Alan,
feel free to email him at alan@uncharted.net

Nicholas Murray Butler, Bill Murray, and Alan Murray -- Thoughts on Columbia

2010-03-19T19:41:00.015-06:00

Eating lunch in the Low Memorial Library at New York's Columbia University brings back fond memories. For instance, I remember when a spider bit an unsuspecting Peter Parker during a campus tour, transforming him into a wall-crawling superhero. Parker, now Spider-Man, would later become a student at Columbia University.

And then there's Weaver Hall, not far from the library, where three eccentric scientists were fired by the dean. The words echo, "You are a poor scientist, Dr. Venkman! And you have no place in this department, or this university." Shortly after, back at Low Memorial Library, future Ghostbusters sat, just outside, mourning the death of the Department of Parapsychology.

Of course, I didn't see any spiders, there is no Weaver Hall (though I looked) and Columbia University really doesn't have a Department of Parapsychology, but it's fun to imagine over lunch.

And there's more to the Low Memorial Library than movie trivia. It's also the place where the Pulitzer Prizes are awarded each year. It's a place that inspires, where greatness has left its footprints––like Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler, former President of Columbia University. Butler once said, "Those people who think only of themselves are hopelessly uneducated. They are not educated no matter how instructed they may be." I believe that and I think President Butler would be proud at how much Columbia University does think of others, no doubt, inspired in part by the legacy he left behind.

The Columbia Scholastic Press Association's 86th annual Spring convention is a prime example of thinking of others. This week, over 300 guest speakers, professionals and publication advisors from around the country, converged on campus, volunteering their expertise for over 400 unique sessions over three days, anything from reporting and photography, to design and leadership, and much, much more.

And it's not just workshops. This army of experts were on hand throughout the convention to offer critiques on newspapers, yearbooks, photography, and websites. They come at great expense of both time and money. Their passion for education is contagious. Truly, they fit President Butler's definition of true education, for they think of others time and time again.

For me, it is an honor to participate, a chance for Uncharted to reach out and think of others and I look forward to each invitation. I always walk on campus thinking, "Mr. Murray, you have no place in this convention, or in this university." Each time I teach I come back better than I arrived. I always learn from the students and advisors attending my session.

This time was no exception as I shared and discussed leadership principles and models that have been invaluable in the founding of Uncharted and its growing success. The students attending my session are leaders on their campus publications. They were eager to learn, their questions were informative, their comments genuine, and their enthusiasm sincere. They could relate with the challenges of leadership. And they gave this instructor a lot to think about on the flight home.

Alan Murray is Executive Director of Uncharted.
He likes sea horses and snowshoes and
frequently has an impulsive urge to leave the country.
To contact Alan you can send to: alan@uncharted.net

Explorer clothing gear

2010-03-05T17:43:00.007-07:00

If you're as fired up about Uncharted as I am, you've probably been wishing you had more clothing options for flaunting your Uncharted membership. Wish granted!

I just opened up a new Uncharted merchandise store online that allows us to buy clothing gear proudly displaying Uncharted's name and even the http://www.uncharted.net/ URL. The shirts are a great option for wear as we explore the uncharted, or even just wearing among friends and family in our daily routines. The prices are a bit higher than our former online store charged, but the quality is much higher. We had several complaints from our staff (self included) about the quality of the former store's merchandise, so this new store is an interim fix.

So come check it out and by all means order something that you like to show your commitment to exploring the uncharted!

Uncharted merchandise store--> http://uncharted.spreadshirt.com/

March. Time to Start Vacation Planning

2010-03-03T13:59:00.000-07:00

February is a long month for me. March brings hope. The melting snow. The first calls of the telephone bird, twittering away in the balmy 40-degree heat wave. I can start to see hints of pavement in the driveway.

And we start thinking about vacation.

I've still got last year's vacation -- to Oregon -- on my mind. And that brings us to this week's update over at Uncharted: While wandering the beach at Seaside, I found a serene man walking the beach, digging clams. So amid the flurry of ice cream cone-toting tourists and ice cream cone-stealing seagulls, he showed me the finer points of diggind razor clams. They're ugly little monsters, but cooked up in chowder, they're mighty tasty.

Finding Buddha

2010-02-18T09:00:00.001-07:00

A karesensui garden. Maybe not the place to take three, shall we say, busy, kids. But these busy kids ate up the scenery at Portalnd, Oregon's Japanese Gardens to the point that when we got to the zen garden, they actually sat on the benches and contemplated the cleanliness, the simplicity of this little sea of pebbles swirling in ripples around the rough rocks. And they got even more excited when their Dad pointed out that the squatty boulders were actually the tigers observing the towering Buddha. Or something like that. I was so blissed out by the time we got there, you could have relaxed me with a feather.

Read more about it here as Michelle takes you on a tour of the gardens. And definitely plan on a visit to the gardens the next time you're in Portland.

Pain? Try Aspirin . . .

2010-02-17T08:56:00.000-07:00

Disappointing news from the land of King of the Hammers -- Uncharted Explorer Cody Fuquay was unable to participate in the race, due to technical difficulties with his vehicle. Having had the battery die in my 1990 Oldsmobile Cutlass way out in Squirrel, Idaho (population 1/2) I feel Cody's pain. But not quite, because I didn't put as much blood, tears, toil, and sweat into preparing for that trip to Squirrel (I don't even remember why I went there) than Cody put into his first attempt at participating in what's described as the toughest rock crawling and desert race in the United States.

If it's any consolation, fewer than 25 percent of the hundreds of participants who entered and qualified for the race finished it -- the course is that rugged and that hard on drivers, mechanics and equipment. Even in the qualifier he was to race in, only five of twenty competitors finished, so we know it's a brutal race.

But Explorers like Cody are undaunted. When we're living our life of adventure and seeking out the uncharted, sometimes we come face to face with challenges and obstacles. But what we decide to do during those challenges defines our adventures.

In other words, he'll be back to race again.

We at Uncharted wish Cody better luck next year at King of the Hammers, and good luck as always as he participates in other desert race and rock crawling events.

Ready for the Races

2010-02-16T22:17:00.002-07:00

It's an event that screams for nicknames.

Lydia “Whistlin' Lyd” Hutchinson you'll meet in a moment. Right now, let's talk about Tud. “Tud” is the nickname. “Tud” Kent. He regularly ran the mail from Ashton, Idaho, to the Railroad Ranch in Island Park, Idaho, a journey of about thirty miles. In 1917, he and four others founded the American Dog Derby. He won the first race that year, a 55-mile slog through deep snow and a raging blizzard from Ashton to West Yellowstone, Montana. In the subsequent ten years, he won five more times, each time in a blizzard. They had better blizzards back then.

This year, those who participate in the 100-mile race will do so in Tud's honor – the race now bears his name.

But there's room for the new at the American Dog Derby, too. The 60-mile race, for instance, is named this year for Ray Gordon, of Rock Springs, Wyo. Since 1995, he's won five races at the American Dog Derby, a record no modern racer has bested. He also boasts of running the Iditarod. Twice. Best I've done is hook our wiener dog up to the kids' sled for a race down our suburban street.

So go to Ashton this year to see the real thing. Races this year kick off Feb. 18 at about 7:30 am (I'm fudging a bit on the time here, get there early to get a good view and so you don't miss the race). Races go on through Saturday the 20^th, with plenty of events in town to keep you entertained.

For more information on this year's events, go to here.

For Uncharted's story on the event last year, go here.

King of the Hammers

2010-02-05T08:51:00.001-07:00

Sometimes, when I'm driving my Toyota pickup (no brake problems yet) or my Honda Pilot, I imagine what it would be like to tear off the highway and go bouncing through the fields next to the highway. Then I remember the rainy, bleak morning when I sat in said Toyota with a thrown rod on the side of the road, lamenting how difficult it is to find competent assistance and parts at 3:30 in the morning, and decide, you know what, I'm going to stay on the road.

Cody Fuquay doesn't do that. Oh, he doesn't necessarily go tearing off through the wheat or canola, either, but he does take his rig -- in this case, a Ruesch Panther -- off-road to crawl up rocks, bounce up and down gullies and otherwise find ways to use and abuse his vehicle without worrying about breakdowns, because when he does break down -- I did indeed say when -- he's got a mechanic and fabricator with him: himself.

Cody, an Uncharted Explorer, will participate in California's Griffin King of the Hammers off-road endurance race next week. We hope he survives, emerges victorious and then returns to tell us about everything that happened to him. Good luck, Cody!

Here's How to Stop Spamming Your Uncharted Friends

2010-02-05T08:45:00.000-07:00

First of all, the obligatory discussion on Spam.

Next, a brief discussion on how to avoid spam. At least at Uncharted. And at least from Uncharted.

You know, we were pretty excited when we got the ability to automatically e-mail our friends when a new story or photoset posted. But then we realized: We're going to e-mail our friends when a new story or photoset is posted. Complete with typos, embedded coding, bits of breakfast and anything else we'd like to clean up but without spamming our friends into oblivion.

But now, eureka, a solution. Here's how to fix typos, edit captions and stories on Uncharted without filling your friends' e-mail boxes with spam:

1) Open up the story or photoset you want to fix.
2) Fix the mistakes, make your corrections or additions, et cetera.
3) When you're done, do one of the following:
A) If you're fixing a photoset, click on "Save," not "Done."
B) If you're fixing a story, click on "Done," not "Publish."

Your story is now ready for use, sans errors. Happy viewing.

And, yes, we know our terminology is inconsistent. We're very consistent that way. We're going to fix it so when you're just saving, you're "saving," and when you're publishing, you're "publishing."

A Light Bulb Moment

2010-01-22T10:16:00.002-07:00

Sometimes the solutions to your problems are as plain as the nose on your face.

Problem: You're a bunch of college buddies working on a fledgling social media and travel website. You're doing it on the side as members of your team are working as butchers or bakers or candlestick makers or what have you. You're trying to do it on the cheap. So when you want to promote things on your own site, you have to figure out a way to do it without spending money.

And then one member of your team has one of those light bulb moments. Ding, the light comes on. This time, it was Alan, who brought us this (click on it to embiggen):

For those of you who've visited our site, this little green thingy may look familiar. It should. It's been on the site in one form or another since we started more than a year ago. Up until earlier this week, it invited you to click away and join Uncharted. It still does, on a rotation with other stuff now. Lucky for us, Alan struck upon the idea of using this little block of space to promote our upcoming stories. To tease you with things to come. To make you want to come back again and again and again and again. And to help us find more ways to promote your stories and photos on the homepage.

So, as the advertising pros say, watch this space. It'll tell of good things to come, and lead you to them once they arrive.

One Island Down . . .

2010-01-18T22:26:00.000-07:00

For the longest time, I’ve been intrigued by two islands.

The first is Keefer Island, a 600-foot-long blot of lava rock and sagebrush in Idaho’s Snake River, lying within the boundaries of the city of Idaho Falls. The island used to have a single willow tree, until wind pushed it down onto the cabin built by an early Idaho Falls denizen. The tree is gone. The cabin still stands. But I’ve never been there.

The other is Utah’s Antelope Island. It sprawls over 42 square miles in the middle of the Great Salt Lake, with a short chain of mountains that pops out of the ground to loom 2,500 feet above the lake’s surface. Isolated by its surrounding salty moat, the island has often called to me to explore its plains and hills. And maybe provide a location to spot the Great Salt Lake’s mythical North Shore Monster.

Now, thanks to Explorer Fishstyx, who gets around in Utah like nobody’s business, I know where to go to get to Antelope Island, and what to do when I get there. You can read about his adventures on the island here.

This is what Uncharted is all about: Exploring the unexplored. Sure, lots of people have visited Antelope Island before Fishstyx. But it’s not until you’re there, breathing that salty air, stalking antelope with your camera and otherwise enjoying the solitude of that island fortress that you can nod sagely with the others and say, “Yup. I’ve been there.” Seeing Fishstyx’s photos and reading his story now cements it in my mind: I’m going to Antelope Island this summer if it kills me. And Keefer Island won’t be far behind.

Now it's up to you. Have you visited Antelope Island? If so, we'd like to hear from you. Just because Fishstyx has published his story and photos, that doesn't mean the book is closed on this adventure. Each one of us brings a different perspective, a different eye, to each place we visit. That's what makes us explorers. And sharing our adventures at Uncharted -- whether we're the first or seventy-first to do so -- is what matters.

The Adventure Continues

2009-12-22T22:59:00.009-07:00

A year ago, if I mentioned Uncharted, you likely would’ve asked me what I was talking about. We were used to blank faces when Uncharted came up in conversation. Most of our friends were surprised to see that this wasn’t just another practical joke, but a real, legitimate, functioning site.

And a year later, we are pleased to see a little less of that blank look when Uncharted comes up in conversation. We’re even more pleased when we run into people all over the country who have seen us around. And we love it when we see someone wearing our t-shirts or driving around with an Uncharted bumper sticker.

Last year, many of you joined with us to unveil www.uncharted.net as the world’s first geo-social media network. That’s geo-social media. It’s more than just our staff sharing their adventures with you, it’s you sharing your adventures with us and each other. It’s more than just linking up with friends from around the world, it’s working with those friends to explore the world together. It’s not just a web site, it’s the people who explore, live, and feel their unique corner of the globe and share it with everyone else. It’s a community of friends.

And so the Uncharted Adventure began with a handful of professionals from a variety of disciplines, anything from a guy selling pink bunny pajamas out of his basement, to an engineer developing bio fuels, to an officer in the Air Force. And we have our share of journalists, photographers, programmers and designers too. They all work full-time jobs. Uncharted is what they do for fun on their own time. We’re grateful to the many employers who allow each member of our growing team to be involved.

And we’ve come a long way.

If you were among those who visited Uncharted on our first day, you would’ve seen three stories photographed and written by us. Back then, there were only a few people making up the Uncharted Community. Our audience was smaller, only two countries and a half dozen states.

Now, we’re viewed by each of the 50 states and over 90 countries, speaking 54 different languages. Uncharted has been featured on the radio, in magazines, and a variety of other publications. Members of our team have been guest presenters at colleges and universities, including Columbia University’s Columbia Scholastic Press Association national convention. We even sponsored one team member as he competed on the national level in orienteering.

And it’s not just us sharing anymore. Now, there are 130 explorers signed up for the journey. Last year, explorers Lisa Wheat, Xelashay and Fishstyx garnered a spot on our home page for their submissions from the Bahamas and Southern Utah respectively.

It’s also easier to find us too. More and more, we’re rising to the top in Internet search results and we have over 80 fans on our Facebook page, where Uncharted Explorers and our audience alike can receive updates and behind-the-scenes info on our progress and where Uncharted is headed in the future.

When we launched, the site didn’t allow our community to communicate with each other like we had envisioned. Now, thanks to our development team, users can choose some basic notification preferences that make it easier to connect with people from around the globe. We’re grateful for the invaluable feedback that many of you provided, paving the way for these improvements. We look forward to hearing any other suggestions you may have for the coming year.

To celebrate our first full year, we thought we’d highlight some of our favorite adventures and share some behind-the-scenes photos of our team making Uncharted what it is today, a community of friends dedicated to discovering the world one journey at a time.

And the adventure continues. We have big plans for 2010 and we’re excited to discover and rediscover the world, your corner and ours. There are countless places to go and even more people to meet. Our development team is hard at work to make it easier for you to share your adventures and link up with those who can help you find those out-of-the-way places, people and cultures just waiting to be discovered. So, check it out here. Come and join us as we continue the adventure.

Alan Murray is Executive Director
of Uncharted. He likes sea horses
and snowshoes and frequently
has the urge to leave the country.

Uncharted Meets the Geek Atlas

2009-11-25T10:12:00.002-07:00

At heart, I suppose, I’ll always be a geek.

My best friend in high school lamented, in my presence, that he was a “geek magnet” at Bonneville High. I have a collection of rocks that look like pig noses. I tell people I work at a landfill. A radioactive landfill. A radioactive landfill where the stuff sometimes blows up or catches fire on its own. And I love my job.

But this confirms it: John Graham-Cumming, author of The Geek Atlas (available in book form here) has noticed me. Not me per se, but a video I put together a few years ago about Experimental Breeder Reactor-1, a decommissioned nuclear power plant, the first to create useful atomic power, which I pass to and from work four times a week. I posted it to uncharted.net’s YouTube channel and promptly forgot about it.

Now it’s featured at www.geekatlas.com, coinciding with Graham-Cumming’s own visit to EBR-1, one of 128 stops “Where Science and Technology Come Alive,” as Graham-Cumming subtitles his book.

And it does. EBR-1 is, to me, a fascinating place. Atomic – now nuclear – research has always been in the background here in eastern Idaho. That I work within a mile of EBR-1, however, makes the place special to me. I love to visit the decommissioned reactor and to inhale, if briefly, the air of the heady days of atomic research when scientists were optimistically hoping to tame the atom and make electricity “too cheap to meter.” Though technology has advanced, fear of nuclear power has stalled those dreams. But it’s fun to think this little bit of Idaho history – and my video, which Graham-Cumming describes as “quirky” – are getting their moment in the sun.

You can, of course, read about Idaho’s atomic history at Uncharted, here. Enjoy.

Vomit and Speaking Engagements

2009-11-05T21:43:00.011-07:00

On a flight home from Ohio I found myself sitting in an aisle seat next to a couple in the middle of an argument. That would be my luck. In an instant, my dreams of a pleasant uneventful and sleepy flight went down the drain.

It soon became apparent that the woman was determined never to speak with her husband again. He, however, was not willing to give up so easily. I munched on some peanuts, trying to ignore the squabble. Stuck on a plane, next to a fighting couple, eating peanuts. It could be worse.

Suddenly, the husband snatched the vomit bag out of his seat pouch. I braced for the worst. Visions of a waterfall of nauseating liquid escaping his mouth, missing the bag, and falling onto my lap went through my mind.

But instead of spilling his guts, he took a pen and began drawing a pair of eyes and a nose on the bottom of the bag. Placing his hand inside, he turned to his wife and in a squeaky voice said, “Hello! I’m the Vomit Puppet!”

If she didn’t want to talk with him, that was fine, but surely she couldn't resist an intellectual conversation with the Vomit Puppet. This continued for most of the flight, his poor wife, doing everything she could to hide any hint of a smile all the way home.

So now, whenever I go on a trip, especially when I’m nervous and preoccupied, such as my recent travels to speak at Columbia University, I think, “It could be worse. You could be seated next to a man speaking to his wife through a vomit puppet.”

Fortunately, there were no puppeteers or squabbling couples on this flight to distract me from preparing my presentation, and by the time I showed up on campus the next morning I was rested and ready to go.

The invitation to speak at the Columbia Scholastic Press Association (CSPA) national convention is truly an honor. I spent most of my high school years attending or even competing to attend similar events. I always came back inspired and excited to try out the ideas that were presented and discussed. I am indebted to the many educators and professionals who donated their time, talent and money to help me build a strong foundation that would set the tone of my life and career for many years to come.

The directors and board of CSPA are educators and professionals who are fiercely dedicated to their students and make great sacrifices each year to pull off both Fall and Spring conventions. Twice a year, they come together with an army of guest speakers to inspire and instruct students from around the world. Their enthusiasm is contagious.

So, when I found myself presenting in the Joseph Pulitzer World Room, the very room where the Pulitzer Prizes are announced each year, I hoped that my presentation would rise to the occasion.

Serving as Executive Director of Uncharted has given me firsthand experience in taking ideas, often seemingly ridiculous and outrageous ones at that, and making them happen, usually with limited resources and staff. So I wanted to show students, perhaps from schools with small budgets, how to be successful on the web notwithstanding.

This expertise is likely something I would never have achieved had it not been for the devotion of others sacrificing their time to present at conferences during my high school and college years. I’m grateful for the opportunity to give back to students now what others did for me.

And it looks like I’ll be back again. CSPA has invited me to speak at their Spring convention. My thanks goes out to all those, who over the years took time to help me get going in my career. My commitment is to do the same for others.

Alan Murray is Executive Director of Uncharted.
He likes sea horses and snowshoes, and
frequently has the urge to leave the country.
To contact Alan, feel free to write to alan@uncharted.net.

Spamalicious

2009-11-02T20:51:00.002-07:00

I promise we're not trying to annoy you. We leave that up to easy listening radio.

But seriously, we need to apologize for the, well, it's not quite a flood of e-mails announcing our most recent update, but it's not exactly the concise, neat little package we had hoped when we added these notification e-mails to the mix. But because we noticed a rather important photo was missing from the photoset, we added it. That sent out a notification. Then it needed a caption. That sent out another notification. And so on. We've settled down now. I think Andrew, our design guru, put it best when he said "You never know how things are going to work until you try them out." And that's what we're doing. Trying things out.

And in trying things out, we make mistakes. That's normal. But we do sincerely apologize for the four or so update e-mails you received from us over the past weekend, and we promise to do better in the future. Be patient with us in our affliction for some day, we may actually get this right. We're working on a fix that will allow us (and you) to tweak your captions, stories and such without spamming everyone in the universe. We'll keep you up to date on what's going on. In the meantime, keep feeding us information on how we can improve. Drop us a line through a comment on this blog or via our e-mail at feedback@uncharted.net . We look forward to hearing more from you, just as you likely look forward to hearing less from us.

Uncharted Heads to Columbia

2009-10-31T22:38:00.005-06:00

It’s a place with an impressive pedigree. It’s a home to Nobel laureates Theodore Roosevelt, Milton Freedman and Enrico Fermi; admitted spies Whittaker Chambers and Harry Dexter White; the moguls Warren Buffet and David O. Selznick. It brought us Isaac Asimov, author of I, Robot, and Paul Gallico, author of The Poseidon Adventure. It brought us the likes of Upton Sinclair and Art Garfunkel, William “The Princess Bride” Goldman and Benjamin “Not that Spock” Spock. And, in 1984, it brought the world a shushing, ghostly librarian and Drs. Egon Spangler, Ray Stantz and Peter Venkman, who has PhDs in psychology and parapsychology.

It’s New York City’s storied Columbia University. And this Monday, Uncharted’s own Alan Murray, our benevolent founder and despot, will walk the same granite stairways and gaze upon the same verdant greenswards as these famous folk.

He is, despite his eastern upbringing – he’s a Pennsylvania native – a little flummoxed. “I’m hoping they all think I'm the CEO of Uncharted the video game,” he says. “That way, maybe more than 30 people will show up, only to be disappointed to find out I am a bum.”

The “they” of whom he speaks are high school students and their advisors; the “what” is the Columbia Scholastic Press Association’s annual fall conference where, this year, presenters representing the fields of digital media, media law, newspaper and magazine journalism, photography, social media and Internet production and others will offer 98 presentations to students hoping to improve their skills in communication and make their high school and private school publications the envy of the universe.

Alan is one of those to whom the students will flock to partake of wisdom. On Monday, Nov. 2, he’ll present on “Geo-Social Media for an Uncharted Era.” He’ll focus on how students (and business) can communicate more effectively and work as teams to save money and time producing web publications. A full description of Alan’s presentation is available here.

“I’m really excited to be teaching this fall,” Alan says. “I spent most of my high school years attending conferences like this one. These events aren't possible without the many qualified professionals who donate their talent and time to make the event a success. It's nice to be able to do what others did for me when I was a student.”

The conference is among the most venerable student journalism conferences held in the United States. It’s sponsored by the Columbia Scholastic Press Association, which was founded in 1925 and formed to “unite student editors and faculty advisers working with them to produce student newspapers, magazines, yearbooks and online media,” according to the association’s Web site. (The online stuff, obviously, came a bit later than 1925.) Students from all over the United States and from overseas attend the conference as part of the education in communications, journalism, web production, photography, and writing.

Other presenters this year will teach students how to write effective editorials, take prize-winning photos, produce video for Internet delivery, explore the ins and outs of how social media can help them strengthen their publications and, from Alan, learn how to use inexpensive or free digital tools to enhance their publicaton’s presence on the web.

We at Uncharted, obviously, wish Alan the best of luck. And Alan, if you see any ghosts, be sure to follow Dr. Stantz’ advice:

Not Quite Camp Wiconda, but Close. Mr. Sta-Puft is There

2009-10-29T23:09:00.002-06:00

What better way to celebrate the entry of fall into Idaho than with a spring story from Uncharted. And, argh, yes, that is a play on words, because not only were these photos of Cress Creek taken in spring, but Cress Creek itself is a spring. I am prepared to be pumelled for the play on words. Go ahead. Do your worst.

But read the story. Cress Creek is such a fun place to take your kids on a hike especially, if they're like mine, they're hyperactive, a bit overstimulated at school and determined that this hike will be completed on schedule. Race up the trail, hesitate only a nanosecond at the crossroads, then race up the hill, over the bridges, down the hills, over the flatlands and to the precipice where they gawk at the Snake River below. Odd thing is if I want them to walk through a Home Depot for fifteen minutes, they're all tired.

I never get tired of going to Cress Creek. It's kind of fun to wander into this little Eden on the Snake River Canyon, parched in summer except for this little green gully where geothermically-heated spring water keeps things green. And then there are the remnants of the Sta-Puft Marshmallow Man, resplendent on one of the rocks overshadowing the trail. The goo is actually ash and pumice spewed out by the Menan Buttes 18 miles to the northwest, but . . . why am I telling you this? Go read the story. Now.

Yapping About Uncharted Online

2009-10-12T10:31:00.014-06:00

Good Monday morning fellow explorers! Its an exciting day for all of us in the Uncharted community since Aaron is installing some great new functionality on our Explorer accounts! It will allow us to keep in touch with each other and stay appraised of new adventures with ease.

Several of you (explorers and staff) were quick to observe that if someone sent you a message on Uncharted, commented on your story, or someone requested to be your friend, you probably wouldn't know it unless you happened to log in to Uncharted. Those days are almost gone!

Thanks to all the hard work from our programmers, designer and technical staff, we just finished beta-testing this new functionality and it is working great! That means Aaron will be installing the new functionality on the Uncharted website today, which may cause a few hiccups throughout the day today (server reboots). By the end of the week your Explorer account will have notifications enabled. That means anytime someone sends you a message, posts a comment on your content, invites you to be a friend, Uncharted posts a new feature story, or if one of your friends posts new content, you will receive a notification message in your e-mail. You can also edit your profile to enable or disable any of those notification functions based on your own preferences.

We're working on getting the same notification process that works for stories to also work for photosets and will spread the word once that is installed.

You also may have noticed the additional "share" button with an orange "+" sign on the upper-right corner of stories. This allows you to easily post a story (including your own) on Facebook, Twitter, Digg or a number of other outlets.

Our staff really appreciated all the input we received from beta-testing last year and subsequent feedback over the many months of continued development. We hope these new capabilities help all of us stay in better touch with our adventurous friends across the world. So feel free to check it out, test it out, and yap away!

The image on this posting shows the new options enabled on your Explorer profile for receiving notifications.

If you notice any problems, as always, please feel free so send us feedback at our feedback e-mail address: feedback@uncharted.net

Time of the Spud

2009-09-07T15:25:00.001-06:00

We're still here at Uncharted, limping along a little bit as we wrestle with server issues. Until the issues are resolved -- and we hope they will be soon -- our updates are going to be a little sparse. Trust me, we've got enough material to update the site twice a month for at least a year, so there's no shortage of material. Right now, it's just a shortage of server space.

So to entertain the troops, we've dusted off an oldie but a goodie: Shelley Spud Days, in which hapless folks play a tug-o-war over a huge pit of mashed potatoes and otherwise celebrate everything there is to know about the Idaho potato. Here's the story. Hope you enjoy it.

Burden of Progress, or Attack of the Mushroom People

2009-08-28T22:59:00.007-06:00

Well, it finally happened. Between the community of Explorers and staff, the data uploaded to Uncharted pushed our server to its limits and required our staff to streamline data storage. There's nothing that makes a web media operative go more crazy than going to his own site and suddenly realizing something has gone wrong! "Why is the site acting up? Have evil Mushroom People invaded our server and attacked it from within?" That was our story this morning. Who are these Mushroom People and why are they attacking us?

This was quite the headache for our team to figure out. Growth is usually welcome, but it does come with a price. All things considered, however, it is a good problem to have. It wasn't very long ago that Uncharted didn't even have an operating website. We only dreamed of such a thing. And even when it was launched, we weren't sure we'd ever get to this point, but here we are. A problem? Yes. A headache? Yes. But a good problem to have? Also yes.

Despite the headache and the fact that our technical gurus and leadership were under the gun to resolve the problem, once our team got together we had a plan of action within 30 minutes, and the site was brought back online within 2 hours. Not bad for a startup, eh? What a team!

And what was the solution? Well, since the Mushroom People are probably watching, we could tell you, but then we'd have to kill you...

Happy Adventures,
GeoJoe

Uncharted Hangs out at the Bar J

2009-08-18T08:55:00.003-06:00

I'm in awe of those who can use a Dutch oven for things other than burning food. I've had a little success using such ovens -- I can make a mean stew and, this summer, at my wife's insistence, we made our first Dutch oven peach cobbler. But making something like biscuits in such an oven, without them ending up like charcoal, is a feat to be seen. So it goes without saying that one of my favorite things to do at Wilson, Wyoming's Bar-J Wranglers ranch, is to eat the biscuits they make in their Dutch ovens.

We're long-time fans of the Bar-J, their dinner show and chuckwagon cooking. If you've never visited their ranch, you've got to, next time you're in Yellowstone Country. Until then, read our Uncharted story on their enterprise here. Have fun. Just watch out for Granny.

Dancing, Dancing, Dancing

2009-08-04T20:26:00.005-06:00

The rumbling thunderstorm and rushing breeze mix their sounds with those of Main Street.

Main Street noises, though, are not the swoosh of cars, the occasional click of a bicycle wheel, the regular shuffling stamp of pedestrian feet. From around the corner of the brick-fronted jewelry store, in the center of the street, emerges a woman carrying the black-on-white, yin with yang flag of South Korea. Behind her, pushed as if they were leaves on the growing breeze, a knot of reedy dancers clad in pink and aquamarine silken clothing, ruffled by the breeze, buffeted, as it seems, by the tloing! tloing! doing! crash! zloing bloing! of the drums and cymbals carried by the similarly-clad band, some of whom growl away on recorders, adding the drill and trill to the cacophony of clashes, accompanied by the swirling dancers, the rumble of thunder and the rush of the wind.

This is the Idaho International Folk Dance and Music Festival, in full swing for its twenty-fourth year. The festival has its roots at Ricks College, a private school – now Brigham Young University-Idaho – in Rexburg. In 1983, a team of folk dancers from the school attended a dance festival in Europe and decided to stage such an event at home. Partnered with the Rexburg Chamber of Commerce, organizers brought the first folk dance festival to town in 1986. You can read more about the festival's history here if you like.

During the festival, Rexburg is gently taken over by the dancers, musicians and their entourages. It’s common to run into them at Kmart or Wal-Mart, shopping with the local families who host them – providing room, board and companionship – during the festival. During the festival week it’s as common to hear German or Mandarin Chinese being spoken frequently, loudly and punctuated with laughter as the dancers eat burgers at McDonalds or ice cream at the Dairy Queen. This is how you know it’s festival time.

It’s a great event. Go read about it at www.uncharted.net here. And thanks.

Tranquility Base, Here . . .

2009-07-17T23:59:00.004-06:00

Nearly forty years ago, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins took those "small steps for men" and fulfilled what even a decade ago seemed an unsurmountable obstacle: Landing men on the moon and returning them safely to Earth. Getting the U.S. space program from the era of crashing Vanguard rockets through the tragedy of Apollo 1 to the glee of watching Walter Cronkite's schoolboy anticipation and tearful joy at hearing Neil Armstrong's words from the surface of the moon took thousands of men and women, countless millions of man-hours, billions of dollars and one rather enjoyable Ron Howard movie.

So maybe, in a small way, getting our family up the 1.2 mile trail from the base of Oregon's Multnomah Falls to the deck at the falls' top, represents our own small steps for men; our one giant leap for family togetherness.

It was not a simple jaunt. The trail may be just over a mile, but it climbs more than 600 feet in that distance, a pretty steep requirement for three little pairs of feet anxious to climb but not necessarily used to such exertion. But, as you'll read in Uncharted.net's update this week, those little feet made it to the top and then, well, we arrived at Tranquility Base.

An 'Expert' Asks A Question

2009-06-20T16:05:00.005-06:00

One of our goals at Uncharted is to build a string of "local experts" from every little corner of the globe who can help you plan, sort out and otherwise prepare for your adventures as you're heading into their neck of the woods. As a resident of eastern Idaho nigh these 37 years, I'm supposed to be Uncharted's expert for this area. But even experts know when they're stumped.

Take the round object at the center of this photograph. Either I or my son took this photo while we were tromping around in the wilds of Hell's Half Acre, a 5,200-year-old lava flow west of Idaho Falls, Idaho, a site featured this week at www.uncharted.net. I have no idea what this thing is. A fellow explorer suggests it might be an owl pellet, though it's a bit smaller and more brightly-colored than other owl pellets I've seen. For the curious, it's somewhere between the size of a nickel and a quarter, based on the wildflowers its by. To me, it looks like a bit of chewed corncob, though I'd be hard-pressed to say who chewed it and who decided to spit it out in such a remote location.

But like all the other Uncharted experts we have -- and those we hope to find over the years to come -- we're learning. We're exploring the little nooks and crannies that make our little slices of the world slices of heaven. We hope to learn more about the places were we live so we can help other see and appreciate the beauty of this earth and decide perhaps it is indeed better to be outside roaming than inside on the Xbox.

So come with us this week to Hell's Half Acre. More importantly, sign up yourself at Uncharted.net, where you can share your local expertise.

And if anybody has any guesses as to what this mysterious object is, let us know.

Going for that Gothic Look

2009-06-05T23:41:00.002-06:00

In Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Slartibartfast, planet designer extraordinaire, brags he won an award for designing the fjords of Norway. Assigned to design the continent of Africa for Earth Mark Two, Slartibartfast is disgusted because he won't be able to include fjords in a subtropical climate. He likes fjords, he explains, because they give a continent "a baroque feel."

Pity Slartibartfast. Had he dabbled in desert scenery, he might have discovered he enjoys the Gothic feel of the solid rock, the sheer cliffs and the massive arches of the Utah Desert.

Uncharted Explorer Xelashay certainly enjoys that Gothic look. This week she's taking us all on a journey through Utah's Coyote Gulch where with a mixture of wind, water and time, the gods or some obscure but self-satisfied planetary designer have been hard at work. Enjoy.

Uncharted Kicks A Few Rocks Down Memory Lane

2009-05-23T22:09:00.002-06:00

One of my hobbies is listening to old time radio recordings. I have to blame my mother for that. She grew up with the likes of George Burns and Gracie Allen, Spike Jones, and an unlikely pair of Midwestern newlyweds, Fibber McGee and Molly.

Fibber McGee and his wife live at 79 Wistful Vista from 1935 to 1959, going from scratchy radio transmission to high fidelity and eventually to television. Molly constantly put up with Fibber’s wild schemes, whether he was attempting to make money without really having to work (such as the time he decided to dig an oil well in the backyard) or concocting some hair-brained solution to a problem he himself created. (He once suggested putting midgets on Fourth of July floats after it was pointed out the route he’d planned passed underneath a 6-foot-high viaduct.)

One of the sanest things McGee ever did was taking his wife on a canoeing trip where, with the soft swoosh of the paddles and an echo that knew more of the words than he did, he crooned to his lady love with the following song:

Cruisin’ down the river, on a Sunday afternoon.
The one you love, the stars above, waiting for the moon.
You and I together will plan our honeymoon,
Crusin’ down the river on a, on a Sunday afternoon.

It’s a sweet song, written in 1945 by Eily Beadell and Nell Tollerton. Blue Barron and Russ Morgan both brought it to the top of the U.S. Billboard Best Seller in Stores list as a number one single in 1949. Here’s the song:

As fortune would have it, Uncharted brings you such a Sunday afternoon feeling on Utah’s Cutler Marsh in two stories by Alan Murray and Brian Davidson. Our 2 ½ hour paddle through the marsh brought this song to mind and wrapped me in a cocoon of warmth as I recalled many an evening of sitting in the dark with Mom and Dad, listening to their old radio recordings.

For me, sound evokes powerful memories. When a new memory is mated with an old sound already linked to older memories, those memories flood out – in this case, bringing a bit of my childhood to life again as we paddled the still waters, watched the birds, and gazed up at the swallow nests built underneath the bridges. Now, swallows and goslings and sandhill cranes – and that scary moment when our canoe got stuck on the mudbar and I thought I’d have to walk us to shore – are indelibly tied in with this little ditty. So much the better for me, as I now have more memories on instant recall.

For the Uncahrted story on cutler marsh, go here.

For additional babblings from yours truly on Cutler Marsh, go here.

And explore the site. A few other staffers also posed their own photos and scribblings on Cutler Marsh. This variety exhibits one of the powers of Uncharted, aside from the x-ray vision and atomic breath. Nobody has a lock on a spot. If you want to write about or photograph something that's already on Uncharted, please do. Go ahead. Really. Each individual is an explorer in his or her own right.

Invitation to an Uncharted Retreat

2009-04-28T11:28:00.006-06:00

Uncharted Explorers - you're invited to come join us during our annual retreat in May. Beta-testers also welcome. We are having the following events free for Explorers. Come to either just one or all of them, your choice:

May 7th, 5:00 pm: Uncharted hike and spring cleaning.

Come with us to enjoy a spring hike and at the same time we will do spring cleaning of the trails we enjoy so much. If you can make it to Cache Valley come join us at Green Canyon at 5pm. If you're somewhere else, join us in the effort by going to your favorite local trail any time on Thursday and invite other explorers and friends to come along to give the trail some TLC.

May 8th, 2:30 - 4:00 pm: Photography workshop - "Shooting Photos with What You Have"

Where: Kensington Place Clubhouse- http://tinyurl.com/c2krq4 * Park on the street on 1800 N, clubhouse is on east side of tennis court.

What: Uncharted's Executive Director Alan Murray, long-time photojournalist and photo editor, will be teaching a photojournalism workshop. The seminar, free to Uncharted Explorers, will discuss what all digital cameras have in common and how to use those components to take dynamic photos. Techniques will also be presented on how to shoot photos that will be more likely to be selected for publication on Uncharted's homepage or the cover of Uncharted Magazine. A question and answer session will follow the seminar.

May 9th, 12:00 noon: International flavors lunch.

Where: Kensington Place Clubhouse- http://tinyurl.com/c2krq4 * Park on the street on 1800 N, clubhouse is on east side of tennis court.

What: Come mingle with Uncharted's staff and other Explorers and dig into some great flavors from all over the world. Also share your own international culinary skills, if you feel so inclined, by bringing something to add to the potluck!

** If you would like to come to any of the events, please visit our Facebook event page and mark yourself as attending so we know you're coming...or RSVP by replying to this thread with your name and how many people are coming. We will be keeping info updated on the Facebook event page and this thread**

Uncharted Brings You the Universe

2009-04-24T22:56:00.003-06:00

Part of our goal at Uncharted is to provide, through our stories and photos, a burning desire in those who read and view what we produce to replicate those experiences in their own lives. Our update this weekend is a prime example of a story and photo package offering just that.

Take me, for instance. Long have I harbored the desire to be an astronomer. When I was eight years old, Carl Sagan's Cosmos debuted on television. Color me mesmerized. For weeks. I watched those shows. I borrowed every book from the library on astronomy. I even wrote a fan letter to Carl Sagan at Cornell University, and he wrote back, advising me to work hard on my math skills if I wanted to be an astronomer like him.

Alas, it was not to be. A straight line of Cs in algebra -- despite my efforts to learn it better than that -- dashed my hopes. My only consolation came through geometry, where I was able to understand the stuff enough to pull As. So I became a writer instead.

Then I read Joseph Burkhead's story on his adventure at Arizona's Kitt Peak Observatory, where he got to go to the top of that sacred mountain and actually have astronomers at his elbow -- both elbows -- unlocking the secrets of the cosmos. Suddenly, it all came back -- right to replaying that eerie Vangelis theme music in my head, from Sagan's television series.

So click here quickly and begin to read. And if you're a Cosmos fan like I am, hit Hulu.com and queue up one of the old shows. Listen to Vangelis' opening theme as you read Joseph's story. That cosmic desire will all come back to you.

I'm leaving now. Going outside to stare at the stars.

Uncharted Goes Underground

2009-04-10T23:34:00.004-06:00

One of the things I enjoy the most about writing and taking photos for Uncharted is that I get to show off some of the wonderful places that make eastern Idaho such a fantastic place to explore. 17-Mile Cave is one of those places.

The cave is a mix of the ancient and modern. Ancient, because it's a remnant of Idaho's volcanic era, a time that saw volcanoes sprouting from the desert, great cracks opening in the Earth oozing lava and, of course, underwater rivers of lava forming caves and tubes under the upper crust, then draining, leaving a place for moderns like us to plow underground. And modern, because the cave is filled with graffiti, has a chamber large enough to host touch football games and is uncomplicated enough to allow amateur cave explorers a place to go without worrying about getting lost.

So, stop reading this and go on to read about 17-Mile Cave. Enjoy.

Finally: Proof that I work.

2009-03-30T21:44:00.010-06:00

I don't have too many photos of myself working. That's what happens when you're most often behind the camera. But this one, taken by Uncharted Photo Assistant John Milligan, is definitely my favorite.

Covering the Holi Festival of Color last weekend at the Krishna Temple in Spanish Fork, Utah, was one of the more unusual assignments I've photographed and written about. Over 15,000 people packed the hillside just below the temple waiting to throw bags of powdered dust into the air and all over each other.

Most of the battle for good photojournalism is simply placing yourself in the right place and waiting for the right moment. Whenever I cover a story, I'm always looking to position myself in such a way as to ensure that I'm ready when the climax of the event goes down.

I positioned myself at what seemed to be the focal point, a pile of dry wood with a plastic witch-like figurine sitting on the top, ready to be burned. As it turns out, the figurine was an effigy of the demoness Holika, for whom the Holi Festival of Color derives its name. I figured everyone's attention would be on the fire, at least for the first few seconds. After that, you just need to run with what happens.

So when the bonfire was lit and people began throwing colored flour all over the place, you could barely see a thing. The plastic bags covering my cameras started falling off and for moments, here and there, it was hard to breathe. The fire was so hot that it started to burn even though I was almost 15 feet away. Before I knew it, I was sandwiched in the middle of thousands of people with barely any room to move, wishing I had a wider angle lens.

But there was something exhilarating about being in the middle of it all, even covered head to toe in colored powder. At Uncharted ,we try to promote a philosophy of "Explore. Live. Feel." That means when we cover a story, we immerse ourselves in it. We want to show you what it was like to be there. I hope I achieved that with this story. In any case, events like these make me excited to get out there and do more stories and photos for Uncharted.

Alan Murray is executive director of Uncharted. He likes sea horses and snowshoes, and frequently has the urge to leave the country. To contact Alan, feel free to write to alan@uncharted.net.

MacGyvering Uncharted

2009-03-28T23:22:00.005-06:00

Sometimes I feel like MacGyver. In fact, working on Uncharted often reminds me of the 1980s television series featuring Richard Dean Anderson as Mac, the secret agent who uses commonplace items to maneuver through challenging situations - anything from disarming a missile with a paperclip, to using a coffin as a Jet Ski, to restraining one of the bad guys by stapling his coat to the ground.

Over the past few weeks I've been on the road frequently, giving presentations and recruiting for Uncharted's team. As we're an all-volunteer force with minimal resources, I often find myself telling potential candidates we put Uncharted together with a Swiss Army Knife, duct tape, and some kite string.

Case in point: we had a presentation at Brigham Young University-Idaho last month, our first of many, discussing geo-social media, a concept unique to Uncharted. As often happens, time was limited and we found ourselves piecing together the presentation at the last minute.

Consequently, I left for Idaho without presentation slides or even a rehearsal. I made it to campus about an hour before my appointment, found an internet signal, and downloaded the presentation sent by the team only a few moments earlier. I then spent the remaining time on the phone with our communications director, reviewing slides and memorizing.

Somehow, the presentation went well and I was able to meet with many qualified candidates. When you take into account that each member of our team has a full-time job and that Uncharted is all team-funded, it's quite incredible to see the high quality we manage to generate, and it's even more thrilling to see it grow. That's not to say we don't have shortcomings. The site is far from what we envision, but we do the very best, given the circumstances, to continue improving Uncharted, thereby giving our audience the best experience possible.

This is all doable because of an incredible group of individuals who make up our team. While they come from various backgrounds, including journalists and civil engineers, programmers and members of the armed services, as well as teachers and accountants, they all have a couple of things in common, certain qualities we search for as we interview potential candidates.

The first is ingenuity. Each member of our team possesses the unique ability to transform the group's collective time, expertise, and resources into low-cost, effective solutions. They do this with little funding and time.

The second is cross-training. Each member comes with a variety of skills or, at the very least, the desire to learn things not necessarily related to their main area of expertise. For instance, it's not uncommon for a member of our communications/marketing team to take on the task of writing a story or taking photos for our editorial department. And it's not out of the ordinary to see a staff writer shooting photos or a copy editor brainstorming public relations issues.

While meeting with candidates at BYU-Idaho, we were most impressed with how professors in the communications department both encourage and provide opportunities for their students to learn a variety of skills, anything from sales to video, to writing and photography, to marketing and more. That said, it probably won't surprise you we've already added some soon-to-be graduates from BYU-Idaho to our team. And even though our recruiting efforts span the globe, I'm sure they won't be the last.

As Uncharted continues to expand, we realize it is our team and our wonderful audience who deserve the real credit for its success. No doubt we'll continue keeping things together with duct tape and kite string for a bit longer, but when you look at the incredible people who contribute to Uncharted, there is little doubt it's course is firmly set towards success.

Alan Murray is executive director of Uncharted. He likes sea horses and snowshoes, and frequently has the urge to leave the country. To contact Alan, feel free to write to alan@uncharted.net.

Uncharted is Trademarked!

2009-03-19T21:19:00.009-06:00

Its official! We just received a certificate from the United States Patent Trade Office showing that our registration of the Uncharted trademark is authorized and complete! If you're familiar with the TM registration process, you know it can be a long and laborious process, but you also probably know how important it is to protect your brand identity. We certainly do. Over a year ago we noticed someone online that started copying our ideas, almost word for word. The night we made this alarming discovery, I went to work immediately on registering the Uncharted trademark and didn't stop until I was done applying. By 3 a.m. the same night I was finally finished, and Uncharted was on its way to getting government authorization for its trademark. Now, over a year later, we can look back on all the work it took to get our trademark out there in commerce and approved by the legal reviewers with great satisfaction in knowing we own the Uncharted name from here on out in our industry. Another step forward in the adventure. Uncharted is here to stay.

Uncharted Brings You the Bahamas

2009-03-13T23:36:00.002-06:00

Uncharted just keeps plugging along, and that pleases us to no end. Today, we updated the site with our second Explorer story (which you can read here), featuring the Bahamas -- our first international destination. We've got a very long way to go to get Uncharted out of the Intermountain West, but with Explorers like Lisa Wheat, we'll get there, one story at a time.

A Taste of the Uncharted Lifestyle

2009-02-26T10:52:00.005-07:00

As we sat around the kitchen table, Alan eating the second half of his Big Juds burger, John crunching away at a cup of half-cooked ramen noodles, and me sitting there looking hung over even though I hadn’t touched a drop of alcohol, the discussion was this: How can we make all of our workdays like today?

This was our workday:

Up at 6, out the door by 6:45. Snowmobile suits, snow pants, parkas, gloves and hats help us to ward off the chilly weather, with temperatures hovering at a mere 6 above zero. Shortly after 7 am, we weaved through the snow-ridden streets of Ashton, Idaho, trying to find a place to park. Then we wander the streets with the sun rising in our faces as we talk to the owners of dogs set to compete in the American Dog Derby, featured on our home page today. Between the twin tasks of putting booties on his dogs’ feet and cleaning up their messes with a small rake and shovel, Bino Fowler of Sunriver, Oregon, told us why he loves sled dog racing. Up the street and around the corner are two dozen other contestants, likely with similar stories.

As the racers leave town one by one, we’re all pleasantly surprised by the easy, friendly manner of the Ashtonites we bump into. When we say hello, nobody turns the cold shoulder. They’re happy to be in this little town, awake so early in the cold. With a few sentences of explanation of who we are and what Uncharted is, we’re given the same insider tips these friendly folk give most everyone with a camera and a question. We follow it, along highways east of town and through banks of snow that force themselves into Alan’s shoes, making his socks soggy.

Nobody treats us as if we were interlopers. This is significant. Both Alan and I have worked for newspapers, and are used to bracing ourselves for the expected comments: You work for the paper, eh? Well, don’t screw it up. We might still screw it up, because newspapers do not corner the market on infallibility. But we’ll do our best. And have fun doing it.

So at the table, having lunch at about 2 pm, we ask ourselves: When will this become our full-time occupation? When will we be able to wake up in the morning and have Uncharted be our full-time, paying gig, not the part-time, volunteer gig it is now? We had fun. We want more of that. Someday soon, we hope. Someday soon.

Of course we’ve got a lot of work to do between now and then. We’ve got to get more agile. More mobile. More integrated with the folks we want to connect with. We’re working on it. And we expect great things to happen.

An Uncharted First

2009-01-31T16:52:00.002-07:00

Like many other businesses, Uncharted has a fairly lofty mission statement:

Uncharted is the premier interactive experience of the world. We're a community of friends dedicated to discovering the world's geographic and cultural marvels through the finest use of innovation & aesthetics, bringing the world to you and you to the world, one journey at a time.

To me, the most important aspects of this statement lie in that we want to be “a community of friends,” working arduously to bring “the world to you and you to the world, one journey at a time.”

Today we hit a first: Uncharted contributor Fishstyx and his wonderful story and photos detailing a journey he took on Utah’s San Juan River will be featured on our homepage at http://www.uncharted.net/, bringing a little corner of his world to you, and you to his world. You'll notice a little badge on the photo we selected to tout his story on the homepage. We'll use it on every story we pluck from Uncharted's pages to brag up one of our Explorers' stories. And y'all are Uncharted's Explorers. Your story could be next.

Fishstyx's story embodies the Explore, Live, Feel philosophy that drives Uncharted. We want to feature stories and photographs that evoke emotion and action in our readers. His story caught my ear because of the lilting, lyric way Fishstyx uses language. His story caught my soul because as I read it, I could imagine myself bobbing along in the raft with him, staring up in awe at the Native American petroglyphs on the canyon walls, trailing my hands in the muddy water. Fishstyx not only told me about the San Juan River, but, for about ten minutes as I sat at my desk in my gray-walled, gray-carpeted cubicle with a fine view of the thick January fog outside the window, Fishstyx took me away from this place. Way better than Calgon.

We’re excited to see our little community starting to grow. We hope it’ll keep growing, and soon become a much bigger community. But through all that, our goal will be to feature writers, photographers, philosophers and thinkers who can metaphorically grab us by the hand and take us with them on an adventure.

Fishstyx is the first. Who will be next? It’s all up to you.

Meeting new people

2009-01-04T01:52:00.023-07:00

Meet “Thedude.” He’s 28, likes politics, traveling and running rivers. His favorite place on Earth is the Grand Canyon. Before he dies, he wants to hitchhike from Argentina to the U.S. and raft the Nile. “I lived in a tent (In Moab, Utah) with my dog for six months,” he writes, “I don’t recommend using that as a pickup line.”

I hope he can live out those dreams––in fact, I’m counting on it. He’s just one of the many interesting people you can meet on Uncharted. People with their own set of travels and adventures, often right in their own backyards. People who have been there, done that, and can steer you in the right direction. And people who can show you places that are truly uncharted.

At Uncharted, we love exploring new places and meeting new people. Even more than that, we want to share those experiences, ours and yours, one journey at a time.

Over two weeks ago, you joined us in making that dream come alive as Uncharted became the first Geo-Social Media Agency in the world. So, you’re probably thinking, “What’s Geo-Social Media anyway?” If you haven’t heard that term before, it’s not surprising, because we recently invented it. Simply put, it’s the mix of professional journalism with an online community, a community of friends sharing their own experiences through visuals and the written word, presenting that material geographically.

And that’s exactly what has happened. In just a matter of days, you’ve shared adventures from Hong Kong to Hawaii, California to Idaho, Michigan to New York, Europe to India. Now, anyone, anywhere in the world can click on a map and experience the globe behind the geography through your eyes.

And it hasn’t gone unnoticed. People from 19 different countries, speaking a variety of languages, have viewed your submissions. It’s been featured on blogs, other websites and carried through the air on radio waves. And your audience is growing every day.

So, this week we’re excited to share with you yet another story from our staff––this time, written and photographed by me, on one of Northern Utah’s geologic marvels, the Wind Caves.

And while I spent considerable time writing and taking photos for this story, I realize that, in a way, it’s not complete. It’s still missing one thing––your photos, your stories and your experiences. So, for those of you who’ve been to the Wind Caves, don’t let our story get in the way of you sharing your own as well, because that’s what Uncharted is all about––bringing the world closer together one journey at a time.

Alan Murray is Executive Director of Uncharted. He likes sea horses and snowshoes and frequently has the urge to leave the country. To contact Alan feel free to write to alan@uncharted.net.

Uncharted featured on KVNU web page

2008-12-18T15:31:00.003-07:00

KVNU radio station's (610 am) "For the People" show has featured Uncharted's launch on their web page today. Check out the article.

Note - the "For the People" show is a great program for keeping abreast of some of the most important issues facing the community and nation. You can listen to their show online at www.kvnuforthepeople.com

Uncharted has launched!

2008-12-17T21:56:00.004-07:00

The adventure has begun. Uncharted is now public! The site was unveiled at 7:35pm MST - 17 Dec 08 (0235 hrs GMT - 18 Dec 08). Several staff members and beta testers got together in Logan, Utah and online to celebrate the launch.

Congrats to the staff, beta-testers, and other Uncharted supporters everywhere. All the hard work has created this:

Feature stories for the launch include a Michigan adventure race, Spud Days in Shelley Idaho, and Alligators in the Snake River, Idaho. Some of the content submitted by registered Explorers includes Malaysia, France and California features. Great start!

Lighting the Sky

2008-12-16T02:57:00.003-07:00

Legend tells the tale of a young girl, who, in the dark of night, grabs embers from a glowing fire. She throws them high into the night sky, creating the Milky Way, full of formations of flickering stars, allowing navigation to the uncharted regions of the world.

Now, if only illuminating cyberspace were that easy.

That’s what we’ve been working on––mapping cyberspace with those little-known, less-traveled places of the globe, full of people, culture, moments and stories otherwise lost to time.

And it hasn’t been easy. Bringing a team together with the skills and experience necessary to pull off a project this complex and widespread was a formidable challenge. Over the past four years, we’ve worked, in some cases, across five time zones. All of our team members hold full-time jobs in a variety of disciplines, anything from journalists to officers in the armed forces, to programmers, artists, marketers and teachers. They speak a variety of languages and have lived and traveled around the world.

And they’re all volunteers. They’ve worked with minimal funding and scavenged resources. Their ingenuity and ability to come together in difficult situations sets them apart from any other team I’ve ever worked with. And while, at first glance, it seems an unlikely group to be working together, the mix has yielded unique results.

It has been my privilege to serve as director of this incredible group, who have labored, often into the late hours of the night and well into the early morning, sacrificing vacations, free time and other opportunities, on a project aiming to bring the world together one journey at a time.

Tomorrow evening you’ll get to see the first glimpse of all that hard work and sacrifice as we unveil, for the first public view, our project, www.uncharted.net. We’ll share with you our first three stories highlighting some of our favorite people and places. And while much of our efforts have been close to home, our vision stretches into your backyard and beyond.

But more importantly, you’ll get to help us throw some embers into the sky as well, because Uncharted, after all, is a community of friends, our friends and, yes, most importantly, yours. We look forward to seeing the places you’ve been and the interesting people you’ve met. We look forward to getting to know each of you as we journey from place to place. We can’t wait to explore, live and feel the world through your eyes and show you the things we’ve seen as well.

So, wherever you are, however far away you might reside, come join us tomorrow evening for this historic moment in our project’s history, the beginning of many journeys to come.

Alan Murray is Executive Director of Uncharted. He enjoys snowshoeing and likes seahorses and likes to leave the country frequently.

Uncharted -- Your Digital Memory Box

2008-12-05T14:31:00.006-07:00

I admit it – I’m a pack rat. I have saved, in various boxes, jars, bags, drawers and shelves just about everything from old TAB soda cans to rocks shaped like pig noses, newspaper clippings, photos, books, trinkets, beads and baubles, ties and, in a cardboard apple box underneath the stairs, ten years’ worth of handwritten journals.

Oh. Allow me to introduce myself. You've already met GeoJoe, our capable communications director. Now meet MisterFweem, the company's creative content director. Now, back to that collection of mine:

Fearful as any collector is of a disaster or misfortune that would rob me of my collection, I’ve spent the last several months laboriously scanning every scrap of paper I can find into the computer, in order to preserve a digital copy of the junk I’ve collected (except for the soda cans, of course, They’re hard to put on a flatbed scanner).

Scanning the journals and photos has been especially rewarding. As I’ve separated the yellowing pages, as I’ve read the words and looked at the photos and bits of flotsam that I’ve pasted in these books, I’ve been reminded of all the interesting places I’ve been, and the soaring and humbling experiences I had while I was there.

I remembered Montsegur – sitting atop a lonely mountain in the Pyrenees mountains dividing France and Spain, atop the ruins of an ancient chateau that was built on the ruins of an even older castle where men, women and children lived, herded their sheep, and were killed in a fit of religious persecution.

I remembered Holy Island – wandering the beaches, looking at the overturned boats turned into sheds, the ancient monuments, moss-covered gravestones and the seagulls screaming and crying above the salty waves, a sound that still says England to me.

I remembered Amsterdam’s Anne Frank House – the stilt-tall, narrow building where this family and others hid in vain for so long from their Nazi persecutors.

And I remembered Idaho’s Horseshoe Lake – fog-bound, surrounded by pines lit by a three-quarter moon, with the elk singing and shrieking and bellowing their mating calls through the night.

Uncharted is going to be a place like this. Like these. Uncharted is going to be my digital memory box – this time, shared with the world, not tucked away in cardboard boxes or forgotten on a shelf. See you other pack rats there.

Pink Bunnies Explained

2008-12-01T18:00:00.004-07:00

I've mentioned on a few occassions the issue of "Pink Bunnies" which may have left you scratching your head if you aren't savvy to the inside joke. Funny as it may be, I'm totally serious in saying that Uncharted's fate has rested with pink bunnies. Allow me to explain this curious circumstance.

Our designer, Andrew, has quite the creative mind. Out of that creativity sprang the idea to manufacture and sell authentic pink bunny suits as seen in the movie A Christmas Story. Before he could even finish a business plan however, interest was pouring in. The orders were literally multiplying like - well - rabbits! Meanwhile, Andrew faced no mass-production capability. Temporary solution: mobilize the grandmothers! But the situation grew out of control with more work than Andrew could handle alone if he was to still manage Uncharted's design tasks. And if Uncharted had to go without Andrew's expertise while he sorted out the pink bunnies, our project would be delayed further. The fate of Uncharted rested with Pink Bunnies.

As result, our team decided to hop to it and give Andrew some much needed help with bunny control. It took no time at all, and we are happy to report that hundreds of Americans across the country will have pink bunny suits under their Christmas trees this year, plus an innovative and upgraded Uncharted website.

The new Uncharted site is coming soon, but in the mean time, if you're just inching to give the gift of pink bunny warmth, comfort, or humiliation this Christmas, visit www.pinkbunnypajamas.com and place your order.

Beta-Testing Praises and Blues

2008-11-04T16:51:00.004-07:00

If you’re one of those whose mother has ever said, "anything worth doing in life takes hard work," she just may be right. This principle certainly seems to be ringing true for Uncharted.

The beta-testing has begun, and the comments have been great. Some were even quite entertaining. Thank you to everyone who has submitted feedback. The team loves reading your notes. It’s way exciting to be where we're at right now.

On the flip side, we've been forging through some big challenges with the new site as we prepare it to be put to the test. For some reason, our user registration sign-ups were disappearing into some unknown abyss of the virtual universe. A few nights ago, however, our programming contractors, Dave, and Andrew once again lived up to their hero status by cracking the problem!

Now our whole staff is able to register as Explorers on the test site and we've already started testing the features. We have to test everything when it’s still highly dysfunctional. We're trying to make sure the major issues are ironed out before the beta-testers log in to start their functional testing. The beta-test site will be far from perfect when the beta-testers start plugging away, but we hope what we're doing now will help the beta-testers have a more enjoyable and effective experience. This can be both a laborious and a frustrating process! All complaints aside, it’s energizing to see some of the features working, and with every day it just keeps getting better.

We're still very eager to make the site available for beta-testers and are using all the free time we have in our schedules and that our day jobs will allow, to make that happen within the month. In the mean time, we'll be sending out some more screen shots and other materials for beta-tester feedback, so keep the comments and questions coming. We'll keep you posted with the developments.

Let the Beta-Testing Begin!

2008-10-20T11:36:00.007-06:00

We're getting down to the wire. A welcome packet was sent out to the beta-testers today and the programmers are wrapping up final details for the new website.

Uncharted owes all of you beta-testers out there a huge "thank you" for your participation.

Our team of beta-testers includes our staff and over 75 of our friends and family from 3 countries (U.S., U.K. and Denmark) and 11 states. And its an incredible team of vast talent. Travel agents, people who have lived overseas, humanitarian workers, school teachers, photographers, designers, military, college students, programmers, journalists, parents, and more.

Welcome to the Uncharted team beta-testers!

Spud Days Struggle

2008-10-01T22:25:00.015-06:00

Sadly, this is my first update since June. Summer has been hectic and the team is now in a flurry of work as we prepare to launch the new site. We're so close to launch day that we'll announce a beta-tester opportunity soon. Furthermore, we don't expect the beta-testing to take very long to complete.

In the meantime, here's a look at what a few team member's experienced at Spud Days, an annual event held in the great community of Shelley, Idaho:

Seeking out the uncharted isn't always the easiest hobby, especially when Mother Nature works against you. "Rain and lightning seemed to target me over the weekend...a dark cloud poured rain over us the whole weekend and followed us wherever we went," our fearless leader Alan observed. Despite the unrelenting storms, potato enthusiasts at Spud Days remained undeterred and pressed on with the festivities. Determined to neither appear as wimps nor fail in gaining new content and contacts, Alan, Andrew, Brian and Michelle all followed the locals' lead in toughing it out as well. And tough it out they did. They got drenched, probably just one degree shy of "waterlogged". Now consider what to do about the precious electronic equipment. And if that all wasn't enough, they refrained from donning coats for fear a coat would cover up the Uncharted name and URL on their t-shirts! Drenched, cold, and miles away from home, the team showed their commitment--or craziness. Ok, commitment and craziness.

Crazy as that may sound, Brian and Michelle witnessed something even more off the wall. "There was a cordial performance by the new Miss Russett, who performed a veritable rite of passage just before the start of the tug of war competitions over a large pit of runny mashed potatoes. Thanks to a torrential downpour just before the tug of war games began, the mashed potatoes looked more like runny potato mud. Undaunted, Miss Russett added a pat of butter, salted the pit of potatoes and then, in a gesture full of warmth and goodwill, stooped down and ate a spoonful of potato mud to mark the beginning of the event."

The image below shows Andrew capturing video as the rain looms overhead.

To add to the adventure, when Alan and Andrew arrived at their hotel, there was no shampoo. They inquired with the front desk and were informed that there was shampoo in the vending machine, which proved to be false. To make a long story short, they ended up scouring town for a morsel of shampoo, with no shortage of drama along the way.

Adding alarm to an already strange day, Pink Bunnies became an unavoidable conversation topic before they returned home. Pink Bunnies will be explained at a later date for those not in the know. Lets just say Uncharted's fate ironically hinges on them.

Despite all the challenges, Spud Days was a big success, both for the community and for Uncharted. Several people expressed interest in getting involved with the beta-testing, another great Uncharted story is complete and the team was able to expand contacts in the community and local media, all while learning about this great community and event.

To top it all off, Big Jud's restaurant in Archer treated Andrew well with a monstrous one-pound hamburger the diameter of a dinner plate, a one-pound basket of fries, plenty of soda, and 2 scoops of ice cream. In recognition for downing the massive burger, Big Jud's awarded him a photo spot on their wall of fame. More amazing yet, Andrew was still hungry after the meal.

Ahhh, the life we live as we explore the uncharted. Strange, unpredictable and far from boring. The adventure goes on.

Summer Retreat 2008

2008-06-28T21:05:00.024-06:00

One thing you might not know about Uncharted is that we are a small team spread all over the U.S., and sometimes even all over the world. Not only do we have team members in Michigan, Idaho, Texas, and Utah, but there have even been times when some of our team members were in Mexico, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. Yet somehow we've been able to make it through all the crackled audio during our web video conferences. Somehow we've made it through flurries of e-mails. Somehow we've pressed on through online chat sessions full of miscommunicated meanings. And somehow, on June 14th, 2008, we managed to scrape up some funding from who knows where to come back to Logan, UT, where the idea of Uncharted was born. Our purpose? Simple: to see and help each other through a retreat and practical workshops. Oh yes – and to make plans for the new Uncharted site which is about to be released.

We had a blast. It seems like everyone's favorite parts were: 1) seeing the new designs our Design guru Andrew has crafted and 2) being surprised with our first business cards and t-shirts, thanks to the Communications & Marketing team. Heck, it was just great to see everyone, which was probably the most important part. It’s such a rare occasion to have everyone together.

So what? So we got together. What now? Well, one of the best parts about this retreat is that we all came away with better journalism, photo, web, leadership, and communication skills. Plus, we have a very clear plan of attack for implementing the new Uncharted site. In fact, we've been so busy implementing, I haven't even had time to post this until now. This new site will make several improvements in functionality based on the feedback we may have received from you, as well as our own vision for what Uncharted can offer the world.

Here's a run down on what to expect with the new site:

New content, including areas such as Seattle, Arizona, Michigan, Utah, and Canada – with plans to keep on rolling from there.
Easy content submission process.
More professional appearance and more frequent content updates.
Easy ways to share your adventures with your friends.

And that's just a brief summary. The new site looks so cool it nearly made me jerk some tears of joy when we were looking at Andrew's presentation. Our vision is quickly turning into reality. Even though our website and first printed magazine were great starts back in late 2007 and early 2008, it’s looking more and more like 2008 is going to end with a bang. The whole team is energized and going strong.

Keep checking back here for updates as we get closer to our new release.

Developer's Diary - The Eater

2008-04-15T21:13:00.005-06:00

Today's update comes from our workaholic designer, Andrew. He's a big guy, big eater, and he has big ideas that he's trying to turn into reality behind the scenes. Someday, all of us Uncharted fans are going to owe him big. Luckily, all he asks in return is pink bunnies and an endless supply of food. Here's our first developer's diary entry:

31 Mar 08 - "It may not make sense to everyone but I have about 7 pages done and they are constantly evolving and changing. As I design, I may come up with a better solution while I’m working on page 7 than I began with on pages 1-6 so I need to then go back and revise all the previous pages with the new and improved designs. This is always the case... It’s a bit of mental olympics designing a big website."

14 Apr 08 - "I’ve been cuddled-up to my computer for the past 3 weeks designing very extremely incredibly super duper uber exciting pages for every possible function of the Uncharted website. Tonight, I took a minute to take some screenshots to show you what I’ve been working on over the past few days."

Shown below is a sample of his work. Keep it up Andrew!

Call for Content...and How We're Learning to Love Pink Bunnies

2008-03-14T00:53:00.005-06:00

We’re busy now planning out the next few month’s progress at Uncharted, working to bring in more interactive features, easier site navigation and a beefier invitation to all of you to share your stories. We’re getting the word out that we're looking for additional stories, photos, audio and video – your stuff, if you can’t take the hint – to post. There's a lot of talented people we know who are excited about Uncharted, so instead of just hiding behind our glowing computer screens while we plug away at the programming and other chores, we really should help anyone out there that might want to share their adventures. If that sounds like you or someone you know, here's the kind of content that matches up with Uncharted:

* Stories, poems, features, essays, little chiseled pyramids about unexplored, undiscovered, uncharted places, culture, issues, and marvels (anywhere in the world)
* Quality media (photos, video, audio, etc)

The editorial gurus will help whoever has something neat to offer with getting it posted. Contact them – brian@uncharted.net, or jason@uncharted.net.

Big Picture Update: The work presses on. I was able to meet one of our interns, Fei, one of our programmers, Dave, and a PR & Marketing rep, Heather, in person when I visited Logan Utah last week. Incredible people! I spent half of my vacation just sitting around working on Uncharted. Yes, its a bit of an addiction now, but I was able to get out and hit the ski slopes once. Sickness & fatigue made for a failed attempt to hit Jackson Hole, Wyoming for some Uncharted work. Maybe next time.

Beyond that, a few of us spent countless time during ridiculuous hours of the night pondering, pontificating, and yes even debating Uncharted's future. Sometimes this project can seem to be quite the bear, but the momentum is really picking up and we're feeling it. Design is preparing files to send to our programmers while everyone on the team is submitting their feedback on the features, look, feel and interactivity. Oh yes, and its that time of year where our business manager Erin is saving our company from ruin by tackling our taxes. Meanwhile, our leader & computer gurus are telling us the key to our success rests with pink bunnies. That, my friends, is a story for another time.

1st Edition Printed Mag Available

2008-02-22T01:55:00.008-07:00

We successfully started printing magazines in addition to publishing online. Our first shot at it looks great! I can't wait to get my hands on later editions. We figured it would be cool to offer this first edition to the public on a limited basis to make owning this 1st issue more special to those that hop on the Uncharted bandwagon early. Not only will you be able to immerse yourself in the Uncharted while you're on the computer, but now you can have stories and visuals in the palm of your hand! Here's what the Feb 08 edition cover looks like:

This is a real basic, short, barebones start, but the longer we keep hacking at it the better it will get.

If you'd like to purchase a special 1st edition Uncharted magazine, send a blank e-mail to firstprint@uncharted.net and we'll respond with ordering instructions.

Update on the bigger picture: We have some great interns helping us design the core functionality of the future site. We had a great meeting last week to discuss how we want to make it easier for the users to navigate our site's future content. Our designer, Andrew, created an awesome site map for us. Everything is chugging along.

Uncharted Unleashed!

2008-02-08T08:01:00.001-07:00

We did it!

We set out to get Uncharted public in 2007. In mid December, we met that goal by showing our families and friends and getting search engines to crawl the site. We also executed limited testing during the summer (thank you to everyone who helped with that), but now the whole world can visit http://www.uncharted.net/ to jouney with us. Here's a snapshot of what the site looks like:

Take some time to check it out and let us know what you think. There are features on Alligators in Idaho, hiking the Jewel Basin in Montana, Geocacheing, and more.

We've kept our momentum since the public release in December. We released as http://www.uncharted.us/ but have since acquired the .net URL. Now we're focusing on the next phase, which will make it easier for you to upload content. Slowly but surely the word is getting out and we're making more contacts that are interested in this project. Its been really exciting and I hope I can update you more often.

The biggest thing we need right now is to get the word out about the site and to get everyone's feedback. Some of you have given us some great inputs and we wouldn't be where we are without it. The nice thing about the web is that you can always change and adapt.

I must admit though, that turning an idea into reality on the web is not always the easiest cup of tea to drink! Still, when you look back to my earlier post that shows where we've come from, it truly is exciting.

Logo competition - win $100 to spend at REI

2007-10-19T09:34:00.000-06:00

We need a logo with an "exploration" feel to it. Better yet, something that screams explore, live life, and being immersed, using all the senses. Something that goes with the name Uncharted nicely. It needs emotion. It needs to reflect the feeling you have hiking around Colorado, biking in New Mexico, hang gliding off a cliff in Idaho, etc.. and not just seeing, but also hearing, feeling, smelling, all the senses.

We've had a lot of trouble coming up with something that wraps up the emotion we want to communicate. No, its been a nightmare. Easily the toughest time I've ever had when helping develop an effective logo. Maybe you have our solution. Call it begging, fine. We need a frigg'n logo!

Just reply to this message and post an image or link for your proposal, or shoot us an e-mail. The winner of the proposal will get a $100 gift certificate to REI.

I'm excited to see what you might propose. Good luck!

Uncharted programming underway

2007-10-16T17:56:00.000-06:00

Now the tough part... programming! We've been discovering how cool it is to come up with great ideas, but also how painfully challenging it is to translate those ideas into reality. Especially with some of the challenges Joomla presents to the non-techies on the team (ahem.. that would be me). The learning curve is steep but everyday we're making progress bit by bit. Sweet persistence.

Our programmer is the bread and our designer is the butter of this creation. (Note - our designer would really dig that analogy since he is a food maniac and we're all expecting he'll be our lead contributor to the food section.) Our fate rests in their hands! I'm sure they'll introduce themselves here eventually, but for right now they are pretty busy plugging away and its no easy task.

Here's their first concept for the framework of the new design. Nostalgic! We've already improved upon this, but we're mostly sticking with what you see as the foundation.

Now just imagine all the spaces filled with picturesque scenes of mountains, trails, ski slopes and off the beaten path surprises, and bam! You have a better idea what it will look like. I know, I know. Pretty lame to ask you to imagine. All I can say is its coming and I'm just as anxious as you, and hey, I didn't have to post any of this to start with.

Sneak Peak Teaser - pics and audio

2007-10-04T21:29:00.000-06:00

Here's something that we threw together to give a sneak peak at some of the photos and type of content we'll be posting later this year in the new release. It takes a little while to load. We have figured out how to make sure content like this loads much faster, so no worries for our future content.

My favorite part of the teaser is the photo and audio from the Wind Caves located in Logan Canyon, Utah. Other photos were taken at the Snake River & Shoshone Falls, Idaho, and Great Salt Lake and Bear Lake, Utah. I wish I could take as good of pics as some of these guys on our team. I'm just the communications guy... anything I take that is good happens purely by luck!

Enjoy the teaser!

And by all means let me know what you think so far.

Let the Adventure Begin!

2007-04-23T11:01:00.000-06:00

...or, let it begin again. Over a year ago someone talked me into helping build a website for people that like the outdoors, active lifestyle, and the likes. That person was my friend who is a Pulitzer finalist. This same friend talks me into doing a lot of stuff I probably shouldn't do, like going on trips to Nicaragua. Yes. I was hesitant despite his professional background. Interestingly, the idea actually started up as a printed publication, and here we are one year later paying a programmer to build an innovative website.

So now its time to start a new adventure... to share the Uncharted adventure with everyone. Everything about the site was designed to help people like us explore new places and experiences, share those experiences with others, and highlight the magnificence of some of the greatest places in the world. We first published Uncharted back in 2006, and have since then been working on more improvements. Uncharted's 2007 revision will be awesome and I'm amazed how incredible this team is.

I'll keep you posted on this adventure every step of the way. As a brief intro, I'm the Communications Director and a founding member of Great Divide Media, LLC, and I work full time in an International Affairs career. I graduated from Utah State University in Logan UT with a BA in Communications and minors in International Studies and Chinese... and yes, I do speak Chinese. I've traveled to over 30 nations on 4 continents. I worked as a Media Relations Rep for the Salt Lake Organizing Committee (SLOC) for the 2002 Olympic Winter Games. I am a licensed pilot, and way too many hobbies to list. Name one and I bet I do it or at least am willing to try! That's me.

Going back to Nicaragua... in the end it turned out to be a blast. We took the risk of going to a crazy place, discovered places that hardly anyone knows about, and now the experiences are priceless. That's exactly why I'm spending countless hours helping to build Uncharted. I hope I can help other people find great friends and info like I've been able to which make life an adventure. Stay plugged in here and I'll keep you posted on our happenings. Come back and visit this blog and share it with any of your friends who might be interested. I look forward to meeting all of you!