Items

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  2022-01-04

  Travel and Tourism Post-Pandemic

  For the majority of the Covid lockdowns, I lived with two of my best friends in an apartment in Fayetteville, Arkansas. This occurred while I was finishing my senior year of college. I did not do much long distance traveling prior to this, but the pandemic gave me a desire to travel to my friends and me. So, once travel restrictions started to lift we planned a trip to Zion National Park in Utah, a place all of us wanted to go beforehand. We spent New Years Day traveling and spent the first week of January 2022 in freezing cold temperatures in Utah (as it made the camp site rental prices shoot way down.) It's a trip that still comes to mind frequently as I enjoyed it immensely. The attached photo is of the four of us atop Angel's Landing, one of the more famous hiking spots in the park. While Covid negatively affected much, the desire to travel more is something I am very grateful to have obtained.
• 2020-03-14

  Pandemic Road Trip

  During Spring Break of 2020, I was making a twenty hour road trip, from Fort Worth, Texas to Orlando, Florida to visit friends and family. At this point, rumors of COVID spreading were in the air, but the majority of people will still ignorant to how much the pandemic would effect our daily lifestyles. After arriving at my Great Aunt's home, I prepared for bed and got some rest to be ready for a day of walking at Disney World. The following morning, March 14, when my family and I arrived at Disney, we had never seen the park so empty. No one is any lines. Restaurants were completely open, and it was probably the best experiences I will have at Disney, and I am okay with that. The following morning, March 15, we started receiving updates that the nation would be shut down due to the issue of the COVID-19 pandemic. This immediately prompted the question of, "Who is going to pick up your cousin from New York?" Being that my family was in Texas, and I was in Florida, I was the closest relative to drive to pick her up. By 4 hours..... At 4am, on the morning of the 16th, I started another 20 hour drive from Orlando to Upstate, New York. At this point, I have had enough of being in the car, but the good news is, I got to help my cousin move out of her dorm room and make a 22 hour road trip the next morning... Driving across with my cousin is not for weak of heart, but we were able to safely venture back to Texas after passing through the snowy Appellation Mountains, several torrential rainstorms, and . I am thankful that we traversed the country safely and without getting sick. This is still one of the coolest road trips I have ever taken.
• 
  2020-07-20

  COVID in Army Life

  This shows a unique aspect of the pandemic becoming a terrifying unknown to soldiers in training during the Pandemic. With no connection whatsoever to the outside world, we had no idea what we were dealing with when in came to COVID. It was all speculation. Then as we got to our units we began figuring it out, while simultaneously seeing unique travel restrictions lifted for our operations specifically.