The other day somebody asked me if I felt a connection to Martin Luther King, Jr. The best I could say was that in 1965, five years before I was born, my dad, a Lutheran Minister, marched from Selma to Montgomery along with roughly 24,999 others. Here is the story in his own words. (The excellent documentary footage in the second and third YouTube clips was from a film directed by Stefan Sharff, a now-deceased Columbia University film scholar.)

“It all came about after watching a Sunday night TV show of the police troops on horseback trampling the marchers as they were leaving Selma and crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge. It was a horrendous site. Several of us pastors, from a variety of denominations in the Chicago area, spontaneously felt a strong need to go to Selma and support the non-violent protest march for voter registration and other Civil Rights issues that MLK was leading from Selma to Montgomery. We organized by phone and there were about 12 to 15 of us who assembled on Monday to take the train from Chicago to Birmingham. We were met and briefed in Birmingham by Joe Ellwinger, a Lutheran Pastor, and several others people who were helping to organize the march participants.

On the third day we were bused from Birmingham to join the march. The concern that the march remain nonviolent was repeatedly voiced because of fear of a mass slaughter. Armed National Guard and other troops lined the march route, prepared to dispel any semblance of violence, and helicopters flew continuously overhead. There was significant taunting along the way by people hoping to incite violence. The marchers  continued peacefully, amidst the taunting, singing the songs that had characterized the Civil Rights movement. We continued into Montgomery and assembled at a large field at St Jude surrounded by tanks, armed vehicles, and troops. The attempts to instill violence as we approached St Jude were always met with peaceful passive response. Once the marchers (about 25,000 or more) assembled, the speakers, including MLK, a host of other civil rights leaders, and celebrities, addressed the crowd.

From my own experience during the march the most taunting attempts by people trying to incite violence was by throwing things at us or spitting in our faces. Once the gathering at St Jude had finished, the crowds dispersed and the participants slowly began their return to wherever they had come from.

Upon returning to Chicago I received a significant amount of hate mail and threats. (A photo of our group had appeared in the Chicago Tribune as we departed for Selma.) One particular threat I recall was when I was making a house call in the neighborhood of our church and the woman who answered the door said:

“Oh, aren’t you one of them who was in that picture? It’s a good thing my husband isn’t home because he would kill you.”

I received several other pieces of mail, many with copies of the newspaper photo, indicating that I should be shot just like James Reeb. (That was a reference to a pastor who was shot). As I remember the responses continued for a month or more but then slowly diminished.

As for my personal fear I recall being very fearful throughout the march hoping that the marchers in such numbers could remain nonviolent. We stood no chance if violence erupted. Also as we assembled in mass at St Jude realizing that someone with significant hatred and prejudice could wipe out so many people at one time. It was also disconcerting as I returned to Chicago wondering how or when someone might like to express their feelings in a violent manner.”

This is what the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources web page advises:

When is ice safe?

There really is no sure answer. You can’t judge the strength of ice just by its appearance, age, thickness, temperature, or whether or not the ice is covered with snow. Strength is based on all these factors — plus the depth of water under the ice, size of the water body, water chemistry and currents, the distribution of the load on the ice, and local climatic conditions.

There is no such thing as 100 percent safe ice.

Thanks for clearing up the ambiguities, Mr. DNR. This morning the temperature was -17, plenty cold for “spontaneous nucleation,” and all the other chemical reactions scientists say have to take place for lake ice to properly form. It looks solid. And there’s even a thin layer of snow, making the lake almost perfect for skate skiing. But what day do I finally take that leap of faith, click into my skis, and start gliding? Your guess is as good as mine.

In daylight hours my conscious brain knows that the southern border of Mexico is far less dangerous than the northern border. I also know that Chiapas recently received a United Nations award for being the safest state in the country and that, of the 22.5 million tourists who visit Mexico every year, very few are harmed. But late-night fright had set in and I couldn’t exactly cozy up to a few statistics.

The bang was loud, but apparently not loud enough to wake anyone else in camp. After staring into the white bunting of my mosquito net for about an hour, I let the rush of the swollen Lacantún River lull me back to sleep.

At breakfast the next morning my guide, Antonio del Rosal, shed light on the mystery crash. There had been so much rain over the past few days, he told me, that a waterlogged tree fell over—a logical explanation in a jungle known for its towering Ceiba trees, some of which are more than 500 years old.

I was relieved, but I also felt a little stupid. I was in Mexico to attend the ATTA World Summit, an annual conference that brings together more than 600 tour operators, outfitters, tourism officials, and journalists from more than 50 countries. One reason the summit was in Chiapas this year was to spread the word to world travelers that the vast majority of Mexico is far less dangerous than the international press makes it out to be. Even President Felipe Calderon dropped in to deliver that message.

“Yes, we have problems,” President Calderon told a packed auditorium in San Cristobal de las Casas the Tuesday after the tree crashed. “But we are a courageous people…and a country of great natural and cultural wealth…and it’s in our nature to be a friend to the world…I wish with all my heart to be better providers of tourism.”

Based on my ten or so visits to Mexico over the past 20 years, I agree with President Calderon.  I love Mexico–especially Chiapas, with its evergreen forests, colonial cities, rolling green mountains, surreal celebrations, and Mayan ruins.

Yes, Mexico has problems. But they aren’t as widespread as the press makes them out to be. For those who want to see for yourselves, heed this open invitation from President Calderon: “Esta es tu casa. This is your home. We mean it.”

It’s hot in Devil’s Kitchen. Too hot to sleep. But if I have to have insomnia, It’s nice to have it while lying in a tent in Canyonlands National Park while staring into the Milky Way. Out here I can remember what I love about my country—namely, wide open spaces and freedom. Out here the 2012 Presidential Campaign is trapped in far away TVs, Facebook updates are impossible, the stock market can’t save my life, and my only concern is whether we’ll have enough water to hike out tomorrow. When life is this simple I can turn to the impractical questions: How does a person form “convictions?” If convictions are formed by personal experience, how can one president align the convictions of 307 million Americans? Did Milan Kundera get the concept for the “Unbearable Lightness of Being” from Leo Tolstoy’s concept of “lightness of being” in “War and Peace?”  Wouldn’t it be cool if there were lions in Canyonlands? Will I ever sleep again?

That sums up my dad’s philosophy, which is why he framed the line from “The Wind in the Willows” and hung it in his bathroom. Dad’s love for boats goes way back: He bought his first sailboat from an old college chaplain with a bottle of scotch.

The reason Dad loves boats is that they make fishing more fun. So last Sunday, we portaged the canoe into Trout, a pristine BWCA lake, to fish for walleye, which makes the perfect sandwich.

My mom and I paddled while Dad trolled for walleye. In less than five minutes he was reeling in a bass—which he eventually caught and released because he can’t stand their wormy filets. Another five minutes later, he reeled in another bass. Then another. It went this way until lunchtime, at which point we landed the canoe at a campsite, sat on a slab of granite sloping into the water, and ate turkey sandwiches. After lunch we paddled the opposite shoreline while my mom and I scanned the Norway Pines for bald eagles and my dad laughed like a kid and reeled in bass.

Last Saturday I was on a ten-hour flight from Madrid to Dallas, in seat 31C of a Boeing 767 that was spewing more carbon dioxide than I knew how to compute. To distract myself from my poor math skills, I opened the Summer 2011 issue of “OnEarth,” published by the Natural Resources Defense Council and, for the fun of it, started underlining facts and statistics, starting with the Table of Contents.

Fact Number One: “New York City spends more than $1 million per day dumping its trash in nearby states.”

Fact Number Two: “…82,000 chemicals are now loose in our environment—in toys and clothes, furniture and appliances—and only a tiny percentage has been tested for safety.”

Fact Number 13: “Every day a billion gallons of wastewater and storm water flow from California into the ocean bringing along heavy metals, pharmaceuticals, pesticides, and other contaminants.”

Fact Number 30: “Detroit is America’s poorest large city, with a third of its citizens living in poverty.”

I gave up my game after Fact Number 31 because I became engrossed in Paolo Bacigalupi’s review of “Welcome to the Greenhouse,” a short story collection of 16 science fiction writers who share their dystopian versions of life after humanity has wreaked havoc on the environment.

“Our lives here and now have become historical—a snapshot sepia-tone moment between the way things were before and the way they will be after,” Bacigalupi writes. “But where are we going? And how might a storyteller engage with it?”

That’s the trillion-dollar question. As the earth lumbers toward seemingly irreversible climate change with very serious repercussions how does a journalist engage in that reality while still trying to maintain a sense of hope, wonder, and awe in what still exists?

Despite the carbon my mode of transportation emitted, I still found plenty of wonder in Spain—in the rolling Basque countryside, the cathedrals of San Sebastian, and the kindness of nearly everyone I met. How much did my trip contribute to the demise of the planet? I don’t know. I, like everyone who willingly steps onto a plane, am still in denial.

Last week I traveled to Costa Rica for the first time. Curious to experience the full effect of the jungle, I took a walk by myself on a lodge trail in a thick and wild part of the Osa Peninsula. My feet crunched along to chirps, caws, roars, and howls. At one point I crossed paths with a black and yellow five-foot-long snake. With my limited knowledge of herpetology, I thought I was walking straight into the jaws of a Fer-de-lance. But this snake wasn’t a Fer-de-lance. (It was a relatively harmless tiger rat snake.) And it didn’t kill me. Neither did the jaguars that still roam freely throughout this jungle corridor. It was oddly comforting, however, to be in a place so wild that the possibility still exists.

I celebrate the sun by taking a run. In Stockholm, that’s easy. From the Clarion Hotel Sign, a sleek centerpiece of Scandinavian architecture, I head down the Kungsgatan to the Kungsholms Strand, a recreation path that follows the placid water of the Barnhusviken. I run past pale blooms sprouting on the willow trees, teak houseboats, and normally stoic Swedes who can’t hide their happiness that spring has finally arrived. Afterward, I find a hanging bubble chair on the Clarion’s rooftop deck that twists toward views of centuries-old church spires and listen to the lyrics of the lounge music—”You make me want to tell the whole world about love….” But, really, today I just want to tell the whole world about Sweden.

Last week while reporting a story in Miami I spent a day on a 46-foot dive boat in the Gulf of Mexico observing (and supposedly “helping”) Neil Hammerschlag and his crew of PhD students and undergrads tag sharks. The director of the R.J. Dunlap Marine Conservation Program, Hammerschlag, 31, is the youngest professor at the University of Miami and operates the largest shark-tagging program on the East Coast. By attaching real-time satellite tags to approximately 60 sharks’ fins, Hammerschlag and his crew can constantly track the fish, allowing them to “spy on the secret lives of sharks.”

His findings have been illuminating. “These animals go places where we never thought they’d go,” Hammerschlag says. For example, he found that hammerhead sharks move through the Gulfstream as far north to the same latitude as New York. Researchers previously thought they swam only as far as North Carolina. Hammerschlag has also found prime areas where the sharks feed and breed, which makes them vulnerable to overfishing.

“Sharks are the canary in the coalmine,” says Hammerschlag. “They’re at the top of the food chain, the most feared animal on the planet, and a great celebrity species to lead the charge for conservation.”

To that end Hammerschlag has taken more than 1,000 high school students—many of whom have never stepped foot on a boat—shark tagging to show them the important role sharks play in the ocean’s ecosystem. Before they even leave the shore, he tells them the grim realities the sharks face:

“Today alone, 270,000 sharks will be fished,” he says, “mostly sold to Asian markets for their fins.”

I flew to Managua on Ronald Reagan’s 100th birthday, while halfway around the world an uprising in Egypt was sparking a revolution in the Middle East. It was an ironic start to my reporting trip through Nicaragua, a country best known in the U.S. for the ever-shifting conflict between the Contras and the Sandinistas—a civil war that ended 30 years ago. It’s true that Nicaragua is still volatile, but that has more to do with its volcanoes and earthquakes than politics. (Although Daniel Ortega’s endorsement today of Libya’s Colonel Gaddafi might create a few ripples.)  Politics aside, Nicaragua is one of the safest countries in Latin America right now. Read more about Nicaragua’s slow and sometimes painful metamorphosis in my upcoming November 2011 Outside story. In the meantime, here are a few road-trip snapshots through a magic and tragic landscape.