Wyoming Archives - National Parks With T

Welcome back to National Parks and other public lands with T! On a regular basis, we’ll feature favorite photos or stories from a friend in the National Park community. Are you a National Park fan with a favorite you think would be great for this series? Send me a private message through the contact section of this blog!

About these photos»

Place: Yellowstone National Park
Date: 2017
Photo Credit: Don (The Beerchaser)
Why they are some of my favorites: If I had to choose our most memorable park visit, it might be Yellowstone. My wife and I visited it together in 2017. I had not been back there since I was eleven, when my family including four kids took a camping trip across the US pulling a camping trailer with a 36 horsepower VW bus. We were in the Great Yellowstone Earthquake and fortunately the campground we were supposed to stay in was full as it was the one where the landslide killed a number of people. We stayed at Canyon Village and I still remember the shaking in the middle of the night, the animals howling and a rolling shake the next morning when I was sitting on a rock and the trees and power poles started swaying.
Editor’s Note: The 1959 Hebgen Lake Earthquake in Montana caused a massive landslide, killing 28 people.

Meet Don from The Beerchaser»

One of my initial retirement goals in 2011 was to eventually have a beer at every neighborhood tavern or brewery in Portland— and to blog about the experience. So a few months after retiring, with some help from my tech-savvy son-in-law, I started the blog.

By August 2012, I had reviewed 23 bars – all in Portland except one in Port Towsend, Washington. With one exception which was somewhat disappointing, all establishments were great to visit. This validated my premise that each bar or pub has an interesting history and distinguishing characteristics.

With retirement travel, the “journey” expanded. We started hitting bars in Europe, Alaska, various parts of the US from the Southeast to Montana and Wyoming and Oregon’s coast and desert country. Almost nine years later, I have visited and reviewed 375 watering holes. With 125 of them Portland area establishments and another 250 outside the City of Roses.

Each quarter, I also select an individual or group as my Beerchaser-of-the-Quarter. These people, almost all of whom I know personally, are military heroes, media personalities, academicians, authors and athletes. They may or may not have anything to do with bars or beer but have an interesting story and have made a contribution to society.

I became involved with the Benedictine Brewery at Mount Angel in 2016 as a member of the Brewery Advisory Committee. I helped set up the business operations as a volunteer before it opened in the fall of 2018. The Benedictine Brewery at Mount Angel is one of only two or three in the US, that is owned by Benedictine Monks and does its development, major production, and taproom service on-site, with monks doing the brewing and running their own operation.

—Written by Don from The Beerchaser