As summer approaches, the snow pack melts and the rivers fill. So there's no better time to start planning a weekend trip to Central California realistically doable from a Friday afternoon through Sunday evening. more ›

Now with President Barack Obama talking about reinvigorating the econony and the job market, there's been a resurgance of an idea of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's: bringing back the Civilian Conservation Corps, the first "emergency agency" that he established. Now there's talk in Congress of bringing it back as part of Obama's economic stimulus plan, according to the LA Times. more ›

Next time, don't go to Yosemite and bitch about the crowds. Consider a secret little place my family's been vacationing in for years now: Three Rivers. A tiny town in the foothills of the Sequoias, Three Rivers is a pretty idyllic little spot, and home to many families, artists, and musicians. In short, it has a lot of character. Highway 198 runs right through the middle of it, up to Kings Canyon, a 462,901 acre national park; Lake Kaweah yields three forks of the Kaweah River that give the town its name and splits it up into sections known as "North Fork" and "South Fork". more ›