LightBackpacking.com

My friend Rich helped me get Lightbackpacking.com up and running several months ago and then after getting this fledgling blogger into the air, turned it over to me to make it fly or not.

So, I tune into his blog gpstracklog.com frequently to see what he’s writing about.

Well, seems there is a little virus going around the blogophere with people sharing five things about themselves no one knew before and then they tag five fellow bloggers.

So here goes:

•I’m a member of the Department of Homeland Security….but only as a volunteer member of the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary. And, believe it or not, they now do FBI checks and fingerprints even for civilian volunteers. My main duty is helping maintain a lighthouse (a federal aid to navigation) on the Mendocino Coast. We also focus on boating safety.

•My main hobby besides thinking and talking about and trying out backpacking gear (and backpacking), is photography. My work, primarily nature shots and lately ocean storm photography, sells at several commercial outlets locally.

•I was a really late bloomer when it came to being in the outdoors. Since I wasn’t in Cub Scouts or Boy Scouts and my father died when I was 12, I didn’t take my first backpacking trip until I was 48. First car camps at 42.

•I belong to Rotary International, which helps with international projects like eradicating polio, gives scholarships to local high school kids, dictionaries to third graders and small grants to non-profit community organizations.

•I was a crime reporter for a series of Southern and Northern California newspapers for seven years before becoming a public relations specialist.

So, now I’m tagging some others: fellow ultralight backpackers Joe and Chuck, Ken and Marcia (friends of my backpacking partner “Duke” Ellington and the Point Cabrillo Light Station (nature preserve and historic site)