PinkFloydActuary's VirtualTourist Home Page

I never was one of those clever people who could come up with a great screen name, so I simply melded the name of my favorite band with my chosen profession, and there you go! As far as I know, it's a dorky enough choice that nobody else uses it across the Web, so if you see it elsewhere, there's a good chance it's me.

For those of you who love Floyd as much as me, I try to slide a reference in here and there (such as the title of this page), I hope you enjoy them!

If I had unlimited resources (and a little more writing talent), I'd simply travel all the time and write about this wonderful planet. I'm sure lots of folks here feel that way too.

My top goal is to see all of the national parks. Some of the remote parks in Alaska will make that a stretch, so my more realistic goal is to get all of those in the continental US. So far, I would say my favorite is Yellowstone, by a mile. I hope to get back to there and spend a little more time exploring it in even greater detail.

My favorite spot is Las Vegas - I'm not sure if there are two more polarized favorite vacation destinations than a National Park and Las Vegas, but I love them both. 2008 brought my 18th visit to Vegas, and again I was amazed at how much there was I hadn't seen before.

I'm of the mindset of seeing a little of everything and then going back to see places we like in depth. I'd like to hit a little more in the southwest in the upcoming years (Big Bend, Guadalupe Mountains, Carlsbad Caverns and Saguaro.) The Vegas trips have been too few and far between lately, I hope to get back soon to see the four new casinos since my last visit. Starting to look like Vegas may end up being my only other trip this year...

I'm closing in on having visited at least a little of every state. There are just 4 left on the list: Rhode Island, Delaware, Alaska and Hawaii.

The spring road trip was our make-up of the gas shortage lost southeast trip - we saw Shiloh, the Little River Canyon (Fort Payne, AL), and Congaree among others. Pages for these, as well as Columbia, SC and Chickamauga Battlefield are now up.

The actuary conference was in Toronto this year - my Niagara Falls page is now up, and I also have completed my Toronto page.

I still need to get some things up there about Gurnee. I hope I can go out and get some pictures from around town one of these days....

Since I've only ventured outside the US once, and that was into Canada, I probably don't have as diverse of a set of experiences to choose from. However, that doesn't stop me from having my 12 favorite destinations in alphabetical order (I couldn't decide who wouldn't make the cut anymore):

1) Acadia National Park - the whole Maine coast is fantastic, and the few hours spent here weren't close to being enough
2) Arches National Park - the trails, the scenery, one of the best
3) The Black Hills of South Dakota - so many wonderful natural sites and mountain-side monuments
4) Bryce Canyon National Park- the best park outside of Yellowstone
5) Crater Lake National Park- You'll never see a prettier shade of blue
6) Devils Tower National Monument- Close Encounters of the cool scenery kind
7) Glacier National Park - Alone with the bears and this Montana beauty
8) Las Vegas - Never a dull moment after more than a dozen visits. Always something new
9) Multnomah Falls- The whole Columbia River Gorge is something spectacular, and this is the crown jewel
10) Olympic National Park- So many different landscapes - something for everyone
11) Yellowstone National Park- I'm already planning out for the next trip out there
12) Yosemite National Park- As beautiful as advertised.