Daniel Weldon

The goal is to hit them all, but the park I dream of visiting is whichever one I've recently been researching. For me, access to most of the parks in the lower 48 means an easy, possibly long drive. It's those parks on the extreme that really get my eyelids fluttering. Isle Royale. Dry Tortugas. Big Bend. Gates of the Arctic. Wrangell-St. Elias. The parks I've yet to see (and some that I have but not enough of) are what occupy my dreams. I dream big so I will see 'em all. Help me get there!

That's like asking a parent who their favorite child is. I love them all as each one has brought joy into my world. To spotlight a single experience though, it would have to be a 7-week lap around America where I drove through 36 states, saw more than 30 NPS sites, beached on the Pacific, Gulf, and Atlantic coasts, crossed off the 50th state (NE) on my "must run in" list, ate like A. Bourdain and solidified my love of exploration! Maybe I do have a favorite. Shh, don't tell the others.

The first thing I will do with $10,000 is invest in more gear to better document and share my adventures. After that, I'll do the totally rational thing and "blow" the rest on more exploration. 10GRAND would allow me to continue living my dream on the daily to hopefully inspire someone who dreams all week for their weekend adventure. More exploration. More adventure. More dreams to reality.