About Me

Why “The Wandering Developer”..?

Simply put, I love to travel and spend time in the outdoors. I count myself lucky to live in a place where the outdoors is easily accessible and to have a circle of friends and family that share that same desire. While I love me some technology I feel in order to achieve some balance in life I need to “unplug” once and a while.

What Is Your Development Experience..?

Most of my development experience is rooted in web development. While I was in school pursuing a degree in computer science, the world wide web was in its infancy. Creating websites was kind of a “new thing” so I started investigating what this “new thing” was all about. I also studied art during my college years and the combination of art (mostly Photoshop for UI design) and programming that went into creating web pages and websites really resonated with me.

After graduating I landed a job with Compaq Computers (remember them..?) and started my journey with Microsoft web technologies and Active Server Pages (ASP). ASP evolved into ASP.NET and I eventually gained a lot of experience developing web applications with the .NET Framework using the C# programming language.

Fast forward to today and I’m still primarily using C# but in more than just web applications. A few years ago I discovered the Unity3D Game Engine and I’ve had a great time learning game development. I’ve always been a gamer (starting with the Atari 2600) and all the different aspects of game development (art, sound, programming, etc.) is resonating with me the same way web development did all those years ago.

I’ve also jumped aboard Microsoft’s cross-platform train and have migrated to using mostly .NET Core in more recent projects. Watching Microsoft fully embrace open-source and leaving behind the “Windows Only” mentality has been such a breath of fresh air.

Where Have You Wandered..?

I’ve enjoyed wandering both within the United States as well as internationally. I grew up in the Great Lakes area so Canada (Niagara Falls & Toronto) was always a short drive away. My parents travel to Cancun, Mexico every year so there’s been a couple of years I’ve tagged along to enjoy the “touristy resort” experience. I’ve also been to Maui, Hawaii for that same experience. However, it’s the “non vacation resort” kind of trips that I find the most memorable. Here’s some of my favorites (in no particular order)…

• Twenty two days hiking along the Via Dinarica in The Balkans. The trip started in Solvenia and took us through Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Kosovo and finished in Albania. Most of the time was spent in the mountains, however, we did get to spend some leisure time in places such as the town of Bled and the cities of Mostar, Sarajevo, Prizren and Tirana.

• Ten days in the Alaskan Arctic rafting down the Kongakut River. Bush planes in and bush planes out. Look up “the middle of nowhere” and this is probably listed. Caribou, wolves and bears, oh my..!

• Hiked the Berg Lake Trail by Mount Robson in British Columbia. The hike was about (a’boot) 14 miles and some change from the trailhead to the campsite. Spent 4 days/3 nights camping and hiking around the area.

• Iceland twice. First time was my honeymoon and we circled the whole island in two weeks. Did some ice climbing on a glacier and took a zodiac boat out on the Jökulsárlón lagoon. The second trip was to experience New Years in Reykjavík and do some ice caving, which was something we wanted to do on the first trip but couldn’t due to the caves not being accessible.

• A week and a half in Ireland to attend a wedding in Kilkenny. The wedding just so happened to be the same week as St. Patricks Day so my wife and I got to experience Dublin on St. Patricks Day. After the wedding we drove up to Northern Ireland visiting the Giant’s Causeway and spending some time in and around Derry.

• Two weeks in New Zealand and being able to visit both islands. My wife (girlfriend at the time) and I went as far north as Cape Rienga on the north island down to Milford Sound on the south island, staying in hostels all along the way.

• Multiple trips taken down to the southern part of Utah to hike, camp and “unplug”. Capitol Reef National Park, Zion National Park, Arches National Park, Canyonlands National Park, Bryce Canyon and Grand Staircase-Escalante just to name a few.