*Please note that, aside from this line and the news feed below, nothing on this page has changed since 2001.

With all this talk of this "internet" thing over the last couple of years, it has come to my attention that millions of people are spending hours of their days just reading through random crap that has nothing to do with their lives. And sadly, despite my unparalleled skill for making up random crap, I have thus far made no contribution to this noble cause of crippling the productivity of web surfers around the world. So here it is, my half-witted attempt to befuddle, confuse, confound, and more or less grind your intellectual activity to a halt. If you have any questions, comments, or ads for male impotence drugs, send them to jeff@villagex.org.

• October 31st - November 14th, 2024: Knocked out a final section of the Camino del Norte before following a couple Eurovelos through France. Read about it here and here.
• August 17th - September 2nd, 2024: Ventured to the San Juans and subsequently to Newfoundland for some very fast and very slow hiking. Read about it here and here.
• June 12th - July 4th, 2024: Attempted to hike the width of Bulgaria, but ran out of cash. Read about it here.
• May 8th - 18th, 2024: Headed for a tiny island in Honduras to drink a lot of smoothies and mostly avoid scuba diving. Read about it here.
• November 30th - December 10th, 2023: Sought out the squiggles in the dense jungles and undulating landscapes of Puerto Rico. Read about it here.
• November 9th - 22nd, 2023: Took a wintertime roll up the Mediterranean Coast, surviving storms and snapped chains. Read about it here.
• October 24th - November 8th, 2023: Recruited much better climbers to set up top ropes for me on an island paradise. Read about it here.
• August 16th - 30th, 2023: Escaped every summer heat wave with a ride through the Baltics. Read about it here.
• July 22nd - 29th, 2023: Inexplicably biked across Iowa a second time, fueled by pie, light beer, and dad rock. Read about it here.
• June 16th - July 2nd, 2023: Met up with Bre to wander erratically around various corners of Europe. Read about it here.
• April 5th - 24th, 2023: Walked from Bilbao to Santiago, betwixt cows and coastal vistas. Read about it here.
• December 1st - 20th, 2022: Ate lots of Turkish delight and occasionally managed to ride a few miles. Read about it here.
• November 7th - 21st, 2022: Hiked the Via Francigena from Lucca to Rome. Read about it here.
• August 4th - 7th, 2022: Made a brief stop in Southwestern Ireland to hike the spectacular Dingle Way. Read about it here.
• July 20th - August 2nd, 2022: Met up with Maggie to hike hut-to-hut in the mountains of Romania and Bulgaria. Read about it here.
• July 7th - 19th, 2022: Bought another bike and rode 700 miles along a couple of Eurovelo routes in Northern Europe. Read about it here.
• January 19th - February 5th, 2022: With the forecast holding steady, couldn't resist walking another few hundred miles north of Lisbon. Read about it here.
• January 11th - 17th, 2022: Took advantage of unusually warm, sunny weather in southwestern Portugal to hike along the coast for a week. Read about it here.
• December 31st, 2021 - January 4th, 2022: Ducked down to the Yucatan to dodge the Omicron spike and ride a 5-day loop around cenotes, haciendas, and Mayan ruins. Read about it here.
• November 10th - 14th, 2021: Went on a magical paddling adventure through a Utah canyon with old friends and a bucket of poop. Read about it here.
• August 24th - September 5th, 2021: Delaying my return to heat, smoke, and the Delta variant by churning out miles on two more Eastern European Eurovelo routes. Read about it here.
• August 15th - 23rd, 2021: Stayed relatively faithful to a mountainous bikepacking route in western Slovenia. Read about it here.
• October 5th - 19th, 2020: Bikepacking through the Balkans in the time of Covid. Read about it here.
• September 6th - September 22nd, 2020: Took a break from my apartment office and worked from some of the larger cities south of the border. Read about it here.
• September 9th - September 22nd, 2019: Backpacking with dad around South Korea, eating more than the daily recommended allowance of fermented cabbage. Read about it here.
• June 30th - July 19th, 2019: Eating a lot of cheesy bread products in mountain villages througout Georgia and Azerbaijan. Read about it here.
• March 20th - April 20th, 2019: Visiting a few dozen Village X projects by the most difficult means possible. Read about it here.
• February 23rd - March 13th, 2019: Riding way too many overnight buses through the milder climes of South America. Read about it here.
• January 22nd - February 12th, 2019: Biking through remote Cambodian villages whilst waving to smiling children. Read about it here.
• October 29th - November 2nd, 2018: Ventured beyond the known bounds of the European continent to the country that doesn't exist. Read about it here.
• October 17th - 29th, 2018: Vastly underestimated The Netherlands in my attempt to casually bike its circumference in a week. Read about it here.
• October 3rd - 14th, 2018: Ate way too many meals at 7/11 and hiked up a few mountains in-between. Read about it here.
• August 23rd - 27th, 2018: Biked from Belgrade to Budapest. Read about it here.
• August 13th - 22nd, 2018: Wandered from Corfu to the Balkans. Read about it here.
• August 10th - 12th, 2018: Connected cheap flights by biking DC to Pittsburgh. Read about it here.
• July 1st - 11th, 2018: Tried biking around the Baltic States and Eastern Europe while working remotely, but ended up a bike and a laptop short. Read about it here.
• January 9th - January 23rd, 2018: Attempted to hike the national trails through Israel and Jordan and discovered that the Middle East is not immune to winter. Read about it here.
• June 20th - July 4th, 2017: Toured Malawi on a Village X scouting trip and danced with villagers to goat herds and boreholes. Read about it here.
• March 27th - April 13th, 2017: Walked a really long way (or three) in Spain and Portugal. Read about it here.
• December 27th - January 27th, 2016: Ventured to the ends of the earth to celebrate New Years with old friends from Florida. Read about it here.
• December 16th - 20th, 2016: Exploring ecotourism opportunities in spite of uncooperative dogs and governments. Read about it here.
• November 8th - December 10th, 2016: Picking off leeches in the jungles of Borneo -- in between trips to the mall. Read about it here.
• August 16th - August 28th, 2016: Learning to love fermented horse milk in Kazak- and Kyrgyzstan. Read about it here.
• August 10th - August 15th, 2016: Spent a few days in Poland and Ukraine to try to learn some Russian before heading east. Read about it here.
• July 29th - August 10th, 2016: Roadtripped with my dad for the first time in a decade to explore the fjords and smorgasbords of Scandinavia. Read about it here.
• July 15th - July 27th, 2016: Scaled cliffs on iron rungs and hiked between high mountain huts in Slovenia and the Italian Dolomites. Read about it here.
• June 18th - July 2nd, 2016: Transported a friend to the northern terminus of the PCT in the most roundabout way possible. Read about it here.
• June 5th - June 15th, 2016: Nearly met up with friends in that city from Game of Thrones, but danced on an Albanian canyon ferry instead. Read about it here.
• April 1st - April 14th, 2016: Took advantage of my ongoing jetlag and still-packed luggage to book another cheap flight to Hong Kong. Read about it here
• March 15th - March 30th, 2016: Slackpacked a bit around Turkey's Lycian Way and the Chemin de Saint Jacques in France. Read about it here.
• December 10th - December 24th, 2015: Sped to and fro along the Amazon and Napo rivers to investigate the suitability of a text messaging system for better access to healthcare. Read about it here.
• November 6th - December 4th, 2014: Spontaneously abandoned my life in Atlanta to motorbike around some Indonesian islands for a month. Read about it here.
• February 27th - March 10th, 2014: Quite nearly climbed to the top of several glaciated volcanoes, descended into the deepest cave in the western hemisphere, and ate somewhere around 62 tacos. Read about it here.
• January 24th - 27th, 2014: Raced around Haiti, exploring caves, seeking out waterfalls, and proving that a month in West Africa did little to improve my French. Read about it here.
• December 12th, 2013 - January 10th, 2014: Crossed the Sahara, as well as more jungly climes, and nearly made it back to map out trails and visit those who were better at Peace Corps than myself. Read about it here.
• June 17th - August 10th, 2013: Nearly made it through training for 'the toughest job I would ever love'. Read about my (much abbreviated) Peace Corps journey here.
• May 5th - May 12th, 2013: Somehow came out not owing several thousand in damages on a Mazda 3 we scraped across every speedbump in Guatemala. Read about it here.
• December 16th - December 31st, 2012: Skipped out on Christmas to climb volcanoes and feast on guinea pig. Read about it here.
• March 20th - May 7th, 2012: Motorbiking around southern Africa. Find sporadic updates here.
• April 29th - May 8th, 2011: Led six unsuspecting OARers on an exhausting, whirlwind tour of Nicaragua and Costa Rica (with motorcycles!). Read about it here.
• December 28th - January 9th, 2010: Tried my best to make Haitians understand the bizarre western concept of "hiking" and kickstart an eco-tourism industry. Read about it here.
• October 14th-17th, 2010: Took way too many people to the ancient South American city of Cartagena for a dip in a big tub of mud. Read about it here.
• May 26th - June 13th, 2010: A conference in Crete, reached by the most convoluted route possible. Read about it here.
• April 23rd-27th, 2010: Four days? Sure, that's plenty of time to see three countries. See the story and pictures here.
• March 6th-14th, 2010: Spent a way-too-relaxing spring break in the mountains of Colombia. See the story and pictures here.
• January 22nd-25th, 2010: Gave the Corolla a rest and tackled the wilds of Puerto Rico in a set of highly expendable rental cars. See the story and pictures here.
• December 27th-January 4th, 09-10: Found new and exciting ways to destroy my car south of the border with one of the most epic UF Outdoors Club trips yet. See the story and pictures here.
• November 25th-29th, 2009: Celebrated Thanksgiving with rice, peas, and stewed goat on the profoundly misunderstood isle of Haiti. Read all about it here.
• October 24th-31st, 2009: Flew all the way out to the Pacific Northwest to talk about leveraging the internet for academic collaboration over distance. Read about everything but the conference here.
• August 29th-31st, 2009: Jumped on a last-minute weekend adventure with cousin Piet in the TAG area. Pictures here.
• August 8th-24th, 2009: Tackled nearly every adventure sport imaginable in the grand ol' American Southwest. Details and pictures here.
• July 17th-July 26th, 2009: Spent some of the last weekends of summer on rope in the wilds of Tennessee. Details here.
• May 17th-July 24th, 2009: Joined a research team of civil engineering undergrads to design a sustainable water retention technology for the arid reaches of the Kenyan countryside. Read about it here.
• May 1st-16th, 2009: Burrowed through underground rock churches, scaled the heights of medieval castles, climbed the epic Simien mountains, and rode a lot of ridiculously uncomfortable Ethiopian buses. Read about it here.
• March 6th-17th, 2009: Navigated the labyrinthine souks and hiked the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco, but never managed to eat camel. Read about it here.
• December 31st 2008: So how can you be a starving college student and still travel every time you get a few days off? Here are some ideas.
• December 8th - 17th 2008: Headed for the Mayan empire for more tomb raiding, with a bit of cave swimming and sketchy border crossings thrown in. Story and pictures here.
• August 10th - 23rd 2008: Explored ancient Incan tombs in the heights of the Andes mountains. Story and pictures here.
• June 21st - July 3rd 2008: Scoured the jungles of Panama in search of the elusive capybara. Story and pictures here.
• April 26th - May 8th 2008: Improvised a last minute trip to the wonders of the southeast. Read about it here.
• December 27th (2007) - January 6th (2008): Ventured into the darkest reaches of the Jamaican jungle and lived to write this report.
• October 4th-7th: 12000 caves, 1500 cavers, and one really big fire at the TAG Fall Cave-in - see pictures here.
• August 10th-21st: Heading north to Nova Scotia for some cool-weather hiking/biking - get the story here.
• June 23rd-29th: Visiting the tropical rainforests of Costa Rica in the heart of the rainy season - see all the sodden critters we spotted here.
• January 8, 2007: UF WINS NATIONAL FOOTBALL CHAMPIONSHIP! GO GATORS!!!
• December 27, 2006: So oft deprived of a proper Christmas in Florida, Andie and I set out to the west to find snow, reindeer, and adventure! Read about it here.
• October 10, 2006: Paddling the picturesque waters of Wekiwa Springs with the beautiful and resilient Andrea Sell. Learn what not to bring on a canoe trip here.
• Jun 25, 2006: Commencing crazy road trip to the remotest ends of the continent. Watch for updates here.
• May 8, 2006: Descended into the grimiest bowels of the earth and hiked to the frosty heights of the AT with the UF outdoors club; read all about it here
• December 15, 2005: Returned home alive after travelling to all the darkest corners of the earth. Read all about my crazy year-long trip here
• November 11-12, 2004: Went sea kayaking out at Cape Canaveral and shared a small island with about 13 million blood-sucking locals
• November 4, 2004: Discovered how much fun it can be to destroy a perfectly good bike at the San Felasco trails.
• November 4, 2004: Barely survived UF's clever attempt to kill me at the Lake Wauburg Adventure Race
• October 22-23, 2004: Experienced the joy of underwater camping while scuba diving the Florida Keys.
• August 20, 2004: Finished another term at IBM and drove 17 hours back to Gainesville to try the college thing for the first time in 20 months.
• August 7, 2004: Hung out with the dregs of society to watch Black Sabbath and Judas Priest at Ozzfest.
• June 21-28, 2004: Skipped work to spend a week diving in the tropical paradise of cozumel. Report and pictures (updated) here.
• May 30, 2004: Went boating on Lake Travis with several people who had never been on the water before; bought a new propeller for the boat rental place.
• May 16, 2004: Front and center for a Styx/Peter Frampton concert in San Antonio. "I thought that they were angels but to my surprise they climbed aboard their starship and headed for the skies"
• May 8, 2004: Came out of retirement to run the Chuy's Hot-to-Trot 5K. Defeated Elvis and a giant fish to get a nearly decent time of 19:30.
• April 22, 2004: See the world's largest paperweights at the petrified forest. Pictures. (fixed)
• April 21, 2004: The Grand Canyon - pretty cool place - check out pictures here.
• April 20, 2004: The Death Car strikes again on the road to Death Valley. Check out these pictures of my once beautiful Corolla.
• April 17-18, 2004: Starting out on the road to Austin, we run into a couple of fairly impressive rocks and trees; check out the story and pictures here.
• April 16, 2004: World's most "extreme" internship comes to an end; now it's on to the next adventure.
• April 9-11, 2004: Attempted to see all of L.A. on foot in 2 days... how big can one city really be? Pictures here. (story forever lost in abnormally bad computer crash - refer to Death Valley link)
• April 6, 2004: Attempted to rollerblade down mountain. See scars here.
• 4-4-04 (I'm amused by simple things -- it's going to be a crazy Cinco de Mayo next year): Went back to San Francisco, climbed up a few hills, went sailing at Berkeley; pictures here
• April 3, 2004: Managed to go through Napa and Sonoma Valleys without drinking a drop of wine (no easy task, it's practically in the tap water), pictures here
• March 27, 2004: Went to San Francisco today - story, pictures here