About This Site

How did I organize this site?

As I was putting this site together I found myself channeling my inner OCd. That's OC with a little 'd' which I gladly give full credit for defining to Matt and Karen Smith of the Dear Bob and Sue National Park travel books. (If you haven't read them, order them now and you won't regret it!) Over time (and a ridiculous amount of re-orgs) I finally settled on the current format.

You'll find my adventures broken down by regions as aligned with the Eastern National Park Passport Program books as well as by State. Within each of those adventures you'll find pictures, stories, and stamps from each of my stops.

How did I snag copies of retired or lost stamps?

Now, if you're a serious Stamp Hunter, then you know that there are a LOT of retired and lost stamps out there. My OCd makes me want to collect them all (I won't even get into my Star Wars Collection). Sadly, with so many stamps lost the great cosmos (or forced to be returned to Eastern National for any number of reasons), it's impossible to collect all the variations in person. Therefore, I have taken to internet hunting for images of old and retired stamps to add to the collection. Yes, I could just collect all the stamps from places like Jack Mount's Nostalgia Stamp site or the National Park Traveler's Club, but honor prohibits me from just doing that. Besides, the hunt is the real fun. However, if I have visited the park, monument, historical site, etc - then I figure I've 'earned' the stamp and all it's variations. Then I use a great photo editing application named Gimp to align the date of the digital stamp with the date of when I actually visited the location and to match any stamps I earned in person.

Why don't I have pictures for every place I've stopped?

If I had made a plan for what I was doing when I started traveling and collecting in 2001, I would have an excellent assortment of photos to go with every stamp I've ever collected.

  • The official signs

  • Views from where I found them

  • Photos of the locations

  • GPS coordinates and specific addresses of where I found every single stamp

It rattles me quite a bit to know I didn't collect all these things from the beginning. However, I've also had to accept that I'm never going to make it to every single site if I also worry about backtracking to every single stop I've already made, so there are gaps. There will probably be more gaps going forward, but I'm going to do my best now that I have this site as motivation to track my adventures more effectively. There are also stamps located in places where there just isn't much to see. National Heritage and Scenic Trails often have stamps located at individual county visitor centers and there isn't often much to take a picture of to 'remember' the place.

How do I plan my adventures and decide where to go next?

Living in the greater DMV (DC, Maryland, Virginia) area, I plan my trips basically in a giant circle spiraling out. Ideally, my goal is to finish states and regions when time allows. I've been trying to 'finish' Virginia for a very long time but there always seems to be just one more stamp to locate. The next challenge is that once I know where a stamp is, the hours of availability aren't always the easiest (there's one in Virginia that is open seasonally, only on Sundays from noon to 4pm).

At this point it takes a good amount of planning for a stamp/park hunting trip.

  • Google maps to estimate drive time

  • Websites to confirm dates and times of availability

  • Phone calls to make sure they're actually open (or if they even still have a stamp)

  • Identifying how many 'mini' stops there are between where I'm starting and the major park or site I'm heading towards

  • Estimating how long I may be at each stop - will there be much to see? learn? tour? hike?

  • Is the family coming with me? (3 kids adds a significant amount of cushion between and at stops)