Travel

Medicine As Currency For Peace: How Global Health Funding Could Change The World (Forbes)

Forbes | I first met the virus as a young surgical resident in training. I read the initial 1981 report of five people in California who died of a mysterious, unnamed disease. The virus outsmarted and outran us. The first year, we watched helplessly as a few hundred people died. The next year, a few thousand,…

Notes from the Road: Hadza and Clean Water

Tracy and I are in Africa for two-weeks: Tanzania, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Kenya. The trip will bring together work from Hope Through Healing Hands (global community health) and The Nature Conservancy (intersection nature and health) in conjunction with Pathfinder International (global women’s health). As chairman of Hope Through Healing Hands, I will explore how we can globally impact peoples’ well-being and…

Notes From The Road: Bob Marshall Log, August 2017

Notes From The Road | The Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex consists of three wilderness areas in Montana totaling over 1.5 million acres. Located in the northern Rocky Mountains along the Continental Divide, the region is as primitive as any found in the United States outside of Alaska. It’s also diverse, encompassing the dry and open…

Retreating From Global Leadership Puts America at Risk

The 2016 presidential campaign is well under way, and the candidates are already jousting over who is best suited to respond to an increasing number of obstacles abroad, ranging from the refugees crisis in Europe and the Middle East, to the threat of ISIS, to Russian aggression under President Vladimir Putin. As Democrats and Republicans,…

In Search of the Family Doctor

Over the course of three visits to Cuba in the past year I have learned much about this nation, its people, its art, and its healthcare system.  We’ve toured polyclinics, hospitals, and medical schools. I’ve met with professors and medical students.  We’ve gotten the government’s healthcare statistics and double checked those with providers on the…

Hector Frank and a New Opportunity for Cultural Unity

Last October, Tracy and I visited Cuba and got an up close view of the country, the people, and their challenges. I’ve written about my impressions of their healthcare structure–in many ways woefully lacking, but with some surprising lessons for us in America. What I didn’t write quite as much about was the art. We found…

Notes from the Road: Hong Kong

I’m in Hong Kong right now attending some financial meetings and touring some infrastructure projects. It’s been an eye-opening trip so far. Today in a financial meeting, one of the smartest participants is an historian, a student of thousands of years of Chinese history. He observed: “The era of a Dynasty always begins with low…

Notes From the Road: A Big Picture Impression of Cuba

Two weeks ago, I was in Cuba as part of a healthcare delegation to learn more about the country as a whole and its healthcare system in particular on a “people-to-people” trip. Cuba is a land of heterogeneity and chaos: an amalgam of cultures, colors, tastes, and textures. Wifi access there is severely limited, so…

Retrospective on Rwanda

I’ve been home from Rwanda and Kenya only a few days and I’m already on another flight, heading back to Aspen, this time for the Aspen Ideas Festival Spotlight: Health, co-sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. It’s on flights that I have time to reflect on a few takeaways, drawn from the myriad impressions…

Fishing in Alaska

European Summer Travels 2013

Copenhagen, Denmark The statue of the Little Mermaid who gazes longingly out to sea from her rock to the harbor.  Copenhagen is one of the most historic cities in the Baltic region; loved exploring the 850 years of recorded history.             Helsinki, Finland Missed the all-year round Igloo hotel, but…

Aspen with Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson

Spent the other day at the Aspen Institute in beautiful surroundings with my former colleague Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson discussing health and defense strategy.

Bike Ride Through Kadriorg Park, Estonia

Rode bikes with Mary and Lee through Kadriorg Park, Estonia, site of Peter the Great’s Summer Palace, and then went by the President’s Palace.  Apparently he is a Princetonian but I did not see the orange and black flag flying that day (wonder if he was at reunions?  Finally to romantic Old Town to see…

Biking in Estonia

Biking in Tallin, Estonia with Sister Mary and Lee on cobblestone streets with cozy nooks amidst romantic towers

California Cycling

I finished my 75 mile ride from San Francisco to the Red Woods near the Russian River.  Now, it is time to enjoy nature and great conversation.  

LeConte Adventures

Tennessee features some of the most exquisite landscape on the planet, and I recently made the hike up to the LeConte Lodge in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.   Waking up at Zoder’s in Gatlinburg, saying “Hi” to Cesar the parrot, who has been here 31 years and says “Hello!” back to me each…

Tour of the new URS-designed Caterpillar plant

I sit on the board of the giant engineering company URS, so today Karyn, Bryan and I toured the new URS-designed Caterpillar plant in Suzhou, China. Very impressive. 72,000 sq./m, LEED Gold certified factory of front-loaders (and corporate office). Took only 14 months to complete. URS recently acquired Scott Wilson, a London-based, global engineering firm….

Met the new Girl Scouts CEO