Last Video From the Road: Episode 6 - Welcome Home Riders!

Here's the final Legacy Bus Tour video, Episode 6: Welcome Home Riders! It covers our trip down the West Coast, including Portland and Grand Ronde, OR; the Redwoods in Crescent City, CA; San Francisco and the Monterey Bay Aquarium in CA; Phoenix, and then onto our final destination, Tucson, AZ.

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We were so lucky to be able to share this trip with you through our videos, photos, and blog. We discovered hundreds of inspiring individuals and institutions making a positive impact on American Indian and environmental issues in the U.S., and shared our hopes and visions for the future with thousands of Americans ourselves. We will carry the knowledge we gained forever as we return to work on all aspects of these issues in our careers, studies, and lives.

Udall alumni are everywhere, doing amazing things, so keep your eyes and ears peeled. If you are a student devoted to tackling these challenges, check our website www.udall.gov for information on the Udall Foundation's scholarships, internships, and fellowships.

Happy Trails!

By: Jen Baldwin

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Episode 5: Rocky Montana High, Sustainable in Seattle

The Legacy Bus visits an art show on sustainable tranportation in Colorado, learns about Farm to College programs in Montana, enjoys the outdoors in Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks, and explores campus sustainability at the University of Washington in Seattle.

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By: Jen Baldwin

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Episode 4: Over the River, Across the Bayou, to the Heartland We Go!

More Video! -- Featuring Local, Organic Music

Here's another video – they're going faster than hotcakes now! Episode 4 is our first tribally-focused video, covering our stops with the United Houma Nation, the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation's Native American Health Symposium, Haskell Indian Nations University, and the Haskell-Baker (Wakarusa) Wetlands.

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This episode, like all of our videos, features very special music. Jason Pitre, the son of Houma's Principal Chief, Brenda Dardar Robichaux, was kind enough to give me an album of songs of the Medicine Tail Singers recorded live at the IICOT Powwow of Champions, which he mixed himself. The album is called "We Sing For You," and for further information about the singers and Jason's recording business, Native Rhythms, you can contact him at nativerhythms [at] yahoo.com.

I'm trying to feature musicians local to the places we're visiting in each video documenting our trip. Please check out their web pages, give their other songs a listen, and support them, as well as the local music scene where you live!

By: Jen Baldwin

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Two Years Later – New Orleans

Bret Muter eloquently described in words the scene we encountered as we toured the homes of Juana Ibanez and her next door neighbor on the 4th of July, almost two years after hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans.


Here are some of the images.

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Katrina is no longer in the eye of the mainstream media, but there is still much work left undone, and more need there than I have ever encountered. We were truly inspired by Juana's optimism about rebuilding the house where she grew up, whether it takes a second story with a turret, boat, and all.

We feel so touched that Juana showed us her city, and that she and her husband opened their homes to us. We wish her and her neighbors the best of luck rebuilding their homes and community.

By: Jen Baldwin

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Episode 3 - Chi-town, Nashville, and New Orleans

Here's Episode 3 of the Udall Legacy Bus Tour, covering stops in Chicago, Nashville, and New Orleans. Even though the bus has reached its final destination, more videos are on their way – not only webisodes of our trip, but more detailed looks at some of the places we visited.

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If you might not be checking the blog as often in the near future, you can actually have videos download automatically to your computer when they're done by subscribing to our free podcast in the iTunes music store! Here are 5 easy steps to subscribe:

1. Download the iTunes software at http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/

2. Maneuver your way to the online Music Store, and search "udall" in the store's search engine.

3. The Udall Legacy Bus Tour Videos podcast should appear among a few other unrelated search results. Select this result.

4. Click SUBSCRIBE!

5. In iTunes, occasionally check out your Podcasts section to see if a new episode has downloaded. Ask your tech-savvy friends and family for additional help!


There's so much to share with all of you, that I'll be working as fast as I can to get videos up on our blog. Thanks for your continued interest and patience, and I'd love to hear your thoughts!

By: Jen Baldwin

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Do You Believe in Magic?

We had a new rider join us in Seattle. Like the rest of the crew of the Legacy Bus Tour, he was a student leader working to promote solutions to the world's most pressing issues. Unfortunately, he's distracting many of the riders away from socializing in our free time. His name? Harry Potter!

Several of us hit up University Book Store near the University of Washington in Seattle the night of the release of Book 7, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Our eye-glasses and ballpoint-penned lightning bolts on our foreheads fit right in with the other young witches and wizards, some of whom brought brooms and flaunted couture capes. There we made slime in Professor Snape's potions class, listened to bands that sang about Hogwarts and He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named, got our picture taken as Harry, Ron, and Hermione, and made predictions about the conclusion of the beloved series. At least we weren't the OLDEST people in the crowd, since there were several parents in attendance.

One estimate says that 400,000 trees were cut to make the first printing of the book - which makes environmentalist fans like me cringe - but I was excited to hear that half of those trees were Forest Stewardship Council certified "sustainably harvested" this time around. Although that's a step in the right direction, it's too bad they couldn't all be printed on 100% post-consumer recycled paper. Personally, I'll hold out and recycle a copy of the book from another rider. Sharing is one of the best ways to approach sustainability, and it's also more fun – I can't wait to talk about the book with the other riders!

By: Jen Baldwin

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Episode 2: Constant MO-Tion

Episode 2 is ready for public consumption, and presents an overview of our stops in Bar Harbor, ME (College of the Atlantic); Rutland and Burlington, VT; Ithaca, NY (Cornell); and State College, PA (Penn State). Here's a teaser: it stars Willy the Donkey!

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(Click here for a hi-res Quicktime version of the movie)

By: Jen Baldwin

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A Maine Education

(Editor's Note: Please join us as we reminisce about Maine)

It's been difficult keeping up with video editing while simultaneously filming our action-packed itinerary, but the longer drives out West are going to give me more time to work (although editing on a moving bus is a separate issue!).
It seems like ages ago that we visited Bar Harbor, Maine, but I just couldn't help putting together some footage gathered while many of the bus crew ate their first fresh lobsters ever, thanks to Ken Kline and the wonderful Sous-Chefs at College of the Atlantic (even though it's a little late!).
With the supervision of Professor Jasmine Smith, our riders learn the not-so-delicate art of eating lobster.

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By: Jen Baldwin

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Native American Health Symposium - Oklahoma City

I was really looking forward to the Native American Health Symposium that took place on July 9 in Oklahoma City. Kudos to Dr. Steve Prescott for proposing the symposium and hosting a wonderful welcome dinner for us the night before, and to the team at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation for organizing the flawless event.

Dr. Steve Prescott with Jenny, Martina, and Bret S.

Health care is a really important issue I haven’t studied in depth, and I was curious to learn about the unique ways it effects the American Indian population. The speakers focused on how to address dementia, arthritis, and diabetes that are disproportionately impacting Native communities, and how to work with traditional elders who might have different perceptions about ailments and treatments than their caregivers.

I was particularly struck by Kenneth Copeland’s presentation on youth obesity and diabetes. He elucidated connections between children’s health and the riders’ main focus areas of environmental and Native American issues that I didn’t anticipate. Increasing numbers of children are developing Type II Diabetes Mellitus, due to decreasing physical education programs and the lack of readily available nutritious food. He called upon Udallers to seek holistic solutions to these problems. We need to rethink our city and town planning to provide sidewalks and safe places for children to exercise outdoors, decrease toxins in the environment, and increase access to nutritious foods while eliminating products with high amounts of corn syrup, refined sugars, and palm oil.

By: Jennifer Baldwin

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First Bus Dance Party!

It’s about time! Here we have 13 strapping young Udallers traveling in a tricked out bus with a kicking sound system. A cowboy hat made its debut Sunday evening, to everyone’s delight. I can’t believe it took us 3 weeks to have our first dance party – clearly we’ve been working too hard!

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Inspired by Nashville’s bumping music scene, we began playing Johnny Cash’s “Get Rhythm” and danced in the bus aisle. (We knew those hand grips on the bus were there for a reason!) Hoping to inspire some bystanders to join us, we cruised down the strip and danced off the bus in front of the bars, but you couldn’t really hear our music outside, and it was a Sunday night, so most people who happened to be hanging out nearby looked baffled rather than inspired to see us bopping around!

I know I’m not alone in saying that I hope many more dance parties are to come. We’re already looking forward to Zydeco in New Orleans!

We’re curious … What music would you blast if you were traveling around the country in a bus with your friends?

By: Jen Baldwin

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Episode 1: In MO-tion

It took three weeks, but here is the first of what was originally intended to be a series of videos documenting the breadth of our activities. We’ve visited so many cities and met so many people that it’s getting really hard to keep up! I’m not certain I’ll be able to complete the full series before the end of the trip, and still find time to include some shorter clips that are fun, introspective, and more in-depth. Regardless of the style, you can expect more videos to come!

Questions: I’d love to hear your comments on the videos so far. What do you want to see? More dizzying but comprehensive round-ups of our stops in each city? More in-depth looks at individuals and organizations making change? More fun and funny clips of crew members in day to day life on the bus?

If you were given this unique opportunity to look at public service and environmental and Native American issues in a cross section of the USA, what questions would you want addressed?

Without further ado . . .

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