Travels

Cloudpoint recap of CFTA 2019 in Austin,Texas

Here’s a collection of photos from my trip to Austin, TX for the CFTA 2019 (Campus FM Technology Association). Great conference ran by outstanding people. Lots of campus facilities leaders who are extremely talented at integrating data solutions, BIM, and GIS. And it was a beautiful city filled with music, culture, electric scooters, history, and a whole lot more.

Jon’s Top 3 Highlights of Austin

cablanding1.jpg

1. The bat colony

This is a must see, Austin has the largest urban bat colony in the world. 1.5 million bats emerge from under the Congress St Bridge every night. Its a continuous stream for about 45 minutes.

IMG_3782.jpg

2. Scooter rides

I found that this is the best way to get around the city. Faster than a car during heavy traffic times. Just pickup a scooter, scan the barcode, and take off. Once your done, you can leave it anywhere and just scan the code to “lock” it. This saved me lots of walking. OK, so the cool app with a tracking map might also have had some influence over me…

IMG_3799.jpg

3. LBJ library & museum

Learned a lot of history and details on the life of LBJ. You’ll definitely need at least half of a day to cover the whole thing. It’s well worth the visit.

Duluth, MN and Door Co, WI: Fish boils, Aerial Lift Bridge, Jeans, and Smoked Salmon

So recently I made my first trip to Duluth, MN for the GIS/LIS conference which consisted of well over 500 people from across Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa and many other states throughout the country. Micah Williamson and I were able to make the trek Northward all the way from central Illinois. One of the highlights of the trip up was the stop at Micah’s sister’s house in Eau Claire, WI where our timing was perfect as she was making burritos and kind enough to share with us, Thanks Amy!

The three days in Duluth at the conference were very enjoyable as we were able to meet many new faces and give out some wonderful gift bags of specialty coffee beans from the Blue Heron Trading Co located in Duluth’s popular DeWitt Seitz Marketplace which is the same building that houses our northern partner company, ​North Point Geographic Solutions.

While there, we were able to sample the amazing smoked salmon at a local favoritet, Northen Waters Smokehaus. A little free time the first night allowed us to squeeze in visits to my new favorite stores, Duluth Trading Company, where I picked up a much-needed pair of jeans, as well as the Duluth Pack Store which I highly recommend if you are visiting the area. However all of the luster of the tasty food and outfitter stores were both topped by the magnificent Aerial Lift Bridge which is an absolutely spectacular site, especially when lit up at night.

My second trip was to Door County, WI for the Fall regional meeting for the Wisconsin Land Information Association which was highlighted by the fish boil at the social night held at Waterfront Mary’s. If you’ve never been to a fish boil this is also a must see traditional event where they boil the fish in a big black kettle and boil it for 30 minutes or so over an open fire with all the right mix-in’s added in. For other highlights of our latest ventures at Cloudpoint Geographics please subscribe to our newsletter at cloudpointgeo.com/newsletter.