Lonnie, my expedition partner from the One World Expedition is 'stranded' in Grand Marais due to snow, wind and cold. I am in Eugene, Oregon at a Law conference. I have to admit, I'm very jealous of Lonnie's predicament.

Stuck in winter - hardly a bad a thing if you ask me.

The conference in Eugene, however, is more than worth my missing a few days of blizzards (seriously). The Public Interest Environmental Law Conference (PIELC) is "the premier annual gathering for environmentalists in the world! Now in its 25th year, the conference unites activists, attorneys, students, scientists and community members to share their expertise and insights. With keynote address, workshops, films, celebrations and over 100 panels, PIELC is world-renowned for its energy, innovation and inspiration."

Usually, when I attend a conference I go with the assumption that, after getting through all the fluff, pomp and circumstance, I will gleen maybe one piece of valuable information. In Eugene, the student organizers of PIELC brought the most amazing mix of people together. Key note speakers like Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Dinah Bear, Vandana Shiva, Zyg Plater, Winona LaDuke, Sheila Watt-Cloutier and more. I spent my four days in awe of the amazing wealth of knowledge and insight.

Most impressionable to me, was a keynote lecture by Jerome Ringo the current chair of the board of the National Wildlife Federation. He talked about the crisis of global warming and what we need to do as individuals and a country.

He said, "the worst effects of global warming are yet to come. We have to make our public officials to be held accountable... the effort to reduce world wide carbon emissions will not be successful as a movement until all America is a part of the process. We've got to get onboard. We do not have the luxury of time. We must fix it now."

Then almost in parting he left us with the words, " We need to leave new foot prints that generations yet to come will follow. We want America to take the lead [in reducing carbon emissions], not because it's politically correct or economically correct but because it's morally correct."