Have you taken a DNA test, and apart from seeing your ethnicity estimates, you wonder what’s next? Have you tried to get in contact with a ‘DNA match’ and not got a response? Have you found ‘surprise matches’ and are unsure what to do about that. Or maybe you haven’t even taken a test, and wonder what all the fuss is about? Or you’ve heard about DNA tests being used by authorities to catch criminals and it’s made you wary. All of these aspects and plenty more will covered at Unlock the Past’s upcoming event “DNA Down Under“.

Blaine Bettinger, author of the best selling book “The Family Tree Guide to DNA Testing and Genetic Genealogy”, heads a lineup of world-class genetic genealogists, who are touring Australia during August 2019, holding 1-day seminars in most cities, and culminating in a 3-day DNA-fest in Sydney.

The dates:
Brisbane – Wed 14 Aug
Perth – Sat 17 Aug
Adelaide – Tue 20 Aug
Melbourne – Fri 23 Aug
Canberra – Mon 26 Aug
Sydney – Thu-Sat 29-31 Aug

The speakers:
These speakers will take your understanding of DNA to the next level, no matter what level you’re currently at. The team brings a wealth of knowledge and experience in family history and in particular DNA and its usefulness as yet another tool to help you in your research:
– Brad Argent
– Blaine Bettinger
– Fiona Brooker
– Louise Coakley
– Gail Edwards
– Kerry Farmer
– Mike Murray
– Michelle Patient
– Jason Reeve
– Helen Smith
For more on the speakers, click here.

The options:
Book for a 1-day event in your own city, or head to Sydney for a 3-day DNA-fest. … OR do ‘DNA to the MAX and book for your city AND Sydney and save. Note: Sydney’s 3 -day program is different to the other cities, so you won’t be overlapping in the talks offered.

Early Bird Prices End Soon
Whatever you choose, be sure to book before 30 April 2019 to take advantage of their early bird rates, and save. Save $30 for a one day event, $60 for Sydney (3 days), or $80 on DNA to the MAX (Sydney+1 other city).

DNA Down Under Ambassador
I’ve been chosen to be one of the DNA Down Under Ambassadors, and I will be attending both the Adelaide and Sydney events, so I hope to see some of you there.

I’ll admit I’m almost a ‘total newbie’ to DNA. I’ve done the tests, but am really still working on the papertrail of genealogy, rather than focusing on the DNA side of things at present, so no doubt there will be plenty for me to learn. Anyway I shall be reporting on the events, and what I’ve learned from them in due course.

More information:
For more information and booking head on over to their website, and follow the event on Facebook

www.dnadownunder.com

Next week the genealogy world converges on Salt Lake City, Utah in preparation for the world’s biggest genealogy conference, RootsTech 2019, which runs from Wednesday 27 February through until Saturday 2 March 2019.

With an expected attendance of around 25,000 people coming from 37 different countries, there’s 300 classes on offer, and over 200 exhibitors to check out – RootsTech really is something else, and nothing I’ve been to compares.

Sadly, I’m not going this year. I did make it in 2013, 2015 and 2017 (you can read about them here), and considering my first time was a “once-in-a-lifetime-bucket-list-thing”, I can’t believe I’ve made it there three times already.

Anyway, this year I’ll be a part of the #NotAtRootsTech crowd. And while I know it won’t be the same, I’m determined to still make the most of it, and ‘participate’ from home. At least when I’m not working anyway.

So how can I (and you) participate in RootsTech when we’re not at RootsTech? There are a few options.

WATCH THE LIVESTREAM LIVE
Firstly, you can watch the Livestream Live. There’s 22 presentations being livestreamed, but if you’re on Australia, you;’ll need to be dedicated as due to the time difference the streams start at 3.30am (Sydney time) and go through till around lunchtime.

Here’s a link to the list of livestream talks with both the US time, and the Australian time for each, and click here for more details on each of the talks.

It is expected (although not 100% guaranteed as I can’t find it written anywhere) that these talks will all be available to watch later in the video archive.

WATCH RECORDED CLASSES
The RootsTech website lists the following classes as being recorded (but not live streamed). they say that recordings of these will be posted shortly after RootsTech 2019 concludes and will be available in the video archive.
– Blending Family History and Technology with the Art of Storytelling
– Descendancy Research: Another Pathway to Genealogy
– Making Memories of You
– New York Research Essentials
 – You Can Do DNA
– How to Write Your Life Story in Five Pages or Less
– Heirloom, Documentation or Junk: What to Keep or Toss
– S.O.S. (Save Our Stuff): Stories and Heirlooms
– Families Discovering Family History Together
– Writing and Publishing a Family History: Ten Steps
– Artificial Intelligence in Photo Management (and How It Can Boost Metadata)
– Breaking through Brick Walls in Scottish Research

If you’re super excited for RootsTech and can’t wait for it to start, why not watch the recorded and keynote sessions from RootsTech 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018. They’re all there!

BUY A VIRTUAL PASS FOR EVEN MORE ROOTSTECH
This a new feature they’ve brought in this year. For US$129 (which is approx AU$180) you can buy a Virtual Pass, and this gives you access to 18 presentations. From a look through the topics they are different from the Livestream ones, and different from the “recorded classes” sessions – so it would appear that these are EXTRA ones, just for those who pay.  They say “with the virtual pass, you’ll have access to the online recorded sessions from the conference. You can watch playbacks from your laptop, tablet, or smartphone device whenever and however you’d like!”

The list of talks covered by the Virtual Pass are:
– Chromosome Mapping for Absolute Beginners—Jonny Perl
– Must-Use U.S. Records at Ancestry.com, FamilySearch, Findmypast, and MyHeritage—Sunny Morton
– A Deep Dive into Understanding Your DNA Results—Blaine Bettinger, Angie Bush, Jonny Perl
– The Surname Is Key: History of Surnames and Conducting Surname Research in Germany—Dirk Weissleder
– One Touch Genealogy Research: Handle a Record Once—Thomas MacEntee
– You Need Both! Uniting DNA and Traditional Research—Angie Bush and D. Joshua Taylor
– Chromosome Mapping Tips and Techniques—Blaine Bettinger
– Deeper Analysis: Techniques for Successful Problem-Solving—Elissa Scalise Powell
– The Magic of German Church Records—Katherine Schober
– My Ancestors Are from Germany, and I Don’t Speak German—Tamra Stansfield
– When Details Disagree: 8 Ways to Resolve Conflicts—D. Joshua Taylor
– 20 Hacks for Interviewing Almost Anyone, and Getting a Good Story—Joanna Liddell and Karen Morgan
– Going Dutch: Finding Families in Online Records of the Netherlands—Daniel Jones
– Beyond the Mists of Time: Sources for British Medieval and Early Modern Genealogy—Nick Barratt
– The Combined Power of DNA, Records, and Family Trees—Jen Baldwin, David Nicholson, Diahan Southard
– The Genealogist’s Google Search Methodology—Lisa Louise Cooke
– Jewish Genealogy: How to Start, Where to Look, What’s Available—Lara Diamond
– Slave Traders, Speculators, and the Domestic Slave Trade—Kenyatta Berry

For details on the Virtual Pass, or to buy one, click here.

FOLLOW ALONG ON TWITTER
The geniepeeps who head to RootsTech are a very online social bunch, and you’ll no doubt find them Tweeting, Facebooking, Instagraming, and Blogging all the way through. But my advice is to head to Twitter, (yes, you will need an account, but it’s free) then type in the hashtag #rootstech or #rootstech2019 in the search box up the top and watch the tweets come up. Also type in #notatrootstech and you’ll find others also ‘participating’ from afar.

There’s plenty of tweets going on about it already, here’s a screenshot of a few …

Search results for #rootstech on Twitter

So there you have it. So from Wednesday to Saturday if you’re in the northern hemisphere, or Thursday to Sunday for those of us down south – it all happens. So let’s enjoy it, and learn from so many of the world’s best genealogy presenters.

And don’t forget to share your experience of #NotAtRootsTech with others. You can do this via your own private Facebook page, on public social media, or if you blog, why not blog about your RootsTech experience from afar.

ONE LAST THING
So if you don’t make it to Salt Lake City by next week in time for RootsTech 2019, but you really, really, really wanted to go – you might like to consider going to RootsTech 2019 London in October 2019. While not quite on the scale of their US one, it’s still going to be a huge show, and would be awesome to attend. You can read about that here.

Continuing on my report of the Unlock the Past Alaska cruise … and we’re up to day 4, and there was more exciting happenings!

Monday – 10 September 2018 (Skagway, Alaska, USA)
It was another super stunning weather day with blue skies all round. I heard a fellow cruiser say that they never expected to get sunburnt in Alaska … but they did! We docked at Skagway early and those on tours made their way off. Many went on long train rides which certainly was one way to see the place.

the LOOONNG train at Skagway

I didn’t have any tour booked, so wandered ashore, then took a shuttle bus to the town for a walk around with my mum.

selfie with my mum

To say that this town looks like it’s out of a western movie is an understatement. It really, truly does! You can totally imagine gun fights happening in the streets. Well I can anyway!

the main street … looks just like a Western right?

One thing that fascinated me was the painted rocks near where we docked. They were painted with a ship name, and usually the captain and often a date. So there’s me thinking what a fabulous (but rather unusual), genealogical source they would be. Proof that your seaman captain was here at that date! Now if I could just find one that related to my seaman ancestor dating back to the early 1900s! Hmmmm.

the ship banners are painted right up high

a close of up a few of the painted ship banners

Anyway the town of Skagway was full of little shops, most selling jewellery (despite what the vintage sign outside said – obviously they were just for looks). I did find a little store selling chocolates, and each variant was a different “paw” type. I bought a few but then remembered I wasn’t meant to bring food back on board, so had to eat them quickly!

paw chocolates

a pretty view of our ship

she’s big!

As it was a tourist day, there weren’t any talks on until the evening, when Dick Eastman had a talk on ‘Genealogy searches on Google’.

During the evening there was talk about a possible aurora. While I wasn’t prepared to stay up till 2am, I did stay up and fortunately it appeared around 11pm, and kept ‘dancing’ and moving for maybe 12-20 minutes. That was exciting. I’ve never seen one before, and aren’t likely to any time soon (unless I get down to Tasmania).

a pic of an aurora

While my photos really don’t do it any kind of justice, you can see a smear of bright green in the sky, with the silhouette of mountain in front of it. Still I saw it, and I have some kind of photographic evidence of it too. So YAY!!

Tuesday – 11 September 2018 (Tracy Arm Fjord, Alaska, USA)
I was still kinda on a high from seeing the aurora last night, and maybe that’s why I didn’t sleep so well … whatever the reason it was good, as it meant I was up before 6am on my balcony watching us sail through icebergs in the the Tracy Arm Fjord. Ooh another first for me … ICEBERGS!

I managed to take about 180 or so iceberg pictures. Do you know how hard it was to cull those down to show you these few! So you’re getting the teeny-mini version here.

Anyway my roommate Helen and I stayed out on our balcony for several hours watching the sun rise, and the icebergs glide past, and even seeing some seals and birds on them.

the stillness was incredible

sunrise from my balcony

iceberg

another iceberg

dirty iceberg with seals on it

pretty iceberg

iceberg with seals

and still more icebergs

We sailed the fjord for most of the morning, though apparently didn’t get the the end as the icebergs were getting too big, and the captain didn’t want to re-enact the Titantic scenario.

During my lunch in the Windjammer (buffet area)  I (along with a heap of others) was fortunate enough to see a whale. So yet more excitement. YAY! And I even managed to get a fin of it on camera. So ta-da …

fin of an orca whale

Ok so it’s not the super-pod that the whale-watchers saw on their tour, but it’s still cool. But trust me, if you ever get the chance to go whale-watching DO IT! The only thing I regret about my trip is that I didn’t do the whale-watching tour.

Talks were scheduled all afternoon, and the two I went to were
– Is it true?: The Facts, Fun and Fiction of Family History (Michelle Patient)
– Cornwall’s People and Emigrant: Where did they go? (Susan Brook)

The DNA Panel with the topic of “DNA Ethics and More” with Helen Smith, Maurice Gleeson, Cyndi Ingle, and Michelle Patient was held in the evening and it was so engrossing it went way overtime, no-one wanted to leave. But it was a really good discussion on numerous aspects of DNA and ethics. 

the DNA panel. From left: Helen Smith, Michelle Patient, Cyndi Ingle and Maurice Gleeson … Helen asks a question and the others are deep in thought about it

The cruise continues, with still more to see and places to go … so stay tuned.

Tuesday the 4th of September was the longest day ever (well for me anyway). I was up at about 3am, ready for a 6am flight – and my long trip to the US for my latest adventure began.

After after 3 plane flights, bad food, and no sleep, 30 or so hours later, I was at my hotel in Seattle, USA. By this time it’s Tuesday mid-afternoon and a lovely blue sky day, much to my amazement … as my only prior knowledge of Seattle (other than that’s where Nirvana were from), was that ‘it ALWAYS rains’. I must say that I’m very impressed that I was proved wrong.

I made it … finally!

Anyway I was there primarily for Unlock the Past’s Alaska cruise, which I will report on in a later post, but prior to the cruise I had two days in Seattle. So in this post I’m writing about that.

Wednesday 5 September 2018
This was my “free” day. A day to sleep (which I reckon I needed), or a day to tourist. I opted for a bit of both. A quiet morning at the hotel, followed  by some touristing courtesy of the hop-on-hop-off bus in the afternoon – and another perfect weather day. While the bus has 18 stops or so I want to show you just 2 places I saw – the Space Needle and the Chihuly Glass Garden and Exhibition. Both were certainly something worth seeing. While I dd take plenty of photos, I found videos of both, which shows the scale of them far better than my pics do.

one of the many spectacular glass displays

If you want to see more of the Glass Garden, click here for a longer video.

the photo doesn’t do it justice

For more on the Space Needle, check out this link.

After visiting the Chihuly Glass Garden and Space Needle, I popped into the Seattle Public Library, as that’s where I’d be tomorrow for the conference, and hey it’s a library, so I need to visit! I found the genealogy floor, and even the Australian genealogy section (though it was pretty small), still nice to know they had one though. And had a browse around everything.

It’s a very nice library, and would have been good to stay longer and explore their records more. Anyway it wasn’t to be on this trip.

the Seattle Public Library is an interesting looking building

Level 9 – genealogy

how many titles do you recognise?

Thursday 6 September 2018
No sleep in today as the Unlock the Past in Seattle conference day had arrived, and as one of the organisers I had to get there early to help set up things. This was a day-long conference that  was open to anyone (locals and cruisers who were already in Seattle), to come and hear some talks from some speakers who were on the cruise, and others who weren’t.

Held in two streams, one on DNA, the other Irish and General, here’s the talk topics:

Steam 1: DNA
– Using Y-DNA and mtDNA to Explore your Ancestry (Blaine Bettinger)
– Using Autosomal DNA for 18th and 19th Century Mysteries (Blaine Bettinger)
– Challengers with Irish Genetic Genealogy (Maurice Gleeson)
– Using Third-Party Tools to Analyse your Autosomal DNA (Blaine Bettinger)
– Phasing and Mapping your DNA

Blaine Bettinger ready for a day of presentations (Photo: Helen Smith)

the crowd in the DNA stream (Photo: Helen Smith)

Steam 2: Irish/General
– Tracing Your Immigrant Ancestor to Ireland (Maurice Gleeson)
– Genealogy and the Little Ice Age (Wayne Shepheard)
– The Hidden Web: Digging Deeper (Cyndi Ingle)
– Navigating Irish Birth, Marriage and Death Records (Maurice Gleeson)
– Newspapers, Gravestone and Probate: Rice Sources for Irish Research (Maurice Gleeson)

Wayne Shepheard speaker on the Little Ice Age, with Alan Phillips, UTP in Seattle conference organiser

the group listening to Cyndi Ingle’s talk on the Hidden Web (Photo: Alan Phillips)

I chose to sit in on the Irish and General talks, and as always I learnt plenty. Now the trick is to remember it! The Little Ice Age talk was a real thought provoker, and brings in facets I’d never considered. Cyndi’s Hidden Web was great explaining why Google doesn’t find everything, and how can find it yourself. And as for Irish records, there’s always more to learn about them, and Maurice is a great speaker.

All ten talks were livestreamed as well, so allowed others around to log on and listen in at the time. Of those, six of the ten talks were recorded by Legacy Family Tree Webinars and are available for viewing with a subscription. Please note, Blaine’s weren’t recorded, as he advised that his Seattle presentations were already covered by ones he already has on Legacy Family Tree Webinars. Though the titles are different, the content that is covered in the talks is the same, or possibly even more detailed in some areas. You can view all of Blaine’s talks here.

Now I don’t want to give you a sales pitch, but in my option Legacy Family Tree Webinars is a truly fabulous way to extend your genealogy knowledge. They have great talks by well-qualified speakers from all around the world, you can watch and listen to them when you choose. There’s literally hundreds to choose from, and it costs very little. I took out a subscription earlier this year, and my plan is to watch one video a week as a to help boost my genealogy education. If you’re interested in checking it out click here. It’s just US$9.95/month, or US$49.95/year.

Anyway after a great conference, it was off to dinner at the famous Ivar’s Acres of Clams with a bunch of new and old friends for a great catchup after a long day.

it was a great dinner with new and old friends

Stay tuned, as next post we board the ship for Alaska!!