In marked contrast to the silence that surrounded former Current TV editor Euna Lee‘s detainment in North Korea in 2009, the author, mom of Hanna, and wife of actor Michael Saldate has been keeping her Facebook followers extremely well informed about the family’s current cross-country trek. The gang packed up their LA belongings at the outset of the holiday weekend and hit the road for New York City, where Lee is enrolled in the master’s program in journalism at Columbia University.

They are tenting it along the way at various campsites, and thanks to the kind of Smartphone device that is strictly forbidden in North Korea, Lee has been uploading short video clips about everything from the closed food stop in Barstow to the windy weather in Arizona. There was also this somewhat ironic status update to go along with the video from a Border Patrol checkpoint in Tombstone:

An officer asked me if I have a resident card. I didn’t realize how close we were to Mexico.

Lee told FishbowlLA via Facebook that she is not sure yet what kind of journalist job she wants to pursue post-Columbia, but that she is open to various possibilities. Saldate, meanwhile, will have a whole new range of acting avenues to pursue in the Big Apple. Best wishes for success to them both.

[Photo: "The Arizona sky from my tent," July 3]