Sharing photos, videos, vintage images I've discovered, and -- occasionally -- commentary and thoughts from retired life and travels.

plants

Spring is in the air… a tad early!

March 17, 2012

This early heat wave – if it was this much warmer than normal during the summer, that’s surely what it would be called – has resulted in early flowering of almost everything, including some plants that shouldn’t even be flowering until late April.  As well, most trees have started leafing out and the hardwood portions of the local forests have started turning green.

The following video from our yard  captures just a small part of this strange season in Arkansas.  For this video, I didn’t add any music, just natural back ground sounds from our yard.

How are the seasons progressing where you are?

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Trail to Nymph and Dream Lakes

January 11, 2012

dream_lakeThis was our second time on this trail segment, which runs from the Bear Lake parking area to Emerald Lake and connects with other Bear Lake area trails.  We had hoped to make it to Emerald Lake if our legs, and the weather, held out.  The weather had been iffy overnight and during the morning.  Trail Ridge Road had been closed closed the night before and remained closed due to snow for the first time in the season. With rain threatening, instead of a hike that morning, we went into Estes Park.  After lunch and walking around Estes Park town center a bit more, we headed back into the park to the Bear Lake area trailhead.

The trail we chose goes to a trio of subalpine lakes – Nymph, Dream, and Emerald – in upper Tyndall Gorge.  The trail is well maintained and rises steadily over most of it’s 1.8 mile  length.  Difficulty is easy to moderate, but can be more difficult for those not acclimatized to the altitude as it climbs to over 10,000 feet.  We had already been in Colorado a week, so the altitude was less of an issue than it might have been otherwise.

tyndallFrom the Bear Lake area trails parking lot (9,475 ft.), the trail climbs steady for 1/2 mile, then levels off at about 9, 700 feet at the south end of  small, lily pad covered Nymph Lake.  The trail begins climbing again in the forest on the north end of Nymph Lake and levels off again at Dream Lake, 1.1 miles from the trail head and at an elevation of 9,912′ ft.  Dream Lake is .35 miles long.  The trail passes along its west shore.

We had hoped to make it all the way to Emerald Lake, 1.8 miles from the trailhead and 10,090 feet above sea level, but we turned back at the north end of Dream Lake due to deteriorating weather conditions.  Weather in the high country can be unpredictable, even in the middle of summer, but this was the middle of September and we’d already had some rain on our hike.  We had rain gear with us. However, it was already 3:30 PM and light rain was falling again, so we decided against pushing on ahead.

Blog posts from this visit to
Rocky  Mountain  National Park:

Selected Information
Resources:

Rocky Mountain National Park
Estes Park
Grand Lake

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Across from Frontier Park, Hays, Kansas

October 30, 2011

Sunflowers in field across from Frontier Park, Hays, Kansas, 8-21-2004

We had stopped for the night in Hayes, Kansas, on August 21, 2004.  We were on our way to the old gold mining region southwest of Pikes Peak in Colorado, where we would be renting a mountain cabin for a week.

This was one of many large fields of sunflowers that we saw on our trip.

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Mt. Rushmore, Yellowstone, Grand Tetons and more….

August 22, 2011

Whenever we go on a trip, I take a lot of pictures.  Before I share any of the pictures, I post-process them – sort of like putting them through a digital darkroom – to remove flaws and adjust the saturation and contrast.  It takes time, but I have been able to streamline my process somewhat.

I have just completed processing the last groups of images from the first big western trip we took after I retired in 2007.  I’ve started creating videos using photos from that trip, with background music from YouTube audio swap. The first two of the series have been already posted:

Since I’ve finished with all the groups of images from the trip, the video for today is a montage of photographs from the trip; for the most part, one picture each day of our travels and explorations.

The audio track is Paul Mottram’s “Sidewalk Saunter.”

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Native

July 27, 2011

Rest stop at Marais des Cygnes National Wildlife Refuge, Kansas, and Kansas highway 52

Native grasses at a travel rest stop at Marais des Cygnes National Wildlife Refuge, Kansas, intersection of U.S. Highway 69 and Kansas 52 – with our motorhome and car in the background.

From the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service:

The Refuge is named after the Marais des Cygnes River which runs through the middle of the refuge and is the dominant natural feature of the region.  The name, Marais des Cygnes, comes from the French language and means Marsh of the Swans.  It is presumed that trumpeter swans, which were historically common in the Midwest, used the wetlands adjacent to the Marais des Cygnes River during spring and fall migration.

The Refuge was established in 1992 for the protection and restoration of bottomland hardwood forests.  Approximately 5,000 acres of the 7,500 acre refuge are available for wildlife oriented recreation including hunting, fishing, and birding.   A wildlife sanctuary encompasses the remaining 2,500 acres of the refuge and is not available for public use.

The Marais des Cygnes Massacre:

The Marais des Cygnes Massacre is considered the last significant act of violence in Bleeding Kansas prior to the outbreak of the American Civil War. On May 19, 1858, approximately 30 men led by Charles Hamilton, a Georgia native and proslavery leader, crossed into the Kansas Territory from Missouri. They arrived at Trading Post, Kansas in the morning and then headed back to Missouri. Along the way they captured 11 free-state men, none of whom were armed and, it is said, none of whom had participated in the ongoing violence. Most of the men knew Hamilton and apparently did not realize he meant them harm. These prisoners were led into a defile, where Hamilton ordered the men shot and fired the first bullet himself. Five men were killed.

Hamilton and his gang returned to Missouri. Only one man was ever brought to justice. William Griffith of Bates County, Missouri, was arrested in the spring of 1863 and hanged on October 30 of that year. Charles Hamilton returned to Georgia, where he died in 1880.

The incident horrified the nation and inspired John Greenleaf Whittier to write a poem on the murders, “Le Marais du Cygne,” which appeared in the September 1858 Atlantic Monthly.

Related sites:

Related posts:

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Garden Flower

July 21, 2011

Olbrich Botanical Gardens, Madison, Wisconsin, September 22, 2008

Olbrich Botanical Gardens, Madison, Wisconsin, September 22, 2008, unidentified blossom.

Olbrich Botanical Gardens is located in Madison, Wisconsin. Named for its founder, Michael Olbrich, the gardens are owned and operated jointly by the City of Madison Parks and the non-profit Olbrich Botanical Society. The gardens were officially established in 1952.

Noteworthy additions to the gardens were the Bolz Conservatory in 1991 and a Thai pavilion or sala, a gift to the University of Wisconsin–Madison from the Thai Chapter of the Wisconsin Alumni Association and the government of Thailand through its king, Bhumibol Adulyadej. Opened in 2002, it is one of only four sala outside of Thailand and one of two in the United States (the other is located in Hawaii). – Wikipedia

Olbrick Botanical Gardens:

Madison, Wisconsin:

Related Posts:

Dane County Farmer’s Market Photo Gallery

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