One of our favorite destinations at Arches National Park is the Windows area, which has two large arches cut from  the same sandstone fin. The Windows arches are also known as the Spectacles, with a large “nose” fin remnant separating the two windows when viewed from the southwest.

The Windows, Arches National Park, Utah, September 24, 2007

The Windows trail is a loop trail that leads to three massive arches, North and South Windows and Turret Arch.  The 1 mile (1.6 km) mostly gravel trail has a very modest change in elevation. An alternative, slightly longer, return to the parking lot is by way of a more primitive trail around the back of the two Windows, starting at the South Window viewpoint. While there is ample parking in the Windows parking lot, this is a popular destination and, at times, the parking lot may be full.

North Window Arch and the Nose bridge sandstone fin,
Arches National Park, September 24, 2007

North Window Arch, Arches National Park, September 24, 2007

North Window Arch, Arches National Park, September 24, 2007

North Window Arch, Arches National Park, September 24, 2007

North Window Arch, Arches National Park, September 24, 2007

North Window Arch, Arches National Park, September 24, 2007
Turret Arch is in the sandstone formation on the left.

South Window Arch, Arches National Park, September 24, 2007

Quick References

Arches National Park

• National Park Service, Arches
• Wikipedia
• Facebook
• Wikitravel
• Recreation.gov – Devil’s Garden Campground (a favorite for us, reservations often required well in advance)
• flickr – photos from the National Park Service

Windows Trail

• Utah.com
• hikespeak.com
• Your Hike Guide
• ProTrails – Windows Primitive Loop

Brown pelican on pilings, from Dauphin Island to Ford Morgan Ferry,
July 3, 2011 – near Fort Morgan, Alabama

Costumed interpreter in the role of a store clerk
in the Meighen family store
Historic Forestvillle, Minnesota – June 14, 2007

Historic Forestville (Wikipedia)

The Minnesota Historical Society operates Historic Forestville as a living museum set in 1899. Costumed interpreters portray Forestville residents and go about daily activities in the general store, house, kitchen, farm, and barn.

Forestville was a rural trade center in the 1800s that declined after the railroad was built elsewhere in 1868. Thomas Meighen, son of one of the town’s founders, owned the entire village by 1890, including the general store, and the local residents worked on his property for housing and credit in the store.

Forestville Mystery Cave State Park

• Wikipedia
• State Park website
• Minnesota Historical Society

Rear entrance, Stanley Hotel, Estes Park, Colorado, September 5, 2009

The Stanley Hotel is a 140-room Colonial Revival hotel in Estes Park, Colorado. Approximately five miles from the entrance to Rocky Mountain National Park, the Stanley offers panoramic views of lake Estes, the Rockies and especially Long’s Peak. It was built by Freelan Oscar Stanley of Stanley Steamer fame and opened on July 4, 1909, catering to the American upper class at the turn of the century. (Wikipedia)

• Stanley Hotel website
• Wikipedia
• Facebook

DeSoto Fountain in men’s bath hall,
Fordyce Bathhouse, Hot Springs National Park,
August 19, 2012

Built in 1914-15, the Fordyce bathhouse is the most elaborate and was the most expensive of the bathhouses on Bathhouse Row, the cost including fixtures and furniture being $212,749.55 US. It was closed on June 29, 1962, the first of the Row establishments to fall victim to the decline in popularity of therapeutic bathing. Fordyce Bathhouse has served as the park visitor center since 1989.

• National Park Service
• Bathhouse Row – Wikipedia

Note: The image is stitched together from multiple images, which sometimes results in straight lines appearing curved.

Art on Sunday #10

Self-Portrait, ca. 1911, Oil on panel, Morton Livingston Schamberg,
Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art,
Bentonville, Arkansas, August 1, 2015

Morton Livingston Schamberg
BORN: October 15, 1882, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
DIED: October 13, 1918, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Morton Livingston Schamberg, a painter, sculptor, and photographer whose brief but innovative twelve-year career ended with his untimely death at age thirty-seven, personifies the image of young genius who was ahead of his time. Schamberg was the first artist to use industrial and mechanical images as the basis for geometric art, which developed into the early Twentieth Century style known as Precisionism. Following his graduation from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1906, Schamberg and friend Charles Scheeler traveled to Paris. Returning to Philadelphia, they set up a studio and did commercial photography for a living. By 1912, Schamberg began incorporating cubist elements in his paintings, showing “the prismatic shattering of light into its component colors”. Schamberg and Sheeler participated in the first Armory Show and were influential in bringing the first exhibit of these paintings to Philadelphia. By 1916, Schamberg’s style changed dramatically, with more emphasis on line and structure, fitting to his central topic, the machine. He shared the dadaists’ attitude towards technology, but emphasized the formal beauty of machines. Other painters, including Charles Sheeler, Charles Demuth, and Elsie Driggs elaborated upon Schamberg’s mechanical theme in their work. Schamberg died prematurely during the 1918 Philadelphia influenza epidemic.

Michener Art Museum

Country scene, cows in a hillside pasture on a foggy day,
Benton County, Northwest Arkansas, April 23, 2011

Garden Pavilion at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, Charlottesville, Virginia, May 8, 2009

Monticello Vegetable Garden | Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello

The vegetable garden evolved over many years, beginning in 1770 when crops were first cultivated along the contours of the slope. Terracing was introduced in 1806, and by 1812, gardening activity was at its peak. The 1,000-foot-long terrace, or garden plateau, was literally hewed from the side of the mountain with slave labor, and it was supported by a massive stone wall that stood over twelve feet in its highest section. One contemporary visitor remarked on the dramatic “sea view” across the rolling Piedmont countryside.

Perched atop the wall, at the half-way point of the garden, is the garden pavilion with its double-sash windows, Chinese railing, and pyramidal roof. The pavilion was used by Jefferson as a quiet retreat where he could read in the evening. It was reputedly blown down in a violent wind storm in the late 1820’s. The pavilion was reconstructed in 1984 based on Jefferson’s notes and archaeological excavations. It overlooks an eight-acre orchard of 300 trees, a vineyard, and Monticello’s berry squares, which are plots of figs, currants, gooseberries, and raspberries.

Young Mature Bull Elk, Moraine Park,
Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado, September 2, 2009