Musings

If one enters Carkeek Park, that means one descends. The focus of this area of public land, it seems to me, is this bridge across the railroad to the beach. One time we were here when low tide was exceedingly low, and we went out to the edge of the water and stood something like 30 feet below sea level on temporarily dry ground.

The park embraces this creek, which flows across the beach in the distance. This shot is off to the left of the RR in the upper photo, and (duh) upstream. Some mallards were sleeping (not shown). Others were watching the man watching them; I think they were hoping for a handout.

Up in the woods, on my returning ascent, I found this denizen “wearing” moss and ferns. Beats all the Paris fashion, if you ask me.

Posted at 7:07 PM | Comments Off on A park on foot

Just me and one gull checking the weather and the light at 7:18am. And just me enjoying the puddle reflections.

Coffee stop appropriate to the fact that we are Seattle-bound.

First sunshine find of the day.

First dairy stop…well, only dairy stop…Tillamook, of course.

Cloud/precip return…and, yes, that’s snow on that upper slope.

Another “vote” that today’s theme should be dairy.

Downtown SEA, looking overcast and bright at the same time.

Welcome flowers. We had no wind when we arrived and I found the scent intense and lovely.

Posted at 10:22 PM | Comments Off on Northbound venue-shift

Here’s a cheerful bit of embodied history embellishing the courtyard outside our room this morning.

Our first major stop was Zabriskie Point. It’s likely you’ve seen it in fashion shoots or a movie. I was there.

I liked this formation the best. I call it Black Cap.

Art by MotherNachur took a different turn as we proceeded northward in the Great Basin. When a cloud is touching the ground, it means (usually) precipitation. If it’s cold enough, well, you get my drift.

Oh, let me interject a photo of mountains not created by MotherNachur. According to my info, this is from an adjacent big hole in the ground made by a gold-mining company.

Austin Pass on US-50. We were so happy the roads were wet and not snowy or icy. Full speed ahead!

And we were even happier to see snow on the summits far above us, and pleasant temps in the valley where we are now. This has been quite a day for zooming through the Great Basin; it’s endorheic, and has no natural drainage outlets. And it’s huge. And relatively unpeopled.

I’m not sure how to read this in any detail, but those blobs over northern California are what we are avoiding by swinging inland and north, to, ultimately, access the Oregon coast from the north. Those blobs mean heavy precip, and at elevations it means snow, and that area has many relatively high passes on the roads out to the coast. Our Nevada legs have worked perfectly (despite a bit of graupel and a few wet flakes); we hope our luck continues in Oregon.

Posted at 8:47 PM | 2 Comments »

We found a scenic vista view spot in central…well, base of the panhandle of Texas. Afterward, we drove and drove on plateau flattishness.

We didn’t intend to visit the stockyards in Clovis, New Mexico, but all of a sudden we were there. Fortunately, there were no sales today, and no hustle bustle, and no bawling and 💩

I took this shot out the side window toward the north, after we had left the flat flat flat and were approaching the pass that would take us through to Albuquerque in the Río Grande valley.

This is the snow we could see ahead of us…although this is further along where it was densest. Temps were above freezing, so no worries; the pavement was too warm to become icy.

Stepping out of a Tex-Mex (more or less) family restaurant after we ate, we could see the Sandia Crest (just north of the gap the interstate that we arrived on came through), with snow on the ground and snow clouds above.

The weather reports this evening featured many discussions of locations receiving graupel (we caught some graupel on the windshield at times). Tomorrow should be…interesting.

Posted at 10:33 PM | Comments Off on Graupel (not a Texas town)

Apologies for the delayed post; I was wiped last night…. Our route yesterday was consistently west from Hot Springs toward Lawton/Fort Sill. We traveled on Interstate, US highways, State higways, and even county roads. There was only one short gravel stretch, with signs saying watch for flooded road; we were lucky as the ditch water was about five feet below the road surface. This is the land of flash flooding.

However, we did avoid the cops in Mena!

This part of the world has many lakes that are reservoirs. For this one, I’m guessing they left the trees telling folks it’d make great fish habitat. Some kind of habitat, anyway.

Disrespect for signs.

We stopped briefly in this small community, so I could stretch my legs. The houses on either side of this street had the barking-est dogs; however, it took almost five minutes for someone to come out and ask what I was doing. This was the view out of the hamlet; I decided not to walk closer to this agricultural implement.

We diverged a bit north to visit the quirky community of Medicine Park. The quirky here is a busy resort/ex-hippy-style place, I assume for a change of pace for those who get off-base from Fort Sill, or away from the fields. We got terrific burgers (this is beef country, after all), and spotted this decoration in a planter.

We crossed the river on this fine bridge leaving Medicine Park. It predates hippy-style.

PDQ we entered wild lands, and saw…tadah! A real wild thing. Two actually, lone males several miles apart. We’re still looking for antelope.

The open plains offer a whole different sunset experience. This dramatic graduation lasted for perhaps an hour. Such a contrast to my experience of the sky in the eastern woodlands.

Posted at 10:22 PM | 1 Comment »

Only leprechaun I saw at tonight’s party; I’m going with too jet lagged to show up on actual St. Patty’s day.

Posted at 10:02 PM | Comments Off on Out, about, in green

Of course, the big adjustment today was the old-style clocks that don’t talk to the Big Giant Head (if I have it right 😀). For me, that’s two: the range and the microwave. Both our vehicles also have one clock apiece that requires manual resetting, but that’s for another day.

Posted at 8:26 PM | 2 Comments »

“Green, white accents.” That’s what I’d entitle this lovely front garden. The distant chairs look like blobs here; in person, they looked like they had the potential to be mildly comfortable. Pour me a martini!

Posted at 7:25 PM | Comments Off on White daffies, white tulips

For a time, I kept track of this lot. The last time I posted a photo of it, if I remember correctly, workers were finishing the two floors below the (former) ground surface, which appeared to both be parking levels. Now, the apartments far above are being finished, and I’m sure the builders are more than ready to have inhabitants move in, and to start working down their debt load. Or perhaps I’m projecting.

The title refers to the increased pressure on nearby roads and sidewalks and businesses by the new residents of this multistory building, which used to be a one-story artist studio and apartment structure. Sooooo many more residents to come….

Posted at 8:18 PM | Comments Off on Densification

This is the most arty pollen-rimmed ex-puddle I saw today.

Rather like marbled endpaper.

Posted at 8:20 PM | Comments Off on Nature’s art