Enchanted Highway, part 2

Enchanted Highway, part 2

Tin Family, Slaying the Dragon, the Enchanted Castle,

the Whirly Gig and Gift Shop

Gladstone to Regent, North Dakota

October 2022

Enchanted Highway, part 1

 Enchanted Highway, part 1

Geese in Flight, Deer Crossing, Grasshoppers,

Fisherman's Dream, Pheasants on the Prairie and

Teddy Roosevelt Rides Again.

Gladstone to Regent, North Dakota

October 2022

Rocky Mountain National Park, afternoon day 2

Fern Lake Trail Road (with East Troublesome Scar),

Alpine Visitor's Center (11,796') and a Snow Squall,

the Alluvial Fan (Roaring River) and Sleepy Elk

Rocky Mountain National Park

September 2022

The West 2022 - Rocky to Roosevelt

The West 2022

Rocky to Roosevelt

September/October 2022

Yellowstone, Again

 

Some of our "Must Do Again" stops were the Grand Prismatic Spring and Old Faithful. And we had to include the Fairy Falls Trail hike to the Grand Prismatic Spring overlook. Last trip we started this hike but gave up as the rain got a little more than we were willing to hike in. Then it was back to Old Faithful. Again we wanted to see it without the rain and fog (which it disappears in). This year we were greeted with blue skies.

Prospector's and the 49th State

Some pizza at Prospectors Historic Pizzeria and Alehouse in Denali Village, Alaska. Wash it down with a cold 49th State Brewing Company Solstice IPA. Gotta love vacation. (June 2014)

The Big Roadtrip

That's right, the blog here has been on autopilot for the past week or so. I've been spending a lot of time in the driver's seat of my car. This is just the tip of the 4806 mile journey to southwest Colorado and beyond. More, a whole lot more, on the epic trip next week. Stay tuned.

Louisville Bats Baseball

 George Rogers Clark Memorial Bridge. 2nd Street over the Ohio River into Indiana.

 Buddy Bat

 Jairo Asencio was eventually called up the Baltimore. Pitched one inning and was designated for assignment.

 Tides first basemsn Travis Isikawa. Travis made the bigs with the O's shortly after this game (6/18) The Yankees picked him up and released him to make roster room for Jeter. The White Sox then picked him up and send him to their AAA tam in Charlotte. We saw him before playing single A with Hagerstown.

If vacation hadn't gotten crazy enough we drove to Louisville, Kentucky for a baseball game. That would mean we got into Memphis at 5:30 pm Thursday and left at 1:30 pm Friday. 20 hours. It's a 6 hour drive to Louisville, the game starts at 7. No problem we may be just a little late. Oops, there is a time zone to be crossed. Make that 7 hours, we're gonna be late. So, 4th inning we roll into Louisville Slugger Field. The Bats are playing the Norfolk Tide, The Orioles AAA team. Signature food at LSF was a fried bologna Hamburger, didn't see that until it was too late, I already settled for a stadium brat. Well, the Bats lost 1-2, but they had fireworks anyway. We left Louisville by noon Saturday. That would calculate to about 16 hours.

OC's Boardwalk Observation Tower

Just like Summer and summer vacations, Theme Week: Summertime here along the Outskirts of Suburbia, is drawing to a close. You can see the memories flashing by like a movie. Like Danny Zuko and Sandra Dee singing all about their summer romance while image of them holding hands and skipping around the beach flashed by as the T-Birds and Pink Ladies doo-wopped along. Summer will be back. It won't be long until it's too hot and uncomfortable to move very far from the A/C. Until then warm some cider, roast your chestnuts and spike the eggnog. Christmas is only a week a way.

Sunrise, Friday the 13th

I am always saying that my daughter and I get out of bed before daylight when we go to the beach to get down to the shore and look for seashells before anybody else, but he truth is that's what gets her normally-awake-at-the-crack-of-noon butt out of bed in the dark when she's on vacation. Me? It's this right here. This was our first morning of vacation. The bottom picture was taken first, notice the thicker clouds at the top? Sunrise lasted all of about 10 minutes before dipping behind that cloud layer. Didn't come back out fully til after lunch. But that 10 minutes was well worth the price of admission. Actually, we had awesome sunrises each morning. It was the sunsets that were iffy.

Hey, it's SkyWatch time, so click on the icon on the right sidebar and see the world.

Back from the Beach

When we sat down at the end of the school year to see when we could fit a vacation in this year we started marking off days the kids were here or there. A week at this camp, a week at school, a week at that camp followed by 4 days at that camp. Well this past Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday didn't have anything marked on them. So a couple calls and we had reservation at our old reliable vacation destination... Chincoteague Island, Virginia. The great thing is the laid back atmosphere. It's not a neon nightmare filled with stupid high school kids. But four days just wasn't enough, though. Two more days, I think, I may have checked everything off the list. Crabbing? Not enough but, check. Crab cakes? Check. Boogie boarding? Check. Shell hunting at sunrise? Check. A little more exploring off the island? Negative. Birding? Check. I did my part, it was the birds that failed to show. Relax? Nope. That's not why I go on vacation. Oh yeah, Theme Week: Beach.

Twist o' the Mist 1997

Sorry, I have no Painted Gentleman to post today. Instead, I offer you ice cream. Larger Than Life ice cream. This is the Twist o' the Mist in Niagara Falls, New York. I held off posting this, hoping I would be going up there again this summer. But things being what they were we were unable to go. Maybe next year. Maybe over Christmas. How cool would that be? Sits on Niagara Street near Rainbow Boulevard and the Rainbow Bridge to Canada. See I have suffered from this odd building picture taking for a long time.

Downtown Bar Harbor, Friday Night

This is the main drag through Bar Harbor, Maine. This is the street with all the souvenir shops. This is the street to the docks where the fireworks were launched. The town park is off to my right, just beyond the fountain you can't see. Behind me will take you past the fairgrounds and on into the heart of Acadia. The moose? He sits on watch over town from atop Geddy's. Good food, local atmosphere. You can go anywhere some other time, but if you're in town hit this place. And then walk back up the street and get some blueberry soft serve ice cream. That's what I'm talkin' about.

Jordan Pond, Acadia NP

Acadia National Park is the only national park in the Northeast, established in 1916 it now spans over 40,000 acres (Mount Desert Island is 69,000 acres). There is a road around the interior of the park, Park Loop Road, that is 27 miles long. And the road surface is the best on the island. I figured I would be on an island and everything would be right there. Wrong. In 5 days of running around I chalked 500 miles on the truck. Just on the island. Every morning was fog. By lunchtime it would clear up a bit but We wouldn't see the sun until day 3. We never did see a sunrise or sunset. There are 120 miles of trails within the park but how much fun is walking and climbing on wet rocks when you can only see 100 yards in any direction? We only hit maybe 5 or 6 miles of trails. These pictures are from last Friday on the Jordan Pond Trail. A 3 mile flat trail that ran along the edge of the freshwater pond.