secret undisclosed location. How is everyone this morning?
We’re moving a little slowly after our long drive…but now it;s time to get people showered and ready to eat pancakes before heading out to the National Park to orient ourselves and pick a hike of the day. 🙂
Enjoy! Another hot one here in the Hudson Valley, mid 90s with the threat of rain. But at least it will be cooler tomorrow. I’m going to take it slow today. Yesterday was a marathon day for errands.
Me too! So tired of watering plants just to keep the poor things alive. There doesn’t seem to be much growth at all. No prize-winning size zinnias this year:(
It’s hot here too (the humidity makes it worse) — but not as hot as there and we’ve been getting regular rain, thankfully. I saw you finally got some the other day though. Woo hoo!
I took a little video of the fireworks with my phone (the city puts on a big show) and here’s a still from it. I still in awe of being able to carry all this technology around in my jeans pocket – how crazy is that. 😀
Depending on the tide tables, we’re either doing Otter Cliffs and Thunderhole trail, or maybe the Bowl and Beehive trail today (have to stick with some easy stuff for the Finny).
CBtY and I have a date for standup paddleboarding later this week. I can’t wait to try it.
Awesome hike with all the kids. Finny did rest, but got a little scared on the ride back down. I’ll post pictures as soon as I upload. 🙂
Tomorrow, we’re doing the Otter Cliffs and Thunder hole Ocean Path hike, trying to take advantage of the high tide. We have some low tide walks we want to take too. I could stay here for weeks and not run out of stuff to do…
We had a busy day yesterday, hiking and braving the crowds in Bar Harbor. I think we are going to need to come home for an afternoon nap after our hike this morning-Finny is getting a little worn out with all the excitement.
The weather seems to finally be cooling of here. How about everyone else?
My favorite quote from Marty yetrday, looking at the park service map: “i wish we could get from he right liung to the left lung without going up…”
Salt spray was carried up the entire cliff by the sea breeze (it was pretty windy when we were there).
There is more on my Photobucket account. You can probably back-track from here.
This is my grandmother Pearl, she was a portrait photographer and hand painter at a booth on Revere Beach, Mass. in the 20’s-30’s during the depression.
She would photograph and hand color the photos of locals and vacationers alike.
The photo was taken by the owner of the studio.
Ma passed a few years ago on Christmas Day, 2009, she was 95.
Hope everyone’s enjoying the vacation.
By the looks of things they are fantastic!
There’s more, while at the photo booth she met my grandfather, got married, had two children, wove machine belts during WWII, worked a department store or three, lost her son in an auto accident and her husband to a heart attack a year and a half later, and was a baker and cake decorator until she retired in her early 70’s. She did it all and never regretted a thing. She was a feminist before the the term existed. A good role model and inspiration to us growing up. Certainly had an influence in the way I see women in the world. We were lucky to spend a lot of time with her.
Yeah, me too with the grumpy. We usually go to the firehouse for a cookout, but don’t really relish the idea of being outdoors in this heat. Will probably opt for a quiet evening at home with Inspector Linley instead.
Hi, BobX,
I build ponds as a sideline or extra benefit to my clients.
When I`m doing a remodel or a new build, I always get my clients to put in a pond, some kind of water feature, a reef aquarium or a freshwater tank.
It works out for them & obviously for myself, plus it ends up being a photographer`s paradise.
Alice,
Stand Back, those Triffids do leap, hence the Batman exclamation, “Holy Leaping Triffids”.
Here`s the condition of the 6′ reef as of two weeks ago, but it has changed quite a bit even since then.
Tuesday will be another big day of adding corals & even better if I can successfully remove a fish I recently added.
The bugger is eating corals that a fish of that species would not ever normally eat.
So although I have a large selection of corals ready to introduce to the reef, I cannot do so with many of them, till I remove this fish.
I have a fish trap baited & set in the reef right now.
This fish in question has decimated some longtime growing colonies, eating individual “members” numbering in the hundreds.
I could probably get Bebo to do a stand-in of one for you. She’d be glad to swing through the trees — it would mean she could get the squirrels soooo much easier.
Our high temp Saturday is predicted to be 83. Guess we will have to drag out our sweaters and extra blankets, now that we’ve become used to 100+ every day.
Hi all. Sorry I keep making myself scarce. Got a little bit of a lull in my schedule, but then decided to haul off and try to buy a house. Turns out to be a time-consuming project in its own right. If all goes well, in a few weeks I’ll be the proud owner of my own safehouse. 🙂
No worries, sometimes life gets in the way.
Same here, infection came back and took me out over the weekend so no comments on the flog, which was great by the way, girls and guys.
Good luck with the new home. Like Andi says, you’ll come out on top. Best thing we ever did.
We got a decent amount of rain yesterday (one heavy rain and two light rains totaling almost 1 inch) but the drought monitor moved us from severe to extreme drought this week along with 53% of the state (with most of the rest of the state in severe drought). It’s going to be a very bad summer for Indiana farmers.
These little rains are obviously highly localized. We got less than 1/2″ for the same period. Guess we need to wash the car, hang the laundry out and leave the car windows open to tempt the rain sprites to our house.
The other day when you got that thunderstorm that rained so hard, we got zip, so things are definitely very localized. What I wouldn’t give for an all day rain.
Unfortunately this location is no longer accessible to the public.
A new bridge and road widening project has the entire area closed.
The access road is blocked and will be removed.
Thanks for the reminder! Your photo takes me back to my Florida days and exploring the Lake Hell ‘n Blazes area near Palm Bay. Best place in the world to get lost I ever experienced, but the fishing was great. We got in by swamp buggy and took a small airboat along for the side trips from camp.
I know the area, Dad lived in Palm Bay for a while. Puzzle Lake has it’s name for a reason, you can get in, but can you get out? I’ve fished the St. John’s since I was a kid. This is the far east side of Lake Monroe looking west.
secret undisclosed location. How is everyone this morning?
We’re moving a little slowly after our long drive…but now it;s time to get people showered and ready to eat pancakes before heading out to the National Park to orient ourselves and pick a hike of the day. 🙂
What are you all up to?
Enjoy! Another hot one here in the Hudson Valley, mid 90s with the threat of rain. But at least it will be cooler tomorrow. I’m going to take it slow today. Yesterday was a marathon day for errands.
What a nice woodsy scene! Looks cool, too. Have fun exploring the trails.
What a relief that rain was. But now I’m greedy and want every one of those 30% chances of rain to turn into a downpour.
Me too! So tired of watering plants just to keep the poor things alive. There doesn’t seem to be much growth at all. No prize-winning size zinnias this year:(
The wildflowers have pretty much disappeared from the woods.
Looks like a great spot. Hope you’re all having a good time so far. Can’t wait to see more photos. 🙂
We’re celebrating Canada Day today – parents are visiting. Happy w/e to everyone!
Happy Canada Day olivia! How’s the weather up there? We’re sweltering!
Thanks ID!
It’s hot here too (the humidity makes it worse) — but not as hot as there and we’ve been getting regular rain, thankfully. I saw you finally got some the other day though. Woo hoo!
I took a little video of the fireworks with my phone (the city puts on a big show) and here’s a still from it. I still in awe of being able to carry all this technology around in my jeans pocket – how crazy is that. 😀
Happy Canada day! I saw a place with poutine here today and thought of you. 🙂
Thanks CG!
LOL, poutine invasion. ;D
Being jealous of you being in a great place to hike. 🙂
Depending on the tide tables, we’re either doing Otter Cliffs and Thunderhole trail, or maybe the Bowl and Beehive trail today (have to stick with some easy stuff for the Finny).
CBtY and I have a date for standup paddleboarding later this week. I can’t wait to try it.
Just because I love otters, I’d probably be unable to resist a hike at Otter Cliffs.
Awesome hike with all the kids. Finny did rest, but got a little scared on the ride back down. I’ll post pictures as soon as I upload. 🙂
Tomorrow, we’re doing the Otter Cliffs and Thunder hole Ocean Path hike, trying to take advantage of the high tide. We have some low tide walks we want to take too. I could stay here for weeks and not run out of stuff to do…
uh, that should be “Finny did great”.
I am jealous. It all sounds wonderful. I’m glad Finny is enjoying it too.
Agree with Andi – jealous, ha. 🙂 Sounds like you’re all having a great time!
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Ferntastic!
Making it hard to sleep in. 🙂
We had a busy day yesterday, hiking and braving the crowds in Bar Harbor. I think we are going to need to come home for an afternoon nap after our hike this morning-Finny is getting a little worn out with all the excitement.
The weather seems to finally be cooling of here. How about everyone else?
My favorite quote from Marty yetrday, looking at the park service map: “i wish we could get from he right liung to the left lung without going up…”
It’s a great area for outdoor life!
There must be a park escalator, right?
Just back from Ireland. Had a really good time.
Here at the Cliffs of Moher.
Gorgeous!
Beautiful spot. I miss the salt air of the sea. Haven’t been to the coast in quite a while.
Salt spray was carried up the entire cliff by the sea breeze (it was pretty windy when we were there).
There is more on my Photobucket account. You can probably back-track from here.
Beautiful!
Olivia,
Pippi was just as surprised at that pic. She couldn`t believe she was here at Froggy Bottom either. The look on her face tells it all.
Ha!
She’s so pretty. 🙂
Olivia,
Here`s
Gum Ball
She`s just a teenager & I think she wears a bit too much make-up, but whaturyagonnado.
Oooh. That’s a beautiful shot! And just the right amount of makeup.
Great shot. And that color is amazing.
Didn’t know you were a star, did you Pippi? Looking good!
Oh that looks gorgeous! I hope you had a wonderful time!
Very nice.
We have some good cliff photos that we took today. Just uploaded some of them.
Wow!
This is my grandmother Pearl, she was a portrait photographer and hand painter at a booth on Revere Beach, Mass. in the 20’s-30’s during the depression.
She would photograph and hand color the photos of locals and vacationers alike.
The photo was taken by the owner of the studio.
Ma passed a few years ago on Christmas Day, 2009, she was 95.
Hope everyone’s enjoying the vacation.
By the looks of things they are fantastic!
What a great family keepsake! She looks like she would be a cool grandma;-)
She was an interesting lady that’s for sure, a sort of trailblazer for her time. We miss he a lot.
That’s a wonderful photo, Bob. Do you have any of her prints?
Yes, we have a quite few, her mother my great grandmother.
Grandma Tufts
I also have the hand colored print of the one that’s posted, framed, so I didn’t scan it. I should probably digitize it to preserve the color fade.
That’s beautiful … 😀
What a great photo and story.
There’s more, while at the photo booth she met my grandfather, got married, had two children, wove machine belts during WWII, worked a department store or three, lost her son in an auto accident and her husband to a heart attack a year and a half later, and was a baker and cake decorator until she retired in her early 70’s. She did it all and never regretted a thing. She was a feminist before the the term existed. A good role model and inspiration to us growing up. Certainly had an influence in the way I see women in the world. We were lucky to spend a lot of time with her.
What a wonderful photo. And what a wonderful smile.
Still smiling in her 90’s.
Last time we were together, my two favorite women in the world.
You’re a lucky guy, BobX! Looking good!
So nice to see.
That is a wonderful image! She had a great smile.
Here’s the last, cause you like the smile.
We think this is a self portrait at the beach studio. There are others of relatives with the same background and we think she took them all.
Wow, that’s a beautiful shot! She just glows!
I would guess a lovely person, both inside and out.
Beautiful. 🙂
Happy 4th to all who celebrate it.
Grumpy 4th to all who are put off by its jingoism and ignoring of the hypocrisy of the Declaration.
(I’ve got a foot in both camps)
Yeah, me too with the grumpy. We usually go to the firehouse for a cookout, but don’t really relish the idea of being outdoors in this heat. Will probably opt for a quiet evening at home with Inspector Linley instead.
AndiF
Here is a pic of some Fried Egg Fireworks to help you celebrate.
Now in return, do you have any idea what kind of flower this is?
Baker`s Dozen
Not a clue. Candis does all my flower identifying. 🙂
Lotus?
Great shot by the way.
Looks like a lotus from the top down. 🙂 Do you have more photos of it?
Olivia,
What do You think?
That is ridiculously beautiful. 😀 Lovely, lovely, lovely. And the fish too! 😀
These are truly amazing shots!
Great goodness, what a pond!
Hi, BobX,
I build ponds as a sideline or extra benefit to my clients.
When I`m doing a remodel or a new build, I always get my clients to put in a pond, some kind of water feature, a reef aquarium or a freshwater tank.
It works out for them & obviously for myself, plus it ends up being a photographer`s paradise.
Mrs X really wants a water feature but we keep putting it on the back burner. Her butterfly garden has taken precedence.
Gorgeous setting, KNUCKLEHEAD! I’d really like a copy to send to a yoga instructor friend of ours, if you don’t mind.
indianadem
Send me an address & I`ll send you a large file.
Which one were you referring to?
I think she would really like the one with fish. old fire walker @ sbcglobal.net (remove spaces) thanks, KNUCLEHEAD!
Done,
If you want a larger file for your friend, I can send it by snail mail on a CD.
The file I have is too big for an email.
The one I sent is probably maxing out my email at 17+ megs.
I’m downloading it now and 17mb should be plenty big. Thanks very much!
WOW! Gorgeous shots, knucklehead!
Looks like a Lotus seed pod in the making. Beautiful!
Flower or undersea life form? Ya got me.
Alice,
In that case, what would this be.
Candy Bar Coral
I`m rebuilding my big reef with all kinds of new corals & more fish.
It should be a showcase reef in a few more months.
Yikes – a colony of triffids.
Looking forward to seeing the new reef.
Alice,
Stand Back, those Triffids do leap, hence the Batman exclamation, “Holy Leaping Triffids”.
Here`s the condition of the 6′ reef as of two weeks ago, but it has changed quite a bit even since then.
Tuesday will be another big day of adding corals & even better if I can successfully remove a fish I recently added.
The bugger is eating corals that a fish of that species would not ever normally eat.
So although I have a large selection of corals ready to introduce to the reef, I cannot do so with many of them, till I remove this fish.
I have a fish trap baited & set in the reef right now.
This fish in question has decimated some longtime growing colonies, eating individual “members” numbering in the hundreds.
And the bugger fish.
Gold Spotted Rabbitfish.
Love all the shots you’ve posted in this cafe but the wide view of the reef is special.
A red, white, and … green one (because I do have so much trouble being properly patriotic).
click for larger
I love grass, under appreciated in the garden world, imho.
Happy independence day, Italian style I believe. Red, white and green that is.
Took this the other night while waiting for the fireworks.
Samsung Galaxy Player 4.0, 3.2mp
Beautiful shot, Bob! The color of the sky is wonderful.
I’m looking forward to using my new camera, especially on our trip later on this summer.
Thanks, I’m looking forward to the pics. Where to?
Such a gorgeous deep blue.
Really didn’t know what I’d get it was pretty dark.
Question for the day: Have all the watermelons this year just plain sucked or is it just a Hudson Valley thing? Discuss amongst yourselves.
No watermelon here this year ~ no water to put in ’em.
Today’s dose of reality. Sigh.
… but then you can’t
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snort
Well what fun is that?
Ha! 😀
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I’m expecting to see an ewok appear at any moment.
I could probably get Bebo to do a stand-in of one for you. She’d be glad to swing through the trees — it would mean she could get the squirrels soooo much easier.
Sounds good to me!
Okay, she wasn’t quite up to swinging but she said she’d just climb up there.
Oh wow, that’s beautiful Andi. The upright trees vs the angled light … wowsers! Love it. 😀
Now there’s a surprise. Who knew you liked streaky light? 😀
😀
Our high temp Saturday is predicted to be 83. Guess we will have to drag out our sweaters and extra blankets, now that we’ve become used to 100+ every day.
We turned off the a/c yesterday when the temps dropped into the mid-80s. It’s so nice to have the windows open.
And the firewood.
I’m working on that until it heats up again.
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Taken here [LINK]
Tomorrow is FFF day and the theme is The zen of it all, suggested by NorthDakotaDemocrat.
Zentastic!
Click here [LINK] to enjoy and share zen moments.
Looking forward to it.
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I think that your lawn needs cutting. 😉
At least its green. Ours is mostly a lovely shade of brown.
Three young Pileated Woodpeckers vs. squirrel residents in the hollow tree out front this morning. The squirrels won.
Mammals rule! Woohoo!
Hi all. Sorry I keep making myself scarce. Got a little bit of a lull in my schedule, but then decided to haul off and try to buy a house. Turns out to be a time-consuming project in its own right. If all goes well, in a few weeks I’ll be the proud owner of my own safehouse. 🙂
Houses are amazing time sucks but the payoff is usually worth it. Hope you enjoy yours.
No worries, sometimes life gets in the way.
Same here, infection came back and took me out over the weekend so no comments on the flog, which was great by the way, girls and guys.
Good luck with the new home. Like Andi says, you’ll come out on top. Best thing we ever did.
I hope that everything works out. We’ve had ours since 1994. The boran2 boy knows no other home.
click for larger
We got a decent amount of rain yesterday (one heavy rain and two light rains totaling almost 1 inch) but the drought monitor moved us from severe to extreme drought this week along with 53% of the state (with most of the rest of the state in severe drought). It’s going to be a very bad summer for Indiana farmers.
I was just noting to CG that, based on the green/brown ratio of our lawn, we must have had a lot of rain last night.
We’ve been getting a fair amount of rain here but it’s still probably not enough to catch up.
These little rains are obviously highly localized. We got less than 1/2″ for the same period. Guess we need to wash the car, hang the laundry out and leave the car windows open to tempt the rain sprites to our house.
The other day when you got that thunderstorm that rained so hard, we got zip, so things are definitely very localized. What I wouldn’t give for an all day rain.
In our case, the temps are so high that any rainfall just evaporates.
We were out in Utah in May and all the rain we saw was virga — none of it ever reached the ground. It’s very sad to see how parched things are.
A shout out to wilderness wench. Hope all is well up there on your misty mountain.
Shout out from me too.
Same here.
in case you forgot what it looks like.
Unfortunately this location is no longer accessible to the public.
A new bridge and road widening project has the entire area closed.
The access road is blocked and will be removed.
Maybe restricted access will help preserve the area. I’ll bet that it’s loaded with wildlife.
It is, both loaded and now a protected preserve. Was an active cattle ranch.
Thanks for the reminder! Your photo takes me back to my Florida days and exploring the Lake Hell ‘n Blazes area near Palm Bay. Best place in the world to get lost I ever experienced, but the fishing was great. We got in by swamp buggy and took a small airboat along for the side trips from camp.
I know the area, Dad lived in Palm Bay for a while. Puzzle Lake has it’s name for a reason, you can get in, but can you get out? I’ve fished the St. John’s since I was a kid. This is the far east side of Lake Monroe looking west.
Beautiful, Bob. Our creeks are either dry or down to the occasional puddle so it’s nice to see flowing water.
This was after a tropical storm a few years ago. We’re very short of water, although it has been raining, still not getting near enough.
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Awwww.
It’s a bit warm/humid and sunny here in the Hudson Valley. Off to work!
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Love that squiggly tree on the upper left. It’s almost as if it sought to defy convention.
I love twisty trees. Here’s one I followed through a fall a couple of years ago (sadly, it’s dead now). And here’s a whole grove of twisty trees.