Backroads Road Trip

We just returned from an epic road trip.  1,500 miles in five days through some really remote (and some not so remote) country.  Redfish Lake and the Sawtooth Recreation Area, where have you been my whole life?  The area made me fall in love with Idaho all over again, Idaho's other shortcomings notwithstanding.

The trip to Park City (via Stanley and Redfish Lake) was just my son and I, my little buddy, as my husband had a work-related meeting.  He was such a great road trip buddy, I can't even begin to describe it.  Never, well, hardly ever, complained and so helpful.  The kind of road trip buddy that will roll down his window so you can take a picture of the sandhill crane.   And on the way home, a complete family with hubby included, and this time I didn't have to do the driving!  I could finish my bike yarn bomb for Moscow's Artwalk and knit a saddle blanket for "Neigh Neigh."  

Park City was nice, but I loved Stanley, ID, population 63.  The winters are pretty rough though.  Luckily we caught it in a mellow June, and not a typical June with snow squalls.  I didn't love Sun Valley and Ketchum.  All those fancy stores, but the yarn shop is hard to find.  I'd take Whitefish, MT any day.     

Here are some of the trip highlights:

We were stopped when a bad accident occurred on HW 55.  For two hours.  The man cub tried to recruit other kids to play soccer with him to pass the time!

Oh, Sawtooth Mountains!

Redfish Lake!

A Sandhill Crane!

"Mom, are the antelope those bouncy things?"

Headwaters of the Salmon River

Rockin' bike trail in Park City, UT

Top of the Wasatch Range overlooking Park City, UT

Bike trail in Sun Valley, ID

Returns at the Sawtooth Hatchery

Australia pt I

Fig or Banyan tree, across from the Opera House

 Here are a few pictures from a land down under!

Our B&B in Sydney

Sydney Harbor at Sunset

A cormorant in Sydney Harbor

I Heart Art Museum Sandwiches!

Rainbow Lorakeets, not pets

The Nobbies on Phillips Island

Our Little Nature Park

Amazingly lovely Easter weekend.  Weather in the 60's, highly unprecedented.  We visited friends--two dinners out!  I'm already making plans to repay the hospitality this summer once we have our large, outdoor dining table out.  Our extra outdoor rooms will soon be available!

Easter Sunday afternoon was lazy and delightful.  Our neighbor's daughter had a Fairy Tea Party in the backyard.  While we were enjoying watching the children play, we spotted a beaver and a pair of mallards in the creek.  The mallards didn't seem at all disturbed by children running up and down the bank chasing them.

It inspired me to clean up the backyard and get it ready for summer playtime.  Today I mucked out part of the creek.  I actually enjoyed it; there is a certain satisfaction in throwing large, beaver chewed logs onto the bank that beats working out at the gym amongst frat boys.  So much more to do, but at least I have my self-imposed marching orders--and a creek that's already pretty beautiful in its own right!

Beaver neighbor!

Mr. and Mrs. Mallard

 

The Tide Is Changing!

Spring is not here quiet yet, but we were treated to two days in a row of 60 degree weather!  I had fun going around the yard today to see what was starting to emerge, and took advantage of the warm weather to dig out the asters in the perennial bed.  I like asters, but they have gotten a little out of control over the years and need to be thinned.  It was so warm I was ready to take off my sweater, but by afternoon, the weather was already turning colder.  Snow is expected for tomorrow!  It's kind of a funny thing on the Palouse that once the weather hits 55, people start stripping off clothes like it's Mardi Gras!

 

 

 

The pine siskins and goldfinch are back, along with the winter residents, chickadees and juncos.  Of course, so Early, the crazy pheasant, who is lucky he hasn't been shot or strangled over the years by our next door neighbor!

 

Outer Banks

When I die (at some hopefully distant time), most of my ashes will probably be scattered in the favorite places of my adopted home, the Pacific Northwest.  However, two handfuls should be saved for locations back east.  One of those spots, Wind Rock, a lookout off the Appalachia Trail in Virginia, may require my will to have a topo map included.  The other spot may or may not still exist, as it is a fragile barrier island off the coast of North Carolina.  Hatteras.  Only a few feet above sea level at its highest point and a few hundred yards wide at its narrowest, it is vulnerable to the ever changing whim of ocean and wind.

After a five-year hiatus, I finally was able to return to the Outer Banks.  Although we stayed on Bodie-Not-Really-An-Island, we did make it to Hatteras briefly.  Long enough to enjoy the empty beach even in what was still peak season for tourists.  

The beach is always changing.  My parents preceded the first stoplight when they started visiting in the sixties.  Now there is a five lane highway on Bodie Island.  Where there were once dunes, strip malls now exists.  Where there were once beach houses, now there is only the beach.  Inlets are dredged to keep them open and the sand is used to fill inlets cut by storms across narrow parts of the island.  The "natives," old North Carolina bankers with their distinct accent that is a mix of Judy Dench and Dolly Parton, are slowing going elsewhere or becoming assimilated.  And yet, the Outer Bankers are the same as they have been since they first appeared.  The only difference is that now people are there to try to force them to remain as they are currently.


But they won't.  I don't know if they'll exist by the time I'm ready to have my ashes scattered there.  But if history repeats itself, usually when one inlet closes, another one opens elsewhere.

The pictures above were all taken by my mother in January and February of this year.

American Bittern.

These pictures of the sunset were all taken by my mother on this most recent trip. 

Early Migrants

Before the first bulbs begin to appear, visitors start to arrive at our birdfeeder.  Our winter residents include Chickadees and Juncos, but in the spring we get Pine Siskins, Goldfinch, Red-breasted Nuthatch, and House Finch.  Sometimes we get other migrants, like Red Crossbills or, in this case, Evening Grosbeak.  On this particular day, we had about 30 passing through.