Rattlesnake Lake - North Bend, WA

September 4, 2009 & September 2 & 3, 2010

Rattlesnake Lake is a medium-sized lake just south of the town of North Bend in Washington. I've now been to the lake twice while visiting Monica.  Both times we stayed at her co-workers house, just outside of town, so we could puppy-sit sweet Luna dog. Before I get to the lake, I must tell you how much I love that house! It's right on the Snoqualmie River with no neighbors on the opposite side of the water, so you can sit on the back porch and watch for osprey and hawks and other critters. nearly the entire back side of the house is windows or large sliding glass doors, so you can open it all up and still feel like you're outside even while you're in.  There's also a little cottage with a living roof that hangs out over the water with just enough room for one people bed and one doggie bed. Unfortunately, Monica has claimed that as her own and doesn't like to share. Ok, so on to the lake. 

We reached the lake in two ways, twice by car and once by biking up the Snoqualmie Valley Trail that runs right past the house.  Ann joined us for one of the car trips and we brought along dinner and some light cocktails for an evening picnic. The biking trip wasn't too difficult, despite the fact that I hadn't ridden a bike in years and I have asthma.  A few stops along the way and I was good to go.  In 2010 we stayed on the shore and picnicked and hung out, but in 2009 we spread out on the beach and played in the water a little.  The water was much lower in 2009 than it was in 2010, and we were able to see the stumps of old trees that had been cut. The water was even low enough to walk out to one of the larger stumps and climb around without getting too wet.  We never ventured up the Rattlesnake Mountain trail, which leads to an awesome (as evidenced from pictures) overlook of the Lake; however, I did take a short walk up a tiny part of the Iron Horse Trail (which seems to go all the way to the eastern Cascades as far as I can tell from Google Maps) through the Iron Horse State Park, which was a nice little stroll. We never did see any rattlesnakes though. I'm not sure whether to be upset by that or glad...

2009

Rattlesnake Lake

Rattlesnake Mountain

Luna says "Throw the ball Monica!"

Luna also says "Now YOU go get the ball Monica"

Total relaxation 

2010

 Osprey

Luna likes the lake too 

Magnuson Park - Seattle, WA

September 3, 2008

This is yet another post from a long ago trip. My first trip to Seattle, in fact. The main mission of this adventure was to go check out the Sound Garden (for which the band is named, no lie), but we also strolled through the Fin Project.  The sound garden is an installation of these tall modern weather vane-looking structures that play like an organ in the wind. Slightly eerie, but so incredibly cool! The Fin Project is an installation of the fins from decommissioned 1960's nuclear submarines that resemble a pod of orcas.  A pretty clever way to recycle!

Natural Bridges State Park - Santa Cruz, CA

February 5, 2011

Since it's been more than a year since I went to Natural Bridges I can't remember what exactly inspired the trip. I think possibly Ann was visiting prior to moving back to the area and we took a day trip up to Santa Cruz.  That seems plausible. But I suppose how I got there isn't really that important.

Because we visited in February it was a bit late to catch the Monarchs, but there were still a few there and we spent a bit watching them from the viewpoint at the end of the little boardwalk.  Then we took the easy hike on the Monarch Trail to the Moore Creek trail down to the beach, where we checked out the tidepools and Ann dug for sand crabs.  We didn't find many critters that day, but there were some spectacular anemones with their tentacles spread wide, a snowy egret, and a couple oyster catchers and it was a beautiful day with sailboats and surfers in the bay. Oh and the bridges! Sadly there's only one left, since the other two were worn away by the ocean and weather, but it's still pretty incredible sticking out of the water like it does.

Monarch

The Arch

Snowy egret

Oystercatchers

Anemones and hermit crabs

 Surfers

Tidepools

Chimineas Ranch - San Luis Obispo County, CA

April 20, 2012

You've never heard of Chimineas Ranch? Yeah, me neither. At least I hadn't before I had the opportunity to visit during a Flora of San Luis Obispo County workshop that I participated in through the Jepson Herbarium. Chimineas is waaay out in the middle of nowhere in SLO County.  It's southwest-ish of Soda Lake, which is part of the Carrizo Plain (I was sooo close!). We were lucky to have THE Chimineas biotanist with us (whose name I simply CAN NOT remember at the moment, big surprise), and he led us along the main road through the ranch to some interesting spots with fun wildflowers. 2012 was unfortunately a "bad" wildflower year; however, we still got to see some beauties.  While there we stopped for bathroom breaks and lunch at the ranch house, which I got the impression is available for retreats and the like. Would be a fun place to stay. There's a very inviting pool! And swallows! So many swallows! They were building their nests in the eaves of the house and flitting all around. We also saw a couple coyotes, a ton of meadow larks, and a pair of burrowing owls (proud to say that was my find on the way in). Unfortunately, I was unable to get any pictures of these critters since I was in a group setting and had no control over the stops that we took. Plus, we were on a mission for plants, not animals.

Ranch House

 

Ranch

Plant Nerds in their Element

Clarkia sp.

Delphinium sp.

Southern Chaparral

Ceanothus sp.

That's a long road 

The Carrizo Plain is out there...

Ride in a B-25 Bomber - Marina, CA

October 11, 2008

Merry and I decided to check out the Marina Air Fair that's held annually at the Marina Airport. There wasn't a lot going on while we were there, but there were some neat old planes and beautiful classic cars. The highlight, however, was getting a free ride in a B-25 Bomber. Merry had donated some signs and banners and negotiated getting us a two for one ride (which she kindly paid for, since rides were expensive!) with some other sponsors in the Bomber. They took us out over the bay on what happened to be a very clear day in Monterey. I rode in the middle, while Merry rode up front with the pilot. She was able to climb into the nose, while I climbed into the tail. There were even guns at all the seats! It was such an amazing experience! Especially since it's not something I thought I would ever have an opportunity to do. After the flight, Merry, true to her form, made friends with the owner and pilot of the plane and got us an invitation to the Sponsor's dinner at Kulah Ranch where we got a free buffet meal complete with complimentary wine. Not a bad way to spend a day!

Old Planes

Old Glory - B-25 Bomber

Takeoff!

Monterey Bay!

Salinas River

Pilot & Owner in the cockpit

Merry in the nose

From the nose

 Tight squeeze to get into the tail

Check out my guns 

 Huge nerd

 Aliasing propeller

 Huge nerd in the tail

Salinas

Fort Ord

The soldiers signed the plane

Merry in the nose

Merry and I with John the owner

Merry and the Corvette

Pretty Cars!