Category Archives: photo essay

PPAC #31: In the Woods

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For Marsha’s Photographing Public Art Challenge.

I wrote a post last August about the Evergreen Trail at Columbia Springs Environmental Education Center in Vancouver, WA. But I didn’t include photos of the wood carvings that can be found along the trail. These have been carved into still-standing dead trees.

I don’t think I even noticed all of them the last time I was there, but Chules and I went on the trail again this past week, and there they were, just staring at us.

Kind of a fun discovery.

The Many Faces of Bold

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Bloganuary prompt: What does it mean to live boldly?

Nelly Bly, Library of Congress, public domain via WikiMedia Commons.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States, photographer Steve Petteway, public domain via WikiMedia Commons
Rosa Parks, photographer unknown. Public domain via WikiMedia Commons.
Bette Midler, Library of Congress Life, Photo by Shawn Miller. CCO via Wikimedia Commons

Five Things

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Bloganuary prompt: What are five things you are grateful for today?

I am grateful that I woke up to a rosy sunrise,

And for the beauty of early morning frost

Oh, wait… time out!

I started this post yesterday, but then woke up this morning to rain. No problem; I’m grateful for today’s rain, and how it plays with reflections on my deck.

I’m grateful that most of my native plants survived the heat dome of last summer….

and I’m grateful that Mother Earth is better at growing sword ferns than I am.

Dogs Make Me Laugh

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Bloganuary prompt: What makes you laugh?

dog day1
“I’m really sorry I did it. Really, really sorry. Um… which ‘it’ did you discover?”
dog day2
“I don’t know why the cat dug up the water sprinkler, but I scared him away just before you got here.”
stylin4
stylin1
greener
partners2
“Hmmm. Fruity, black currant, vanilla, buttery… I’d say cab-sauvignon aged in oak.”
“I’d say cherry Pop Tart.”
partners3
“Are you sure, brown dog? Bark if I see ANYTHING at all on the street, and twice as loud if I see NOTHING at all?”

Road Trip

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Bloganuary Prompt for January 2: What is a road trip you would like to take?

I’m not much of a traveler. I find plenty of adventure right in my own back yard. Literally. Now, my definition of adventure may not match yours. Like the epitome of boredom: watching grass grow, or watching paint dry… I happen to enjoy both of those pastimes.

So when it comes to dreaming of road trips, I’ll stick to the one I took last October and will retrace next month, Washington State to Colorado.

My trusty buddy Chules and I left home on a Wednesday, two days later than planned due to an utterly random case of vertigo (me, not Chules). We dropped down from Vancouver, WA into Oregon and headed east along the Columbia River.

glimpse of the Columbia River east of Hood River, Oregon

There would have been a lot of cool stuff to see along the way. The Columbia River Gorge is always scenic, The Bonneville Dam is – well – there. The historic town of Pendleton, OR is home to one of the Pendleton Woolen Mills, and offers tours of the mill as well as outlet shopping for their way cool blankets and clothing. If I were planning to sight see, I would probably continue east from Pendleton and fit in a stay at Joseph, OR to revisit the multiple bronze sculptures around town and to tour the bronze foundry.

But, alas, we were destination focused, so we turned southeastward from Pendleton, and made it to Nampa, Idaho before I had to stop for the night. (My vision only allows for daytime driving.)

worrisome skies in Utah

The next day, we traversed Idaho, briefly dropped into Utah and then headed east into Wyoming, where we spent our second night in Rawlins, WY.

Rawlins, Wyoming

If I were going to dally in Utah, I might have visited the Great Salt Lake, and headed east from there to the Dinosaur National Monument near Vernal, UT. That would have then led me through some national forests and over the Rocky Mountains before arriving at my daughter’s home in Centennial, Colorado.

Snowy mountains in Colorado that we passed through on our return trip

Instead, we took a more northern route across Wyoming to Cheyenne, WY and then down through Denver, CO to Centennial.  The best thing about the trip was arriving in Centennial and getting to visit my six month old granddaughter.

And while I was there, I was able to watch grass grow while I weeded out part of their lawn. And I was able to watch lots and lots of paint dry as we repainted their living areas.

Chules watching grass grow
Violet watching paint dry.

What could possibly make for a better trip than that?

Vancouver, USA Summer Spots (Walks #10 and #11)

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Photo: Lacamas Heritage Trail

As our Vancouver USA Summer Spots Challenge walks continue, Chules and I moved on to the Salmon Creek Greenway Trail and the Lacamas Heritage Trail.

The Salmon Creek Greenway Trail check-in was at the west end of the trail. The east end is 3 miles away at Klineline Pond, where we visited earlier in our 7th walk. I’ve been on the Salmon Creek trail many times, so it was a familiar, comfortable place to visit.

I was surprised at how low the water level was, but I guess that’s to be expected given the dry, hot weather we’ve been facing this year.

It was heating up pretty fast on the day Chules and I visited, so we didn’t walk the whole length of the trail. But we got in a good mile and did our gps check-in.

The day we went to Lacamas Lake for the Heritage Trail visit, it was actually cool and drizzly, and I was glad to have taken a warm vest along. Chules didn’t seem to care one way or the other.

I had never been on this trail before, at least not that I recall, and I was pleasantly surprised at the tall trees, lush ferns and expansive lake.

This is another candidate for a return visit in the fall to enjoy the color changes.

Eleven check-ins done, four to go!

Vancouver, USA Summer Spots (Walk #9)

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In our quest to complete the Vancouver USA Summer Spots Challenge (and thereby be entered into a drawing for which I no longer even remember what the prizes are), Chules and I made our ninth outing a trip to Washougal, Washington, which is east of Vancouver. There, the Captain William Clark Park overlooks the Columbia River.

The park’s namesake, William Clark, is half of the famed Lewis and Clark explorer duo that came to the Pacific Northwest in 1806. The park features replica dugout canoes, and while I was trying to figure out if they were supposed to be Lewis and Clark’s dugouts or those of the local Chinook tribe, I learned that the explorers never described their canoes in their journals, so the replicas would be speculation at best.

I can pretty much guarantee, though, that they didn’t have a hole at the bottom as seen in this photo:

The park is also the location of Cottonwood Beach, and I took Chules down to the water to soak his tootsies, but he was not interested in the least so we made our gps check-in and headed home.

Nine check-ins down, six to go!