They are Lost

You might not believe this...but I cannot find my pictures from Hawaii! They are on the computer somewhere, but I don’t know where! I’ve been looking...does anyone have any clues on how I can find them?

That’s why I’ve not written on the blog...no new pictures!

In the meantime, spring has not arrived. It’s cold, windy, rainy and gray. The redbuds are in bloom, but it’s hard to enjoy them when the wind is gusting at 25 mph. The daffodils are afraid to bloom as I have a lot of “blind” ones this year! Not a good spring.

Musings: Back Home (part 1, maybe)

We are back home after being away for 11 weeks! Folks wonder how we can be gone for so long, but it’s not hard...pack up and go! Which is what we did. For 9 of those 11 weeks we were in Southern CA, for the remaining 2 we were on a cruise to Hawaii.

This dainty ship, aka The Golden Princess, was our floating hotel for 14 days. She’s a bit bigger than I like, with a full contingent of 2600 passengers, but she is pretty. By the way, that "flying wedge” atop the back of the boat is a night club by night and really quiet place to sit back and look at the water during the day.

We’ve cruised to Hawaii several times, yet it’s still fun to visit the lovely garden isles. Late February in the Islands was perfect...not too hot,  not too cold, not too much rain, not too much humidity, and not that many tourists. Folks tend to visit Hawaii during the Christmas and Easter holidays but not in between. We were in that 'tween season and it was good. Lucky for us we were off the sea by the time the tsunami from Japan raked the islands. I wonder what a large cruise ship feels like as it sails through a tsunami?

I have divided cruises into “easy” and “hard” water varieties. An easy water cruise is calm, and frankly there are not too many of them. What you see above is an easy water day. When the water looks like this, you do not know you are moving 18-20 knots per hour. A cruise through the inside passage to Alaska is an easy water cruise. There’s land on both sides, and that tends to keep the water calm or least not too rocky. Generally speaking, a cruise in the Caribbean is of the easy water variety too (except during hurricane season). The water is usually clear and still. Sailing around the Hawaiian Islands is an easy water cruise too. Only NCLA has that cruise now. These 3 cruises are good for folks who have never been cruising, are subject to seasickness or want a calm ride.

A hard water cruise is just the opposite. The ultimate hard water cruise is sailing the Drake Passage from Ushuaia to the Antarctic Peninsula. This picture is of the Drake after it calmed down a bit! That’s some bumpy water! The North Atlantic can be hard water. AND, the water off the coast of LA is hard. The general pattern for a 14 day Hawaii RT cruise from San Pedro has the following flow: the first day out is rough with seasick bags by the elevators and the stairs. The second day is less rough and only a few seasick bags are located in the public areas, the third day will be less rough and there are no seasick bags to be found (I wonder if they have run out of them by then) and the 4th day will be perfect. There are then 5 days of smooth sailing. The waters around the Islands are easy as is the first day back to the US Mainland. Then, just repeat the water pattern from less rough to very rough. The day before landing in San Pedro, the ship stops in Ensenada for 4 hours. That’s usually pretty calm, but the crawl up the coast to San Pedro can get a bit choppy.

We’ve been on the this cruise and had 4 bad days out and 4 days back OR 1 bad day out and back. There will always be one bad day in each direction. For the weak of tummy, take Bonine or Dramamine or wear a patch or wear a bracelet or take your ginger (whatever works for you) and enjoy the cruise. We’ve been on far too many cruises and we take Bonine and we don’t get seasick. I don’t know what would happen if we did not take Bonine, but I don’t want to find out either.

In Hawaii I was able to feast my eyes (and camera lens) on flowers! As you know, I love capturing flower images and Hawaii is a perfect place to do that. We visited a garden on the Big Island that was filled with beautiful flora and I was in camera heaven. I’ll post more pictures later, but here’s a teaser.

In the meantime, I’ve become more connected than ever before. I own a Verizon iPhone now; along with an iPad, an iTouch and a MacBook. I’m one of the older members of the iGeneration...I don’t think they give folks my age general admission, but maybe they will let me sit on the sidelines and participate a little bit. I’m learning how to text, which is great fun. I might get an iPad2 as the other DrC thinks he’s ready for the iPad, first edition. We’ll see. I do like toys and Apple makes some pretty ones. Watch this space to see what happens next.

This and That

A morning walk is a good time to look at nature as well as muse about everything and nothing in particular. Every morning there’s something different to look at, even if I take the same path through the park. This morning I heard a sound I had not heard before. It was a rhythmic slap on the water...I looked toward the sounds and saw the UCSB rowing team plying the lake. I had not seen them before! I feel righteous with my morning walk, but rowing definitely trumps walking!

I also look at the trees. Do you ever wonder what makes a tree limb grow the way it does? This is a white oak, and they have the weirdest shaped limbs of any tree in the park. Makes me wonder why the limbs wander around as they do? Does anyone know?

Then there’s the tree bark. A sycamore has a very distinctive bark. Mother Nature had a bit of fun when she designed the sycamore tree.

 

 

Sometimes, tree bark gets modified by woodpeckers. I never see the woodpeckers going back to the tree to retrieve their bounty, but as you look at the tree, there are no acorns stuffed in the holes, so I guess the woodpeckers are fast (and as you know from a previous post, I’m not good at capturing “fast.”)

Harvey’s Kids

This is Harvey, and if you have read my blog, you’ve met him before. He’s an injured goose that stays at the lake year round.

This year however, he raised a clutch of ducklings!

Momma duck left the nest when she thought the ducklings were old enough to fend for themselves, but Harvey had other ideas. He tended to them and now they are his. Since Harvey does not fly, neither do these ducks. I guess they will get the model for flying from some of the wild ducks that come thru the park, but in the meantime, they walk or swim where they need to go.

 Like all ducks, they have learned how to panhandle! 

Of Fast and Slow

I’ve decided that I can take pictures with the new camera. They are not as good as the pictures I took with my other camera, but each day they are getting better. Practice is the key. I had lots of practice with the old camera and only 2 months with this new one. I need to give myself a break!

In the meantime, I’ve also decided that subject matter for pictures falls into 2 categories: Fast and Slow. The fast things get away and the slow things I can capture.  Landscapes are slow. Birds are fast! Every so often, I get a “fast” something, but generally, I’m better at capturing the slow.

The other morning there were 4 vultures sleeping in the tree. They were slow and I was able to get a few shots of that big bird.

Then there was this scrub jay. 

Jays generally bob up and down pretty quickly, but this guy was slow and then he jumped on a satellite dish and posed for me.

Then there is the hummingbird. This guy falls into the Fast Category.  I’ve tried...but this is the best I’ve gotten so far.

Unless you count the acorn woodpecker at the feeder??? An acorn woodpecker all bent up on a hummingbird feeder is clumsy and slower than a hummer...but still fast enough to fly away as soon as he sees that he’s the object of my attention.

There are also flowers...they usually fall into the “slow” category, as they do not move very much. But, have you noticed, every time you start to focus on a flower the wind starts to blow! So...there are some “fast flowers” too.

In the meantime, I click away hoping to find something pretty to color my day.

Ground Hog Day Musings

The eastern US is getting slammed with a snow storm... “the official weather genius” ground hog lives in the east... he did not see his shadow this morning...that means that spring will come early. (As you can tell from the above picture, we are not in the eastern US.)
 

Now, if the ground hog was a westerner, the forecast would be different. Which leads me to wonder if “the” ground hog really knows what he’s doing after all? We don’t have ground hogs in the park, just pesky little ground squirrels. They saw their shadow this morning.

Not related to ground hogs or spring, are the opportunistic woodpeckers. Who knew that Acorn Woodpeckers like sweet nectar from a hummingbird feeder?

Of Blossoms and Mushrooms

I know it’s not spring, but there’s a tree in the park that burst into bloom yesterday! Granted, the weather has been wonderful, but this tree is a bit early.  The other trees are still dressed for winter, as they should be.

As you can see the blossoms are beautiful and they are a welcome treat, as there are not many flowers blooming this time of year.

On the other hand, there are mushrooms. They seem to indicate that it’s damp and gray, unlike the blossoms, but who knows what Mother Nature is up to.

The early morning bird watch has not yielded any big birds. This morning I saw a blue bird, and it actually sat still long enough for me to get a picture of it.

I also saw a quail, but trying to capture a close up of a quail is next to impossible. They move so quickly and I need a steady hand. I’m happy to see quails from afar!

One more day of "Life in the Slow Lane."