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Archive for the ‘Travel’ Category

Merritt Island: Where It’s a Warm Day

Posted in Birds, Favorite Places, Nature, Travel, Travels With Maggie, tagged , , , , , on January 12, 2012| 3 Comments »

 “It doesn’t matter if the water is cold or warm if you’re going to have to wade through it anyway.” – Teilhard de Chardin

 

A gathering of storks, egret and ibis at a pond on Merritt island in Florida. -- Photo by Pat Bean

Travels With Maggie

It’s cold and windy today here in Harker Heights, Texas, where Maggie and I are parked in my oldest son’s driveway.

And it’s snowing in Chicago, my youngest son said in an e-mail he sent me today.

Wouldn’t it be nice, I thought, to be bird watching on Merritt Island in Florida. When I checked out the weather there, I discovered it was a balmy 78 degrees.

"I'll just lay here and sleep until it warms up if you don't mind." -- Photo by Pat Bean

My thoughts went back a couple of years to the winter day I actually did spend watching birds on the island, which is located near Cape Canaveral.

I can dream can’t I?

But there’s no getting around bundling up and taking my daily walks with Maggie. Even if she doesn’t care for the idea any more than I do.

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Lost Maples State Natural Area

Posted in Favorite Hikes, Favorite Places, Nature, Travel, tagged , , , , , on January 11, 2012| 7 Comments »

 “Because they are primeval, because they outlive us, because they are fixed, trees seem to emanate a sense of permanence. And though rooted in earth, they seem to touch the sky. For these reasons it is natural to feel we might learn wisdom from them, to haunt about them with the idea that if we could only read their silent riddle rightly we should learn some secret vital our own lives …” – Kim Taplin, “Tongues in Trees,” 1989

I walked this path in the Lost Maples State Natural Area in search of a golden-cheeked warbler and was rewarded with peace and beauty that enriched my thoughts. -- Photo by Pat Bean

Favorite Places

Located in Texas’ Edwards Plateau, Lost Maples State Park has a magical aura. It’s a place where, besides seeing a golden-cheeked warbler, one can see physical evidence of the past. When I visited it, I felt like I had dropped into one of Mother Nature’s special places.

A rocky climb to the top of an Edwards Plateau Ridge in Lost Maples provides evident that this land once lay beneath a sea. -- Photo by Pat Bean

Lost Maples got its name because the maple trees there are far from other maple forests. While it’s most visited when the maple trees wear their brightest fall colors, I find it a place of calm beauty anytime of the year.

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A Wigeon of a Tale

Posted in Birds, Nature, Travel, tagged , , , , , , on January 10, 2012| 4 Comments »

“Be like a duck. Calm on the surface, but always paddling like the dickens underneath.” – Michael Caine

The flock of American wigeons I saw recently that reminded me of my five-year search for its Eurasion cousin. -- Poor photo by Pat Bean

Bird Talk

My kids tell me I have a better memory for where I’ve seen a new bird species than I do for their birthdays. Well, they’re wrong. I know the dates they were born very well. They just think I don’t because of how often I forget what day it is.

They are right, however, in thinking that I can remember where and when I’ve seen a new bird for my life bird list, which I started back on April 10, 1999.

The first bird on it is an American avocet. It and the next 67 birds on it were all seen when I went on a guided bird tour to Deseret Ranch in Northern Utah. I tagged along as a reporter assigned to do a story on sage grouse.

It was the first time I kept a list of the birds I saw — and the day I became a birder. I give

An American wigeon, a species that can be found all across the United States. -- Wikipedia photo

all credit for my newly found passion and addiction to birdwatching to Mark Stackhouse, who led the tour.

After I had listed the 67 birds, and had decided I would start my bird list, I did a very foolish thing. I added a Eurasian wigeon to the list.

A few years earlier, when I had been following Congressman Jim Hanson around during one of  his visits to Northern Utah, he made a stop at what was commonly known as the Millionaire’s Duck Club, a private hunting club located adjacent to the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge.

Everyone was all excited that day because someone had spotted a rare Eurasian wigeon through a roof-top telescope. I was invited to take a look, and the wigeon became part of the story I eventually wrote. With written proof that I had seen the bird, I didn’t think twice about adding it to my list.

Eurasion wigeons, which can normally be found in winter along U.S. coastal areas. -- Wikipedia photo

But then I got into the spirit of birding, and realized I wouldn’t recognize a Eurasian wigeon if it dropped down from the sky five feet in front of me. And I knew that I didn’t want any bird on my list that I hadn’t personally identified. But to take it off, would be to mess up the entire order of my list.

It took me five years before I did finally see this duck. It was Oct. 4, 2004, in Yellowstone National Park. What a great day that was. And I remember it as well as I remember the days my children were born.

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Dandelion Defective DNA

Posted in Birds, Nature, Travel, Travels With Maggie, Wildflowers, tagged , , , , , on January 9, 2012| 10 Comments »

 “It gives one a sudden start in going down a barren, stony street, to see upon a narrow strip of grass, just within the iron fence, the radiant dandelion, shining in the grass, like a spark dropped from the sun.” Henry Ward Beecher

Why is a rose thought to be more beautiful than a dandelion? -- Photo by Pat Bean

Travels With Maggie

I’ve taken my daily walks with my dog, Maggie, while visiting my daughter here in the Dallas suburbs in Rowlett’s Springfield Park. There’s a nice pond, which on my visits has been full of wigeons, coots, cormorants and shovelers, and a paved path that goes all the way around it.

For variety, one can wander over to a slow-moving creek that borders the park and watch, if you’re lucky, a turtle or two, and perhaps spot a ruby-crowned warbler flitting among the tree branches.

Creek turtle -- Photo by Pat Bean

Despite being winter, the park still has green grass, although much of it lies beneath crackling brown tree leaves. On my most recent walk, I came across a sight that always delights me, the unloved dandelion.

Perhaps seeing dandelions springing up unwanted in someone’s lawn or in a landscaped park thrills me because I’ve always been for the underdog. Or perhaps it’s because their bright yellow color brings joy to my soul. Or perhaps it is because I love the wild freedom of a flower that can’t be tamed?

Future generations of dandelions waiting for the wind. -- Photo by Pat Bean

The dandelions were blooming, I suspected, because of Texas’ recent warm weather spell – which last night disintegrated to cold and rainy.

Along with spotting the few dandelions this past Friday, I also saw evidence that some of the golden youngsters had already passed their prime. The elderly among the dandelions had dropped their petals and were white-headed, and in various stages of dispersing their life forces to the wind. They do it with a promise that many more dandelions will invade many more lawns come spring.

How is it, I wondered, that we humans can ooh and aah over a field of bluebonnets but be turned off by a lawn full of dandelions? Who decided what is beautiful and proper and what is not?

Is there something wrong with my DNA because I can love a dandelion as much as a lily?

Aha, my wondering brain concluded as I pondered these questions, perhaps it is those who can’t appreciate the yellow glow of happiness that a dandelion symbolizes who inherited the defective DNA gene?

 

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A Black and White Saturday Treat

Posted in Favorite Places, Travel, tagged , , , , , , , on January 8, 2012| 2 Comments »

 “Shades of grey wherever I go. The more I find out the less that I know. Black and white is how it should be. But shades of grey are the colors I see.” Billy Joel

Of course the program was in black and white.

Stepping Back in Time

Remember the old riddle: What’s black and white and red all over? As I recall the answers included an embarrassed zebra and a newspaper.

But yesterday, the answer might have been a play performed at the Pegasus Theater in Richardson, Texas, which I attended with my daughter and son-in-law.

Using lighting and makeup, the play, “The Frequency of Death” by Kurt Kleinmann, was made to look as if it were an old black and white movie of the 1930s. It was delightfully creative with a corny script that had me frequently laughing or guffawing with delight.

Ben Bryant as Nigel Grouse, the smart assistant of the dumb detective. -- Photo by Pat Bean

The melodramatic murder mystery continues through Jan. 22, in the Eisemann Center in Richardson, and will be performed Jan. 26-29 in the MCL Grand Theater in Lewisville. If you’re anyway near the Dallas-Fort Worth Metropolitan area you might want to check it out.

The red, by the way, was the fiery and startling color of the dress worn by co-producer, Barbara Weinberger, when she came out at the end of the play to announce the winner of a T-shirt from among those who had correctly guessed who the murderer was during intermission.

I had guessed wrong. But that’s OK. So had my daughter and son-in-law.

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Weekly Photo Challenge: Launch

Posted in Journeys, Travel, Uncategorized, Weekly Photo Challenge, tagged , , , , , , on January 7, 2012| 9 Comments »

“You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment.” – Henry David Thoreau

Launching myself out of an airplane was a scary moment -- but I smiled all the way down. -- Photo by NikNak

I’ve always thought the advice to do something that scares you at least once a year was good advice. Besides the jolt of adrenalin it gives your brain, it helps in gaining a true appreciation for life.

Following that advice wasn’t hard to do when white-water rafting was my passion. But with age, that activity drifted away with the currents. I found that canoeing was more in tune with my body.

When I turned 70, I got my annual  jolt of adrenalin by jumping out of an airplane, which I thought perfectly fit this week’s photo challenge.

But I now I face another challenge. What can this wandering/wondering old broad do this year to scare herself. I’m open to suggestions.

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On Grooming a Cocker Spaniel

Posted in Travel, Travels With Maggie, tagged , , , , on January 4, 2012| 4 Comments »

Maggie relaxing in my daughter's chair after today's grooming. I can't help but notice after each grooming these days, her once pure black muzzle gets grayer and grayer. -- Photo by Pat Bean

 “Anybody who doesn’t know what soap tastes like never washed a dog.” Franklin P. Jones

 Travels With Maggie

My traveling companion, Maggie, is a cocker spaniel with thick, fast growing fur that needs to be trimmed and washed every 10 days so as to keep both her ear infections and allergies at a minimum.

My previous cocker could go six weeks between groomings, and when I owned her I had a steady paycheck coming in weekly and a great groomer who charged only $25.

The cost of sending Maggie to a groomer these days ranges from a low of $42 to a high of $53 – and I live on a pretty low fixed income. So Maggie gets home, or shall we say RV-groomed since that is our home.

When the weather is warm enough, and when my RV, Gypsy Lee is hooked up to electricity, it’s an outdoor job. I sit on my RV step with Maggie in front of me and the clippers plugged into an outdoor outlet. The wind usually blows the clipped hair away.

On cold days, I sit on my toilet seat with Maggie propped up a bin in front of me and then sweep and vacuum the hair up afterward. It takes about three days before the last few pieces are finally discovered and discarded.

One or the other of those procedures works everywhere except my oldest daughter’s home, where I have no place to plug in Gypsy Lee. Today, since it was too cool to groom Maggie outside, I used the small downstairs half bath as my grooming saloon. I sat on the toilet and put Maggie on a stool in front of me. With the door closed, her cut fur was confined and didn’t get all over my daughter’s house. Clean up was much easier than in my RV.

I keep the grooming routine as simply as possible, using only two clippers blades for the job, a No. 10 for her back, throat, face and ears, and a No. 4 for the lower body and legs. Neither Maggie nor I have much patience, so on a scale of 1 (great) to 10 (disastrous), the outcome is usually in the above 5 range.

Today’s might have actually been a 4. But that’s not what pleases me. Every single time I have groomed her in the past, which is over 200 times in the nearly 12 years I’ve had her, today was the first time I didn’t have to fight her to get her right ear groomed. It has been extremely sensitive all her life.

I suspect the reason for her cooperation today when I was working on that ear is the new medicine that she was put on two weeks ago to fight her most recent ear infection. That infection was an extremely painful one for her, so much so that if it couldn’t be controlled it might have ended with me losing her.

I felt like shouting for joy when I finished. Maggie just wanted her treat. She always gets one afterward – whether she’s been good or not.

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I’m an Old Broad and Proud of It

Posted in Birds, Books, Nature, Travel, Travels With Maggie, Writing, tagged , , , , on January 2, 2012| 18 Comments »

 “In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life. It goes on.” – Robert Frost

A tree that doesn't want to die. Now this is what I call a passion for life. -- Photo by Pat Bean

Travels With Maggie

When I first started writing about my travels, I tried to disguise the fact that I was an old broad. Then one day, after a hint from an online writing colleague that being an old broad was what set me apart from all the glamorous young women out there traveling in search of love. I claimed the honor.

I first heard the term “old broad” back when I was a journalist reporting on the environment. In writing about wilderness issues and the value of protecting it, I came across a group called “Great Old Broads for Wilderness.”

I sent this photo of me taken by my friend, Shirley Lee, in Cozumel to my kids announcing that I had a new boy friend. Even old broads want to have fun.

Wow, I thought, when I met some of these women, like Susan Tixier, the brain behind the organization, and author Terry Tempest Williams, as they exercised their passions to help protect wild lands from disappearing from America. Suddenly the term old broad seemed more honorific than derogatory.

Recently I’ve added a couple of new adjectives to my own old broad-persona that I feel fit perfectly. I’m a wandering-wondering old broad with passions for writing, travel, birds, books and Mother Nature.

One of my goals for this year is to rewrite my travel book with this voice. It’s too bad I didn’t do it the first time around. I won’t make that mistake this year with my blog. It’s a promise.

And my canine traveling companion, Maggie, who is also an old broad, is my witness.

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300 Miles of Trivia

Posted in Birds, Travel, Travels With Maggie, tagged , , , , on January 1, 2012| 5 Comments »

 “Why is it trivia? People call it trivia because they know nothing and they are embarrassed about it.” Robbie Colrane

Sign of the Times

Travels With Maggie

With my canine traveling companion, Maggie, snoring softly in Gypsy Lee’s co-pilot seat, and 300 miles of highway in front of me yesterday, I loosed my brain to digest the passing sights.

Sitting behind the wheel of my RV frees my mind to seek answers to insightful, puzzling and stupid questions.

The googling of my mind began this misty morning when a great egret floated down to land beside Highway 288 near the 72-foot tall statue of Stephen F. Austin.

The Austin image, located south of Angleton, is less

Statue of Sam Houston visible from Interstate 45 south of Huntsville. -- Photo by Pat Bean

impressive than the 77-foot one of Sam Houston, which sits beside Interstate 45 south of Huntsville. Both men were Texas history-makers and both statues were created by the same artist, David Addicts.

The Austin statue, I remembered as I passed it, has become somewhat of a joke to locals. From a distance looking north, Austin appears to be picking his nose. Looking south, he kinda looks like he’s peeing.

And then my mind shifted gears. I suspected that a lot more people knew who Houston was than knew who Austin was. Houston avenged the Alamo and became president of the Republic of Texas. Austin merely colonized the state and was considered the Father of Texas .

Statue of Stephen F. Austin located south of Angleton.

What makes some people stick in our minds while others fade into oblivion, I asked my wandering/wondering brain. And then a list of names popped into my head.

I remember Edgar Allan Poe because he frightened me. Harriet Beecher Stow, author of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” because she shamed slave owners. John F. Kennedy because he charmed us; Charles Manson because he horrified us; and Mae West because she scandalized us.

I then wondered what names might pop in the heads of others if asked the same question.

And so the next six hours went.

On passing a Walmart semi, I decided this was the new sign of the times. A red Corvette pulled over to the side of the road with a police car’s swirling red, white and blue lights flashing behind it made me think that sometimes it was better to drive a plain brown wrapper.

I laughed at the sign outside the small city of Buffalo, which announced a Buffalo Stampede the third Saturday in September. That explained the herd of buffalo I had just passed, which was a brand new sight for me on this often traveled stretch of interstate that connects one of my sons with one of my daughters.

Another first for me was a sign promoting the Spearmint Rhino Gentlemen’s Club. Huh?

I looked that one up on the Web and discovered there were clubs with this name all over the place, including Las Vegas and Australia. Another sign of the times, I suspected.

Of course, as always, my eyes were seeking out birds along the way. Red-tailed hawks sitting in trees and turkey vultures flying overhead were the most common. I saw a great blue heron in a marshy area, and a snowy egret nearby. Eastern meadowlarks flew up from some roadside weeds, and a flock of crows flew into the air, leaving their road kill behind temporarily.

All too soon, Gypsy Lee, Maggie and I were pulling up in front of my daughter’s home.

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Eagerly Looking Forward to 2012

Posted in Birds, Favorite Hikes, Favorite Places, Nature, Travel, Travels With Maggie, Writing, tagged , , , , , on December 31, 2011| 11 Comments »

 “An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail.” Edwin Land

Travels With Maggie

 

I was hoping for a nice sunrise this morning to illustrate the start of both a new year and new day. But it's misty outside this morning here in Lake Jackson. The above sunrise, however, was one of many I enjoyed this year. It was taken on a June morning at Lake Walcott State Park in Idaho. -- Photo by Pat Bean

The melodious song of a Carolina Wren is playing outside my window, serenading me as I drink my morning two cups of cream-laced African coffee..

It is early, but I wanted to get a head start on writing my blog before I drive 300 miles to celebrate a late Christmas and New Year’s with my oldest daughter, who lives in Rowlett on the outskirts of Dallas.

Along with enjoying being serenaded by “hope with feathers,” I’m listening to the soft snores of my canine traveling companion, Maggie, who is curled up asleep on the couch. I’m grateful for the sound as Maggie is 14, and I know my days with her are limited. This is, especially true as she is still recovering from a painful chronic ear infection that has long resisted treatment.

I hope in 2012 to once again make it to the top of Angel's Landing in Zion. -- Photo by Pat Bean

 

Darkness still holds the day at bay outside. I am happy and at peace with myself and the world as I await the sun, and perhaps a nice sunrise. A new day, with its blank pages so full of promise, always thrills me. Sometimes I make wise use of it, and sometimes I don’t.

A new year is even more thrilling. As always I greet it with resolutions to be better and do more.

I am looking forward to spending part of each day in 2012 writing this blog. My other writing goal is simply 500 words of writing a day, plus work on rewriting my travel book. As always, I hope to eat better (and less) and exercise more.

I’m also hoping this wandering/wondering old broad’s body will once again take me to the top of Angel’s Landing in Zion National Park.. It is my one special place in this world, and last year my body rebelled and wouldn’t get me up there. 

Hopefully this year will be different. Making the 2 ½ mile climb/scramble to the top gives me confidence that I can face anything fate throws my way.

Daylight is now coming. It’s misty so it looks like there will be no spectacular sunrise. Still, I greet the dawn with eagerness, as always wondering what surprises await me and Maggie as we head down the road.  I can hear Dr. Seuss’ words playing in my head. “Oh the places you’ll go, and the things you’ll see …”

Happy New Year all!

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