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Posts Tagged ‘special places’

Angel’s Landing Tops My Special Places List

Posted in Birds, Nature, Travel, tagged , , , , , on January 13, 2011| 2 Comments »

The best view of Angel's Landing comes at the end of the hike where you look back up and say to yourself: I did it. -- Photo by Pat Bean

“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places … where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.” — John Muir

 Travels With Maggie

It’s 6 a.m. in Dallas right now, and 27 degrees outside. I’m just waiting for it to warm up a bit before my dog, Maggie, and I get on the road to my youngest daughter’s home in Arkansas.

 The week here at my oldest daughter’s has been one of recharging batteries. Except for a dinner at On The Border one night and a trip to the vet because Maggie had an eye problem (better now), I haven’t left the house.

 My daily blogs while here have been recaps of earlier adventures in the area. So what, I worried when I woke up at 5 a.m. this morning is this travel writer going to post today. Well, my brain whispered to me, what about telling them about your special place? Perhaps readers will even return the favorite and tell you about their special place.

 While I don’t always listen to my chatty brain, I was delighted with this suggestion. My favorite spot in the whole universe is the top of Angel’s Landing in Zion National Park. I made the five-mile round-trip hike to stand up there for the first time in the 1960s – and have repeated it over 30 times since.

 Two of those miles zigzag up the mountain, while the last half mile is an actual scramble over rocks. While coming down is easier on the lungs, it’s harder on the legs. The climb used to be as easy as a walk in the park. These days, it’s a slow uphill/downhill battle.

Walter's Wiggles is a series of 21 hairpin turns up to Scout's Landing, where the half mile rock scramble to the top of Angel's Landing begins. I'm catching my breath halfway up the wiggles. -- Photo by Kim Perrin

That’s OK. It gives me plenty of time to take pictures of the Indian paintbrush growing out of rock cracks, to look for the peregrine falcons that nest near the top, and to listen to the cheery chickadees that flit along the rough trail.

My favorite trip to the top was made the year when friends who were going with me had to cancel. I went alone, but instead of camping, I stayed at the Thunderbird Lodge in nearby Mount Carmel Junction. The day I made the climb was windy, really windy.

Perhaps that’s why, for the one and only time, I had the mountain top to myself for a whole hour. I wrote in my journal while I listened to my all-knowing brain tell me what it always tells me when I stand on Top of Angel’s Landing:  You made it to the top. Now you can handle anything the coming year throws at you.

 And I always do.

So what’s your special place? I’d really like to know.

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Uluru, The Great Wall and Yosemite are Tweeting Me

Posted in Nature, Travel, tagged , , , , , , , on January 8, 2011| 5 Comments »

 “You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on you own. And you know what you know. You are the guy who’ll decide where to go.” Dr. Seuss

Ayers/Uluru Rock in Australia Calls to Me -- Five photos stitched together by Stuart Edwards

 

 Travels With Maggie

 I was on the road yesterday, traveling from my oldest son’s home in Harker Heights to my oldest daughter’s home in Rowlett, located just outside Dallas. It was a 170-mile, three-hour drive up Texas’ Highway 35 through Temple, Waco and Waxahatchie, the three cities big enough to be marked in bold on my map.

 I was accompanied by bumper-riding cars and blow-my-small-RV-off-the-road-semis. OK, I exaggerate. Most of the cars allowed a respectable distance between each other and the semis that whizzed past me only created a small crosswind that required me to keep both hands on the wheel. It could have been a monotonous drive.

 Instead I kept myself entertained contemplating the suggestive post to those of us who have taken the pledge to blog daily during 2011. The WordPress moderator asked: What places would you like to visit and why?

First on my list would be Australia, and more specifically, Ayers/Uluru Rock. Located smack dab in the middle of this country that has long fascinated me, I’m not sure exactly why I want to stand beside this huge sandstone monolith that is sacred to the Aborigines. The best I can come up with is that it calls to me. And one of these days soon I intend to answer.

Great Wall of China -- Photo by Jakub Halun

Great Wall of China -- Photo by Jacob Halun

 Second on my list of places I want to visit would be China, where I want to walk on the Great Wall. A designated World Heritage Site, as is Uluru, the wall also calls to me. It’s the man-made equivalent of Australia’s rock island. I’ve long been fascinated with the Mongolian legacy of domination that began with Genghis Khan. The wall failed to keep the nomad hordes out of China and represents, to me, the multitude of guarded borders of today’s world that are proving to be just as ineffective.

 One of these days we’re going to have to accept that we all live on the same planet and if we ever are going to have peace, we’re going to have to learn how to play nicely in the sandbox.

Mirror Lake at Yosemite National Park -- Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

 The third place that sits at the top of my list of must-see places is Yosemite National Park. It’s the only western park of significance that I haven’t visited. It’s magnificent scenery calls to me, and this call I plan to answer this fall. I can’t wait to blog about it as one of my daily posts.

 So what places call to you? I would really like to know.

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