it's a full-sized pom

Thursday, January 26, 2012

It’s 4:30 in the pm, a delicious time of day in clement Florida. The palms change color, lights soften and that feral cat lurks and challenges the sorry excuses for dogs. J snoozes in the passenger seat after several hours at the Space Center that included a bus tour to the VAB. (The Vehicle Assembly Building, tall enough for Saturn 5s back in the halcyon ‘60s.)

now you've seen inside

the VAB, too

I worked in the public library again, a great place to hang out while J’s in his Rocket Garden. I remember Isaac Asimov extolling the virtues of libraries. It’s where he educated himself. He called them “spaceships” and “time machines.”

We watched “The Right Stuff” last night under a star-peppered sky. What a great movie and what great camerawork. Of the 7 Mercury astronauts only John Glenn and Scott Carpenter are still alive. (As of now, 2012, 50 years after the film events.)

After several loops around the campground this morning, we sat in a nearby McDonald’s (This one not a corporate store, and so they made the decision not to offer senior coffee. Keeps those damn gray heads from loitering.) Other drawback is no outlets. (How can we charge our jet skis?)

Decided I needed some real food (I’ve been living on sweet peppers and hummus and nuts.) and so I stopped at Publix for salmon. I’m ravenous for steak but all the beef looked as if it’d been dipped in red food dye. Ah, at this point I miss Wyoming!

Where's the beef?!

Friday, January 27, 2012

Deebie and Luigi will drive down from Jax to meet up with us tomorrow morning. J and I will check out of Manatee Hammock and join our company in an oceanside La Quinta in Cocoa Beach. The amenities sure not to deter that 9-year-old from surfing, nor J from charging our devices.

the outdoors is exhausting

Saturday, January 28, 2012

Happy Birthday, Sarah!

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Back at Manatee Hammock after our 30-hour whirlwind with Deebie and Luigi. They pulled into the campground yesterday morning just in time for glorious sunshine after a slightly wet and overcast Friday. Deebie and I looped the RV subdivision, choosing the rigs we thought we could maneuver, and watched young boys catching crabs for bait. (When we asked a fisherman what he might catch, he said “nada” fish. Yeah, he chuckled. “No fish!”) We immersed Deebie and Luigi in our campground routine with a lunch of Daniel’s original hopple popple. Everything slid down easily, including the dilly beans from neighbors Moya & Roland back on Menlo.

dilly beans

early b-day cards & cookies from Deebie

getting a few chapters in before lunch

Then the four of us whizzed off to room 302 of La Quinta Inn and Suites. Luigi asked, “Which do we have?” His theory was that a suite was classier than an inn. Whatever we got, it faced sunny sand, a sparkling surf and a dazzling white cruise ship moving like a watch-hand on the horizon! Can’t get any better than that, unless a sand “box-spring” is more your cup of tea. Even with cool winds off the Atlantic we were to see overnighters sleeping on the beach surrounded by their shopping bags.

our view of Cocoa Beach Pier

While J counted electrical outlets, Deebie, Luigi and I staked out a table by the pool. Luigi morphed into a sea creature, and Deebie and I gave the bartender at the Tiki Bar a little business.

Much later, back in 302 we ordered dinner, opened the Argentine Black Box (an x-mas present Deebie got from Luigi’s Nonno) and parked ourselves on the balcony. The wine wasn’t bad, but it developed a leak we didn’t notice until we’d repainted the floor of the balcony. To free up the balcony conversation, J invited Luigi inside to watch Spielberg’s The Lost World, but the worn out sea creature fell asleep minutes after the cuddly dinosaurs maybe ate the little girl.

"But there were onions hiding under the cheese!"

some of us liked the arrangement

Deebie and I were out the door this morning at  5:30. We walked clear to nostalgic Bimini Road and past our old house. No Foreclosed signs. In fact, the road was dark and quiet, everyone still in Sunday morning stupor. Watched the ocean sunrise on the home stretch, or the best that a cloudy sky could muster. Us sun worshippers gazed east while all the gulls stood en masse facing Ron Jon’s. J and L greeted us with a big wave from the balcony.

We had endless choices at the complimentary breakfast buffet and lots of hot coffee. Luigi worked off some of his biscuits and gravy (and scrambled eggs, bacon, banana and muffins) in the pool again – hoping his new buddies Gavin and Ryan would join him, but alas they were moving on.

but Deebie thought the bacon looked strange

J made himself a waffle

Checked out around 10:30 and became beach fleas for an hour of brutal sun. (“I’ve never been to the beach with long sleeves before,” Deebie said.) The surfers were making the best of a few flaccid waves and skinny, sun-screened kids outran the waves. We had to drag another wet Luigi out of the surf.

Luigi thought it read no "girls"

Stopped by a very small farmer’s market where Deebie bought me a shockingly red tomato and J bought himself a sugarless apple tart (sweetened with orange juice).

cracking pecans with hand muscles

Deebie & Luigi headed back to Jax around 2. J nosed around for sci-fi books in the Cocoa Beach Library Book Sale and I downloaded 60 photos from my trusty Canon.

at Manatee Hammock

pretending to be a narwhal

where to fish for nada

a pelican pretending to be an anhinga

hoping L doesn't splash his iPhone

covering all bases

my beautiful sister

L was wet more often than dry

Monday, January 23, 2012

“You here to register?” asked a crusty old vet. At the entrance to the Forest Public Library sat diligent Republican volunteers pointing wanna-be voters in the right direction. Lots of Romney campaign signs lined the drive across the street from a produce stand, although Deebie thinks Florida will go Newt. Spent much of the day in the comfy library with its fast connection and bookcases of musty old – already antiquated – tomes.

J bought an inedible (antiquated?) croissant this morning from Winn Dixie. We tossed it, but I went back later to grumble and requested a cookie to make up for it. No problemo! I learned from O’s laptop experience to question what should be the obvious. Of course, Deebie has never met a French fry she hasn’t sent back to the kitchen.

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

After another hike on the Florida National Scenic Trail, we took showers and checked out of Juniper Springs. I would have liked to hang out longer, but J was anxious to get to Titusville with his soon-to-expire Space Center pass. Our sandy walk was a time for him to reminisce about his early career in cognitive psychology and the bright lights of those who had an impact on him.

His current conceit is to imagine interviewing potential “floating managers” for the Family Dollar store. Clearly such a person needs to be on the order of “one out of fifty.” So of the people he’s known how many might get the job (at maybe $40K/year)? He thinks at least three of his professors might quality. J is prepared to argue that this is a penetrating commentary on America’s economic future! (TIME MACHINE footnote: J says the Times’ main headline two days from now makes working on a Mac ethically as compromising as listening to the Ring. What would life be without both!!)

A banana, clementine and that rather bent – but free – chocolate chip cookie rewarded J’s imaginary research at our turnaround point.

waxing on!

And here we are at Manatee Hammock, sitting along the edge of the Intracoastal Waterway, the sun at our backs, gazing out at the VAB, which for an extra $25 is now open to tourists. We remember watching that breathtaking night launch of the Kepler observatory in 2009 from this very same point. And to think it continues to discover new exoplanets that just might be habitable!

yeah, that's me

Pelicans dive-bomb, mullets leap, J scurries over his wireless keyboard, a couple points into the abyss at gilled surprises. A woman bicycles with either a teddy-bear schnoodle or a pom puppy in her wired basket. Bali would look positively prehistoric next to it, D&K!

with flying digits!

folks just love to decorate

(Mal’s x-mas present – the citronella candle lantern – exploded last night during “Silver Blaze,” our latest Sherlock episode that kept us rapt until 9 when we surveyed the damage. ((K,  I assume you know this marvelous episode. It’s all about the gregarious nature of horses, and the susceptibility of men to boutiques.)) The candle glass broke clean in two. We’re still using it, though.)

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

The postcards were assembled for our morning hike. Daybreaks here are ridiculously stunning, as if Adobe had something to do with it. Even the manatees were making headway in the placid ICW. Familiar faces biked the campground or walked their dogs, and a feral cat has taken up residence. Speaking of feral cats, K, how is your latest?

Stopped at Sunrise Bread Company for coffee and scones – and an outlet! – before heading to the Space Center. The coffeeshop remains one of Titusville’s thriving businesses – maybe the only one, since many more buildings seem boarded up this year.

J bought an annual pass to the Space Center last year, which is good into March, and was anxious to take advantage of his continued free admission. He packed up water, clementines and his wireless keyboard, planning to take notes surrounded by all those blossoms in the Rocket Garden.

this one's for you, Ski

Regained him at 3 and after a pitstop to restore him with a Mickey D chocolate shake, we continued on to the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge. Had a heck of a scare that I’d dropped my camera out of the car at the entrance to the one-way gravel road. I ran all the way back a mile maybe, asking cars along the way if they’d noticed a red camera. After my mad search finding nothing, J rang to say he’d found it. Hence, these pix!

American Bittern?

new construction to

house Atlantis

right up your alley,

Deebie!

one of Mallory's x-mas presents

a citronella candle lantern

Saturday, Jan. 21, 2012

Listening to screaming kids in Juniper Springs Campground, one of 14 in Ocala National Forest. Lots of families and lots of black bear, according to warnings. Down in the Everglades panther-crossing signs stir the imagination. Here black bear-crossing signs only prompt a “Gee, they’re everywhere, aren’t they?”

Fancy way to stash food or garbage

although we generate little of it

Juniper Springs was constructed by the CCC in the 1930s and is another one-of-a-kind national forest with semi-tropical flora. Campsite 64 is our pied-à-terre for another night or two – wrapped in saw palmetto and Spanish moss-ladened oaks and aflutter with amiably hopping turkey vultures, black vultures and wild turkey.

I like these neighbors!

Easy drive out of Milwaukee on Wednesday. A 4-inch snowfall and temperature drop of Tuesday sent us off with the only taste of winter we needed.

Ah, what a feast for the eyes!

Drove long hours south but conditions were ideal. J and I spewed our usual invectives at the dearth of public radio and the loud-and-clear “Praise the Lord” channels. Always billboards that boil our blood: Homosexuality is an abomination; Where is the birth certificate? And the many smiling baby faces that remind us how soon their little hearts began beating.

What a lunch selection!

I'm above the flying buttresses!

Some students are very proud of this!

The only extended stop – other than two night sleeps at a Motel 6 in Marion, IL and at a Walmart south of Atlanta – was lunch in Sewanee, TN and the University of the South. One of those small, lovely private colleges where writers gather in the summer for workshops and readings, concerts and sipping. (Small but 10,00 acres!) Of course, the school is Episcopalian and the student body fairly khakied and sport-jacketed, but the brand-new-looking Gothic architecture is stunning. Bought a Sewanee Review with a book review by my UWM Professor Thomas Bontley so as to underline our visit. Then a pitstop at the well-remembered Hallelujah Pottery, but alas 3-year-old Trinity was still taking her nap.

I just love the owner!

Found this on my walk.

We bypassed Jax because Ashley and Elijah are filling my sister’s house. Brainstorm instead: we’ll hook up with Deebie in Cocoa Beach next weekend.

K recuperates from a nasty fall as I write this. I left town the day she returned from the hospital. I’ll make it up to you, dear friend! Step slowly and carefully, and be as much of a bitch as you feel necessary.

reading Ethan's email

1 pm

Back from a short hike on the Florida National Scenic Trail, Eth. Remember walking part of it in Big Cypress? Flora similar to PBG natural areas – sand pine and scrub oak. Much of the downed timber along the trail was harvested as a result of the 2004 hurricanes Francis and Jeanne. Indians named Ocala’s sand pine “clausa,” which means closed (duh?). Intense fires are needed to open the pine cones and scatter the seeds, just like the lodgepoles of Yellowstone.

Stretches 1400 miles across the state of Florida

cushioned sandy path

false rosemary

J and I walked a lovely boardwalk nature trail this morning, although J was chatting with his sister Jean and probably saw little of it until our return.

haven't seen a gator yet

wish I had someone to go canoeing with...

Campsites on the weekends are rather cozy at Juniper Springs. We’ve new neighbors – in our laps! – but we don’t mind. They look like a nice family and already the grandmom has urged a youngin’ to speak quietly.

Sunday, January 22, 2012

Writing this in gloves! But the morning temps still aren’t as cold as Yellowstone’s. How quickly we adapt to warmth! Hiked along the boardwalk with J to get the juices flowing and solve the problems of the world – that includes the Schowalter/Hay family, too! Guess what? We failed, again!

J’s reading the Times on his iPhone and regaling me with Dowd’s Sunday editorial. What about Obama the crooner! And Newt wins 44% of the vote in SC? Deebie saw a great billboard in Jax: No Newt is Good Newt!

Drove 10 miles west to a Winn Dixie – the nearest grocery store – for some greens. After describing it to O on the phone yesterday, he said, “You mean, not Sendik’s?” We snared a whole-wheat hoagie roll, though, and fried up some tasty croutons for our smoked-salmon salad.

got the feeling you've seen all this before?!

maybe not Brussels sprouts, though!

The one-man-operation was all sold out!

J found a multiple electric outlet here

sharing the boardwalk

sips at Boots when she's not on duty

I can drive and

play photographer

sometimes you just

need a different

perspective

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Okay, now the trick is making the last leg home interesting enough to blog about. (It might have something to do with the plummeting temps and my dwindling enthusiasm! Last night’s cold wind almost launched our air mattress! Who needs NASA?) Right now McD’s Fox News blathers on in wide-screen high-definition annoyance. Grr.

J's developed a taste for ribs, Deebie

Didn’t take long to leave behind captivating Badland landscape for the soporific flatlands – endless tended fields peppered with hay rolls, endless train cars (coal heading east, empty going back) endless dust. Every vehicle in ND needs its rear end lathered.

And then there’s FARGO. At the beginning of our trip Fargo was where the Red River breached its banks. Fargo was of Coen Brother fame. Fargo was where J was born, where his dad graduated from college. Now it’s damn irritating, especially when we’re so close to Moorhead and the schizophrenic iPhone directions test our patience. Took a couple of years off my life just looking for a damn park. MOORHEAD! Deliver me.

on the street where

J did his 4th-grade homework

where sports

are big-time

They are twin cities, divided by states of ND and MN. Toonerville kiosks collect 75 cents when you drive from one to the other, both ways!

“Maint Reqd” flashes with each crank of the ignition. Time for an oil change.

Just arrived at Planet Toyota. Complete with historical murals of the Corwin monopoly, founded 1914, now in hands of great-great grandsons. Flat screens in surround-sound, a bean-bagged game hideaway, Camp Toyota with stuffed Mickey and its own screens animated with bug-eyed cartoon characters, baskets full of granola bars and cookies. (J chews audibly.) And geysers of coffee.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Doing our “lizard” thing in the sun on a bench at Jamestown College. Lovely little campus on the top of a hill, the sun already taking the chill off – especially for those muscular blonds in red shorts! Bought a birthday postcard for Nathaniel with greetings from where his great grandmother graduated in 1928. Quiet, friendly, Christian. J comes from good, solid stock. Someone sneezed when beading together his DNA!

even McD's looks good

before sunrise

crossing the border into MN

well, they elected Jesse

(Thank you, everyone, who commented on our shenanigans. It was great knowing you’d hitched a ride!)

ND Sphinx

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Glorious AC at the Bully Pulpit Golf Course in whose clubhouse we find refuge from the 90 degrees. (J can’t help renaming it Bloody Pulpit Gold Course.) Imagine a golf course tucked into the lap of lunar-luxuriance, stunning 24/7 green (although 9 holes are still closed from spring flooding). I get a kick out of golfers who prime golfcart-fitted coolers with ice and then stuff the remaining space with bottles – for a loopy hour on the distant greens, zipping hole-to-hole under a blazing sun. The friendly clubhouse server doesn’t sell 6-packs. You have to buy beer by the bottle ($4), and they do!

Kelly Green RIT?

With cool bottles ourselves, lounging in the “Transportation Museum Room,” we can push a button to see a film of TR building the Panama Canal. Perhaps inspiring a little drift toward political nostalgia, a long-ago quote from H. G. Wells: “ … the friendly peering snarl of his face, like a man with the sun in his eyes….”

but it made him pee a lot

J went to our campground’s ranger talk last night while I volunteered to wash dishes. I made the better choice. J imitated the ranger spiel, a cross between one too-many campfire presentations and unfettered lunacy. After all, it’s almost a full moon in ND!

After a morning drive to  “signal mountain” for J’s chat with Jean (didn’t happen but we enjoyed hot-air balloons whooshing overhead), we replayed our familiar breakfast at the campground and then took a hot walk along the park road, J as far as the turnoff to Peaceful Valley Ranch. He waited in the shade – alert for rattlesnakes – while I hiked the full distance to the ranch and discovered it had closed for the season, although Horny Horse was still lurking around outside the corral dreaming of his moist mare, no doubt.

hope springs eternal

ND woolly bear

TR loved this place, too

After dinner J drove us a few miles on the Scenic Loop where from every perspective we saw postcards of almost unnatural beauty – timeless, austere and scary.

and to think TR thought they'd become extinct

a wild one for you, K

making our bed in paradise

Sunday, September 11, 2011 – Happy Birthday, Julia Clare!

Crept out of Cottonwood CG before 6 to take off the chill of 40 degrees and for another try at signal mountain. No luck. Now we’re concerned, although we think Jean might have gone to NYC for the Memorial. (Just learned she was in fact at a ceremony at Provincetown Lighthouse – with no cell signal, of course!)

Needing coffee we stopped in at the Cowboy Café – their first two groggy customers! Our teenage waitress (hoarse from last night’s volleyball game) kept it coming and J got his bacon fix. Afterwards, we strolled around sleepy Medora, bumping into retired and foreign student volunteers who water the grass in summer, also deadheading flowers, tending short-lived gardens,  bagging tourist wrappers. Nearby this morning’s hot-air balloons snuffled down for a coffee stop themselves.

earning a train ticket out of ND

wanted the liver & onions but sold out

do you see a

(Minnesota?)

ND theme here?

sometimes things get

really,

really,

BORING!

Another winding drive back to Cottonwood where I left J snoozing in the Twizzler while I hiked to Peaceful Valley Ranch at my own pace. No snakes, no Horny Horse, but herds of buffalo and lots of frantic prairie dogs.

more wild ones that like the campground, K

While J chatted with O, I called Jelly Bear to wish her a Happy 13^th Birthday. She loved the blue-butterfly earrings I sent her from Mammoth. J’s contribution was an iTunes card. Not sure if it’s something she can use or not!

Our Western Adventure is like those balloons coming to a landing. Behind the closing curtain summer’s stagehands scurry for a final scene. We gather wits (addled? limping along?) and search out the white x’s on a well-worn stage. Menlo will open like a draughty back door, with musty basement and wonderful neighbors who will welcome grungy lost ones home.

The weather will change in a few days here. Already sidewalks in Medora are cushioned with cottonwood leaves, brittle and wispy, each breeze a baton for millions of castanets still on the gnarly-barked trees. Autumn brings arboreal slumber, biting wind and “Closed for the Season” signs. Storefront flower baskets on life-support, “Open” flags faded and listless. Owners tally the summer take, boxing up nonperishable inventory for the spring thaw. Library hours won’t be any  more generous but TRNP will remain open, its bison, wild horses, elk and prairie dogs well adapted to what comes next.

we consult it every day

non-wilds off to other pastures, K

And we, too, will adapt to city ways. After 6 weeks of peeing in the woods and squirting toothpaste into the sage, we’ll effortlessly adjust to electricity and plumbing. But the Twizzler stinks. Can’t live in such a confined space without a certain shall-we-say absorption. Think I’ll break down and pay for a thorough detailing!

rarely used

Ethan alerted us yesterday to the supernova “PTF 11kly” that has all astronomers and wanna-be’s astir. It’s the brightest in 25 years and a mere 21 million light years distant! With moonglow at our backs we scanned the tail of the Big Dipper for its +10 luminance… Note: that’s very very dim, despite the supernova’s real brilliance of a billion stars! Are you out there, Carl?

I look better in shadow!

don't you just love 'em!

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Boondocked at Walmart in Miles City, MT last night and woke to throbbing 18-wheelers and the subdued light of casino neon. Tracked a variety of commerce leaving a truck stop, their trailers filled with boats tilted skyward, green farm machinery, and perplexing bundled raw materials that led us to believe some kind of  business is booming somewhere!

But we’re back in the heat! Left Mammoth before light yesterday and posted a blog in the parking lot of the grocery store where I used the Motel 8 signal (of varying strength) across the street. Watched dog-walkers and Asians stack suitcases in SUV’s while J nibbled on freshly-slung donuts.

Pulled into the Gardiner PO parking lot, startling a family of five mule deer, two of the fawns still spotted and jumpy, ears like cell towers. Bleary-eyed tourists groping for their cameras.

At Eth’s suggestion we stopped in Livingston to nose around that rustic literary town and noticed a “Sold Out” poster for an Evening with the town’s favorite summer residents. Bought a North Dakota Idiot book for a buck for Tod, J’s coffee shop pal back home, and a native of Minot:

“A Montanan and a North Dakotan jumped together off a ten-storey building. Which hit ground first? The Montanan! – the North Dakotan lost his way.”

When we discovered that our bookstore clerk was Proprietor Andrea Peacock, Doug’s lovely wife, I reminded her that she’d hosted Ethan for dinner last summer. She remembered him fondly and assured us that she would’ve definitely found room for Ethan at this evening’s gathering. She didn’t offer to find seats for us, though!

Stayed on 90 out of Billings and finally! visited Little Bighorn National Monument. Eerie to replay the battle in those rolling rises and coulees of golden grass, stark white gravestones scattered where Yankees fell, some of them recent immigrants with no English. Thanks to a filmstrip enactment of the battle it was easy to see how advantageous the terrain was for concealing Sitting Bull’s blood-thirsty warriors, whose wives and children were hiding nearby on that year’s hundredth anniversary of the American Revolution.

Friday, September 9, 2011

The best campsite so far! Number 13 in Makoshika State Park within the Hell Creek Formation. Name means “Place of Evil Spirits” and here indeed is found the infamous K-T Boundary of meteorite fame and the death of dinosaurs.

Fortunately we’re no where’s near extinct. We had the campground loop all to ourselves, moonglow our lantern, the air soft and warm but full of flies, kamikazing into my wine. Where once the dinosaurs had played we luxuriated in comfy shade thanks to a sun-shelter built for our purpose. Enjoyed a blazing fire because a previous camper had left a box of dried kindling and logs. Salad with grilled chicken strips, a multigrain baguette and another sweet Washington peach, all the while marveling at the palette of strata we had for our dining room. There was no music, but we heard some.

Had spent the hottest hours of the afternoon in the Glendive Public Library and then visited the Makoshika Fossil Museum still in disarray from a recent move, but Steve, its energetic and knowledgeable manager/guitar-store owner, plans big things and urged us to return when the pterodactyl would surely be painted!

Woke to wrens and bluebirds. Made strong coffee and sipped while the sun slid down the formations. Took a hike on the Diane Gabriel Trail, the endpoint remnants of a hadrosaur. J held back at the bottom of the final steep climb, opting to make do with my description!

switchbacks are closed due to shifting ground

lion country

she takes her wheels everywhere

so do we!

thought the Miles City PO had been shut down

but it was just a gas leak

he wanted s'mores

but made do with an iPhone

it's already

that time of year

but we had a good run

black bear cub up a tree near Dunraven, E

for when we're too old

to drive

and we don't know what's upside down

elk food

J & CL chow

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

We’ve turned yet another page in our Yellowstone adventure by moving to historic Mammoth, 5 miles outside of Gardiner, MT. Our site (#63) is just as lovely before the sun skulks over the tawny mountain as it was last evening at dusk after our salmon feast. The campground is terraced between parched and brittle bear grass, shuddering sage candelabras and bear-proof storage bins. A motley assortment of misshapen pines and trembling aspen afford us welcome afternoon shade. (Aspens don’t propagate by seeds. Instead, they’re cloned through a root system that can be thousands of years old.)

J took this!

people must feed 'em

at one time you could bathe here

for you, D

for you, O

more huckleberry

chateaubriand in YNP!

Walked trails that J handled easily today and then took our own historic tour of Mammoth. Most of the buildings built between 1872 and 1916 still stand. No need for horse stalls (K!) or barracks any longer, but they’re all buzzing with research offices and residences. Watched a slide program in the Mammoth Hotel last evening, the spiel given by a pianist who fell in love with Yellowstone in 1978 (as a dishwasher) and has been making himself useful ever since.

wooden-inlay US map inside the

hotel with Maryland's capital listed as Baltimore

remember Wraith Falls, Eth?

Undine Falls

Last evenings curtain call at #63 was a run of the elk, their annual rut echoed all over the Park by songs of dissonance. I watched a majestic bull in a hormone-heightened frenzy drive out an adolescent spike bull while bellowing to his harem. As he shepherded them up the hillside between tents and RVs, a garland of taillights came to a standstill on the winding road to make room for a park ranger broadcasting warnings for everyone to take shelter in their vehicles. (Bulls can be deadly.) Clotheslines are not allowed in Mammoth during rut! Imagine what an elk cow would make of the testosterone-driven bull with a string of boxers and dishtowels on his rack. It has happened!

pheromone central

Monday, September 5, 2011 – Happy Birthday, Cousin Bonnie!

Canyon celebrated Labor Day by hanging out the red, white and blues and closing down the campground for the upcoming season of stark, steaming, spectacular cold.  How I’d love to eavesdrop on the Valley winter! Bison wearing masks of white, their impenetrable wooly hoods sugared with frost; wolves howling in the miasma of morning, the hot blood of their kill shocking against immaculate snow; bushy-tailed coyotes breaking suddenly for a chance to pounce.

Canyon shower & laundry facilities

you can get a towel for a buck

Sunday, September 4, 2011

Several cups of cafeteria coffee took the edge off our 30 degree morning. After J de-layered in the roomy Visitor Center bathrooms, we drove back to the Lamar where we found a strong cell phone signal at Slough Creek. Chatted with Philip and Oliver before moving on to the wolves. Along the way we passed pronghorn, bison, elk and coyote. The pièce de résistance, as always, were 5 wolves of the Lamar Canyon pack that circled the bison kill but were no longer particularly interested in it. On our drive back to Canyon, we stopped at Antelope Flats – and another strong signal – for an Ethan chat over that vast but today grizzlyless landscape.

illegal to take

I give human nature A++ for clogging up a half-mile of the park road for the sight of a bison or coyote. Everyone must have coyotes in his backyard in Des Moines or New Haven, but to see that flash of near platinum lurch through the YNP sage is in truth as thrilling as a grizzly, and the spirit can’t resist the photo op of an iconic bison lumbering down the center line of the park road,  indifferent to us and our schedules.

Saturday, September 3, 2011

Cozy evening in the Canyon Lodge filled with drinks and the buzz of who-saw-what-today. I’m too cheap to spend $7.50 on a glass of wine, and besides, I’d already had some at dinner.

bridging the Golden Gate

Blacktail Plateau area

spotting wolves by my lonesome

sometimes the only wildlife you see

Thursday, September 1, 2011 – Happy Birthday, John Petty!

a Honda holding rocks

but these rule

Sluggish day for wildlife – although I spotted the black wolf again in the Hayden. Opted to drive into Mammoth for a shower at the Hotel – $3 for a delicious hot and much-needed wash down. (Needless to say, any time spent not hunting for wildlife coccons me in galling guilt. I might have been clean, but I’d have blown off the coconut shampoo for a badger sighting any day!)

they're moving down the mountains

they race up with nimble hoof

J meanwhile managed to fill his eyedrop prescription at the tiny, inventory-diverse Gardiner Pharmacy. (Note that the river is spelled Gardner, the town Gardiner. According to the patient gray-braided pharmacist, Founder G varied his name’s spelling. It was the PO that ultimately determined the town’s name, the Geologic Survey the River’s.)

Bought a chunk of Alaskan King Salmon at the Gardiner Food Mart (much cheaper than our Menlo’s Sendik’s), a package of (reduced, of course!) sliced veggies and several tiny red taters. All with the idea that we’d picnic in Mammoth.

Heading south from Gardiner town we noticed tables that proved set up with goodies raised by the local Hutterite Colony. Bought one tomato and a bag of radishes from bonneted long-frocked women skilled with a scale and cash box. Just in front of me a local codger was disappointed the pies were already sold out. He put in a reservation for strawberry/rhubarb on the women’s’ next visit.

Mammoth picnic area ended up much too windy for preparing our planned feast. Postponed it for tomorrow.

Friday, September 2, 2011 – Me Mum would’ve been 93 today!

Yup, woke to frost at Canyon. Hightailed it to the 6:30 a.m. cafeteria for a bottomless cup o’ joe. Had something that claimed to have once been scrambled eggs. Not! J liked the well-fried bacon, though.

another messy carnivore

Drove south to the Hayden Valley where we heard wolves but couldn’t see them for the thick morning ground mist. Proceeding on I swung into the human madness of another pullout.

Triumph!  I’m the first to notice the black wolf of the Canyon Pack emerge from the mist, and then I discover 7 more. Needless to say, my fellow wolfers were very appreciative. The eight wolves were stunningly visible in morning light cavorting in the region of last Sunday’s long-finished carcass.

Next it was north to Dunraven Pass and a strong voice and data signal near Mt. Washburn. Downloaded Ethan’s latest writing, checked the NYT and – now current – headed for the Lamar Valley. From the vantage of the horse corral I saw two Lamar Canyon Pack pups frolicking in the frosty sage. Word was that they’d already been fed by their adults from yet another bison carcass nearby.

J and I wanted a hike on the Cache Creek Trailhead and so we moved just around the bend where we shared parking with both overnighters and – voilà – old friend Ray! He was delighted to see us again and urged us to stop by Pebble Creek CG to greet Darlene who was off duty that day.

our Pebble Creek hosts

I asked expert Ray to point in the general direction of the carcass (there were actually 2 carcasses at some distance from each other) and he no sooner pointed to one when he spotted a wolf on it. Soon it was joined by 3 others! Earlier in the morning someone had seen one of the attentive adults carry a bison leg to the youngsters! Watched the adults themselves feast for several minutes before heading off for the trail.

Followed a ranger – packing heat and two new “Trail Closed for Bear Activity” signs – on his way to the second bison kill. Grizzlies had been seen on that one. Don’t want to stress a griz who thinks you might want to share! The ranger was determined to prevent a repeat of last week’s fatal griz encounter, second and hopefully last of this summer.

he'd just sat down to eat lunch; never got to it

On our return leg two fisherman passed us quoting Yeats!

Whipped up our deferred salmon dinner at the Yellowstone Picnic area in mid-afternoon. Sun was warm and the wind less unruly. What a feast, one I fearlessly hoped might draw some scenery to us.

Finished off with a chemically-enriched pint of huckleberry ice cream created by Montana’s own Wilcoxson Ice Cream, headquartered in Billings. Thus fortified, we attended an Official Evening Ranger Talk. The young Flat Brimmed Hat regaled us and a dozen others with his musical Carolina accent and the tall tales of Mountain Men.

as close to a griz as you want to get

every day, too!

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Home again. Yellowstone, that is! Left the peace and quiet of GTNP this morning for the giant-lensed fanatics of  “that other park to the north.”  Arriving at a turn-off in the Hayden Valley were  greeted warmly by folks eager to show us their animal views though Swarovskis.

cheaper model

For the uninitiated those are the spotting-scope Princes of Yellowstone. Swarovski is an Austrian maker of crystal jewelry for upscale wenches, of formidable gun sights, and above all for the $4K marvels of which three were in evidence at our very first wolf-and-grizzly show. We enjoyed comparing the generous owners’ views of ursines and canines discussing the weekend’s kill. (Wolves do most of the killing, bears most of the eating.)

One of the optic wives was an ebullient from Alabama who encourages her husband’s off-season hobby of river-gold sieving. (May have paid for the scope!) With the energy left over from Yellowstoning summer and winter she plans a book of her husband’s stunning animal photos and leads an elder-support group in her native South.

Monday, August 29, 2011

Sort of a downer after yesterday’s excitement. Spent much of today figuring out our Internet access in this paradisiacal refuge from civilization. Ranger at Fishing Bridge assured J of no WiFi in the Park. (None for tourists I suspect.)

Did watch two black wolves frolic in the Lamar Valley sage, then on to technocracy.  Sitting in Roosevelt Lodge, watching the upper middle class lining up for breakfast, we debated calling AppleCare for a signal. Deciding that would be unproductive, as well as phone-tree dwelling, we lucked out with a decision to drive up onto Dunraven Pass. There we found not only Verizon voice but Verizon data. Made us so happy to keep in touch with current disasters, earthquakes, hurricanes, the Black Locusts.

Found a new campsite amid the rocks of Tower.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Left Tower Campground at 6 for a slow, lovely crawl into the Lamar. Many five-legged wolf maniacs already perched high above the park road. I watched from a slope at the horse turnout for 2 hours without seeing anything. J and I then hiked the Cache Creek Trail through sagebrush to the badger hill, well short of Waab’s poison gulch (cf. Ernest Thompson Seton). After glassing for almost an hour, I spotted first a black and then 5 more from the Lamar Canyon Pack as they moved left until they disappeared into the trees. The black alpha male has a pronounced limp.

the bones are still there, Eth

watching for badgers

It was truly great to find my very own wolves. I was even evilly glad to share them only with J.

Snared # 8 at Pebble Creek ahead of time for the night and then drove on to Tower for a much-anticipated cup of joe. Wanted another chance in the Hayden Valley and so stopped at Canyon for lunch (ghastly but delish) and here we sit at a turnout awaitin’.

for once he didn't finish it

but my rib-lickin' fingers were evidence I did

More triumph! I’m the first to spot a black wolf emerge from the treeline, then another black. Both are feeding on Sunday’s bison carcass surrounded by ravens.

J does algebra while I scope

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Yesterday’s wildlife drama was so exhausting that after a smoked salad dinner at Otter Creek, we drove home to Pebble Creek in a daze. In the end eight wolves of the Canyon Pack were drawn to that old – and by now almost picked clean – bison carcass. But wait, there’s more! Suddenly a griz sow and her two cubs joined the scrimmage only to be surrounded by those wolves and pushed back. Each time she and her cubs were repelled, though, they’d make another foray, unleashing their indignation by batting at the wolves. One of her cubs was singled out and surrounded by wolves, prompting Mama Griz to move off the carcass and swing ferociously at her cub’s assailants. As expected the griz family triumphed. The wolves lurked in the vicinity but let the bears feed. At one point in her determined gorge Mama Griz steps on the carcass and pulls up the rib cage with a foot!

scene of chanterelle blowout last summer

Since I tend to focus on wolves, J insists that I include a subscript on grizzlies. I admit they are sublimely adapted to this wilderness.  They tumble joyously down mountain sides. They roll around in wolves’ kill. They eat elk, bison, trout, earthworms, flying bugs, acorns and huckleberries. I think they like the last best.

After an hour or so the three sated (or frustrated) grizzlies lope up the hill and disappear. A green light for the wolves to regain their former footing on top of a surely seriously depleted pile of bones.

Drizzly morning at our site 8 in Pebble Creek. Had an extended chat with Ray who’d just returned from driving Darlene to work at the Northeast Entrance. He told us Yellowstone visitation is down 10% from last year’s record-setting numbers. He gets a kick out of folks who ask him if the park fills up on weekends. “The entire population of Billings could enter the park and would anyone notice?!”

A portion of the road near the horse corral is still graveled, having been washed out in the spring – more evidence of spring’s heavy snows. Closed the road for a week. “Best week of the season!” Ray said. He’s hoping to get another (bigger) RV. The one he’s had for ten years isn’t fuel efficient. “You can literally see the gas gauge go down when you start it up.”

Back in the Hayden Valley at 2 pm. I saw a black wolf appear from out of the trees that thrilled a young Italian couple! No one else but the three of us saw it.

Lots of bison, mule deer, mountain sheep, elk and sandhill cranes, but even the wolves are easy to see!

no otters at Trout Lake

but I saw this industrious beauty

creatures have right of way

who needs to know

how to spell here

where the magic never dies

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Next year we’ll stay a month!

maybe huckleberry ice cream

has something to do with it

or maybe the beef

but those peaks

and the Idaho peach

lure, as well

Jackson has a great

farmer's market

your next manicure, Deebie

the point is...

what a surprise!

another one!

damn shoelaces

so many opportunities, so little time

definitely next year