In praise of Missouri.

Alright, I know I should be knee-deep in more photos from California, but in all honesty I did return last Friday and I did turn right around and zoom north in my trusty car to my best friend's birthday party. I brought my camera half as habit, half with the idea that I'd snap a few candids. But what I ended up with was a sort of photo essay. About the day, about the party, the people, and about the gorgeous scenery that it's easy to forget about when you're on the beach or in the bay or headed toward a national park.

So I trundled along I-70 west for a couple of hours, then veered north on 63 for another hour. It's when I got to 36 west that this begins. For what did I spy but huge clusters of wildflowers, as yet un-mowed, still growing free as in the time before humans.







Even better were the the patches of daisies growing along the side of the road as said roads turned to gravel and houses were hard to find.







When I arrived at the homestead (admittedly about an hour and a half late - not my fault!) the extended family was already gathered under one of the large trees on the property, in the shade, trying vainly to escape the heat of the day. It was a typically "summer" day in Missouri, hot and muggy, with an annoying wind that did nothing to cool anything down; except that it was June 4th, and it's not usually 97 degrees in June. Oh well. We're used to it anyway. :) And we had a birthday to celebrate!









Yeah, the alcohol flowed. After dinner I drove into town with best friend's husband so he could buy more beer, and being the awesome man in general that he is, he let me pull over sporadically to snap some more shots. There's just something so peaceful and right about the countryside, and it lets you step lightly into the past with the herds of cattle, the bright red barns, the tall grasses, all things we city folk have left in the metaphorical dust.







When we got back, everyone was gathered down by the lake my friend's parents had filled in several years before. It is definitely flourishing, with fish to fish for, frogs to spy, and it's clean enough to swim in. I was invited to go out in the boat almost immediately, and seeing as how I'd never been in a little fishing boat before, I hopped in. (Okay, all but crawled in 'cause I was skeered)













And as I said, there was swimming, and there were boys, so there were antics.





So the day lengthened into eveningtime and it cooled off a bit, and it was one of those nice times when you didn't have to think about other obligations or things in your life that suck, you just chilled, chatted, laughed, and imbibed. The way it should be, frankly.







When it was finally dark, best friend's husband and brother-and-law and a few other cohorts went around to the far side of the lake to shoot off surprise fireworks; I stood with her on the dock and cheered them on. Lightning bugs sparkled in the darkness in all directions; bullfrogs bellowed while the smaller frogs went click-click-click; cicadas whirred in the trees; a few distant cows mooed at the night. And everything was okay.





That night, as I sat with my friend and her hubby on the deck under the canvas umbrella, thunder rolled in the distance, and by morning it had rained enough to cool things off somewhat. I headed back reluctantly down the path on which I had come, breathing in the fresh country air a last time.

A rose garden and a beach.

Last Saturday I went to the Berkeley Rose Garden. There are so many gardens in the world, it's easy to get your hopes up only to have them dashed by, say, a random proliferation of local leaf plants that all pretty much look the same.

Not so with Berkeley's rose garden. It is built in an open coliseum shape and instead of rows of people, it is rows and rows of the most gorgeous roses of what must be every variety known to man. The ones I visited were bred specially for Mother's Day, so it was important to get out there to see them before they passed on.

Anyway, these are immediately some of my favorite flower photos ever. (There are a lot, but stay tuned for the beach below!)

























Let me tell you a little something about Ocean Beach.

First, it took over two hours to get there. It is along the coast of San Francisco, and all I had to do was take the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) to Embarcadero Street, and then hop on the underground Muni line (N Judah) and sail on toward the beach.

Well, first there was a massive backup on the Muni track which delayed everyone for at least half an hour - that's how long I stood there, at least. Then the pleasant four stops and then smooth sailing to the beach detailed on the bus maps is a LIE. The bus must have stopped at every street corner. Which meant like forty stops.

Then when I got to the beach, I was prepared for it to be chilly. But not for the wind. No. Not for the wind.

I keep drawing comparisons in my mind to some lifeless planet thousands of light years away, where all of the beaches are super cold and the wind is gale-force and never, EVER stops. That, my friends, is Ocean Beach.

I was there for the sunset (even though, alas, there were no clouds). I had bought a beach blanket beforehand, all happily, and couldn't even use it because the wind would have taken it five miles down the beach in about 0.78 seconds. I brought my tripod - not fun on a over-packed bus! - and didn't even use it. Couldn't take my mind off of the awful, awful conditions long enough to care about using it.

Then you add the sea spray and sand that is whipped up by these tropical storm-force winds. Looking back toward the dunes, there was literally a pale beige haze. My glasses were obviously ridiculous. I had to hide my camera in my jacket to keep the lenses relatively clear. And when I gave up sitting on the hard-packed sand, I just stood, facing away from the ocean and the huge, unforgiving sun, and just meditated the time away. I finally left at eight o'clock.





But you can't tell any of that from the photos.

Next stop - the number one national park in the country!!

California, here I am.

Don't hate me, but I've been here for almost a week. Just now posting. Okay, go ahead. Throw those tomatoes.

If there's one thing I can say about myself as a person, it's that I'm pretty fearless when it comes to going it alone during travel. The day after I arrived in Berkeley, I took a short day trip to Mill Valley, CA to visit the giant redwoods in the John Muir Woods, a national monument. (Think of it as a state park, Teddy Roosevelt style) It also helps to have a good GPS system, too, so you spend less time craning your neck and saying, "Oh, that was Algonquin Way."

As you probably know, giant redwoods are the largest living things, so much that I honestly think their name should be capitalized. They are the trees that three our four people linked togehter (or more) couldn't hug, and they create an amazing canopy of leaves that fosters the growth of shade-loving plants along the forest floor such as redwood sorrel, moss, and sword ferns. Redwood Creek runs through the woods, almost bisecting it, and when I was there Sunday the water was a nice medium between a gush and a trickle.

Okay, enough about all that. The photos.











The next day, I learned how to use the Bay Area's transit and streetcar system and got myself (in the sad, steady rain) to Aquarium of the Bay at Pier 39 in San Francisco. What's the big attraction there, you ask? Hmm, not the touch pools...not the sharks....no, it's --

The jellies.









They are truly some of the most fascinating creatures in the entire ocean; I also think anemones are fascinating and of course there are many other strange and confounding creatures in the deep. BUT, just to watch the jellies float and flow, wondering what their purpose is beyond survival and the food chain, it keeps you glued to them for a long time.

The Aquarium has a long tube as well, although it is harder to photograph through its warped glass, so not much to show from that. However, an enormous school of fish - tuna or sardines or something - formed right above me at one point and created the most phenomenal swirling vortex; I got it on video, but it was extremely difficult to photograph. Maybe one day I'll learn how to post a video, because I'm telling you, it was just about a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Well, I'm here for two more weeks! Which means lots more photos to come. =)

Silence.

So, wow, I haven't posted in a while! A friend very gently pointed that out to me, LOL. Well, I've been busy working (pretty much every day) and getting ready to spend almost a month on the West Coast. The good news is I'll have lots of new photos to talk about, and of course if you click on my Flickr photostream link on the right you can get quicker visual updates on the places I've been.

In the meantime, I should probably finish posting photos from Texas....