Tgregoryt takes a trip. - tgregoryt

Subway exit
A few blocks it says.

Park
Some people go sledding after it snows, I go to a zoo.

Full house
And apparently I'm about the only one who decided to come to the zoo.

Welcome
Welcome to the zoo!

River
The Bronx river as you enter the park

A waterfall
Not what I think of when I think of The Bronx.

Where are the animals?
Apparently they went inside.

Where are the signs?
Covered in snow.

Plowed road
The zoo opened late and they were still clearing snow when I arrived.

Long walk
This would probably be a big park to walk through in the summer.

Snow
Lots of snow

Tiger exhibit
No tigers, though.

Tiger explorers
This represents the tropical area that tigers live, except today it's not all that tropical.

Snow everywhere
Since I live in Florida, you'll notice that I like pictures of snow.

Red Pandas!
Where are the pandas?

The Himalayan highlands of Tibet
Depicted more accurately.

Africa
In the winter.

Asia
The mountain pass to Asia is impassible

Path to Asia
Another path to Asia blocked.

Asia
A brave explorer fights both the jungle and the snow.

Taking a break
I think there are benches in the park, somewhere.

Zebras
Everybody knows that zebras have stripes so that they blend with the snow. That's why we can't see any.

Contemplating
Contemplating the meaning of snow in front of apartment buildings right next to the zoo.

The Congo
I was thinking there was less snow in Central Africa.

Where are the animals?
I think maybe there are no animals.

A bench
I think that's a bench. Kinda wet, though.

Through the valley
Through the great valley to see the Gorillas, which were also away on holiday.

Looking for animals
I think they are around somewhere.

It's an iciclopotamus!
Well known in Central Africa as looking like icicles.

Congo
I must be at a really high elevation near the equator here. Surprised I can breath.

Snowy path
On the way to the main eating area.

The restaurant
Not so many people here, but at least the gift shop was open.

My lunch
For lunch today, I got a table-full of snow.

South America
Near Patagonia, I would guess.

Older buildings in the zoo.
This part was the original part of the zoo.

Ice cream for sale
But not at this time - the ice, at least, is free.

Elephants
I think people collect elephants, but I'm not completely sure about it.

Ducks
Animals! The ducks were there!

And humans
Which were looking at the ducks. Although the plural form of the noun "human" may have been generous.

Peacock
There were about 6 of these wandering through the park

And Cranes
Enjoying the cold

Ducks
More ducks - maybe they are from the Congo.

Buffalo
Liked the snow, but not so much the people, or more precisely, me. They were waaayyyy over there.

Polar bear
He seemed happy!

Polar bear
Polar bear enjoying the weather.

Grizzly bear
He seemed pretty happy with the weather, too.

Grizzly bear
Although he was a long ways away

Seals
This particular species didn't make much noise.

Seals
I think that is because they work for the Navy.

Ducks
These ducks are actually in an enclosure.

Penguins
With the penguins!

Penguins
They seem OK with the snow, too.

Outdoor cage with arctic birds
Enjoying the weather.

Birds on a rail
Looking at the penguins

Birds on a rail
Enjoying the snow.

Cats
See? Cats are dangerous animals that belong in a zoo.

Birds
Here are some birds you can save by enclosing your cat.

Blue birds
Although not in this country.

Toucan Sam
Somewhere in this enclosure is a box of Fruit Loops.

Turtle
Another indoor animal

Snake
And snakes, most of which were in very dark cages.

Bug
This was a very large bug - almost a complete meal.

Indoor squirrel.
A smaller animal that was inside.

Not sure what it was
But I'm pretty sure it is related to elephants.

Giraffe
For some reason the giraffes were around - about 5 of them in this area.

Exit
Bye Bronx zoo!

Entrance
A maze through gators on both sides

Gators
This day was pretty cold and most of them were in the sun.

More gators
These gators are pretty fat and happy.

Famous gator
This one was in several movies.

But not sure which is Pops...
Maybe they were all in several movies.

Camouflage
If you were wondering about a gator's color...

Another big one
Looks pretty serious to me.

Gator pond
I think there were at least 10 of these lake/ponds.

Scenery
Which made the park scenic, even if it didn't have so many gators.

Central viewing tower
You can also see ugly Orange Blossom Trail from up there.

Phosphates
There were many, many birds here.

Through the trees
Probably looks nicer when there are flowers around.

Seeing the park
You can look at the whole park from this walkway.

Seeing the park
You can also go on the zip line. I chose not to spend the money for that.

Birds
Along with gators, there were many birds

More birds
Most of which were wild

Ostrich
And some of which were wild in another sense of the word.

Boat tailed grackle
These things like humans. Oddly they haven't found my birdfeeder yet.

Parrots
The park had about 20 parrots.

Polly wants a cracker!
Including this one, which didn't speak but did make a lot of noise.

Vultures
Vultures were everywhere.

Vultures circling overhead
Not sure why - was there inevitable death here?

Feeding time
Or maybe a lot of excess chicken from gators that were too cold to eat.

Other reptiles
There were a few snakes, too.

A train!
And a small train I didn't ride.

Petting zoo
And deer you could feed.

Crazy tourists
And crazy tourists you could photograph.

Welcome to Virginia
Hello Virginia!

Car room left
The car room had many, many expensive cars. This was the left side.

Car room right
This was the right side.

Soap box derby car
I always wanted to build one of these for $14K 1985 money. Never did, though.

Rolls Royce
Yeah, that's a quality car.

VW Beetle
Yeah, that's a quality car, too. Especially like the color :)

Little cars
Apparently there exists some crazy hobby where people buy little cars.

More brands
Turns out it is such a popular hobby that there are two brands!

Electric trains
This is an O-Guage set with three tracks. Waaaayyyy better then my Christmas set :)

Model Train close-up
I think they had at least 8 mini-cities like this. It wasn't as good as Chicago's musuem, but it was still pretty cool.

Don't forget the busses
They had a small exibit on busses, which are part of Virginia's transportation history.

Cool ships
They had a bunch of model ships. Those might have been U.S.S. Virginias.

Walk-through rail car
The main exhibit was their rail cars. This one was Norfolk-Southern's president's car.

Eating area
No restaurant, but I suppose you could bring a picnic.

Steam Engine
They had at least 10 restored steam engines you could walk around.

Covered train exhibit
A large part of the trains they had were still exposed to the elements. But Norfolk Southern had donated enough money to build this roof over the refurbished engines.

Outside - rotting trains
Unfortunately you can only restore so many trains at once.

Various box cars
They had a wide variety of cars to see.

Piggy-back cars
You could walk between them, although there were not so many signs telling you what you were seeing.

Overgrown rails
It takes money to maintain vegetation, too. Money that the museum has trouble finding.

Rotting mule
This is one of the cars that moved boats in the Panama Canal.

Inside of a steam engine.
Hopefully they'll leave this rusting steam engine open so you can see how they work :)

Restoration process
This caboose was in the process of being restored.

Sno Cat
Also under the roof was this sno-cat, which travelled to FAA towers in the blue ridge mountains. It is a Virginia Transportation piece, after all.

Old School Bus
Don't recall the year, but this restored bus was also under the roof.

Single person manual rail car
One person moved this rail. I thought this was cool because we have a restored version of this in a Winter Garden museum.

Coal car
Coal was/is a bit important to Virginia's economy.

Roanoke Zoo mini-train
Near the Roanoke Star there is a small zoo. This train for children was replaced by another.

Buggy without horse
The type of thing Jefferson rode 70 miles from Monticello to DC in (over 3 days)

Covered wagon
These things designed to take all of one's belongings out west aren't nearly as big as one thinks they are.

Engineer's seat
An exhibit to allow either 1) youngsters to pretend to drive a train, or 2) older folks to pretend to be a PE.

Rock!
Well, it's not every day that one sees a rock!

Roanoke Star
It's big, it's bright, and it's on top of a big, windy hill.

Roanoke Star
There's the landmark sign to tell you all about it.

Roanoke
View from the star.

Roanoke
Another view from the star.

Platform
The tourist platform next to the star.

Me
A star next to the Star.

Hello!
Hello, Shanadoah National Park!

Parking
I was here the second week of December. Not too many other people were here.

Typical road scene
In the summertime there would be more RV's then you could shake a stick at.

Tunnel
There were several tunnels - not so many cars, though.

Late in the season
Everything was also closed in anticipation of snow.

Highest point
Coldest point, too.

Huh?
So we are to watch our children heave themselves over cliffs?

Cliffs
This may be one of those cliffs you can watch your children fall off.

Brrrrrrr
Icicles - Yeah, it was cold.

Brrr...
No, it's not just Photoshop making the pictures blue - it was like 20 F or something.

Cold forest
Even the rocks were shivering.

Old lodge
This is one of the old houses up here - now it is a utility closet for the Park Service.

Me!
I believe this was looking east.

Me again
Mountains make me happy :)

Shanandoah
Looking off towards the west

Dead tree
There were lots of live trees, but this cream deadwood added color to the brown of the grass.

Rocks
Look, rocks!

Rocks
Look, more rocks!

Lonely tree
Not so much green this time of year - but there was this pine tree.

Winter flowers
Everything is brown in the winter - even the flowers.

A tree through a tree
I think there is symbolism here.

Brown
If you like brown leaves, this is definately your place.

Appalachian Trail
It meanders through the park.

Appalachian Trail Sign
In the event there is 3 feet of snow to walk through, look for this symbol.

Appalachain trail
Last time I was on this trail I was further south but in about 2 ft of snow.

Appalachain trail
I am happy because I found the symbol. And there are not 3 ft snow drifts and I do not have to fry my boots to put them on.

Protect your forests
Forests like these need protection and funding - don't forget your forest :)

Bye!
Bye-bye, Shanandoah National Park!

Welcome!
Welcome to Legoland! Despite the kids climbing on those, the letters are made out of Legos.

Aerial view
Looking towards the north - you can see mini lego buildings if you look close enough.

Aerial View
South - the parking lot was between 5-10% full.

Aerial view
Towards the west is a lake.

Aerial view
Not so much room left for expansion.

Entrance
Apparently this is a red dinosaur.

Looks like a dragon
They throw water at each other.

Legos
If it's not a structure or a plant, it's probably made out of Legos.

Lego sign
Signs are made of Legos.

Lego man
The people are made out of Legos.

Star Wars
Darth Vader is less scary when he is made out of Legos.

R2-D2
R2 took some time off from his Rebel duties to pose for photos.

Legos at the Loo
.

Einstien
Even Einstein was made out of Legos.

Lego Kingdom
Here they are shooting ducks at each other.

Creative
The park has many creative lego things all over.

Blacksmith
.

Book
Oddly my sister did not stop to read it.

Heiroglyphs
I did not know Legos were necessary in the Afterlife, but now I will remember to pack some in my tomb.

Adventure ride
This ride was one where you shot things, and when you hit them the Legos would dance around.

Glow in the dark Legos
The story had something to do with saving treasure or something.

Watch out for bad-Lego-man!
.

Final score
I took pictures and still beat my sister.

Lego animals
There were Lego animals all over - many at this ride.

The ride's car
This ride went a bit too fast and only allowed one adult per car.

Lego Elephant
Squirts us (but doesn't hit you in January, at least).

Lego elephant
From the other side.

Lego Giraffe
Life-sized, too.

Rocks with eyes
I think those rocks have eyes or something.

Lego lions
The Lion King, who is really a bit further down the street.

Lego octopus
These were some of the Lego animals outside of the ride.

Lego Monarch
Inside of a gardening store.

Lego Bambi
There's rabbits in there, too.

Lego foxes
.

Lego otters
at the waterfall.

Lego dinosaur
That one looks like a dinosaur.

Lego driving school
For kids only - at the end you get a license. Some poor kid got stuck at that light for most of the duration. Another ran the stop sign to wave at his parents.

Ford Exploder
Life size, but I was unable to open the hood.

The Lego mini-cities represented a bunch of places
Florida had a lot - this was Miami.

Tampa
They also had the Bok Tower, which is about 45 minutes SE of the park, and doesn't look so interesting..

And Key West
Details were somewhat surprising. There is a guy on the front porch in the back house chasing cats.

St. Augustine
The oldest city in Legoland, or rather USA.

Treasure boat
complete with a Lego shark and Lego corals growing on the boat.

Daytona 500
The cars weren't working when I got there, and I didn't notice anybody puking in the Infield.

Space Shuttle
They actually devoted quite a bit of space to Kennedy Space Center - they had the VAB and Rocket Garden, too. And every 10 minutes the shuttle "Blasted off" - although not so impressively.

Pirates!
Not a part of Florida.

Building a ship
for the pirates.

Brooklyn Bridge
Not really.

Pier 39
This represents the 900 seals that show up in San Francisco.

Hollyweird
Grand opening of some movie.

Washington, DC
The Lincoln and World War II Memorials.

The Capital
Oddly, those figurines in front didn't work. I thought everything worked well in the Capital.

Arlington Cemetery
.

The White House
Complete with the President and his family - including his dog in a Santa hat - at the front door.

New York City
The Empire State Building is 22 ft tall.

Central Park Zoo
With seals and polar bears.

Cetral Park
The pigeons are made with 6 pieces - apparently the smallest figurines out there.

Karate class.
Kind of amazing the detail they put in these things.

Guy on the can.
This was in Grand Central Station. My sister didn't see this guy.

Las Vegas
The Venetian. They also had Paris, the Needle thing, Excalibur, MGM Grand

The desert next to Vegas
Complete with Sand Men (like snow men but brown).

Dead guy
Didn't quite make it to the water.

Limosines
Bride in a Limo.

Mandolay Bay
This had elephants and a dolphin show.

Wedding chapel.
Not on the strip, but all over the place in the rest of the town, I guess.

Cypress Gardens
The original park was just Cypress Gardens.

Gardens
But that park failed. Perhaps the Lego brand will bring in enough visitors.

More Gardens
The State of Florida bought Cypress Gardens when it failed.

Banyon tree
And I believe that part of the sale agreement was that part of the Cypress Gardens would stay intact.

Banyon tree
This tree has been there a while.

Tall palm trees
Those palms look to be about 40 ft tall - but maybe they're only 30.

Path
This part of the park is really nice, but not so large.

Red flower
Actually the park itself is not so large - we saw all of it in less then 6 hours.

Red tree
Not so many flowers in winter, but still a lot of color.

Water show
We saw the back side of the water show.

Lake front
the park is up against the lake.

Original gazebo
And a new Lego Lady.

Christmas
They had not yet taken down the Christmas stuff.

Lego tourists
Encouraging you to buy more stuff at the Lego store.

By Legoland!
.

Welcome to the Everglades!
Obligatory sign picture.

Truck loaded
A bit unconventional, bit it gets there without scratching the paint.

Arrival
Kinda busy this time of year

Boat launch
Nice boat launch at high tide - kinda muddy at low tide

Everglades City
Leaving the Ranger Station

Airport
The boat launch is right next to the airport where they have many tourist flights going out.

Birds standing on water
Turns out that thing marked "shoal" on my map is not a place to paddle your canoe.

Dolphin!
I think I had only paddled 10 minutes before I saw dolphins.

Edge of Everglades
The ranger station was not actually in the Everglades.

Last view of Ranger Station
The Bay is a little less then a mile wide.

10,000 Islands
This might be one of them.

Tourist boat
Tide was against me here, and I think I was passed by about 10 of these boats.

Tourist boat
Whichever way it was going, it made big waves.

Bright sun
Getting sunburned as I head out.

Rain
But in the distance

Mangrove
Bonsai tree

Choppy water
Kinda choppy that night

Arriving at the beach
It was sunset when I got to the first beach - Jewel Key.

Dock
First night's dock was the beach.

Jewel Key
A few less people then Key Largo.

Wildlife
This was the only place I saw racoons.

Oysters
Yummy!

More racoons
I saw four of them out there.

Morning launch
I had to drag my canoe waaayyyy out at low tide.

Happy paddler
This was before I started paddling, though.

A little choppy
Seas were 2 ft, which is a lot for a 14-ft canoe.

Chokoloskee Bay
My camera broke so I had to go in to Naples. This is going back out from Ranger Station on Day 4.

Pelican
Guarding the city of Chokoloskee

Chokoloskee House
This city is on the largest of the islands - population around 400.

General Store on the bay
My sister says there is not much in there. I did not enter to determine if that was accurate.

Big house
This was the largest house on the island.

Thomas Key
It's called 10,000 Islands because, well, here are 3.

Gregory Key
And another.

Lopez River Campground
Here I met the Virginia couple and the North Carolina Party

Lopez River
Sun gets lower

Lopez River
That was the rented canoe of the Virginia couple.

Mangrove
Over the Lopez River

Mangrove
Mangrove tree

Sunset
Day 4

Crooked Creek Chickee
This was where I had stayed when I realized my other camera was not functioning.

Wilderness Waterway
This waterway goes from Everglades City to Flamingo - about 99 miles.

Wilderness Waterway
The brown signs mark the way.

3 more islands
.

Fish camp
This was a private house in the middle of the Everglades.

Brazilian pepper
A robust species that used to live in Brazil, and is now taking over our state.

Watson
A good many people were murdered here in the 30's.

Bidens
Used to be a sugarcane plantation here. Now Beggar's Tick grows.

Butterfly World
Beggar's tick is a good source of pollen - there were at least 6 species of butterflies here and many, many bees.

New Jersey Tea
With a Gulf Frutillary

Great Southern White
This was the most numerous

Common Buckeye
There was also a Queen, Zebra Longwing, and Dainty Sulphur

Mosquito breeding zone
Cistern for the former plantation now breeds mosquitos

Model T
Apparently Mr. Watson ran some machinery with this Ford

Deep woods
Deep in the mangrove

Tree snail
Apparently there are many varieties of tree snails in the Everglades and they are considered endangered.

Mangrove Cove
A nice place to hide from mosquitos

Young fish
Soon to be big fish.

Mangrove roots
A good place to hide if you're a fish.

More trees
A behind the other trees.

Chatham River
Early afternoon

Sunset from Watson
In between mosquitos

Sunrise
Canoes - thus the tide - pointing the wrong way

Fuzzy bird
But my best picture of a great blue heron as they are rather skittish.

Two more islands
With a tree bridge for the ants.

A really small island..
It would be hard to fit a condo on that one.

Back into the ocean
On my way to Pavillion Key.

Flat ocean
A little hard to tell where the ocean stops and the sky begins.

Birds
There weren't so many birds in the park as you would think.

White pelicans
They all gather in one spot.

More white pelicans
.

Calm water
Very calm water this day.

More calm water
more calm water.

School of fish
Underwater pictures only half-worked.

Pavillion Key
The Porta-Potties tell you it's a designated camp-site.

Pavillion Beach
But you can camp anywhere that there was no vegetation.

Pavillion Beach
So the island holds many more people then were there.

Coral or sponge.
I'm not one to know the difference.

A different coral
Some people find these interesting.

Red grass
Red grass

Green grass
Turtle grass to some.

Another spongy coral
Or it could be a coral sponge.

Red coral sponge
Pretty sure it's not a Manatee, though!

Isolated canoe
My canoe

Beach
My view for New Year's.

My tent.
On a private beach.

Birds
On the beach

My tent
I chose the northern corner of the island

My tent
with water on three sides.

Far side of the island
The island was perhaps 1/2 mile long and a few hundred feet wide.

Beach
Pavillion Key beach

In the water
Me in the water.

Ocean overlook
Through deadwood.

Ocean overlook
.

Me
On southern side of island

Hurricane damage
About 40 ft of the southern-facing side of the island had dead trees

Hurricane damage
Last major storm I remember through here was Wilma.

The ocean
Not generally what I think of when I think "Everglades".

Pavillion Key
The uncamped side.

Pavillion Key Beach
.

The sun sets.
.

The North Carolina Party
Set up their camp.

Fishermen
These guys had a power boat and left shortly after this picture.

New Year
.

Waiting
I stayed up with the North Carolina group until midnight.

New Year
Happy New Years!

A New Year begins.
.

Sunrise
.

Sunrise
.

Pavillion Key
in the morning

A niceley framed island
.

Welcome to Sea World!
Near the entrance

Manta
Sea World now has three roller coasters and a flume ride. I didn't go on any, but this is the one they call "Manta".

Flamingos
Miami Vice!

Flamingos
Turns out these birds are about 5 feet tall.

Sting rays
This is one of the acrylic viewing areas Sea World has.

Dolphin Show
The Sea World Dolphin Show was a bit surprising

Dophin Show
As it contained more tricks by people then dolphins

Dolphins
People were diving, flying through the air, and of course riding dolphins.

Penguins!
Well, these were the fake ones.

Penguins!
These were the real ones. I always like penguins for some reason.

Sea lion feeding area
Here you could feed the sea lions.

Seal
And the shyer seals.

Sea lion
This one was aggressive.

Sea lions
The birds have learned that they can intercept the fish before it reaches the sea lion.

Dolphin feeding
This is the line to feed the dolphins.

Stingray feeding
Here you can feed and touch the sting rays.

Dolphin interaction area
If you pay extra you can have a personal dolphin do tricks for you.

IMG_0041.JPG
Or you can feed them.

dophin feeding
My cousin Frank makes a new friend.

Sharks!
The sign says they have the most venemous creatures in the world here.

Shark tube
They also have a tube you go under where the sharks are all around you.

Sharks!
I think the biggest was about 5 ft.

Paddle boats
There was quite the line for the $5/20 minute paddle boat trip.

Monkey
They had two little monkeys where they used to have the big horses.

Monkey crackberry
Teaching the primate to text.

Big eyed monkey
From Brazil somewhere - the only nocturnal monkey.

Bear!
The polar bear was not so active at this hour.

Um... No?
I see a bunch of red trees.

Plant life
Sea World formerly had more of these types of gardens, but they have been replaced mostly with stores.

Shamu!
The killer whale show.

Shamu jumps
Nobody went in the tank during this particular show.

Shamu upside down
That's quite a lot of weight to be airborn like that.

Shamu poses
This is the closest the trainers got to the fish.

Shamu throws water on the tourists
I find it humorous all the people that jumped up and ran. They were warned...

Nightime
At night they lit the park with Christmas lights and trees.

Sea World stores
Nothing like more stores.

Bye Sea World!

Hard Rock Live
Hard Rock Live is in City Walk, in the event you wish to buy an overpriced hamburger.

Universal
Universal has two sides; this one is the side we didn't go in.

City Walk
Before you get to Universal, there is City Walk, which has a bunch of restaurants, clubs, and a 24-screen movie theater.

Islands of Adventure
This is the other side of Universal (the one with Harry Potter) that we went into.

Dr. Suess Land!
I'm pretty sure there are green eggs and ham in there, but I didn't eat any.

Hogswart Express
Unfortunately you can not get on board.

The backside of the Hogsmeade
See - we have snow in Florida!

Waiting in line
While in line for the Harry Potter flying broomstick thing, they send you through Hogswart's Arboritum.

Inside the castle
There are a bunch of talking paintings in here, too - but the story is that you are chasing those guys up there.

Dragon skeleton
I think this was actually in the Three Broomsticks

Hogsmeade
Most of the park is not so crowded, but for some reason the too-small Harry Potter area is stuffed with people.

Jurassic Park

The car is about to be eaten!

Jurassic Park

This dinosaur is in the restaurant which is modelled after the movie.

Jurrasic Park - the water ride!

This is a big flume ride where you ride through Jurrasic Park - complete with dinosaurs!

Jurassic Park - flume ride

Here they have animatronic dinosaurs.

Geyser

And apparently animatronic geysers. Mmm... Geology.

Velociraptor cage

Those of you who have seen the movie may recognize this as the velociraptor cage.

Toon Lagoon entrance

Among the toons at Toon Lagoon are Popeye and Bullwinkle.

Flume ride in Toon Lagoon

This would be the Bullwinkle ride.

Bullwinkle Flume Ride

This would be the log ride. It's kinda fun with a story of the lady getting tied on the tracks.

My sister

About to get wet :)

The two of us

Hold the camera out there and hope for the best

Flume ride in Toon Lagoon

Some of the more colorful graphics.

Drop on flume

We all gonna die!

Popeye's ride

After Popeye's ride I was a bit wet. And cold, given that this was January.

The Incredible Hulk

I didn't ride that one as even though I was wearing wool and probably polypropylene, I was still freezing my *ss off.

Dr. Suess Land

Instead we rode this trolley thing which went pretty slow.

Characters!

Not sure who this is, but he sure seems happy to see me!

Merry Christmas!

Come to think of it, it was probably between Thanksgiving and Christmas, which generally means an empty park.

Zues maybe?

This guy was outside of a restaurant. He might actually be Atlas, and apparently he is shrugging.

That's a spicy meatball!

I believe I know some people that might take that sign literally.

Atlantis entrance

Entrance to the Atlantis show, which was waaayyyy better then I anticipated.

Exit to Atlantis

The Atlantis show had a lot of water, rocks moving, crazy flashing lights, and you walked through a tunnel of water. Pretty cool except for the crazy wait.

Gate to Hogsmeade

A gate into Harry Potter's world!

Entrance to the Three Broomsticks

Some kind of fancy-dancy restaurant. Actually we met a Universal Waitress (not on duty) in there that explained many things to us.

Hogsmeade at night

This was the last place we stopped.

A dark Olivander's

Here there is a show wherein a wand chooses a tourist.

Olivander is choosing a wand

And here are the tourists unto whom the wand has chosen.

Property is transferred
My Realtor Martina, my sister, and myself at the close

The front of the house
Arrival at the house after the close

Front from the left
I put a bird feeder on that Red Maple - a bat house will go up at some point.

Current landscaping
There's actually three rose bushes there if you look close enough.

Back of the house
Most of my back yard

Back of the house
Utility easement on the right, a small 400 square ft house (currently a shed) on the left.

The shed
There are plumbing holes and a breaker box in there, but fixing it is pretty far down the list.

East side hole
They put an air conditioner in there at one point - currently it is a nice place for water to enter

Old kitchen
Hard to see the yellow gunk encrusted on those doors.

Living room wall
Bad mud job on the far side, lots of nails in between.

Original floors
Maybe these floors needed glue? Whatever there's water damage all over them.

Old tub
That drain leaks pretty bad underneath. The hole in the wall was them trying to fix it.

Old mirror/vanity
Not sure what I'll be doing with that vanity, but the mirror was rusted and will be replaced.

The Green Room
That light fixture was around 40 pounds. Not sure what was done in here.

Master bedroom/bath
And not-so-pretty curtains

Master bath
A dead lizard - or at least a stained baseboard shows the way to water damage.

Kitchen prep
Preparing to paint the house

Christine's room
Christine's room after patching.

Living room
The living room prepped.

Sai Ponugoti
Sai assists with the demolition phase (getting rid of carpet tacks)

Green room painting
My father gets artistic after painting the ceiling

The main bathroom
Pre-destruction

Bathroom plumbing
The plumber takes out the old tub.

Tub out
They actually hauled that tub for recycling.

Tub
My father didn't want to see it go.

Tub sub-floor
Apparently you just rotate the tub out of there to get rid of it.

Rear wall
Had to take out those 2x4's to put in the new one, though.

Cleaning
Killing everything on the floor with bleach.

Scrubbing the floor.
If it was alive, it isn't now.

Christine's room - subfloor
Christine's subfloor is ready.

Vapor barrier
Those 9-inch vinyl tiles may stick to the floor OK but they're still letting vapor through.

Pad
The floor I had needed a vapor barrier and a pad.

That's the wood
around 650 square feet.

Doing the floor
Let's get this party started!

Laying the boards
This was a mostly glue-less floor. It needed glue on the outside edges though.

Mom paints
My parents painted the insides while I did the floors.

Dad in the kitchen
Dad works the difficult kitchen.

Oh yeah -
Gotta like power tools.

Fast worker.
Working fast.

Done!
Well, with most of the floors, anyway.

Ready for stuff
Floors are in and most of the paint is down.

Living room pre-stuff.
Before the couches, there was a floor.

Living room
Sooner or later I need to replace those closet doors, too.

Chirstine's room
Still needs the trim - I'm getting there.

Master bedroom
Partially trimmed.

Master bedroom
Pre-furniture.

Big truck
Used a 26' moving truck.

Emptying the truck.
Bill D starts the process.

With a liftgate
Not sure if that slows you down or speeds you up.

Black cat.
He really liked the apartment.

Grey cat.
Not partucularly pleased to be moving.

Tiling the bathroom.
I start on the bathroom wall.

Gotta be level.
That level is in a lot of my pictures.

Back wall complete.
Tired yet?

Broken toilet flange
Original cast iron toilet flange broken in several spots. Somebody in the past had tried to fix the leak with caulk. Never caulk the base of a toilet (at least if you are going to clean it up later).

Fixed flange
The toilet flange the way it is supposed to look. There is a rubber seal to connect to the original galvanized pipe below.

Bathroom paint
Ended up painting the ceiling here.

Bathroom prepped
And the walls...

Finished tub
Those two bars took me 10 hours to install.

Finished tub
Looks a bit better then the old one.

Finished sink
Those faucets are hella expensive :(

Finished bathroom
The light's been changed, too.

Green room
Not so green anymore! Since this picture blinds were added and the desk was changed.

Kitchen
Kitchen is done (for a while).

Wireless network
Added an outlet in the front closet and put the wireless network in it.

Attic ladder
Now we can store Christmas stuff up there.

Happy grasshopper
This guy was in a tree in the back yard. Tasty!

Butterfly
Or at least he will be - caterpillar on the Maypop - Passiflora incarnata

Monarch
Either a Monarch or a Queen butterfly on the Scarlet Milkweeds - this guy fluttered around my yard all day - at least the butterfly plants are successful :)

Paint job
Blue and yellow

Fixed air conditioner hole
Those glass bricks required more masonry work.

Interior brick
Formerly this was boarded up. Now it lets in a bit more light.

Hole in the wall
Now a window.

Working the other hole in the wall.
They didn't center this hole properly... I guess I'll work that problem when I get there.

House number
Added LED outdoor light and a new number here...

Small house windows
Formerly holes, now windows, on the small house.

Replaced stove hood
In an unusual test of physics, turns out that air flows out of the building better when it is not blocked by a steel plate.

Monarch larvae!
We finally got a Monarch caterpillar. In December.

Welcome to the Carnegie Museums of Art and Natural History
These two museums are combined in the same building.

Natural History entrance
Seeing as I'm a geologist, guess I'll start with the Natural History.

Pennsylvania sea
Currently known as "cheap but dirty energy".

Time
With a watch?

Fossil
Sometimes I believe that I am.

Gators
Gators are even in Pennsylvanian Pennsylvania!

Gators
Gators have been feared since before the Triassic!

Men working
They recovered those rocks 80 years ago and they are just now opening them.

Rocks
Oooh - rocks!

Bisbee Green
See the Arizona pictures to see the big hole this came out of.

Rock collection
1) This rock collection is not at the bottom of a fish tank and 2) it's bigger then mine.

Gold
My collection also lacks gold and platinum nuggets.

Dinosaurs
Carnegie was into dinosaurs, and this is one of the largest collections of dinosaurs in the world.

Superman
Posing by my kill.

T-Rex
This one wanted to steal my kill, but I fought him off, too!

Brontosaurus
Exact replicas of those bones are in several musuems world-wide, including Washington, London and St. Petersburg.

Cenozoic
The less interesting cenozoic had things like mastadon bones.

Mammal wing
This area had stuffed animals - life sized though.

Africa
That's a dried up water hole in the middle of the savannah.

Pennsylvania mammals.
Nice beaver.

Petting zoo
This was a hands-on section - you could touch everything in here. Dead owls are surprisingly soft.

Bugs
Not such an impressive bug collection - but then most people don't like bugs.

Plant room.
Or plants.

Fungi
And even less fungi, which make life possible.

Out of space
The birds got stuck in a third-floor hall way.

Ancient Egypt
They had two mummies in there.

Pottery
This is what pottery looks like when they dig it up.

More pottery
And my understanding is they find it just like that - sitting there all nice and clean, in an air-conditioned display case.

Polar bear
This was the Inuit side of the American Indian exhibit.

Art
On to the art museum!

Roman glassware
Hmmm... That looks familiar.

Ancient art
They had art from Ancient Greece, Rome and Africa in this room.

Sarcophagi
And a Roman sarcophagus. Not sure what anyone would want with that.

Architecture room
Carnegie had this idea that he should copy the world's great art so that people wouldn't have to travel to visit it.

Notre Dame
This is a copy of Notre Dame in France.

Greece
These are copies of Greek statues. See? Now you don't have to go.

Miniatures
There were about 6 displays with miniatures.

Small dining room.
Believe it or not those chairs are less then 2 inches tall.

Sitting room
The glass kept out a scale device, but you could fit perhaps three dimes under that chair.

Tiffany lamp
Turns out that Tiffany started with a patent for staining glass.

Georgie
This was painted after he died, and there are more then 60 of the same painting in existence.

First hall
They had regular art, too.

Art hall
I believe the lesson here is that if you have wall space, you can afford more art.

Edvard Munch
They have art by famous artists, such as this by Edvard Munch, made famous by his work "The Scream".

Renoir
And Renoir.

Vincent van Goph
Vincent van Goph

Matisse
That big green one is a Matisse

World War II
And then they had good stuff by quality newer artists - this one depicts World War II. Kinda sad.

A bit more modern
Then they had more modern stuff, like this table.

Love
And Love, along with a chair made out of rubber.

Wall?
And then this? - a white square? "Minimalist" they call it.

A drain?
And then there was this - a drain on the side of the right wall. Huh? And those two buckets on the floor are a seperate work. "Poor man and too much beer", I believe they should call it.

Crazier still
That TV is art - the video plays a scene from Wonder Woman over and over and over and over and over again. Hmmm.

More modern art
Each of these TV's is of course art - they play pictures of a woman doing something. I think in one she repetitively stabs herself with a knife. Hmmm...

???
Two concrete blocks and a slide projector in a dark room. Uhhhh.... OK....

Useful furniture
Not to mention this lovely sitting chair that you can fly on.

More chairs.
But if that chair wasn't good enough for you, they do have a better selection.

Parking
Not so many cars in the New York side.

Niagara Falls!
Look, it's Niagara Falls! Actually this is oil on canvas, Godfrey Fankenstein "Niagara Falls from Goat Island" (1848) - as displayed in the Carnegie Musuem of Art.

First view
If you guessed this was the American side, you might be right.

Flowers
Some say the American side is ugly, but we do have nice flowers.

Viewing area
This is the main viewing area on the New York side.

Viewing area
Hence the term "viewing".

Obligatory picture
Of course, usually I take this picture from the base of the waterfall.

Maid of the Mists
Those people must be very patriotic seeing as they are all dressed in blue!

New York trail.
If you notice there is more development on the Canadian Side, you might be right about that, too.

Not such a good place to swim.
There are rapids for several miles up the falls - these are the ones above Horseshoe Falls.

Falls.
Ummm. Yeah. Don't climb over that railing. On second thought, Darwin requests that you do. Thank you.

Flowers
More New York flowers.

Me
I heart N.Y.

American Falls
Those two structures are absent from the 1848 oil on canvas.

Luna Island
That is apparently the top of "Bridal Falls", and the island is called "Luna Island" from which you can view the American Falls.

American Falls.
The American Falls from Luna Island.

Don't swim.
The sign should read "violators will be prosecuted with a 400-ft plunge into sharp rocks".

Rapids
These are the rapids above the American Falls.

Me at the American Falls
Getting ready to take the plunge. Yeah - not really - turns out there are rocks down there.

American Falls
American Falls view.

Walkway to Canada
The State Park extends south a ways - I walked along this path to the Peace Bridge.

Walking to a foreign country.
Apparently Canada is bigoted against bicycles.

Entrance to Canada.
Once you go in, you can't get back out without a passport.

Peace Bridge
I suppose that if you're not afraid of heights you could live here in limbo for a while.

Canada line.
On this bridge the line to get into Canada is much longer then the line to get into USA.

Borderline
I think my thumb has illegally entered Canada.

Canadian side
The first view of the Canadian side is a rather impressive one.

Niagara Falls, New York
The New York side is much less developed then the Ontario side, but still has a few hotels.

Pathway to the falls - Canadian Side.
The Canadian side has this view pretty much to Table Rock - which is the top of the Horseshoe Falls.

Ugly old bridge
Turns out the ugly metal thing that got in the way of many of my pictures is a historic landmark.

Canada path
I guess they cleared out the vendors here - nothing but a nice view over a cliff.

Surrounded by trees
The American Falls - through one of a few trees on the Canadian path.

The Horseshe Falls.
Pretty sure this is the same tree, because there weren't that many.

Human.
Look - a human tree!

Pathway
The Canadian side has a few more hotels, the Embassy Suites is the tallest in this photo.

Clear view
Th Canadian view is slightly more direct then the American one.

Canadian flowers
Our flowers are prettier then your flowers! pttthhbbbbttt!

Rainbow
The sun was changing angles through the falls, creating a bit of a rainbow.

Sign
There were a few historic landmarks, which didn't tell me all that much about what it cost to get into that high needle-thing.

Plants
Our flowers don't grow cars! Thhhhbbbdt!

Casino
They don't grow casinos, either, although maybe that would help our economy.

Peace Bridge
Looking back at the Peace Bridge.

Getting close
Pretty sure this photo exists in many thumb drives around the world.

Just visiting
Anyone else need a restroom?

Canadian walkway.
There were many, many more people in Canada then in USA. I would almost call this crowded.

Canadian walkway.
The path on one side is the falls and on the other a 200-foot wide park with grass and some flowers.

Setting sun
It was getting late and the sun was making nice colors in the mist.

Road
This road goes along the path.

Moonlight.
I didn't notice the moon until it got that high. Bummer.

Less color
Still kinda pretty though.

Sleepy
Is it me or are you sleepy?

Falls at night
At night they light up the falls.

Colors
In all kinds of colors - yellow, green, red.

Mist
Apparently they have fireworks most weekend nights, too.

More colors
Unfortunately I had a four-hour drive and had to wake up at 0500, so I missed 'em.

River
Not to be outdone, the New York Side lights up the rapids behind the falls.

Here we are!
Welcome to North Carolina

Bristol Motor Speedway
And one Tennessee picture. Not sure why they have so many parking spaces. Who would want to watch cars going in circles?

Rocks
Rocks are much more interesting.

Safety meeting
But we are here, after all, to work.

The railroad
On the railroad tracks.

Tunnel
But inside tunnels.

Stalactite
This is how much stalactites grow in exactly 97 years.

Lots of tunnels
The locations of the tunnels through North Carolina

Museum
The North Carolina Mineral Museum!

Exhibit

Wow - now the government can see your dreams!

Mining
An exhibit about the local mining activities

Blue Ridge Parkway
On to the famous Blue Ridge Parkway

Road
The road runs across the spine of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

North Cove
There are places about every 3 miles to pull out and look at the blue mountains.

Vista
I suppose after 300 miles of this (it goes to Virginia) it might get old.

Through the trees
Unless you are silly and like mountains a lot.

Mitchell view
That looks like a good one to climb!

Mitchell sign
The State Park is about 14 miles by 5 miles around this mountain.

Top
This would be a scenic view from the top if that human wasn't in the way.

Tallest mountain in the east.
It was July 5, and there was a line to take this picture.

Photographers
I may not have the best pictures up here, but somebody must.

Top view
Ahhh - there's the view.

Nature trail
There was a short trail around here, too.

Overhang
Not so many views but many plants.

Hanging moss
And moss.

Trail
Turns out I'm allergic to pine pollen.

View
They say acid rain killed these trees.

Waterfall trail
What's a good trip without a waterfall trail?

Me with waterfall
The obligatory waterfall picture

Waterfall and trees
Two mile round trip to see this one.

waterfall
Without the human for those of you that prefer it that way.

Trail
This trail was a bit steeper and some... Less fit... tourists were having trouble with it.

Church
One expects churches in the deep South.

Gemming
But gemming? You mean people pay to sift through mud?

Wow
Wow. Here?

Biltmore sign
If you're in Asheville, you have to see the Biltmore.

Bus ride
60 dollars to ride a bus? Stupid inflation.

Biltmore
Yes - one family lived there - 125,000 square feet. And I'm currently looking for just 1200.

At the Biltmore
Thomas wuz here.

Acreage.
Well, there is the 125,000 square foot home. But did we mention the 125,000 acres it first came with?

Garden
That's 195 square miles

Lillies
Or roughly 1/3 the size of London.

Stone
Should mention the hand-carved statues that came with it, eh?

Flowers
And the gardens.

Roses
The estate is so expensive that they sold most of the acreage.

More roses
And charge $60 per person just to pay for the maintenance.

Side view
There is also a winery here.

Bird house
And a hotel - which is slightly larger then this guest house.

Statue
And a horse farm.

Front
This is the front of the house as we wait to get in.

Not so welcome
Unfortunately no pictures are allowed from inside, so you'll have to Google Biltmore Estate to see the inside.

Side balcony
I was able to take this picture from the side balcony, though.

Gardener
I think Hagrid lives here.

Stable
Originally the stable and male servant's quarters - this is now an eatery next to the house.

Rear wall
This is a wall that faces the house.

Gardens
The flowered gardens only covered a few acres.

Conservatory
Including the greenhouses where Professor Plum was killed with the candlestick.

Red celery
Not sure if that red celerly grows in Florida, but I aim to find out!

Inside the greenhouse
Dense tropical foliage.

Yellow flowers
Looking towards the Conservatory

Purplies
Everyone likes purple flowers.

Bee
Even this bee!

More flowers
Flowers in the mountains

Rest of gardens
The rest of the gardens are merely landscaped well.

Landscape
The estate now only includes a paltry 8,000 acres.

Bench
I found this bench off-trail.

Stream
The 8,000 acres includes a river, a stream, and two lakes.

Bridge
And associated bridges

Fish
And fish.

Stream
Turns out railroads can be quite profitable!

Pond
This is the pond closest to the house.

Road bridge
Nice place to relax after a hard day of blowing your grandfather's fortune.

Plant
One of the younger Vanderbilts liked to take pictures of these things.

Road bridge
Plenty to photograph.

Dam
The water actually flows below the engineered lake in order to reduce sediment loading.

Waterfall
Makes for a private waterfall.

Tuscon Airport

The big Saguaros greet you at the airport, and they even line the streets with them.

My Ride

Air Force One. No - not really - this is just for important dignitaries like me. We all know Obama gets a 747.

Pima Air and Space Musuem

This is the Pima Air and Space musuem. It is across from the Air Force boneyard and about 3 miles from the public airport.

Air Force One

They have lots of airplanes on display inside and out. This actually was Air Force One - Kennedy flew in it.

Cessna 152

They have little planes, too.

F-14

And faster planes. I think this one is an F-14

Roger, roger. What's your vector, victor?

This is an old cockpit. You could push things but you didn't go anywhere.

Warehouse

They had 4 warehouses for the nicer planes

BD-5j

Including this - the smallest jet that once flew in the Jame Bond Film Octopussy. Unfortunately it only goes 350 miles per hour and is homebuilt/experimental.

Bumblebee

And this - the smallest working airplane ever built. It is about as big as me.

SR 71 Blackbird

And this - the fastest/highest jet every built. Somewhere around Mach 3.2 and 71,000 feet I think.

Me with SR 71

I'm about to get in.

SR 71 engine

That's a life-size replica of the engine.

B-24 Liberator

This was one of the first heavy bombers in World War II

C-46 Commando

This airplane was a high-altitude freighter during the war. It was made famous by its ability to transverse the Himalayan mountains to supply China and India.

B-29 Superfotress

This was the largest bomber in World War II. This is the type of aircraft that dropped the atomic bomb.

B-29

Sure - I'll fly that one, too.

Jeep

They had a World-War II era jeep in the hanger with the B-24.

B-17 Flying fortress

This is another WW-II era aircraft. Had a whole bunch of machine guns on it, and rather uncomfortable seats.

Missile

There were a few missiles in there - this one was ground-to-air, I believe. The one next to it was a guided bomb from WW II.

Outside

Outside the planes were not in such great condition.

Heavy lift helicopter

This is from the army - I believe it can lift 20,000 pounds.

C-47

The military version of a DC-3. I hear they make good planes to jump out of.

C-47

Getting ready to jump.

Harrier

The nice thing about these planes is that you can get right next to them.

Smaller jet

Not sure what this one is but it is more my size.

Big plane

They had at least 4 of these things.

F-18 Hornet

At least I think it's a hornet.

Davis-Monthan Air Force Base

The world's largest airplane graveyard is here. Unfortunately the publci can only visit Monday-Friday. Still, you can drive by it, or see it on Google Earth.

A rock

They have rocks in Arizona, too!  We don't have so many in Florida, see.

Bisbee Town

This mining town is on the way to Mexico. I didn't get into the Queen mine, which is a touristy sort of mine you can go down.

Bisbee downtown

Turns out Bisbee is a touristy place.

Lavender Pit

This is the view of the Lavender Pit - a former open-pit copper mine on the side of Route 80.

Lavender

This is right before the bungee jump. Oh wait - there was no bungee jump.

Douglas

Douglas is this sign and a Wal-Mart. Oh yeah - and a Best Western and a Motel 8.

Border fence

That's Mexico to the left. That fence is about 8 ft high and not so difficult to climb over. This is about 1 mile from the guarded border crossing.

Into Mexico

This is the entrance to Agua Prieta.

Into USA

And that's the exit. Yup, Agua Prieta was that exciting.

Tombstone!

Not sure why they named the city after a pizza, though.

Ok Corral

Hey Mister - can I have your watch when you are dead?

OK Corral

Five dudes were shot here - One died here, two others stumbled a bit before they died, and the other two lived to tell the tale.

Cochise Court House

The historical courthouse in Tombstone

OK Corral

Well, see, there isn't so much to see in this town.

Jewish Memorial

There was a nice Jewish Memorial, though.

Outlaws

Where nice people that had been shot or hung were buried.

The Clantons

Including these lovely Jewish? people shot outside the OK Corral.

Let go skiing!

In Florida you can tell the people from the north - they run into the ocean in January to take pictures. Guess who is from Florida running into the snow to take pictures?

Need a board

Maybe next time I will bring the proper equipment.

Tucson snow

Sure snows a lot in Tucson.

8000 feet

This picture is from somewhere around 8000 feet.

Snowbank

That's a bunch of snow for southern Arizona.

Climbing

Anyone else want to climb?

Geology View

Yessir, people travel a long ways to look at that rock.

Vista

Or maybe there is some silly view or other.

Sandstone

Wind on sandstone makes pretty pictures.

Playground

This place is where children can fall off rocks.

Tucson mountain

I think I see John Wayne over there.

Shower

This is a stream where real men bathe.

Saguaro

The famous cactus.

Tucson

Tucson at dusk.

Tucson 2

Looking down at the city.

Saguaro national park

Welcome to Saguaro National Park!

Missing cacti

Where are the Saguaros?

Killer Rabbit

Ah! The Rabbit got 'em!

Trail

There's one on the side of the trail.

On the trail

I hope that human doesn't eat it.

Prickley pear

These we have in Flroida.

Fruit

Still kinda pretty. And tasty, too.

Saguaros

There were saguaros of all sizes in there.

Cactii

I think ther eare 40 species of cactii in this park.

Trail

Many of which were visible on this paved trail.

Another seguaro

This kind, of course, being the most famous.

Trail seguaro

Don't remember if John Wayne walked amongst the seguaros.

Background

In the background is the mountain with the ski resort.

kinda rocky

This is about 3500 feet - the seguaros grow up to 4000 ft.

Flowers

Only flowers I saw in the park. Apparently this was the time of year for them, though.

On a rock

There's a happy camper.

Big seguaros.

In the valley of the giant cactii.

Rocks

And amongst the rocks.

Crater Lake 001
That entire area was once a volcano.

Crater Lake 002
Mt. Mazama (what that mountain used to be called) erupted around 6700 BC - 42 times larger then Mt. St. Helens.

Crater Lake 003
My first picture of the non-park Oregon, which includes cows.

Crater Lake 004
Welcome to Crater Lake!

Crater Lake 005
I think this is telling tree-huggers which tree to chain themselves to.

Crater Lake 006
Snow? But it's almost August!

Crater Lake 007
Behind me is Mt. Shasta, California. Doesn't show up on film, though.

Crater Lake 008
Ah - Crater Lake!

Crater Lake 009
It's kind of a glow-in-the-dark blue.

Crater Lake 010
This glacier is just starting to grow because of Global Cooling.

Crater Lake 011
This is by the lodge when you first arrive at the park.

Crater Lake 012
The park is between 7-8,000 ft - not quite above treeline.

Crater Lake 013
These guys were looking for gold and found this lake instead.

Crater Lake 014
I'm thinking they'd rather have the gold, but the lake is nice.

Crater Lake 015
The views extend away from the lake, too.

Crater Lake 016
More snow.

Crater Lake 017
This is the view north - I think that is Mt. Hood way back there.

Crater Lake 018
This trail goes to one of the highest points in the park.

Crater Lake 019
It's closed due to snow? What snow?

Crater Lake 020
Oh, that snow.

Crater Lake 021
I guess there is snow here.

Crater Lake 022
Stop snow!

Crater Lake 023
This was a volcano before the volcano.

Crater Lake 024
This is what was left after the blast.

Crater Lake 025
A view towards the visitors center.

Crater Lake 026
The view south.

Crater Lake 027
And north.

Crater Lake 028
There is a road that goes around the entire lake.

Crater Lake 029
Turns out the eastern half was closed due to snow.

Crater Lake 030
Which left half of the lake.

Crater Lake 031
Those cliffs are around 1000 ft.

Crater Lake 032
The size of the lake is a bit hard to visualize with the 1000 ft cliffs next to it.

Crater Lake 033
Won't fit in the camera's frame, though.

Crater Lake 034
There are more trees on the south side of the park.

Crater Lake 035
Looking north.

Crater Lake 036
The island is called "Wizard Island" it's a new volcano in the old volcano.

Crater Lake 037
No private boats are allowed on the lake.

Crater Lake 038
But the park service operates 3.

Crater Lake 039
Which were not in service at this time.

Crater Lake 040
Stupid Global Cooling - closing all of our roads!

Crater Lake 041
This trail goes down to the lake - it is the only such trail in the park.

Crater Lake 042
The trail ends where the boats leave from.

Crater Lake 043
800 ft through the trees.

Crater Lake 044
And cliffs.

Crater Lake 045
More wildlife!

Crater Lake 046
There were mosquitos out the wazoo, too.

Crater Lake 047
And basalt, too!

Crater Lake 048
Here I'm approaching the dock.

Crater Lake 049
The water gets deep quick.

Crater Lake 050
That guy's gonna jump in?

Crater Lake 051
What a nut!

Crater Lake 052
I'll just get close to the water.

Crater Lake 053
Or maybe stand in it.

Crater Lake 054
What the hell? I'm already wet.

Crater Lake 055
So.. Who here has jumped into a volcano off a cliff? Anyone? Anyone?

Crater Lake 056
The dock where the boat leaves.

Crater Lake 057
There are trout in there, but I didn't see any.

Crater Lake 058
There's a trail on that island although you have to take the park boat to get there.

Crater Lake 059
Looking east.

Crater Lake 060
There is still no life here after 8000 years - the rock and lack of rainfall does not support it.

Crater Lake 061
It's kinda a desert.

Crater Lake 062
The road leading up to the park.

Crater Lake 063
Bye northern entrance!

Columbia River Gorge 001
Oregon likes their history. This was the site of the first public electric transmission line.

Columbia River Gorge 002
This dam provided power (and a waterfall).

Columbia River Gorge 003
Somewhere around here some guy first saw Mt. Hood.

Columbia River Gorge 004
For some reason he called this river the Sandy River.

Columbia River Gorge 005
Here we are! A national scenic area.

Columbia River Gorge 006
Two trees take away the nice view.

Columbia River Gorge 007
That's the nice view.

Columbia River Gorge 008
This was supposed to be a hotel in 1920. Now it is just a small glass building on postcards.

Columbia River Gorge 009
This area has one of the highest concentrations of waterfalls in the USA.

Columbia River Gorge 010
Um... Why do they call these mountains the Cascades again?

Columbia River Gorge 011
This side of the gorge is the wet rain forest side.

Columbia River Gorge 012
The gorge is 80 miles long and the other side is actually a desert.

Columbia River Gorge 013
Didn't make it to the desert, though.

Columbia River Gorge 014
This is actually a double waterfall.

Columbia River Gorge 015
The sun does weird things with the camera, but I think this was the prettiest of the falls in the area.

Columbia River Gorge 016
Nice place to take a shower.

Columbia River Gorge 017
This waterfall is too small to count.

Columbia River Gorge 018
More wildlife! Turns out these things really are slow.

Columbia River Gorge 019
Another waterfall through the trees.

Columbia River Gorge 020
This road was built between 1913 and 1922. Amazing engineering for its day.

Columbia River Gorge 021
Another double waterfall.

Columbia River Gorge 022
A bit closer.

Columbia River Gorge 023
And with the goofy tourist.

Columbia River Gorge 024
These white wildflowers were in bloom.

Columbia River Gorge 025
To add interest to the already beautiful landscape.

Columbia River Gorge 026
The next waterfalls are in the Mt. Hood National Forest.

Columbia River Gorge 027
Most of these falls are within 500 yards of the roadway.

Columbia River Gorge 028
That goofy tourist keeps following me around!

Columbia River Gorge 029
Aaaachoo!!! Excuse me.

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Some trails lead away from the waterfalls to views of the river.

Columbia River Gorge 031
Parts of the gorge are over 4000' high. The river here is at least 1/2 mile wide.

Columbia River Gorge 032
A nice stream in the forest.

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Hmmm. The sun comes out and so do the people.

Columbia River Gorge 034
This place is popular enough for a gift shop, a lodge, and a restaurant.

Columbia River Gorge 035
This is the second highest year-round waterfall in the USA; the highest is in Yosemite (CA).

Columbia River Gorge 036
2,000,000 visitors per year? There is a parking area like a rest area for this falls on I-84.

Columbia River Gorge 037
This is a scaled model of the highest waterfalls in the world.

Columbia River Gorge 038
This is the lower falls. That bridge was erected in 1914 to help attract tourists to the lodge.

Columbia River Gorge 039
This tourist made it to the falls, but did not stay in the lodge.

Columbia River Gorge 040
The entire falls is 620 ft (189 meters)

Columbia River Gorge 041
If you are fit (and most tourists are not) you can keep walking on the other side of the bridge.

Columbia River Gorge 042
This leads to more views of Multnomah falls.

Columbia River Gorge 043
Multnomah falls half-way up the trail.

Columbia River Gorge 044
And still more waterfalls!

Columbia River Gorge 045
Some people are impressed by how high they've come; I'm impressed by all the cars down there.

Columbia River Gorge 046
And of course you can stand on top of the falls.

Columbia River Gorge 047
It's a nice view although the viewing platform is a bit small.

Columbia River Gorge 048
There are two more falls up the trail that are over 50 ft - this one doesn't count.

Columbia River Gorge 049
A nice shady spot.

Columbia River Gorge 050
Here's one of the falls. The other one was barely visible through the trees and is not here.

Columbia River Gorge 051
The river is pretty even without major falls.

Columbia River Gorge 052
The obligatory me-next-to-a-waterfall picture.

Columbia River Gorge 053
If you have difficulty with the 600 ft trail, you can cool off here.

Columbia River Gorge 054
An attempt to get at least the top half of the falls in one frame.

Columbia River Gorge 055
Captain on the bridge.

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It's not raining on me, but it is a bit misty.

Columbia River Gorge 057
Did I mention the number of tourists? Easy to get my picture taken, at least.

Columbia River Gorge 058
This is the lodge/restaurant/gift shop.

Columbia River Gorge 059
The Union Pacific runs through here from Minneapolis to Portland.

Columbia River Gorge 060
That's the entire waterfall.

Columbia River Gorge 061
That's I-84, but a useful sign, none-the-less.

Columbia River Gorge 062
This one has two waterfalls.

Columbia River Gorge 063
More local wildlife!

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This is the lower falls.

Columbia River Gorge 065
Abotu 0.5 miles up is the upper falls.

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That's this one.

Columbia River Gorge 067
You can walk behind this waterfall.

Columbia River Gorge 068
Safety topic of the day: watch out for cliffs.

Columbia River Gorge 069
This picture is from an unprotected cliff.

Columbia River Gorge 070
You can also swim around that pool down there.

Columbia River Gorge 071
More wildlife.

Columbia River Gorge 072
After the waterfall I went into this fish hatchery.

Columbia River Gorge 073
It is quite large and used to breed salmon.

Columbia River Gorge 074
Unfortunately this time of year the operation is to clean everything; there are no fish hatching in June.

Columbia River Gorge 075
They leave some fish behind for the tourists.

Columbia River Gorge 076
This is a 10-ft white sturgeon named "Herman"

Columbia River Gorge 077
You can also feed your children to rainbow trout here.

Columbia River Gorge 078
The hunter - or the hunted?

Columbia River Gorge 079
Lewis and Clark used the Columbia River Gorge to get through the Cascades.

Columbia River Gorge 080
The goal of the station is to produce 5.5 million baby fish anually.

Columbia River Gorge 081
Too bad there is nothing in the tanks.

Columbia River Gorge 082
This is where they release the salmon - directly into a stream.

Columbia River Gorge 083
This is from a town called "Cascade Locks".

Columbia River Gorge 084
Didn't actually see any locks.

Columbia River Gorge 085
Just this bridge.

Columbia River Gorge 086
This was the furthest I made it up the gorge.

Columbia River Gorge 087
Time to get home.

Columbia River Gorge 088
Model railroaders attempt to put the Columbia River Gorge in thier models.

Columbia River Gorge 089
This is the real thing.

Columbia River Gorge 090
A last look up the gorge.

Columbia River Gorge 091
And the small glass building I was at earlier.

Columbia River Gorge 092
This was the farthest the big ships could come up back in 1792.

Mt. St. Helens 001
Welcome to Mt. St. Helens!

Mt. St. Helens 002
This is the Washington State Park associated with Mt. St. Helens

Mt. St. Helens 003
Mt. St. Helens is up there somewhere!

Mt. St. Helens 004
This is a marsh about 50 miles from the mountain.

Mt. St. Helens 005
It's a very active spot for migratory birds.

Mt. St. Helens 006
Of course the migratory birds are not migrating in June.

Mt. St. Helens 007
Still has a rain-foresty appearance, though.

Mt. St. Helens 008
Engineers turned the river here to reduce sediment flow.

Mt. St. Helens 009
It's half a dam that slows down the river.

Mt. St. Helens 010
This helicopter does not have so much use today.

Mt. St. Helens 011
This lodge overlooks a valley and the volcano on a clear day.

Mt. St. Helens 012
On the far side of this valley all trees were destroyed - the "blast zone"

Mt. St. Helens 013
There's the mountain!

Mt. St. Helens 014
These folks are looking for the mountain, too.

Mt. St. Helens 015
The eruption rolled down this valley in 1980.

Mt. St. Helens 016
The problem is that the lake's dam could break, flooding the valley. Luckily we have engineers!

Mt. St. Helens 017
This is the main valley the lahar flowed down.

Mt. St. Helens 018
These flowers are growing, though.

Mt. St. Helens 019
This lake was also formed in 1980 - it's at least 5 miles long.

Mt. St. Helens 020
This is a protected corner of it.

Mt. St. Helens 021
Who put that big rock in the sidewalk?

Mt. St. Helens 022
The lake is accessible by boat and has trout in it.

Mt. St. Helens 023
The boardwalk crosses over some volcanic blowdown.

Mt. St. Helens 024
By the way - it's raining now.

Mt. St. Helens 025
Which makes the plants green, I suppose.

Mt. St. Helens 026
But it is not all that comfortable.

Mt. St. Helens 027
Come on, tourists! It's only a sprinkle!

Mt. St. Helens 028
Ooo! A viewpoint! I wonder what I can see here?

Mt. St. Helens 029
A tree?

Mt. St. Helens 030
Basaltic pyroclasts?

Mt. St. Helens 031
Oooh, that is fiery!

Mt. St. Helens 032
This is the observation building. Mt St. Helens webcams operate from here.

Mt. St. Helens 033
This shows the results of the three seismometers around the volcano. They are always active.

Mt. St. Helens 034
Lower left is what you might see on a sunny day. The white window is what we saw.

Mt. St. Helens 035
A rhyolitic pyroclast. Cool, eh?

Mt. St. Helens 036
Most every type of pyroclastic rock came out during Mt. St. Helen's eruption.

Mt. St. Helens 037
This exhibit showed the progression of the eruption. Unfortunately it did not impact that kid.

Mt. St. Helens 038
A curtain rises at the climactic end to the center's movie. I think the mountain shows up on most days.

Mt. St. Helens 039
This is the picture every geologist hopes to have in his yearbook.

Mt. St. Helens 040
This is a former volcanic study station that got destroyed by a recent eruption.

Mt. St. Helens 041
This is a crazy tourist impressed by a cloud.

Mt. St. Helens 042
There is a paved walkway nearby; generally it probaby has nice views.

Mt. St. Helens 043
Other tourists looking for those views.

Mt. St. Helens 044
The soil is not so conducive to life here.

Mt. St. Helens 045
If you say to that mountain "move", it will move.

Mt. St. Helens 046
This trail didn't look so inviting today.

Mt. St. Helens 047
So I tried to get to the back side of the mountain; this lake was on the way.

Mt. St. Helens 048
Nice place to go fishing.

Mt. St. Helens 049
Or stopping on the way to someplace else.

Mt. St. Helens 050
This tree has found a nice spot to grow.

Mt. St. Helens 051
This damn keeps another lake around.

Mt. St. Helens 052
Good for skiing if you have a boat.

Mt. St. Helens 053
Or cliff jumping if you don't.

Mt. St. Helens 054
Safety standards weren't quite the same back then.

Mt. St. Helens 055
This is the dam viewpoint - not so much to see.

Mt. St. Helens 056
It is the highest dam in Washington, but the area is not maintained.

Mt. St. Helens 057
This is supposed to look at Mt. St. Helen's in the distance. I have faith.

Mt. St. Helens 058
Winter conditions? But its June!

Mt. St. Helens 059
No winter conditions at this pretty stream.

Mt. St. Helens 060
Snow? Here?

Mt. St. Helens 061
Oh - those winter conditions.

Mt. St. Helens 062
I guess you need baby feet (or quality GM engineering) to get over this pass.

Mt. St. Helens 063
The pavement ended frequently on these roads but generally they didn't announce it.

Mt. St. Helens 064
Why do they call it the Cascade Range again?

Mt. St. Helens 065
This waterfall was on the south side of Mt. St. Helens.

Mt. St. Helens 066
Gaah! The road is closed by snow!

Mt. St. Helens 067
Going back up the mountain the only open way - and there's a bike race on the road.

Mt. St. Helens 068
These guys rode at least 100 miles roundtrip up and down the mountain.

Mt. St. Helens 069
Let's try going in there, shall we?

Mt. St. Helens 070
That is the observation building.

Mt. St. Helens 071
They say that the first plants here have nitrogen-fixing bacteria in the roots.

Mt. St. Helens 072
Because after the erution there was no nitrogen in the soil.

Mt. St. Helens 073
Once those notrogen-fixing plants became established, others followed.

Mt. St. Helens 074
Leading to pockets of green.

Mt. St. Helens 075
And a few Douglas Firs in protected areas.

Mt. St. Helens 076
The landscae reminded me a bit of Murdor.

Mt. St. Helens 077
Some of the downed trees had been removed by loggers. Others (like this one) were left in place.

Mt. St. Helens 078
I'm a gonna huff, and puff, and blow that tree down!

Mt. St. Helens 079
Look what I did!

Mt. St. Helens 080
This is the most mountain I will get to see during this trip.

Mt. St. Helens 081
Better press that button quick!

Mt. St. Helens 082
This lake created an 800-foot tsunami and rose 200 ft after the eruption.

Mt. St. Helens 083
Watch out for orcses!

Mt. St. Helens 084
And falling rockses.

Mt. St. Helens 085
There's nice geology here if you look for it.

Mt. St. Helens 086
That's clay behind me. Unusual place to find clay, but there it is.

Mt. St. Helens 087
Mud cracks!

Mt. St. Helens 088
There used to be 80-ft high pine trees here.

Mt. St. Helens 089
How many geological signs can you see in this picture?

Mt. St. Helens 090
The lake still frames nice even without trees.

Mt. St. Helens 091
The 170' waterfall I am walking towards is 4 pixels in this shot.

Mt. St. Helens 092
It's a bit hard to grasp the magnitude of this volcano with a camera.

Mt. St. Helens 093
How many eruptions can you count?

Mt. St. Helens 094
This lake has a seismometer next to it.

Mt. St. Helens 095
The seismometer is on the left of this frame.

Mt. St. Helens 096
Keep going, Samwise!

Mt. St. Helens 097
This is the path of the landslide that created the eruption in the first place.

Mt. St. Helens 098
This is not the picture you are looking for as a geologist.

Mt. St. Helens 099
There is a huge fine for going off-trail here.

Mt. St. Helens 100
This is so that people can earn PhD's by studying the new growth.

Mt. St. Helens 101
The life is appearantly rather fragile.

Mt. St. Helens 102
The closer to the volcano you get, the less life there is.

Mt. St. Helens 103
Frodo, we must destroy the ring, Frodo!

Mt. St. Helens 104
If the road hadn't of been closed I might have made it to those mountains today.

Mt. St. Helens 105
From the visitor center it is 8 miles one-way to the waterfall.

Mt. St. Helens 106
So no other trails today!

Mt. St. Helens 107
In the land of Mordor where the shadows lie.

Mt. St. Helens 108
Beware! The Lord Souron sees all!

Mt. St. Helens 109
I would guess that water is warm.

Mt. St. Helens 110
But I don't have time to check -

Mt. St. Helens 111
That cloud is lower then I am - bad weather a comin'!

Mt. St. Helens 112
Time to run (literally).

Mt. St. Helens 113
Now at least I can see the trail again.

Mt. St. Helens 114
The closer you get to the Visitor Center the easier it is to follow the trail - fog or no fog.

Mt. St. Helens 115
That's the 170' waterfall. Gives you a decent impression of the amount of rock that came out of that hole.

Mt. St. Helens 116
Two new lakes created by the volcano.

Mt. St. Helens 117
Climbing back up into the fog.

Mt. St. Helens 118
And now it gets difficult to see.

Mt. St. Helens 119
Souran has found us!

Mt. St. Helens 120
Samwise, I cannot carry this burden!

Mt. St. Helens 121
Where the dark shadows lie.

Mt. St. Helens 122
Yay! Pavement! Discard this silly trinket and lets get home.

Mt. St. Helens 123
It was kinda cold.

Mt. St. Helens 124
And rainy.

Mt. St. Helens 125
Next day it was colder.

Mt. St. Helens 126
But is that blue sky? Maybe it will make it up the mountain!

Mt. St. Helens 127
I'll have to watch out for angry goats and mountain lions.

Mt. St. Helens 128
Close to the lake there are trees growing.

Mt. St. Helens 129
Trees within trees - it does rain a lot here.

Mt. St. Helens 130
In some parts of the area they allowed loggers to come in after the eruption.

Mt. St. Helens 131
They removed the dead wood so they could recoup some of their losses.

Mt. St. Helens 132
They didn't take all of the trees, though.

Mt. St. Helens 133
This area is a good 15 miles from the volcano - all the trees were knocked over.

Mt. St. Helens 134
But there was a nice lake in place.

Mt. St. Helens 135
And this machine - not sure what it did.

Mt. St. Helens 136
I'm thinking the seatbelt did not save that operator.

Mt. St. Helens 137
This trail was two ridges from the volcano.

Mt. St. Helens 138
That was my view west - still looking for those clear skies.

Mt. St. Helens 139
I think that was an excavator.

Mt. St. Helens 140
It's missing a few parts. This machine had apparently tumbled down the mountain.

Mt. St. Helens 141
There are still plenty of lifeless areas in this location.

Mt. St. Helens 142
The fog is back.

Mt. St. Helens 143
I'm high enough for patches of snow, too.

Mt. St. Helens 144
Look - elk! The elk are skittish in this park.

Mt. St. Helens 145
That snow is not passable.

Mt. St. Helens 146
Damn you, snow - my arch-nemisis!

Mt. St. Helens 147
Had to turn around at that snow because I did not have crampons or an ice axe. But it's June!

Mt. St. Helens 148
This is one of the few places in the park you can camp - with a permit.

Mt. St. Helens 149
The douglas firs have grown the most because timber companies planted them nearby.

Mt. St. Helens 150
This is what happens if you are a tree in a 700-mph wind.

Mt. St. Helens 151
Kinda hard to survive.

Mt. St. Helens 152
But the other trees are coming back.

Mt. St. Helens 153
At the end I went back up to the viewpoint - still cloudy.

Mt. St. Helens 154
Bye everyone!

Redwood National Forest 001
Welcome to California!

Redwood National Forest 002
This is both a state park and a national park.

Redwood National Forest 003
This is a Sequoia - much wider then -

Redwood National Forest 004
A coastal redwood. The big sequoias are only found in Yosemite.

Redwood National Forest 005
Crescent City is a fishing area here.

Redwood National Forest 006
They do crabs.

Redwood National Forest 007
The park is composed of trees and seashore.

Redwood National Forest 008
This would be the seashore, which actually has sun!

Redwood National Forest 009
It is like the Oregon coast, only here the sun is out.

Redwood National Forest 010
Mountainous and rocky.

Redwood National Forest 011
Mostly basalt for those of you interested.

Redwood National Forest 012
The trees here are stunted from salt spray off the ocean.

Redwood National Forest 013
Nice place to park.

Redwood National Forest 014
More geology - basalt doesn't weather so quick as the sedimentary rocks.

Redwood National Forest 015
This is the view towards Crescent City.

Redwood National Forest 016
The area has sandy beaches, too.

Redwood National Forest 017
And no rain.

Redwood National Forest 018
A nice view of the ocean through the trees.

Redwood National Forest 019
Now I get to the big trees area!

Redwood National Forest 020
That's a big tree!

Redwood National Forest 021
The trail wandered among them.

Redwood National Forest 022
These little bears are very friendly if you feed them.

Redwood National Forest 023
Want a cookie, little bear?

Redwood National Forest 024
Gotta watch out for speeders, though.

Redwood National Forest 025
Crazy drunk drivers!

Redwood National Forest 026
If they hit these trees they'll explode.

Redwood National Forest 027
I'm a tree hugger!

Redwood National Forest 028
You remember the fall of the Roman Empire? This tree does.

Redwood National Forest 029
They don't want you jumping on the 1500-year old tree.

Redwood National Forest 030
This area is called Lady Bird Johnson area.

Redwood National Forest 031
Mostly because she dedicated the park here in the 70's.

Redwood National Forest 032
The lowering sun made interesting light.

Redwood National Forest 033
Outlining trees.

Redwood National Forest 034
Yes, the ferns are that tall.

Redwood National Forest 035
The trees, too.

Redwood National Forest 036
The insides of these trees burn during fires but the outside survives and the tree lives on.

Redwood National Forest 037
Luckily Mr. Miagi taught me some moves to clear trees from the path.

Redwood National Forest 038
The sun setting over the beach.

Redwood National Forest 039
To be or not to be?

Redwood National Forest 040
I'll figure it out later.

Redwood National Forest 041
Watch out for slugs!

Redwood National Forest 042
There are lots o' elk here.

Redwood National Forest 043
They are not so skittish as at other parks.

Redwood National Forest 044
I would guess that here they are not shot at.

Redwood National Forest 045
This one was braver then usual.

Redwood National Forest 046
That's Blitzer. If your father shoots him there will be no Christmas this year.

Redwood National Forest 047
The next morning I walked up a wide trail.

Redwood National Forest 048
Next to a small river.

Redwood National Forest 049
The trees aren't so impressive until you've been in them a while.

Redwood National Forest 050
These trees were burnt but still quite alive.

Redwood National Forest 051
Not all of the park is old growth; they are trying to recover part of the park from forestry operations.

Redwood National Forest 052
The morning sun in the forest.

Redwood National Forest 053
These pictures describe deforestation issues.

Redwood National Forest 054
Chopping down half of the trees kills them all - it will take 250 years to get the tallest trees back.

Redwood National Forest 055
This trail goes down to the tall trees area of the park.

Redwood National Forest 056
The tallest trees are only in river valleys - where there is plenty of water and limited wind.

Redwood National Forest 057
This is the river

Redwood National Forest 058
Those are some tall trees!

Redwood National Forest 059
This is several trees in one spot - they grow where another one has fallen down.

Redwood National Forest 060
This was the tree back that National Geographic photographed back in the sixties to create enthusiasm for the park.

Redwood National Forest 061
Lets see... Tangent = opposite / adjacent. That puts those trees over 300 ft.

Redwood National Forest 062
You see, tangent = ... Right you get the idea.

Redwood National Forest 063
The path wandered through the woods.

Redwood National Forest 064
Through tall trees.

Redwood National Forest 065
The curving on these is not the lense.

Redwood National Forest 066
I'n not exactly tall, I suppose.

Redwood National Forest 067
Looking for a bear.

Redwood National Forest 068
You can camp around here overnight with a permit.

Redwood National Forest 069
This part of the forest was completely cut down.

Redwood National Forest 070
It was a sheep farm some time ago.

Redwood National Forest 071
Now they are working to restore it.

Redwood National Forest 072
After Redwoods, I took the shorter but longer route.

Redwood National Forest 073
They must have a problem with prisoners here.

Redwood National Forest 074
Shorter distance, but slllooowww driving (and scenic, too).

Redwood National Forest 075
This river was from 10-200 ft below the road.

Redwood National Forest 076
They used to pan for gold here.

Redwood National Forest 077
Away from the ocean the temperature climbed into the 100's.

Redwood National Forest 078
This little post office is most of the town.

Redwood National Forest 079
Much more deserty over here.

Redwood National Forest 080
There's gold in there!

Redwood National Forest 081
This was a one-lane road.

Redwood National Forest 082
One hopes there is no truck on the other side of that curve.

Redwood National Forest 083
Not much room to go if a truck comes.

Redwood National Forest 084
I suppose you could always go down.

Redwood National Forest 085
This was a nice swimming area.

Redwood National Forest 086
Eventually the road crossed this pass.

Redwood National Forest 087
Decent view.

Redwood National Forest 088
And a rock to climb!

Redwood National Forest 089
We're now, like, totally in the valley. Like, dag me with a spoon.

Redwood National Forest 090
That's Mt. Shasta over there.

Redwood National Forest 091
A stagecoach was robbed 4 times at this site. Don't come here at night.

Redwood National Forest 092
Mt Shasta from I-5.

Redwood National Forest 093
My last view of Northern California.

Redwood National Forest 094
Bye Redwood Park!

Victoria, Canada 001
This isn't actually Victoria - it's Port Angeles, Washington, USA.

Victoria, Canada 002
You arrive here early in the morning - boat departs at 0820.

Victoria, Canada 003
There are two boats - a small, faster ferry for people and a big slow ferry for cars.

Victoria, Canada 004
I got my tickets at 0700 so I got to wander around the town a bit.

Victoria, Canada 005
They have a long walkway up and down the Strait of Juan de Fuca

Victoria, Canada 006
This is the closest hotel to the boat.

Victoria, Canada 007
That-s my boat - the HMS Big Boat.

Victoria, Canada 008
Those mountains are the Hurricane Ridge of the Olympic Range. I'll go up there later.

Victoria, Canada 009
It is a little chilly - around 56 or so.

Victoria, Canada 010
This is a small (one room) marine research institute. Not sure who would want to go in there.

Victoria, Canada 011
This boat holds 200 cars and 1000 people. Today 61 people rode across.

Victoria, Canada 012
This is the only ferry for cars from this port.

Victoria, Canada 013
This ship was built in .. 1959??

Victoria, Canada 014
Heave about, ye maities!

Victoria, Canada 015
That's the smaller ship. It takes 60 minutes to cross. Our big ship takes 90 minutes. I preferred the slow route.

Victoria, Canada 016
We're not in Canada quite yet, but the company flys both flags.

Victoria, Canada 017
Away we go!

Victoria, Canada 018
Arrr - there's a mighty sailor for ye!

Victoria, Canada 019
The land of the brave.

Victoria, Canada 020
We are 22 miles from the other side.

Victoria, Canada 021
Those mountains are tall enough you can see them from the other side.

Victoria, Canada 022
The mountains of British Columbia? Not so much.

Victoria, Canada 023
Whale ho! Arr, no, it only be a freighter.

Victoria, Canada 024
Whale ho! Arr, no, there be no whales here, lads.

Victoria, Canada 025
There's Canada!

Victoria, Canada 026
The Canadian Coast Guard could have rescued us if we sank.

Victoria, Canada 027
Victoria is not so impressive on the way in.

Victoria, Canada 028
As you get closer it looks a bit nicer with rocky coasts.

Victoria, Canada 029
And more seaplanes then you can shake a stick at.

Victoria, Canada 030
Other sailors seeing the city.

Victoria, Canada 031
This is one of many hotels in the city. I think most people stay overnight.

Victoria, Canada 032
I was just visiting - until the 3 PM ride back.

Victoria, Canada 033
There are many boats in this port.

Victoria, Canada 034
Including the passenger ferry that beat us here.

Victoria, Canada 035
Ah - Canada! We arrived early I suppose and the vendors weren't quite set up yet.

Victoria, Canada 036
Look, it's Canada! Oh, wait, no - that's Disney's Epcot Center.

Victoria, Canada 037
Oh - this is Canada.

Victoria, Canada 038
Here I am at the real Canada.

Victoria, Canada 039
This is an impressive hotel mostly covered in Ivy. Seems rather British, although I can't say I've been to Britian recen

Victoria, Canada 040
The obligatory get-off-the-boat-and-take-your-picture-by-the-totem picture.

Victoria, Canada 041
This is the British Colombia government building.

Victoria, Canada 042
This is where the vendors set up - you can sail your ship right in to here.

Victoria, Canada 043
There are also many tour boats you can take from here.

Victoria, Canada 044
This is the main shopping street.

Victoria, Canada 045
They really like their totems here.

Victoria, Canada 046
I was unable to knock this one over.

Victoria, Canada 047
The Disney gardens are modelled after the Butchart Gardens located 45 minutes from here.

Victoria, Canada 048
This park is not so bad, though.

Victoria, Canada 049
This path leads to a small lake.

Victoria, Canada 050
With many flowers.

Victoria, Canada 051
And ducks.

Victoria, Canada 052
And a fountain or two.

Victoria, Canada 053
People feed the ducks, which makes them quite tame.

Victoria, Canada 054
The chicks, too.

Victoria, Canada 055
There were many, many ducks.

Victoria, Canada 056
For a second-rate garden this is rather nice.

Victoria, Canada 057
I think I arrived at the right time of year, though.

Victoria, Canada 058
There weren't many people about, either.

Victoria, Canada 059
The azaleas were in bloom here at sea level and at about 2,000 feet in the Olympic National Park.

Victoria, Canada 060
Beautiful, but not so creative, I think.

Victoria, Canada 061
I think they call this one "Fountainless Lake".

Victoria, Canada 062
That squirrel is getting ready to attack those ducks. Squirrels are evil!

Victoria, Canada 063
I never actually saw anybody go across that bridge.

Victoria, Canada 064
More of the lake.

Victoria, Canada 065
Not sure what these flowers are byt they were in bloom, too.

Victoria, Canada 066
This would be a good place for a picnic if I had more time.

Victoria, Canada 067
As it is back to the harbor. This is the start of Canada 1 - A real traveller would hitchhike to St. John's from here.

Victoria, Canada 068
Me - I'll walk around Victoria.

Victoria, Canada 069
A float plane on final.

Victoria, Canada 070
This is the restaurant street.

Victoria, Canada 071
This float plane dock has up to 6 float planes when they are not landing.

Victoria, Canada 072
There are more street vendors up and down this sidewalk.

Victoria, Canada 073
Not sure why anybody would want to look at an art gallery here, but there are crazy people in the world.

Victoria, Canada 074
Gardens are everywhere here.

Victoria, Canada 075
I do like planes.

Victoria, Canada 076
While taking that picture, looked what popped up on the dock!

Victoria, Canada 077
A sea otter!

Victoria, Canada 078
Looked to be about 5 ft long, and just like that he was gone.

Victoria, Canada 079
Damn Seperatists are everywhere in Canada.

Victoria, Canada 080
There were many street musicians on the shopping street. These guys were playing Carribean music.

Victoria, Canada 081
Nice place to shop, if you're into that sort of thing.

Victoria, Canada 082
By God, don't let dad in there!

Victoria, Canada 083
He might buy this! (yep, that's jade). In real life it is in focus.

Victoria, Canada 084
These guys were playing Irish music.

Victoria, Canada 085
Well now - they don't have this at Disney!

Victoria, Canada 086
Didn't know Vader could bust the moves, eh?

Victoria, Canada 087
This is that old hotel.

Victoria, Canada 088
Damned Gators are everywhere!

Victoria, Canada 089
The street vendors have now set up.

Victoria, Canada 090
Caricatures if you want 'em.

Victoria, Canada 091
There's a lot more people, too.

Victoria, Canada 092
Some oddballs like buying art.

Victoria, Canada 093
Couldn't figure out what this sign was talking about. Still can't.

Victoria, Canada 094
The harbor is nice, though.

Victoria, Canada 095
This guy is painted all of those pictures, although not with that phone.

Victoria, Canada 096
This guy is a Native American carver - he did each one of those.

Victoria, Canada 097
Victoria's harbor.

Victoria, Canada 098
This is an old house that was transformed into a tavern, hotel, and restaurant.

Victoria, Canada 099
The grounds are nice, even with the neon "beer sold here" sign.

Victoria, Canada 100
This is a walkway around the harbor.

Victoria, Canada 101
You can see ships come in.

Victoria, Canada 102
And ships dock.

Victoria, Canada 103
There's a sailboat - that one might make it around the world.

Victoria, Canada 104
You can rent those kayaks - I'm thinking they won't make it around the world.

Victoria, Canada 105
You're not supposed to kayak in the middle of the harbor. Tourists are, well, tourists.

Victoria, Canada 106
a yacth a bit out of my price range.

Victoria, Canada 107
OK, I'm going with the long shot - the boat will win!

Victoria, Canada 108
Getting close to the time when I have to get back on my ship.

Victoria, Canada 109
That's USA over there. Wouldn't want to be hiking under those thunderstorms.

Victoria, Canada 110
One last look at Canada.

Victoria, Canada 111
They say the have 330 cruise ships per year port in Victoria - that's one of them.

Victoria, Canada 112
Bye everyone!

Olympic National Park and Forest 001
It's the park!

Olympic National Park and Forest 002
This sign was more impressive then the first sign.

Olympic National Park and Forest 003
First stop was a big tree.

Olympic National Park and Forest 004
Thatsa biga tree!

Olympic National Park and Forest 005
Santa would have trouble putting gifts all around that tree.

Olympic National Park and Forest 006
This is one of the rainiest spots on earth. Record annual precipitation was 156 inches (4000) mm in 1998.

Olympic National Park and Forest 007
That makes it kinda green, although they say that the summer is their "dry" period.

Olympic National Park and Forest 008
This is the mountain-surrounded lake. There's a few sailboats about although none of them were on the lake.

Olympic National Park and Forest 009
This is the southern side of the lake.

Olympic National Park and Forest 010
This lodge sits looking out towards the lake. Every room has some sort of nice view.

Olympic National Park and Forest 011
Might be through trees.

Olympic National Park and Forest 012
Or next to trees.

Olympic National Park and Forest 013
Makes a nice view

Olympic National Park and Forest 014
Even with tourists in it.

Olympic National Park and Forest 015
All these wildflowers were in bloom as I drove by.

Olympic National Park and Forest 016
The park has three major sections - the rainforest, mountains, and beach.

Olympic National Park and Forest 017
This is the beach, which is like the Oregon beaches with a lot more wood.

Olympic National Park and Forest 018
I could probably swim to Japan if the water wasn't so cold.

Olympic National Park and Forest 019
They have Tsunamis here, too. Only here, if there is an earthquake, you run amock as you scream.

Olympic National Park and Forest 020
The beach extends north for a long distance.

Olympic National Park and Forest 021
Many parts are not reachable by car, or even by foot in some places. You'll have to imagine those.

Olympic National Park and Forest 022
I suppose tree huggers get upset by this.

Olympic National Park and Forest 023
This is the misnamed Hoh river.

Olympic National Park and Forest 024
The next lake was Crescent Lake. This little stream ran into it.

Olympic National Park and Forest 025
This is Crescent Lake. Right - beaches, rain forest, mountains, and lakes.

Olympic National Park and Forest 026
A tree taking a swim.

Olympic National Park and Forest 027
A nice pull-out along the highway.

Olympic National Park and Forest 028
That evening I made my way up to another waterfall.

Olympic National Park and Forest 029
There it is!

Olympic National Park and Forest 030
This is still the rainforest side of the park.

Olympic National Park and Forest 031
You cannot get as close to this waterfall as the ones in Oregon.

Olympic National Park and Forest 032
After the waterfall I made my way to the ridge. I had to cross this river?!? to get there.

Olympic National Park and Forest 033
The water was 2.5 ft deep - up to my pant pockets. It was reeealllllyyyy cold, too.

Olympic National Park and Forest 034
But the scenery walking up was nice.

Olympic National Park and Forest 035
I followed this stream for a while.

Olympic National Park and Forest 036
Then went up a steep path.

Olympic National Park and Forest 037
With various views of the valley beneath me.

Olympic National Park and Forest 038
This is the cut-off to the ridge.

Olympic National Park and Forest 039
Unfortunately I was out of time and had to turn back before the ridge.

Olympic National Park and Forest 040
This is the path of a mudslide or avalanche. Try not to be under it.

Olympic National Park and Forest 041
It was starting to get late and I had to turn around.

Olympic National Park and Forest 042
The light changes things in the forest, though.

Olympic National Park and Forest 043
You mean there was a bridge across that river?

Olympic National Park and Forest 044
The bridge makes things a lot easier!

Olympic National Park and Forest 045
I'm no oceanographer, but aren't hurricanes tropical? And in the Atlantic? Hmmm.

Olympic National Park and Forest 046
Down there is the dry side of the park - it only recieves 20 inches per year of rain.

Olympic National Park and Forest 047
It was a bit hazy, but on a crisp day you might see these mountains.

Olympic National Park and Forest 048
As it was I could see Port Angeles.

Olympic National Park and Forest 049
And cool tunnels that don't go under rivers.

Olympic National Park and Forest 050
Look! Snow!

Olympic National Park and Forest 051
Watch out for crazy goats!

Olympic National Park and Forest 052
Those are the Olympic Glaciers - it snows so much there that even though it is rather warm there are still huge glaciers

Olympic National Park and Forest 053
This is the lodge at the top of the road.

Olympic National Park and Forest 054
747 inches! Try shovelling that tomorrow.

Olympic National Park and Forest 055
This is what is left at the top of Hurricane Ridge in the middle of June.

Olympic National Park and Forest 056
Not sure what that thing is. Probably a Zamboni.

Olympic National Park and Forest 057
I'm on snow!

Olympic National Park and Forest 058
Looking towards Port Angeles.

Olympic National Park and Forest 059
Some mountains that need climbing.

Olympic National Park and Forest 060
From here you can see Canada.

Olympic National Park and Forest 061
Woah! This fellow is not so frightened of humans.

Olympic National Park and Forest 062
He is just mosying on by.

Olympic National Park and Forest 063
And checking out that funny box making noise.

Olympic National Park and Forest 064
It's like Florida. Only with snow and mountains.

Olympic National Park and Forest 065
They have a single poma lift here for weekends. I think they have volunteers staff this hut in case some crazy snowboard

Olympic National Park and Forest 066
Nothing like looking at glaciated mountains.

Olympic National Park and Forest 067
If it wasn't so hazy you could see a bit more.

Olympic National Park and Forest 068
The view is nice enough for me though.

Olympic National Park and Forest 069
Lot's of walking today!

Olympic National Park and Forest 070
You mean they get more then 747 inches on Mt Olympus?

Olympic National Park and Forest 071
A mountain view for those of you that like those things (like me).

Olympic National Park and Forest 072
There I am enjoying it.

Olympic National Park and Forest 073
The road to the lodge.

Olympic National Park and Forest 074
I forgot my skis, otherwise I'd head down there.

Olympic National Park and Forest 075
The yellow pixel is actually a person.

Olympic National Park and Forest 076
The lodge again. Unfortunately it is closed at this hour.

Olympic National Park and Forest 077
At least I know where it is!

Olympic National Park and Forest 078
I'll try not to fall here.

Olympic National Park and Forest 079
Mt Olympus through the trees.

Olympic National Park and Forest 080
And towards the sun.

Olympic National Park and Forest 081
That snow is about 4 ft deep if I happened to fall through.

Olympic National Park and Forest 082
This road was closed. 8 miles takes a while, though, seeing as it is a gravel road.

Olympic National Park and Forest 083
Oh dear.

Olympic National Park and Forest 084
These deer like to look at the mountains, too.

Olympic National Park and Forest 085
There's the list if you are counting.

Olympic National Park and Forest 086
That's the biiiggg glacier over there.

Olympic National Park and Forest 087
Taking a rest.

Olympic National Park and Forest 088
Some dear getting their dinner.

Olympic National Park and Forest 089
Time to head back.

Olympic National Park and Forest 090
Kinda pretty at night, though.

Olympic National Park and Forest 091
Looking up towards the ridge.

Olympic National Park and Forest 092
And down towards the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

Olympic National Park and Forest 093
Bye-bye, National Park!

Olympic National Park and Forest 094
This is the National Forest, which surrounds the national park.

Olympic National Park and Forest 095
The next day was foggy. I did a small mountain in the Forest.

Olympic National Park and Forest 096
Normally you can see Seattle from here.

Olympic National Park and Forest 097
Today it was just me and Mr. Spotted Slug, though.

Olympic National Park and Forest 098
At least I know I'm in the right place!

Olympic National Park and Forest 099
From here you can see glaciers. Or maybe not.

Olympic National Park and Forest 100
This is a place you can go to pick and eat your own raw oysters.

Olympic National Park and Forest 101
I don't have a schucking knife, otherwise those two would be yummy.

Olympic National Park and Forest 102
Somebody already got to that one.

Olympic National Park and Forest 103
These oyster beds line the park.

Olympic National Park and Forest 104
Indians used to line the park, too.

Olympic National Park and Forest 105
Might want to cook them before eating them, though.

Olympic National Park and Forest 106
This isn't in the park, but it is an artificial oyester bed. The oysters grow on those poles where they are harvested.

Olympic National Park and Forest 107
Bye forest!

Silver Falls Oregon 086
This park is about rainforests and waterfalls.

Silver Falls Oregon 001
Despite 86?!? pictures this whole park took me about 4 hours.

Silver Falls Oregon 002
I kinda went fast though. Like trotting fast.

Silver Falls Oregon 003
This is the falls farthest north.

Silver Falls Oregon 004
This one is not so tall.

Silver Falls Oregon 005
The entire park is around 1500' in Oregon's northern cascades (east of Salem).

Silver Falls Oregon 006
Putting it in the Cascade rainforest.

Silver Falls Oregon 007
Note the green and clouds. There's not so much sun here.

Silver Falls Oregon 008
These are the stairs leading to the second falls. Wet but easier then rocks.

Silver Falls Oregon 009
The second northern falls - a bit higher then ther first.

Silver Falls Oregon 010
You walk behind this one.

Silver Falls Oregon 011
There are at least 10 waterfalls in this park.

Silver Falls Oregon 012
All within an 8 mile trail.

Silver Falls Oregon 013
And all within the greeeennnn rain forest.

Silver Falls Oregon 014
A description of how the falls form.

Silver Falls Oregon 015
The northern falls from a distance.

Silver Falls Oregon 016
Behind me is the southern falls.

Silver Falls Oregon 017
This water doesn't know what's about to hit it - a 135' drop.

Silver Falls Oregon 018
This one is called "Frankie Falls" - I don't think it counts because it is a very low volume.

Silver Falls Oregon 019
It's falling on me!

Silver Falls Oregon 020
The southern falls - it extends a bit above the frame.

Silver Falls Oregon 021
Geologists care about these things? Watch out for chimneys.

Silver Falls Oregon 022
Actually all of these rocks over my head have air pockets in them meaning rapid cooling. Interesting ...

Silver Falls Oregon 023
Most of these waterfalls you can actually stand behind.

Silver Falls Oregon 024
This type of view is available throughout the park.

Silver Falls Oregon 025
Couldn't decide which shot I liked better - so you get both!

Silver Falls Oregon 026
And of course I have to be in front of every waterfall.

Silver Falls Oregon 027
As you walk down the trail, things get greener and a little quieter.

Silver Falls Oregon 028
All that's missing is a fly fisherman.

Silver Falls Oregon 029
I saw one get out of a car, but I didn't actually see him in the stream.

Silver Falls Oregon 030
Rainforest = green. Even more green then the coast.

Silver Falls Oregon 031
The trail goes along a valley from waterfall to waterfall.

Silver Falls Oregon 032
This one is around 60' high.

Silver Falls Oregon 033
Is this 4 already?

Silver Falls Oregon 034
Once again you get to go under the waterfall.

Silver Falls Oregon 035
That might water Doral.

Silver Falls Oregon 036
Looking through the veil.

Silver Falls Oregon 037
That's not the end of film - its the waterfall.

Silver Falls Oregon 038
The edge does not flow quite as much.

Silver Falls Oregon 039
This one is not so high.

Silver Falls Oregon 040
But I like it more then the higher ones.

Silver Falls Oregon 041
Hard to tell whether to frame it vertically or horizontally.

Silver Falls Oregon 042
Then back to the stream.

Silver Falls Oregon 043
While the path tries to hold the forest back.

Silver Falls Oregon 044
Sometimes it succeeds.

Silver Falls Oregon 045
That's actually a cliff with plants growing on it.

Silver Falls Oregon 046
This would be number 7. It has a name, but I'm not sure what it is.

Silver Falls Oregon 047
The path crossed the river several times - every time on a secure bridge like this one.

Silver Falls Oregon 048
Then it was back into the forest.

Silver Falls Oregon 049
This is the smallest falls on the tour - only 36 feet.

Silver Falls Oregon 050
But it is close to the tallest one on the tour - this one is 178'.

Silver Falls Oregon 051
This one is one of the harder ones to photograph.

Silver Falls Oregon 052
This one is the highest falls. There are actually two levels to it.

Silver Falls Oregon 053
This is the bottom. I suppose you could shower in there if you didn't mind the 50-degree water.

Silver Falls Oregon 054
Making it a bit like Mauna Loa, just a bit colder.

Silver Falls Oregon 055
Reminds me a bit of the Smokies, too.

Silver Falls Oregon 056
Hard to photograph the entire thing.

Silver Falls Oregon 057
From a distance you can see most of it.

Silver Falls Oregon 058
If you look hard enough it is behind me.

Silver Falls Oregon 059
This waterfall has two branches, but the trail doesn't really allow you to see both.

Silver Falls Oregon 060
Sometimes the forest beats the trail.

Silver Falls Oregon 061
This is another one of those falls you can walk behind.

Silver Falls Oregon 062
They didn't exactly stick the sign in the most picturesque spot.

Silver Falls Oregon 063
But you can walk underneath it.

Silver Falls Oregon 064
Which makes it rather picturesque.

Silver Falls Oregon 065
Good place for a bungee jump?

Silver Falls Oregon 066
It's really like Hawaii without the warmth.

Silver Falls Oregon 067
Lots of green.

Silver Falls Oregon 068
And ferns.

Silver Falls Oregon 069
This falls is another one of those that is hard to photograph from the trail.

Silver Falls Oregon 070
This is the top.

Silver Falls Oregon 071
The river flowing away.

Silver Falls Oregon 072
This falls is not on the list. Still pretty, though.

Silver Falls Oregon 073
Lots of waterfalls in this park.

Silver Falls Oregon 074
And lots of rainforest, too.

Silver Falls Oregon 075
This is Winter Falls a high but low-volume falls.

Silver Falls Oregon 076
I am not as close as I look.

Silver Falls Oregon 077
And that is higher then it looks.

Silver Falls Oregon 078
This one falls into a shallow pool.

Silver Falls Oregon 079
A view from the top of the falls.

Silver Falls Oregon 080
There was a 1.6 mile walk back to the parking area through the trees.

Silver Falls Oregon 081
Through very tttaaaallll trees.

Silver Falls Oregon 082
Watch out for Ewoks. They're everywhere.

Silver Falls Oregon 083
Although not there.

Silver Falls Oregon 084
That's a biiiggg tree.

Silver Falls Oregon 085
Goodbye everyone!

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 001
Rainforest? What? Here? Impossible.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 002
My first stop was a wildlife refuge.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 003
They're trying to save Canadian geese? Ah - some sort of Oregonian subspecies of Canadian geese. Still - don't we have e

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 004
Is it me or do those clouds look unfriendly?

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 005
Second stop was another state park on the way towards the beach. Those trees sure looked impressive!

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 006
Turns out this park was a civil war site. Here men whined in 1862 that they were merely keeping peace with Indians inste

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 007
A nice river on the road to the coast.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 008
Rand McNally told me there was an unpaved road on the way to the beach. This is what I found.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 009
Lots and lots of trees. By the way, this is a rainforest.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 010
Very green.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 011
This was the small river on a trail you walk down.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 012
More of the river.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 013
And then - bam! There's this suspension bridge in the middle of nowhere. The bridge sways as you walk across it, for tho

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 014
Right before I crossed.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 015
The bridge is a bit high - maybe 100 feet or so - yet another issue for those of you against that sort of thing.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 016
But you get to see this on the other side!

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 017
Not sure the name of this waterfall but I had to walk 1.5 miles to get to it.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 018
Might was well look at it.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 019
Waterfalls are rather peaceful.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 020
If you don't mind wet rocks, you can walk right up to the pool. Swim in it too, if you don't mind 50-degree water.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 021
My first Oregon wildlife! I was looking for seals - that's a slug. Big one, too.

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As the clouds rolled in it gave a sort of ethereal look to the place.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 023
These yellow flowers were in bloom.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 024
The beach! A bit more hilly then the ones we have in Florida.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 025
Reminds me of Bonsai.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 026
That water is not as warm as you think it is. Nor is the air - 57 degrees F.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 027
Driving north led me to some wide beaches.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 028
There are pull-off spots abot every 500 feet on U.S. Highway 101.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 029
This was another wildlife refuge to save those silly geese.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 030
This is the forest adjacent to the marsh. Many, many flies.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 031
I don't see any geese. I don't see any Oregon Ducks, either. I guess at some other time of year the hunting here is pret

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 032
The other side of the wildlife refuge was the ocean - with a lot of sand in between.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 033
This particular beach was rather wide.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 034
This town reminded me of the painting at my father's house. Maybe it would have reminded me more if the ceiling was grea

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 035
Oregon has a bunch of lighthouses on cliffs. This is on the way to one of them.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 036
We are about 200 ft above the sea. No seals below. The yellow jacket and wet hair means it's kinda raining.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 037
Kinda as in drizzling. Nice islands, though.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 038
I'm sure this looks nicer without clouds, but you get what you get.

The Oregon Coast and Frontl Range 039
There may not be any seals around here, but there are a bunch of birds on those rocks out there.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 040
This path led to the lighthouse and back - about .3 miles to the parking lot.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 041
Did I mention it was green here?

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 042
Apparently those islands have thousands of birds during nesting season - like 20 per square foot or something.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 043
A geologist might find this interesting. The rest of you just have to admire nature.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 044
Kind of what I think of when I think of Oregon beaches.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 045
This is a confused tree. Didn't know which way to grow, so it chose eight directions.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 046
Look - I see seven states!

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 047
Headed the other direction finds a few more cliffs.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 048
And nice places to picnic.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 049
These are the trees right on the coast. They're shorter then other douglas firs.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 050
Nice house. Still no seals, though.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 051
Did I mention the 15-knot wind?

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 052
O.K. - air temperature 57. Water temperature 54. Surfing weather? And some people call me crazy.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 053
The rocky Oregon Coast

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 054
There's a geologic story here, but you'll have to check Wikipedia for that.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 055
Black jacket means its raining kinda hard.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 056
Still looks nice though.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 057
No rain and 85 F, this is probably a nice place for a sandwich. Kinda empty today though.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 058
Crashing waves of the Pacifac.

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 059
Did I mention it was now 55 F?

The Oregon Coast and Frontal Range 060
Everywhere you look in Oregon is rather green.

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They are very proud of their bridges here. Apparently U.S. 101 was not built until WW I, and before that you had to work

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This former lookout is now a touristy gift shop. Yep - I bought some stuff there. Stupid saltwater taffy.

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I'm not seeing it. Is it me?

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Not sure what the sign is talking about here.

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This place is built on a cliff that is 500 ft over the water. Don't trip.

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Heck of a view though, even in the fog.

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Appropriatly named, I think.

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This is some sort of Devil's Hole. Don't dive.

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And I thought there were only two insane people!

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A nice house to watch the crazy surfers.

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An explanation of how the hole formed.

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Oregon's coast goes from wide beaches to cliffs. All are cold, though.

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Heading up to a light house.

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These tsunami warning are everywhere. If you feel an earthquake, scream.

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The bridge in Newport.

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This is a light house. They had to close it 3 years after it started working because ships couldn't see it from the sout

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Newport Jetties. Engineers think they've conquered the ocean.

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They made the beach wider, at least.

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A mis-named "seal rock"

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Maybe it's seal rock because if you stand there you get wet?

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It is green, though.

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And a nice enough view.

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Hat down means it's not raining as much.

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So you're driving down the beach and suddenly you're in a national forest. This is the national forest's version of a be

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Is that a sea lion? Nope - it's just a rock.

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This place is called "Devil's Churn" because the water get's all churned up.

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Did I leave my Mars Rover here somewhere?

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Nope - not here.

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Glad I didn't stand there!

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A bit calmer on this side.

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This is not their home, it is MY home! Now get out before I eat you.

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This is a National Forest, after all.

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With wildflowers along the walkway.

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And views of the beach, too.

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With these signs, there has to be seals!

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There they are!

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The zoom on my camera proves there are there.

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Cute, ain't they?

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Kinda lazy though.

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You're only allowed to get so close to marine mammals.

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If you get too close the feds jump out of thin air and break your legs. Something about a Marine Mammal Protection thing

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Not sure what these are. Is there a marine biologist in the house?

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I didn't notice these tidal pools until chasing seals for some reason. These things may have a name - I call them "food"

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They're still there.

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Ain't they cute? In Canada you can just walk right up and beat them with a club.

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Another tidal pool. There's inerta - inserta -unpside downs - invertasomethingorelses in there.

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This is another light house that is still in use.

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There are sea lions in this picture. Can you see them? You can certainly hear them.

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The trail to the lighthouse is about .7 miles.

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Did I mention those rocks have a lot of birds?

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Holy light house, Batman!

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The poor lighthouse keeper has to look at this every morning.

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Somewhere there's a postcard with this photo, except they photo-shopped in a blue sky.

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There's the sea lions! These guys are really loud.

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I liked the Harbor seals better.

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This place is called "Sea Lion Cave". It was closed when I arrived.

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Biggest sea cave in the world, it says. I'll never know.

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Looking the other direction towards the light house.

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Take away the fog and that's rather pretty.

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My last view of the beach before heading inland.

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'Till the next, everyone!