Moomin Light

Conversation with my body at Ayr Mont

This morning, we were looking down at one of my favorite places at Ayr Mont - the rock in the Eno River.  It's a beautiful, peaceful place to sit.

 

Moomin Light (to my back)(which is having major problems this week*):  It'll be fine.  There's nothing about going down there that will hurt.

Moomin Light (to back while sitting on the rock):  See, you're fine!

Moomin Light's knees:  Starting to grumble.

Moomin Light to knees: Shut up!

View from the rock:

Spring has been colder and drearier this year so I'm really enjoying today's sunny, warm weather.  

Here are some more pictures from our walk at Ayr Mont:

Spring beauty flowers (below, too):

 

Ipheon, with daffodils in the shadows

 

Garden behind the historic house

*  An accident happened right in front of me as I was leaving church after choir rehearsal last Wednesday.  A car was turning into the side road I was on, but the driver mis-judged the traffic and was hit by an SUV that couldn't stop.  The car spun within a few feet of my van, and bits of the SUV's front bounced off my van's hood.  Fortunately, nobody was injured in either vehicle.  There's a lot more to the story, but I've gone over and over it in my head and don't really want to write it.

Every muscle in my body went Sproing! when it happened, however.  My back has been really bad, and I'm getting through on Advil and Ben Gay. I already had a massage scheduled for yesterday, which has helped.**   I also got a CPAP a week and a half ago.  I'm gradually getting used to sleeping with it, but my sleep is all broken up (even more than usual) as I do so.  I've had a lot of really tired days this last week, and I've started blog posts which will never be finished.

** At one point, the massage therapist could tell that my attention had wandered:  "Where are you right now?"  "Back next to the car, trying to comfort the lady who caused the accident."  "Give yourself permission to set that aside for later."

Winter flowers at Ayr Mont

Dear husband and I went for a walk at Ayr Mont on the afternoon of Superbowl Sunday.  It was very quiet and peaceful.  I was surprised at how many flowers were blooming there:

Dear husband pointed out the aconite.

The scilla flowers were way back in the woods.  My camera couldn't focus on them, but they were a nice splash of blue.

It was overcast where we were all afternoon, although we could see that there was sun way off in the distance at times.  Here, a hole in the clouds briefly opened up.

Crocuses and a partly frost-blasted pansy in the garden at the back of the house.   This garden faces south and has two stories of warm brick behind it so flowers bloom early.

I was amazed at how many daffodils were blooming in this one spot, which isn't near the house or unusually warm.

Eno River State Park

Today was going to be a beautiful day so after breakfast, dear husband and I decided to go hiking.  The Eno River State Park isn't too far away.  

We hadn't been there since last summer.  For some strange reason, I always forget how much I like hiking there.

The trail we were on doesn't cross the river.

The view upstream

I love these stairs.

The sycamore trees looked beautiful against the sky.

I sat on a rock and looked upstream for a while.

Brackets on a log

Another view

As we started back along the river towards the van, this heron flew downriver and turned into a small stream.  We watched him fishing for a long time. 

The sunlight was beautiful this morning and in the early afternoon.  I felt all filled up with sun by the time we finished, and the hike woke up a part of me that has been dormant since we got back from vacation.  

Favorite Vacation Photos, October 2012 - Part 2

Part 1 here.

Sunset from the back deck of the house we were renting.

Parts of The Hunger Games were filmed in DuPont State Forest, southwest of Asheville, NC.  Daughter said that the State Forest is very busy on weekends now because of the movie.  We went there on a chilly, drizzly Monday so it wasn't very crowded.

The covered bridge

View from the covered bridge of the top of High Falls

The ceiling of the covered bridge

High Falls from up on the trail

View from the rocks at the bottom - you can see the covered bridge.

   

The rather optimistically named Lake Imaging.  We had our picnic lunch in the shelter on the left.

Triple Falls

Dear husband at the bottom of the second waterfall

 

View down the third waterfall

A wonderful weekend in the Blue Ridge Mountains: Part 3 - Tanawha Trail and Blowing Rock

I should post the rest of these pictures before we get to this weekend.* 

Sunday morning, a week and a half ago, it clouded over and fogged up.  It was still a beautiful time to hike.  Since the views in higher places would be fogged in, we decided to hike the part of the Tanawha Trail (which parallels the Blue Ridge Parkway) off of Holloway Mountain Road (if you look at this map, we hiked the section where the "3.8" is on the eastern end of the trail).

Even in (or maybe because of) the fog, the wildflowers were beautiful.  

I think the goldenrod flowers were at their peak.

The gate to an old cemetary.  We were talking to a ranger later in the morning, and she said that there used to be a cabin in this area.

Ironweed

Thistle

An early taste of fall

 Later, we asked the ranger if this field has a name.  It doesn't.

 

View from the bottom.  The field is so beautiful that it really should have a name.

Assassin bug nymphs on a milkweed pod

Gentians

Before we got back to the van, it started to rain in earnest.  We drove out to the viaduct, but it was totally fogged in.  We stopped at the Viaduct Visitors Center, talked with the ranger, and watched a drenched cyclist drying out in front of the fire in the fireplace.  It turns out that there was a Bridge to Bridge cycling event that day.  The ride went for 25 miles from Lenoir to the Grandfather Mountain swinging bridge.  As the Bridge link says:  "100 miles of pure hill."  It wasn't a good weather day for it!

We went back to Blowing Rock and had lunch at Mellow Mushroom Pizza.  Sadly, they had taken doughnads off the appetizer menu since the last time we were there.  They were small spheres of baked dough with garlic butter and parmesan.  There are no photos of them on the internet.  I should have taken a picture of the ones we had last fall.

We wandered around Blowing Rock for a bit before heading home.  

Hanging baskets

Gardens in front of the playground

 

 

High Country Candles is one of my favorite stores in Blowing Rock.  They've got wonderful candles, and the conversations we have with the people there are always interesting.  We bought some tapers last fall and liked how dripless they really were.  I wanted to make sure we brought home some more.

We bought locally grown apples at Sunset Tees and Hattery.  We get them every fall because they've got much more flavor than apples from the grocery store.   You can choose your own, but we always forget what kinds they are so this time, I took photos.

That was the end of the trip.  However, I didn't post some photos that came before the kayaking photos.  They're kind of strange to put at the end of these foggy day photos.

The first morning, we had breakfast next to Price Lake...   ...and watched the mist rising off the water.

It turns out that they rent kayaks there.  How nice!

 

*  Which includes the Duke Gardens fall plant sale, the NC Pride Parade in Durham, and the Carrboro Music Festival (which all mean lots more photos).

A wonderful weekend in the Blue Ridge Mountains: Part 2 - Bass Lake at the Cone Manor

We went for two walks at the Bass Lake last weekend.  It had clouded over by Saturday evening:

They're redoing the heart ponds. This was a surprise.

Sunset over the lake.

We went back again the next morning...

...because this is a lovely view for breakfast.

Jewel weed was blooming profusely.

Goldenrod blooming at the end of the lake

You usually can't see this well into the island.

 Duck next to all the fleabane flowers blooming by the dam

 

 

Part of the project they're working on is to keep the water lilies from taking over the lake.

 

I've taken lots of photos of the Cone Manor, but I can't resist just one more.

Hydrangea by the lake

Butner Game Lands - Brickhouse Road

I feel all filled up with sunshine.  After the gray, rainy weather of last weekend, when dear husband had to work, and being apart all week, we were really looking forward to today.  The forecast was sunny and unusually warm (60's).  We wanted to go hiking somewhere where there was lots of sunlight so we chose the Butner Game Lands in northeast Durham County (NC). 

We usually end up hiking there at some point in the winter.  We used to live about 15 minutes away from the Game Lands when our older kids were little.  Back then, dear husband would often take older son hiking while I stayed home with napping daughter.  We have so many memories tied up with this place that most people in Durham County, even hikers, don't know about. 

Older son has a cold so he didn't feel up to going.  Younger son said it was too warm (!) so it was just the two of us.

We park across the dirt road from this entrance. There are rarely any vehicles on the roads in the Game Lands.  Today, we didn't see anyone else at all.  It was so wonderfully peaceful.

I remember one very cold Sunday afternoon when older son and daughter were 8 and 4.  We hiked in to this pond, which was totally iced over (doesn't happen that often in this part of NC).  We spent lots of time throwing sticks and small stones out onto the ice.

Interesting rainbow pattern on this pond.

The Flat River

The water in the swampy areas was unusually high.  I love seeing the water right next to the road.

This area is so open and beautiful, and I never can catch it in a photo.  Dear husband said that I needed a person to give a sense of scale.

I thanked him for volunteering.

I liked this line of trees in the water.

A closer view.  I love the reflections.

Milkweed seeds.  If you pull them out and release them they float away...

...which, of course, I have to do.

The dirt road on the way back.

One of my favorite trees there.

 

Rime ice on Mount Mitchell and Craggy Gardens

On the second to last day of our vacation, we were going from Blowing Rock, NC to Asheville, where we were going to have dinner with daughter.  It had rained overnight, but the clouds were starting to break up, at least in Blowing Rock.  We were trying to decide whether to take the scenic route along the Blue Ridge Parkway, or, if it turned out cloudy and drizzly in the higher elevations, whether to just take I-40 and get there an hour or two earlier.

There were snow flurries on Grandfather Mountain so that made us more eager to go on to find more interesting weather.  It started sunning up west of Linville Falls so we decided to head down the parkway the rest of the way.

We hadn't planned on stopping at Mount Mitchell on this trip.  It probably would be all fogged in, and it definitely would be cold.  However, from one overlook, we saw that it had rime ice on the trees so we had to go check it out.

First, we stopped to eat our picnic lunch at an overlook.  Since it was in the 40's and windy, I didn't make anyone eat outside like I did on my birthday when it was in the 50's.  Here's the view we had:

We were right, though, because Mount Mitchell was fogged/clouded in.  You can see the rime ice-covered trees peeking out from underneath:

The drive up to the park:

The beginning of the Old Mitchell Trail, which goes from the park entrance to the top.  We didn't go to the top that day.  Younger son sprained his foot last summer so he still has to be careful.

 

At the park office and along the Commissary Road Trail, the cloud was just high enough not to totally block the view.  Even though it was wintery where we were, the distant hills were still covered with fall color.

I loved the patterns the rime ice made on things:

Icicles:

 

 

Vacation: Blowing Rock, NC & the Blue Ridge Parkway

No internet, except for, every evening, laboriously checking Ray's Weather Center on my stupid not-smart* phone. 

No computer for most of it (I did bring the netbook along so I could look at the photos on my camera, but gave that up after one try.  I didn't want to look at a screen). 

No TV. 

No ads of any kind except for those in the two issues of the Mountain Times and the one issue of Our State that I read. 

Lots of outdoors, hiking, and weather (more on that later).  Lots of time with family and long conversations after meals, or on mountaintops, or by lakes.  Younger son and I did two puzzles and played numerous games of Blokus and Carcassonne - all of which he won.  This is a new development. 

I read His Majesty's Dragon, which older son had recommended.  I heavily recommended it to dear husband.  He read it in a few days, and then he turned around and read it out loud to younger son.  I listened to it also - that's how good a book it is.  It's kind of like Master and Commander but with dragons. We're still quoting from it. 

Older son and daughter were both there for a few days on their fall breaks (you know how HAPPY that made me). We did their favorite hikes those days.  We repeated the Rough Ridge hike (below) again later.

I took over 1200 pictures.  I got some new filters for the camera so I was experimenting with them.  That's why I thought of looking at photos on the netbook.  Instead, I'll be looking at the results over the next few days. 

With the new filters, this sunset photo over Price Lake turned out better than it usually would.

The sky is bluer with the filters, and the distant mountains are much more apparent (Blue Ridge Parkway viaduct around Grandfather Mountain). 

The weather ranged from tank-top-and-shorts hiking weather (in the 70s near the Bass Lake at the Cone Manor)... 

...to freezing temperatures while wandering through a fairyland of rime ice on Mt. Mitchell...

 

...and these were only two days apart!

Dear husband says that I'm not ready to come back from any of our October vacations, but, to me, it felt like it was even harder this year.  I've been running for months, and it took me most of the two weeks of vacation to slow down and relax.  I found it much harder at first to really focus on reading like I usually do on vacation, although, by the end, I was back to my usual rate of one book a day.

Now that I've slowed down, I don't want things to go back the way they were.

Of course, the first few days back have to be focused on getting cleaned up, organized, and going through mail and e-mail (Note to self:  Turn off Freecycle e-mails next year.  They were half of the 700 e-mails I had).  After I get settled in, I have to rethink how I do things.

Even though we had a wonderful walk around Hillsborough last weekend and good conversations with neighbors, I still wasn't ready to get back to our regular schedule.  I didn't really get used to that until Monday evening when I drove to Broadway dance.  I headed past Duke's East Campus and all the joggers & walkers on the trail that dear husband and I like to walk in the winter.  Then I passed the spot on Broad Street where we watched the parade last month.  I turned on to Ninth Street and parked in front of Francesca's - where we've gotten ice cream since before I was pregnant with older son. That's when I was happy to be back where I... belong?

We danced All That Jazz** in class, and I sang along. 

 

* Said with great affection.  I don't want a phone that sends me e-mail, or effortlessly gives me the internet.  

** 1:40 to 2:40.

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....yes, I like what the filters do with the colors...

Flat Top Mountain trail, Cone Manor

Blue Ridge Parkway: The Beginning

We were up in the Charlottesville area this weekend.  Today, we came back by way of the first hundred miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway (Yesterday, we spent the early evening on Skyline Drive (That will maybe end up as another blog post - if I get around to it.).). [Enough periods?].[Just for good measure.]

We don't get up to this end of the Parkway often. 

Here are some of my favorite photos:

Asters

Milkweed bugs on milkweed

Fields

Thistles

 

I love milkweed pods and seeds.

The pedestrian bridge is suspended under the Parkway bridge over the James River.

View of the James River from the pedestrian bridge

 Goldenrod and a view

Peaks of Otter

Yellow wingstem and white snakeroot

View across the pond the other way

Snakeroot

Wingstem