buzzardnotes

Treetops, you ask? We know she’s squirrely, but to go after them in the treetops is a bit ridiculous. No, this has nothing to do with squirrels and I didn’t even see any on this adventure. It has to do with zip lining and rope courses between the zip lines. While this activity was certainly not on my bucket list, it was on Jerri’s. So it was that she promised to take Dalan, her grandson, zip lining for his 13^th birthday. I think this promise opened opportunity’s door and gave her the chance to do this crazy undertaking. Not to be outdone, I decided to accompany her and the kids.  Perhaps I could exorcise some of my own demons about heights and risk.

Zip lining was never on my bucket list because I am afraid of heights and have a very odd feeling of wanting to jump if I’m on the edge of a cliff or high building. So you can see why I was reluctant to do this. You can also see why this was a very challenging enterprise on my part (and Jerri’s, too.)

Jerri, Dalan, Megan and Sierra and I drove up to Tahoe City to join a bunch of other folks at the Tahoe Treetop Adventure Park. (for more pictures and to see where the park is, check out http://northtahoeadventures.com/ ). After we got outfitted with our gear and helmets, we were given a short introduction to the sport and how to operate our clamps (the hooks that latch onto the cables). Then we were all required to go through the sample course to make sure we knew how to operate the life-saving clamps.  (Don’t forget to click on the pictures to enlarge them)

Megan is wondering if this is a good idea. Check out the eye you can seen in the picture

Sierra on her qualifying zip ride. She looked like a pro right off the bat.

Jerri is holding her life saving clamps, listening to the orientation

Jerri and I decided to do what would be the equivalent of a bunny slope for our first course. Sierra and Megan decided the Fuzzy Bunny course also. Dalan, the veteran of the bunch, decided to begin his day on the intermediate level Spiral Course. Well, the Fuzzy Bunny was quite an event for me. Just getting up the log ladder was an experience.

Sierra is awaiting her turn while Megan goes up the ladder

Megan got up on the platform and now she and Sierra are beginning their first obstacle

Meanwhile, Dalan was flying around the Spiral Course like (dare I say it?) a squirrel.  We couldn’t keep track of him, he was so fast. Luckily, he’s a strong gymnast, has good balance and has experience on the courses. Plus, he’s 13. No fear whatsoever!

Dalan on one of the Spiral Course obstacles.

Here’s Jerri on our first obstacle. Note she was standing on a cable and using those free hanging ropes to aid her progress.

Jerri and I found the obstacles to be much more challenging than the zip lines. Upper arm strength was a must. So was balance. We didn’t scamper around the obstacles, but we made pretty good time. We discovered quite often, the item we were standing on was moving in an opposite direction of the thing we were hanging on to.  That made it kinda scary.

Jerri is waiting for me at the bottom of our first zip line. It looks kinds of far, eh?

I had a really hard time taking the “step” into the air. There was no place else to go, so I had to do it. As soon as I stepped off the platform, the gear around my legs took hold and it was very comfortable on the ride down.  It was sort of like sitting in a sling and felt very safe. That first “step” plagued me each time I did a zip line, but I didn’t wait to do it. Later, I noticed people (kids mostly) hanging upside down, not hanging on to the handle, and doing other stunts. Logically, nothing will happen because one is secured to the cable, but I just couldn’t get over not hanging on and doing fun things.

Well, we conquered the Fuzzy Bunny and we trundled off to The Twins course. This was in intermediate course and I don’t know if we were really ready, but there were no more bunny courses. Off we went onto a swinging bridge with very long steps between the slats. It kind of made me think about adventure movies where the hero is trying to get across an old bridge spanning a deep gorge. We were only maybe 20 feet off the ground but it seemed a lot higher than that when we were up there.

Jerri is on the Twins Course swinging bridge. This one was fun!

The most difficult obstacle on this course (for me) was walking a cable with crossing ropes on one side only. My arms were very tired after accomplishing that feat. After having a day to think about it, I think I might do it a bit differently such as not having such a death grip on the ropes. I came to the conclusion that a Flying Wallenda, I’m not. Having said that, I never slipped when walking on one cable. I talked to one of the course monitors and he told me he’s only heard of 5 people falling since the place opened.  I was very happy not to be the 6th.

This is still on the Twins Course. The cable seemed pretty small at the time.

Zippping along in my merry sling (not very tuneful, but it was fun)

The one downer for the day is that there were lots of meat bees in the area. A meat bee is technically a yellow jacket who loves meat. They will land on your food and you can watch them literally take a chunk out of your hamburger and fly away with it. Those little varmints were flitting around us all day long, probably thinking we were their next meal. I guess one really didn’t like me and stung me in the small of my back. It felt like a hot poker for quite some time. Today the sting spot is a large red lump and hurts and itches to no end, no matter what I try. I’ll probably be zoned out on Benedryl by day’s end. It’ll get better, but right now, it’s a giant inconvenience. The varmint. I wasn’t even swatting at him or shooing him away.

A meat bee with a hot stinger. I don’t know why he thought I was a piece of raw meat. I still had my skin on.

While we were doing our courses Dalan ended up doing the Black Diamond Course, which is the same thing on a snow ski course. It’s for the experts. I knew he was going to go on the course but I didn’t get any pictures of him on it. He told me that he was almost totally exhausted when he finished because it demanded so much arm, hand and leg strength. He was glad he did it because the zip line was the longest at the Park and had the best views.  So he told us.

I was proud of Sierra that she stayed with Megan the entire time. She talked Megan through some of the obstacles and kept encouraging her. I know Sierra wanted to do some harder courses, but she was very loyal and protective of Megan. She’s a good kid! Megan is going on 11 and does a lot of stuff, but she had some issues with some of the obstacles. (I don’t blame her. I thought they were hard and scary, too). It was hard for her to go on a zip line beyond the demo ride. But she did it and she and Sierra ended up going on the Twins Course, which I thought was pretty difficult.  They have every right to be proud of themselves also.

Jerri and I never progressed past the intermediate level, but we felt very accomplished at what we did. We conquered some fears and fulfilled an item on Jerri’s bucket list. Plus, we’re pretty sure that we were the oldest folks out there on the course. That made us feel good, too. We may be old broads, but by dern, we’re out there doing our thing, having fun and enjoying life. LIFE IS GOOD!

The Crew: Dalan, Jerri, Megan, me, Sierra

As you know, I have written about the wildlife in my backyard, their habits, antics and entertainment value. My critters (they are varmints when they eat my lettuce, sunflowers and other produce…that’s another story) give me a lot of pleasure and while I gripe about the expense of replanting and preventative garden fencing, they are well worth it. But in addition to providing me with entertainment, the critters are carrying on their life cycle to the best of their ability and take advantage of whatever food and water they can get. It’s easy pickins in my backyard, in more ways than one.

A bit before dusk last evening, I was working a crossword and happened to look out and see a sharp-shinned hawk near the seed block under the bird feeders.  He had just caught a dove and was in the process of killing it.

A Sharp-shinned hawk

Not 10 minutes before this event, the feeding area was teeming with various birds, squirrels and rabbits. They were happily pecking and chomping on the seeds and an old zucchini provided for them. When I looked up, it was deathly quiet and nary a critter was to be seen except the hawk and his prey.  Everybody knows to hide quickly when this hawk flies over. However, there is an exception to this, which I will tell you in a minute.

I watched this drama for quite some time and was quite interested in the process and the entire environment as it evolved.

The sharp-shinned hawk is about 14” long and has a wing span of about 20-28.” I’ve seen several but don’t know if they are pairs or what the case is. Anyway, this bird suddenly turned around and spread his wings and tail to cover his prey and then I saw another sharp-shinned hawk make a pass over where my guy was. The intruder hawk didn’t try to interfere and soon my hawk was back to business. He must not be very strong because he had trouble moving his prey just a few feet away to be closer to a bush. That is when he began to eat the dove. Soon there was nothing left except feathers. This entire episode took less than 20 minutes.

Protecting the kill

While the hawk was moving his prey and beginning to eat, Sid, the ground squirrel (a varmint), zoomed into the area just below the bird feeders (where all the good seed has fallen). Sid didn’t seem to be aware of the bird at first and began to eat. They were only about 6 feet apart when they became aware of each other. They stared at each other but then went about their business. I think Sid must have known that he was safe because he was too big for the hawk to kill and move. The hawk knew Sid wasn’t going to try to horn in on his meal.

Sid Squirrel, a common ground squirrel

Some of you know that Sid is my nemesis as he and his family twice ate my sunflower seeds even before I could get my fence up and they have eaten other produce, much to my chagrin. So I was hoping the hawks would take care of Sid and his family. But I guess I need an eagle or some bird that big to take care of Sid in a natural way. Sid is safe for another day to carry on his nefarious ways.

It was quiet in the feeding area for about 10 minutes and then the critters began to return. Soon, it was as if nothing had happened and everything returned to normal.

Upon reflection of the entire event, it occurred to me that the drama I watched is a microcosm of life in general. A tragedy occurs and the world continues its journey through the cosmos. Even the survivors eventually return to “normalcy.” It’s life, I guess.  Sorry to be maudlin here, it’s just that what I just said is reflected in current events in Carson City where a CC sheriff was shot and killed recently (the first since 1867 to be shot). He is being laid to rest today. It’s sad for the entire community.

Last week, we were at the Atlantis getting very pampered with massages, pedicures and lunch by the pool. That was the life! But life moves on and this week, we had to try out a brand new adventure with our new toy, a Polaris Razor.

Early this morning, Jerri and I took an inaugural ride in our “new” ATV out east to the Pine Nuts. It’s been so very hot that we had to get an early start (like 6:30 AM) to beat the heat. What a glorious morning it was! The only issue we had was that the rising sun was directly in our eyes, but we made do.  (Don’t forget to click on the photos to enlarge them)

Our “new” Polaris Razor out in the wilderness

We went about twenty-miles+ east into BLM land on a recently regarded road. It was really nice and relatively smooth. Our new toy has adjustable shocks, so the ride is much better than on the quad. I also think it’s much safer with roll bars, 5-point seat belts and a winch. Plus, we are side by side and can sort of talk to each other over the noise of the engine. It’s a blast to drive and are looking forward to taking a much longer ride soon.

The road rises into the Pine Nuts and gets into the mountain range filled with piñyon pine trees. (I believe this road goes over the Pine Nuts and ends up somewhere in the Yerrington/Smith Valley areas. Quite a ways from where we were)

Looking toward the southeast, the sky looks a bit hazy, which could be due to possible, pending thunderstorms.

We took a couple of side roads just to see what is out there because I thought I had seen tailings from a mine, but the roads didn’t take us there.   One of the roads would have taken us about 12 miles northeast to Dayton, NV out on Highway 50 (the loneliest road in the USA), but, that is for another day. That road was definitely for an ATV or 4-wheel drive truck as it was narrow and pretty rough and we will be taking it soon when it’s not as hot later in the day.

We saw many rabbits, chipmunks, squirrels and one large lizard. I thought it might be a young chuckwalla but he didn’t match the images I found on the Internet. So who knows what he was? Whatever, he was long and fat.

Our only critter that stood still long enough to get his picture taken

We were only out for a couple of hours, but plan on doing a longer trip soon. This shakedown cruise let us know that this is going to be quite a lot of fun. It’s too bad it couldn’t be longer but with the heat coming on, my needing to do an errand and Jerri getting back to her dog sitting chore (That’s another story all by itself. That dog is not well trained), we elected to get back home.

Wishing you all a very happy and safe Fourth of July.

A night view of the Atlantis Casino

Jolee has been wanting to take Jerri to the spa at the Atlantis in Reno for some time now. She finally tricked Jerri into going and I tagged along because it seemed like a fun and a relaxing day.

Jerri and I were a little leery of doing there because we weren’t sure what a spa at a casino was like. But I knew a great massage was in the offing, so I decided it would be fun no matter what. We walked through the casino to get to the elevators and that was a bit off-putting because of the noise bells and whistles. But, the spa floor was sort of like a beautiful cocoon sheltered from any untoward noise. The pampering began as we walked into the spa, were greeted and taken back to the locker room. As you know, I taught PE for many years and experienced typical smelly rooms. The spa was a class place. We each got our own locker (with a lock for which we decided the combination) with an Atlantis robe and sandals to wear as long as we were there. After we changed clothes, we waited in the “Tea Room” where we had some snacks and water/tea before our massage therapist came to take us to our massage rooms.

Well, a 90-minute massage just about did me in for the rest of the day. It was so relaxing and luxurious that all doubts were erased. I could barely get off the bed to put on my robe to go back to the Tea Room to await the next activity. A 90-minute massage seems to get all the aches and pains better than a 60 minute one. Jerri had a good massage, too, and swondered why she had waited so long to go. Shortly after the massage, we were taken to the salon where we each had pedicures. That was wonderful too.

Jolee ordered lunch for us while we were predicuring and we dined right beside one of the pools that are next door to the spa. After lunch we wandered around and checked out the various treatment rooms that we could use. There was the Brine Inhalation-Light Therapy Room, several different types of saunas, steam rooms, and even a fitness room. Who would want to work out after a massage? Not us! The Brine Room was filled, so we went to the Aqua Spa Lounge (hot tubs to us) and relaxed for a while.

These are our beautiful toes after the pedicure.

It was right about then that I happened to see a clock and it was already 3 PM! How did all the time pass so quickly? None of us wanted to go home yet, so we wandered back to the Brine Room where there was finally some room.   This is what the web site says about the Brine Room Inhalation: surrounded by light illusions brings the climate of an ocean shore. Surrounded by soothing music, a waterfall of Brine cascades over decorative stones, creating beautiful crystals and magical colors. While resting on the heated tile bench, your senses will be stimulated, both psychologically and physiologically by the specific colors reflecting over the water cascade. The ambience and inhalation of salt aerosols positively affect the respiratory tract to increase well-being.   It was definitely all that. We relaxed some more.

There comes a time when all good things must end and we had to go back to our regular lives. But the good thing is that we know about this luxurious place now and we can return to be pampered once again. Those folks at Atlantis surely do know how to make one feel like a queen for a day. Thanks, Jolee, for taking us there and introducing us to another world!

Before my trip to Grand Junction and the dinosaurs, Jerri had asked me to go with her to Washington to pick up two of her grandchildren. Of course I said yes, not thinking that there was only a day of being home before we would take off again. Oh well, there would be two of us driving the twelve-hour route to Clarkston, WA.

The drive was really quite pretty and different from what I had expected. It had rained quite a bit in the desert from Reno to Winnemucca and there were many puddles and small lakes that glimmered in the dawn’s early light. We turned north on US 95 from Winnemucca and stayed on that road until we were almost to Clarkston. There is quite a bit of desert in the Nevada portion of 95 but it changes to rolling grassy hills in Oregon. There we espied several pronghorn.

Pronghorn do not live in North America!

I forgot to tell you that Shirley and I learned there are NO antelope in North America, only pronghorn. (That was an amazing factoid to me as the deer and the antelope have always played on the range. I guess pronghorn just didn’t work in the verse). Anyway, they are pretty animals and seem well adapted to their range in Oregon and Idaho.

We passed through a lot of farmland in Idaho as well as woods that are used to recreation and lumber production. In fact, southwestern Idaho farmers grow more than a billion pounds of onions each year! We saw many other crops but that stuck in my mind. We also saw many beautiful horses and other livestock along the way. Of course, there were many youngsters who were prancing and dancing around the pastures.  Canola is grown in eastern Washington, too. We drove by miles and miles of these fields.

One crop that surprised us was the growth of canola plants. They look like a short mustard plant (at least that’s what we thought as we were zooming along the highway. Sorry about the reflection from the window).

Erik, Jerri’s oldest son, lives in Clarkston with his wife, Tori, and her nephew, Alex. I should have taken a picture of his house as it is 116 years old and looks pretty good for its age. Erik says the doors don’t always fit well and there is quite a draft in the winter, but it works for them. Erik is the personal gardener for the president of Washington State University in Pullman and the grounds for which he is responsible look terrific.  During our one full day there, he took us on a tour of the campus and the presidential grounds. I was quite impressed with everything we saw. Erik planted over 2000 scarlet (or red) tulips so that the presidential grounds were very colorful in the spring. We didn’t see them, but we did tour the front and back yards. The president is quite ill and we were not able to meet him or his wife, but at least we got to see the grounds.

The WSU president’s home

A portion of the back yard

Erik is at the old entrance to the university

Sierra and Erik in a little private glen he made for the WSU president

Sierra, Jerri and Erik

We had a great snack at Ferdinand’s, the WSU creamery. Wow! They make super ice cream and delicious cheese there! You might have guessed that Ferdinand’s is named after Ferdinand the bull, which doesn’t quite compute, but it’s cool and all visitors check it out.

This is the confluence of the Snake and Clearwater Rivers. Clarkston is behind the hill on the right and to the right of the river. The salmon fishing is great there and many, many people fish in those two rivers. Clarkston is also where a paddlewheel boat docks after a river cruise.

We took a walk along the Snake River and I happened to get a picture of young Alex taking a rest break.

Jerri, Alex and Dalan are checking out the river.

That evening, all of us went to Effie’s for the world’s biggest burgers. Oh my gosh! This is no lie. An Effie burger is at least 9 to 10 inches diameter!  If I’d had my camera, I’d have taken a picture of it so that you would believe this story. Jerri and I split one and we couldn’t finish it. I was so stuffed that I couldn’t eat any dessert. That’s extremely unusual for me. The only one who finished his split burger was Erik and then he ate Alex’s leftovers.

This is a photo from the interet since I didn’t get my own photo. But you get the idea of how big this burger is.

The trip was too short, but I’m glad we did it.  I got to meet Tori and Alex for the first time and that was good.  I got to see Erik’s workplace and find find out why he’s so rightfully proud of his work.  He seems very contented and happy there in Clarkston and is looking forward to staying there for many years with Tori and Alex.  Thank you Erik, Tori and Alex for your hospitality!

We left about 5 AM the next morning for the return trip to Minden. Jerri and I entertained ourselves by guessing 50s and 60s artists on Sirius/XM. She seldom misses with the 60s folks and I don’t get many of either decade.  Sierra and Dalan listened to their tunes on their iPhones. They are the mod ones in the family. Again, it was a twelve-hour trip that seemed endless this time. Needless to say, we were all pretty tired when we got home.  I’m getting too old for this stuff.

Dalan expresses how we all felt when we arrived home.

Eleanor Roosevelt once said, “The purpose of life is to live it, to taste it, to experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience.” This trip exemplifies what Eleanor was talking about, I think.

I flew to Grand Junction, CO on June 1 to stay with long time, good friend, Shirley Porter and began tasting life within an hour of landing. There are about 22 wineries in the Grand Valley wherein lies Grand Junction and we got to test only three that afternoon. That leaves a lot to be visited during a return visit.  (Don’t forget to click on the images.  You will be able to see more details on some pictures if you do)

Looking toward Mt. Garfield and the Bookcliffs, a range that goes west into Utah. Taken from one of our three wineries. Fun!

The next morning, we drove to Dinosaur Journey in Fruita, CO that is one-third of the Museum of Western Colorado.

There, we met Chris and Mitch, our delightful young guides (very young to us) who led us through our adventure for the next three days. (This tour was very special as Shirley and I were the only two people on the tour. So we received lots of attention and had all our questions answered to the nth degree). They took us to the Rimrock River Adventures where we met Steve, our boat driver. We floated/rowed and motored about 30 miles down the Colorado River through the Ruby and Horsethief Canyons all the way to Westwater, Utah. To me, it was sort of a mini-Grand Canyon rafting trip where we saw like rock formations (except some of the nomenclature is different, which confused me) plus dinosaur tracks and some pictographs as well as learning more about geology and paleontology. We loved it!

Mitch, Shirley and our boat driver, Steve when we began our journey together down the river.

Chris was our other guide

Mitch and Chris were both such nice guys and had tons of geological and paleontological info and puns. Steve also had many jokes and stories to tell us.

The first picture from the raft is of the FPA (Fruita Paleontological Area)(never heard of such a thing. I thought something with *PA dealt with Pale Ale) It is an area rich with fossils. As we moved on down the river, we began to see several more layers of formations.

The Fruita Paleontological Area

Some of the many formations in the Ruby and Horsethief Canyons

We learned about the following formations:  Schist, Chinle, Wingate, Kayenta, Entrada, Morrison (THE major dinosaur bone layer which also includes the Tidwell, salt wash and brushy basin layers), and Mancos shale. To add more data and confuse you more, here are some more terms and time periods. The Mesozoic Era includes the Jurassic Period from 210 million years ago and lasted for 70 million years. The Cretaceous Period is described as the last period of the dinosaurs and lasted from about 144 to about 65 million years ago. Those are the two eras we were most interested in even though we saw all of the other layers. I know that’s confusing. I can show you pictures of these beautiful layers and formations, but I am unable to tell you which specific formation they are. I just couldn’t get it even after the “boys” explained it several times. So I’m going to tell you about some of the things that I’m fairly sure of.

The Great Uncomformity? At the very least, it’s a visible fault in the earth

I thought this picture was of the Great Unconformity (Occurring worldwide, the Great Unconformity juxtaposes old rocks, formed billions of years ago deep within the Earth’s crust, with relatively young Cambrian sedimentary rock formed from deposits left by shallow ancient seas that covered the continents just a half billion years ago), but now I’m not sure. I AM pretty sure this picture shows a fault that caused the disappearance of some layers.

You can see a lot of folding of layers in this picture. I think the Morrison formation is the top layer.

Steve pulled over to the shore and we clambered up the steep slope to view some special formations as well as a few dino tracks.

The white lines in this rock are mud cracks. They form in fine clay material that has dried out. As the moisture is removed, the surface will split into cracks that extend a short way down into the mud. Later sediments can fill in the cracks and are preserved. Geologists can tell what the original orientation of the rock was using mud cracks.

A dino track in the center of the picture. It might be a theropod.

I think the picture with the red stone is cool. The wrinkles you see are ripples from a river or some water mass. The water lapped lazily on the shore and the little ripples were preserved. We saw several examples of this on our voyage.

Some of the 17 bighorn sheep we saw

Right across the river from the ripples, we saw a total of 17 bighorn sheep. They were grazing close to the water and some were getting a drink. We also saw 3 bald eagles, many great blue herons, one eider, many ravens and no lizards (which seemed strange to me).

Look in the low center of the picture and you’ll see a peculiarly balanced rock. Steve said he had been watching it for years, waiting to see if and when it falls.

We ate lunch at Black Rocks or “deep schist.” That’s pretty old rock.   You can see that the hole was big enough to crawl into. There was a hole on the other side to spy on river travelers.

I was fascinated by the rock with the hole in it. Shirley and I thought it looked like a sculpted polar bear but others thought it was fingers pointing out to the river. I like our description better.

Shirley is checking out the bear

You can also see that the river is brown because it was filled with silt that was washed off the mountains due to some severe storms. We also saw limbs and trees as well as other debris floating in the water. The water was cold and very swift. I would not have wanted to fall overboard and try to get to shore or back into the boat.

Chris is standing on the schist and looking at quartz dikes that came up in cracks of the schist before it totally cooled. It really does look like someone placed a dike in the rock. Another dike is by Chris’ right foot and goes perpendicular to the large dike.

The spires in this picture are called hoodoos. It’s some picturesque erosion, whatever their names are. We saw several examples of hoodoos throughout our tour.

Steve. took us into a tiny creek mouth where we got out of the boat and hiked a distance to see a natural amphitheater and two spectacular pictographs (painted images on rock walls. Petroglyphs are etched into the rock).

The figure on the left is a bear and the other is a shaman.

Steve told us that he heard a concert in this place and the acoustics were just about perfect. I thought it was a magical, spiritual place.

Someone painted the borderline on the rock wall letting us know this particular fact. You can just barely see the white writing at the base of the wall

Not long before we ended our journey, we floated into Utah. I thought it was cool that the Colorado River only has to go about 30 miles from Fruita to flow into Utah. I felt sort of like an explorer, not knowing which way the river would turn or what would be around the next corner.

The wind came up during our voyage and it seemed to blow in our faces for at least the last two-thirds of the trip. It wasn’t a hot wind but it seemed to suck the energy out of Shirley and me. We were close to exhaustion that evening and slept well.

The next day was the Big Dig day. We were excited to get to the Mygatt-Moore Quarry (some miles west of Fruita in Rabbit Valley), get instructions and dig down to find a new fossil. (Jerri had teased me that if I found a big bone, our local paper would have a headline of “An Old Fossil finds a New Fossil!”) Mind you, some big bones had been found in that quarry, so there was a possibility. It didn’t quite work out like that, but we had a little orientation and began to dig in our assigned spot of a small, layered mud embankment.  I found out later that we were digging in mud that was 150 million years old!

Our tools for the day

Shirley is carefully checking out some fragments.

They are real fossils!

We both found mostly plant fragments, but we were excited when we were able to properly identify bone fragments.   Neither one of us found a long bone, but right next to where we were digging, Mitch found a rib of something but he ran out of time and was not able to extract it from the earth.

Mitch is digging out a rib of some sort

Chris and I are discussing how to dig out the fossil I’d found.

The elongated black thing in the center is a bone

Something that Shirley and I quickly discovered is that paleontology and digging for bones takes a great deal of patience, care and finesse. There is also the fact that one spends a lot of time on the knees. We were using little carpets for kneepads, but they didn’t help much after a while. We also found that there is a lot of consulting of each other as to what something might be. I found it good to have so much teamwork. Chris and I were discussing how to dig around a bone (that’s another patience stretcher because in being delicate about this, you might run into another bone and therefore have to expand your digging around area). That black thing in the middle of the picture is a dinosaur bone fragment. I spent the afternoon digging around it but like Mitch, ran out of time.

An interesting thing is that we could not leave the dig area open like you see it in the picture. We put carpets or some type of protective material over it and then shoveled dirt on top of it to make it look like nothing was there. The reason is that vandals and/or tourists can walk into the quarry, look around and take stuff. It is against Federal law to remove any artifact/fossil that one finds unless one has specific permission (like the museum has). No, Shirley and I did not take even one tiny fragment.

While we were busily digging in our little area, other volunteers were digging around a very large bone that had been uncovered and then casted and covered in 2008. No one knew why it had been forgotten but it was. So they dug out as much as they could and then discovered several other bones around the one they were trying to get at. So, again, they had to begin to dig around the “new” bones. They had hoped to extract the original bone by the end of this dig season, but they figure now it will be at least two entire dig seasons to do so.

Volunteers digging out a large bone buried since 2008.

If you look to the left of the orange cloth, you’ll see a round thing and that is one of the “new” bones.

That big bone, etc. was also covered up with plywood, carpets and dirt so as to protect it from the elements as well as people. They don’t dig every day and there is no security out there, so prevention is very important.

There is a popular “Trail of Time” just down the hill from the quarry where people can walk along a trail to see actual fossils sticking out of the ground/rock. Well-marked signs tell them what they are seeing and why such a critter might have been there. It is an informative trail for the average person and kid who are interested in dinosaurs.

Shirley and I at the end of the day. Our digging area is all covered up.

I found the volunteers working that day to be very dedicated to their work. The lead volunteer, Kay, had been volunteering for 30 years at the museum and the dig. Mitch and Chris consulted her as often as each other because she knew so much. Most of the other folks had been digging for 10 to 20 years. As I said, they are very dedicated. Carter, only 12, had been working at the museum in the lab for one winter and now he’s out at the dig being treated pretty as much an equal. Yes, he wants to be a paleontologist.

After our dig, Shirley and I were given a “behind the scenes” tour of the paleontology lab at the museum. We had a chance to view the largest femur (6’7”) of an allosaurus that was discovered at the quarry where Shirley and I dug.

An interesting note is that Mitch is pointing to bite and claw marks on the femur.

Shirley is checking out some microscopic material that will eventually be teased out of its encasement.

I am standing beside the front leg bones of a brachiosaurus that stand over 18’ tall.

Can you imagine an animal that would have been about 85’ long and 40 to 50’ tall? The cool thing about the brachiosaurus is that it was first described by Elmer S. Riggs in 1903 from fossils found less than a mile from where I am standing. Right there in Fruita! Didn’t I say the Grand Valley was rich in fossils?

This is Fruitadens, a tiny adult dinosaur found in the Morrison formation just southwest of Fruita. It only weighed about one pound. Compare that to the Apatosaurus, found in the same rocks, that weighed in at 75,000 pounds!

The Greeter

I loved the Dinosaur Journey Museum as it was clean, interactive, entertaining and informative.  Kids and adults were loving it!

Our third and last day was spent in the Moab, Utah area checking out dinosaur tracks and petroglyphs. It was a very fun day with again, seeing some spectacular colorful country.

shot of the Colorado River It was a gorgeous day looking toward the La Sal Mountains.

Those little spires in the background are called Fisher Towers. The Towers are named for a miner who lived near them in the 1880s and are world renowned as a subject for photography and for its classic rock climbing routes.

Our first dino track was in some sandstone beside the highway. A spring was running nearby and people were stopping by to fill their water jugs with the spring water. Apparently, the water was polluted but they didn’t seem to care.

The track, to the left of the marker, is not large, maybe six inches. I think it was a small therapod.

We next drove to Poison Spider, a well known place to take a trail to see some prints and petroglyphs.

The white marks on the rock are dino tracks. They are white because someone tried to cast them and left plaster marks in the tracks. That is a big no no.

The photo is indicative of a fossilized dried lake bed. You probably can relate when you look at a dried up mud puddle with the cracked mud. This is the same principal. The bigger cracks are more toward the center.

Julia, the museum curator, was describing the scene to us. Boy! Does she ever know her stuff! (They all did, but she was a good teacher)

About 30’ above Julia was a rock face with many petroglyphs. They were etched onto the rock face by first the Fremont Culture and then the Utes.   The Fremont people tended to use triangular forms and I did not get a good picture of them. I believe that the Utes did the following pictures.

Ute petroglyphs

After lunch, we drove to a place called Mill Canyon where we saw an ancient crocodile tail marks as well as tracks. I could see it in real time but it didn’t come out well in the photo. The next track is by a medium sized theropod. The tracks we saw were from 7 to 14 inches long, which indicated a dinosaur about six feet tall at the hip. It lived about 112 million years ago.

A medium sized therapod track almost in the center of the picture

An interesting fact is that the newer signs at that site and at the museum show feathers on the dinos. There is much recent evidence that many had feathers.

This is a dromaeosaur. It was about 4’ tall. Note the sickle like claw that must have been used for tearing the flesh of its victim.

What amazed Shirley and me and made us marvel at paleontologists’ skills was that these tracks were out in the middle of a desert under several feet of dirt. What made them dig where they did to find such a treasure trove of tracks in that old lagoon-type pond? And then that led me to wonder if mankind will leave stuff/fossils that will be found millions of years hence. I wonder if Pampers fossilize.

Our last track site was at Copper Ridge where we got to see the huge tracks of a Camarasaurus made about 150 million years ago. This critter was a sauropod that topped the scales at about 50 tons and was about 75 feet long. It was a plant eater. An Allosaurus, a hunter capable of traveling up to 30 mph made other tracks in the area.

A Camarasaurus footprint.

Our tour was a great success and Shirley and I enjoyed it to the utmost. We both learned a lot and can remember many terms, but we still find it difficult to identify the formations with their proper names. Perhaps someday…

Check out the black line and you’ll see why it’s named Serpents Trail.

Another activity that we did was to hike Serpents Trail in the Colorado National Monument. Called the “crookedest road in the world,” it had 20 switchbacks in 1.75 miles and gains 770 feet in elevation. When it was completed in 1921, most cars had no fuel pumps and had to back up the steep road to use gravity to make the fuel flow. It became a hiking trail in 1961.  It has gorgeous views of the Grand Valley, the Grand Mesa, Grand Junction and the beautiful formations within the National Monument.

This picture shows a switchback in the middle center, the Grand Valley with the Bookcliffs in the background.

On the trail

Shirley took me out to see the Hanging Flume somewhere southwest of Grand Junction. We drove through the scenic and geologically unique Unaweep Canyon. The canyon goes uphill and then downhill (You say, of course it does, you ninny!) But at the Unaweep Divide, two creeks (East and West) flow…one to the east and one to the west. Unaweep is a Ute name that means “canyon with two mouths.”

Thimble Rock is impressive behind the Driggs Mansion, home of a pioneer in the early 1900s.

The Hanging Flume was really impressive. It hangs out over the Dolores River. It was part of a 13 miles long canal and flume to deliver water from the river to gold mining operations. It literally hangs to the canyon wall for the last five miles of the flume. It gave me the jitters just to look at it and try to take a picture.

You can see the flume as a dark line about one third down on the smooth rock

This trip was filled with spectacular sights, exciting adventure, and lots of good conversation. I’m so glad that I had the opportunity to do this and spend some time with Shirley and the Grand Valley.  Thank you, Shirley, for such a great time!

Shirley’s bee in a prickly pear blossom

Shirley’s back forty. It’s pretty with many blossoms and sometimes friendly rabbits and quail. A deer even visited her neighbor’s yard while I was there.

A Western Tanager visited at the birdbath and then at the feeding area yesterday. He only stayed for short while and I haven’t seen him again, but that short visit was superb! He is such a beautiful bird. I hope he was scouting the area and will bring his wife next time. I was so excited to see him because I haven’t seen one for at least 30 years. I just had to share this with you.

A Western tanager, about the size of a blackbird

Annie Oakes Lee, a fellow museum tour guide who also volunteers at the State Railroad Museum in Carson City, asked Jerri and me to join her at that museum this past Thursday. She was practicing how to take folks on the handcar and needed people to practice on. Apparently the brake is tricky and it’s easy to step on it too hard and pitch people off the car. So we went and had a blast. Annie was very proper in making us adhere to the rules and I got into trouble because I didn’t keep both feet on the car. She thought I was swinging my body but I was actually trying to get more leverage to push down on the bar. But she was right. I didn’t have both feet on the floor of the car. We got to take three or four rides and got excited about thinking we could race on one of those cars. That night, though, my forearms and upper shoulders were a bit tight. So maybe racing isn’t a good idea.

Cora, Jerri and Annie on the handcar (Don’t forget to click on the photo to enlarge it)

In addition to the excitement of the handcar, the Railroad Museum is about to officially unveil the restoration of the Glenbrook engine. As it happened, the Glenbrook was steamed up and sitting out of its barn (or whatever the official term is for where engines live). So we got a preview and will avoid the tumultuous crowds on the 23^rd of May. A general history of the Glenbrook can be found at this link from the Reno Gazette Journal http://www.rgj.com/story/news/2014/11/19/years-glenbrook-locomotive-lives/19296427/ and also from the Las Vegas Review Journal http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/nevada/glenbrook-locomotive-soon-returning-active-duty

Jerri by the Glenbrook engine cab

 A short summary of the articles is that the Glenbrook was built in 1875 and is a narrow gauge 2-6-0 Mogul. From 1875 to 1898, it hauled out lumber and cord wood from sawmills on the shores of Lake Tahoe to Spooner Summit, where the lumber was flumed down to Eagle Valley (Carson City area). From 1898 until retiring in 1923, the Glenbrook hauled thousands of tourists between Truckee and Tahoe City, CA. The Bliss family, the owners, eventually donated the Glenbrook to the state where it sat in front of the Nevada State Museum for many years. It was moved to the Railroad Museum in 1982 where restoration work began on it. Chris DeWitt, chief maintenance officer, and his crew worked for 33 years to get it to pristine condition and ready for its second debut. That’s dedication!

The Glenbrook is steamed up

Ready to go

 Annie told us that it takes 3 to 4 hours to get the engine steamed up so that it can go. We were there at the right time and got to see it move, be turned around on the turntable and then run on another track for a bit longer distance for some official photographers. I’m not really a train aficionado but this was fun to see. The steam, the whistle and the soft choo choo noises as it sat idling were somehow a bit soothing. Mom used to talk about hearing steam engines in Santa Ana in the 1920s and she thought the noises were comforting. I could see/hear what she meant.

The turntable is operated by hand. The engine and wood car (I thought this car was called a coal car, but I don’t know what the official name is) park on the turntable and men physically push the turntable around so that the train can move to another track. We watched the men push the turntable and then the engine backed up onto another track. The turntable must be on pretty good ball bearings or something because that engine plus the loaded wood car (coal car) must weigh many tons.

Entering the turntable

Turning the Glenbrook onto the proper track

While we were checking out the Glenbrook and admiring it, a trolley car was rolled out. I don’t know how old it is, but it looked pretty ancient to me. The able craftsmen at the Railroad Museum had restored it also. Annie told me it ran on diesel fuel. It took its turn on the turntable and you can see that it took only two guys to turn it so that it could get on its correct track.

Starting to turn the trolley

A tour for about 50 school kids was scheduled for noon that day and they were going to take a ride on the trolley. Annie was also going to give them rides on the handcar.  These kids had walked from wherever their school was (due to buses costing too much for field trips) and then ate their lunch on the museum grounds. You can see in the pictures that the skies were threatening and we could hear thunder rumbling in the distance. Jerri and I left just when the kids were getting ready for their official tour. We weren’t more than 5 or 10 minutes down the road when the rain began to pour. I heard later from Annie that they were able to get most of the kids finished with their handcar rides before getting drenched. I don’t know how the rest of the tour went, but I felt sorry for them having to walk back to school in the rain.

I was very happy to get our special tour of the museum and appreciated Annie letting us “play” on the handcar. It was a special privilege to get to see the Glenbrook before the official public unveiling on the 23^rd.  I look forward to hearing its whistle and the museum’s other steam engines’ noises in the future  as they take people on rides around the museum tracks.  Maybe we’ll get to take some rides on it when they get some cars to attach to it.

On a trial run

The Pajaro Panthers

 This is the cast of characters for the 2015 Prime Time at Pajaro. We greatly missed those of you who weren’t able to join us and we hope you will be able to join us next year. However, even with only seven of us, there were often several simultaneous conversations.  As usual, we never stopped talking.  We had a lot to catch up on!  (Don’t forget to click on the pictures to enlarge them)

Lynda had picked up Dot at the San Jose airport in the morning and they got groceries for the first night’s dinner. Diana and I picked up Susan at the same airport that afternoon and then zoomed to Pelican 10. It wasn’t long before the first bottle of wine was uncorked and the festivities began.  You don’t see Shoo in this picture because she had just come home from Holland on May 4 and didn’t join us until the afternoon of the 6^th.  She said the tulips were exquisitely beautiful and her Dutch adventure was excellent.

We were having a good time even before the first glass of wine!

Many years ago, Trish had the foresight to save many of the letters we had written to her during our freshman year of college. They were written primarily during the first semester when we were all filled with wonder, awe, and dread of what was to come in our maiden year of college. She distributed them to us and it was fun reading our thoughts. There were thoughts about classes, parties, kissing, making out, and the whole ball of wax that one goes through going away from home for the first time. That of course, led to more discussions and memories of college. It seems so long ago (and it was), but we remember those days just like it was yesterday…perhaps with some embellishments? Who knows? It was fun to talk about those crazy days.

Trish had an antique of unknown nomenclature that we all examined. Diana even checked it out with her loupe, but she and we never arrived at any conclusion as to what it is. I think it has something to do with surveying, but we don’t know.

Lynda is examining the antique

Diana is ever prepared to examine antiques

We didn’t walk as much on the beach as we usually do because of wind, weather and other activities. I think we needed Sherry to jump-start us in that direction.

But we did take a hike in the Nisene Marks State Park , which is four miles north of Aptos. The park offers rugged semi-wilderness, rising from sea level to steep coastal mountains of more than 2,600 feet. Once the site of logging operations until the 1920s, visitors can still find evidence of logging operations, mill sites and trestles in the park. The land was donated to the state by the Marks family in 1963. One note of interest is that the park was the epicenter of the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989. Lynda’s house sustained quite a bit of damage from that quake.

Here we are getting ready to enter the Nisene Marks trails

What a beautiful park! It’s a hidden delight for hikers and bikers.

What a beautiful park! It’s a hidden delight for hikers,  bikers and walkers.  The forest has redwoods, some new growth, many ferns, wildflowers, redwood sorrel and even some poison oak that we all deftly avoided.

Pretty new growth

It’s like a little Eden in here.

Lynda is an elfin spirit in the forest.

Walking the trail

Our first total group walk on the beach produced the usual views of the godwits poking their beaks into the sand, sanderlings scooting along the shore, pelicans flying overhead, and grebes floating and then diving for food in the waves. But we also espied many purple sail jellyfish washed up on the shore.

A by-the-wind sailor…not very big. They are perhaps an inch and a half to two inches long.

An invasion is afoot along beaches from Oregon to California: Millions of glassy purple, jellyfish-like sea creatures that look like sailboats have been washing ashore. Known as “by-the-wind sailors,” they typically live in the open ocean, but when warm water and storms draw them near shore, the wind blows them onto beaches, where they die in stinking piles. These creatures, whose scientific name is Velella velella, aren’t actually jellyfish, but hydrozoans, related to the Portuguese man-of-war.  (according to Live Science.com)  They are pretty, in their own way, and are harmless to humans. Luckily, they were not stinking on the Pajaro beach.

A great place for chowder and other sea food delights

For dinner that evening, we drove to Phil’s Fish Market and Eatery at Moss Landing. I meant to get pictures of our plates, but was too engrossed in my own food. Oops. Suffice to say that we all enjoyed our vittles very much and were stuffed to the gills. Later on, that didn’t stop us from enjoying Diana’s famous berry cobbler made with Jacobs Berry Farm berries. Delicious!

The next morning, Susan, Dot and Lynda helped restore an antique beaded purse  for Diana. Such talent in our group!

The toys and games

As you can see, we all have our electronic toys and phones upon which can be played games. For a bit, we were pretty much occupied with playing Dropwords. I did pretty well with it when I was working with Dot, Susan and Lynda. Alone, I was too slow.

We tried to get reservations to take a tour of the Elkhorn Slough, but they were sold out on the day we could all go. So we drove to the mouth of the slough and watched pelicans and sea lions on a breakwater. We even saw a sea lion pup, which didn’t look too happy.  Many sea lions are not getting enough to eat these days due to warming waters that drive their food supply to cooler areas of the ocean.

A small sea lion on the breakwater

Pelicans on the breakwater. The brown blobs to the right are sea lions camped on their section of the rocks

Dot is enjoying the sea breeze and trying out her own wings.

We didn’t get to take the slough tour but we did see one otter floating on his back near the shore of the marina. Some locals told us he is there quite often.

The Moss Landing malingerer

We had our traditional lunch at the Whole Enchilada at Moss Landing and enjoyed a variety of Mexican food delights. Susan had the biggest chili relleno I have ever seen. I thought there had to be at least 2 or 3 peppers in the dish, but it was just one. Wow! What a meal! Again, we didn’t get our traditional picture marking our presence at the Whole Enchilada, but we do have a few.

Shoo and Diana

Susan and Dot

Ray, the proprietor, always seems to come around to talk to us when we have lunch there. He always talks a bit, asks who is in charge and then gives her a pitch about being in business together. Then he gives her a Lotto ticket saying he gets 50% of the winnings. This year, we couldn’t decide who was in charge, so he had us each choose a number. Diana has been the one in charge before and didn’t want to do it again. However, she picked the exact number and then felt lucky with the ticket since she was spot on. But, alas, it was a loser. Rats!  Diana is always a good sport about these things and we admire her for going with the flow.

It began to rain during our lunch but we walked to a couple of nearby shops to check out their wares. The local boutique made out quite well with our group.

After our walk through the rain, making purchases and checking again on the marina otter, we drove on home to make sure the wine was still in good shape. Well, that is not totally true, but there was a lot more conversation. It seems as though we always have something interesting to talk about. I always learn a lot of stuff when I’m with these ladies.

The chatting forum

It is such a joy to be able to gather each year to celebrate this group. It is not often that a group of high school gals bonds in such a way that the relationship lasts a lifetime. When we come together, it’s as if we haven’t been apart for a long time and we coalesce back into the amazing group we’ve always been. (Not that we aren’t supporting throughout the year, it’s just now it’s face-to-face)  We always know that the group will be there to help in any way it can.

It’s just great to be together with these ladies.  Thank you all for being you!  And thank you, Lynda, for contributing some of the pictures.

Some of you may have already seen this in an email, but I decided to put it in a blog to commemorate that fact that B.C. will be 21 in people years (approximately 147 in cat years…no, it’s not a record) next month.  Who would have thought that she would still be going strong at this age.  She seems to be pretty healthy other than being deaf and VERY persnickety.  Jerri says I should put her in my will in case she outlives me.  Happy Spring to those of you in the East.  You might even be seeing some hints of the season by now!  (Don’t forget to click on the photos to enlarge them)

I may not be a spring chicken but I know a good day when I see it. Here I am striding toward the camera, just like any other diva.

I stop for a sniff at a lady bug. No response, so I move on.

A stop by the daffodils but they aren’t what I’m really looking for.

HERE IT IS! Some catnip coming up from Mom’s last year’s garden. YEA!!! This stuff gets me going!

Well, on second thought, I think I’ll go back into the house to take a bit of a snooze.

I felt pretty good until I sat down. Now I feel sort of spacey. Watch out for my claws. I might accidentally stab you in my drugged state. Cat nip is still the best. I’m glad that Mom lets it grow in a protected area so the squirrels don’t eat it. 🙂

It was a glorious spring day with beautiful blue skies and wispy clouds when Diana and Jack asked me to join them and son Jim and their two dogs, Lucy and Molly, to go to Bodie, an old mining town. Never one to turn down an outing, this promised to be a lot of fun as I hadn’t been to Bodie in about 25 years.

But first a bit of background from the Bodie State Historic Park Guide:  Bodie was named after Waterman S. Body (aka William S. Bodey), who discovered gold there in 1859. The change in spelling of the town’s name has often been attributed to an illiterate sign painter, but it was a deliberate change by the citizenry to ensure proper pronunciation. (Bo-dee)

Bodie once had a population of about 10,000. (Don’t forget to click on the photo to enlarge it)

 By 1879, Bodie boasted a population of about 10,000 and was second to none for wickedness, badmen and “the worst climate out of doors.” One little girl, whose family was taking her to the remote and infamous town, wrote in her diary, “Goodbye God, I’m going to Bodie.” The phrase came to be known throughout the West.

Bodie lies about 13 miles east of Highway 395 and about seven miles south of Bridgeport, CA. I think one reason the town in such good shape is that it’s far off the beaten track and part of the road is dirt, gravel and some rocks. One has to make an effort to get there and the road is not open for several months of the year. The climate is still wicked during the winter. I surely wouldn’t want to be there in the winter with the wind howling and snow drifting all over. A picture in a brochure showed men standing on the roof of a store and snow is just a few feet from their boots.

Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Sadly, only about five per cent of the buildings it contained during its 1880s heyday still remain.  Today, it stands just as time, fire and the elements have left it—a genuine California gold mining ghost town.

The Lampe family, who owned Jack and Diana’s property during pioneer days, used to take a wagon to deliver cheese, eggs and other goods to the Bodie miners. It took them three weeks to get there from Gardnerville! Apparently it was worth the trek as they made some good money doing that. It took us just a couple of hours to get to Bodie. I think I like our transportation better.

Of course, one of the first buildings I peeked into was the school, built in 1879. Originally the Bon Ton Lodging house, it became the school when an early-day juvenile delinquent burned down the first school.  You can see electric lines and poles. Electricity was available during late 1800s from a hydroelectric plant built about 13 miles from Bodie.

The school is the building with the spire on the right side of the street.

Looking west toward the Miners Union Hall, to the right of the large building (that looks like two buildings) in the center of the picture.  The morgue and undertaker’s office is to the right of the Union Hall. Caskets are still inside of it.

The Standard stamp mill where much of the processing and refining process was done. Jack and Lucy are in the foreground.

The bank vault.

The Stuart Kirkwood Livery Stable and blacksmith shop. Note the size of the bellows behind the hood. Many wagons and literally hundreds of horses, mules and other draft animals were required to haul in tons of goods daily.

Only one prisoner escaped from the Bodie jail

The town jail was a busy place what with killings occurring almost daily.   A minister in 1881 pronounced Bodie as a “sea of sin, lashed by the tempests of lust and passion.” Bail for “guests” was $5.  Joseph DeRoche was taken from here by the Bodie “601,” a vigilante group, and hanged.  He must have done something terrible to rile up those vigilantes like that.  Probably one reason the jail was busy was that there were 65 saloons in Bodie.  There were many opportunities for the miners to find R and R after a hard day’s work and then possibly find trouble.

People had other needs, too. This was a two-holer that has sunk into the ground.

The Mastretti Liquor Warehouse is in ruins now but we could see very thick brick walls and a vault-like door that would have protected the booze from thirsty miners.

The liquor warehouse walls were five to six bricks thick

Boone Store and Warehouse, erected in 1879. Harvey Boone was a direct descendant of Daniel Boone.

An old coffee grinder in the Boone Store. With so much stuff on the shelves, it almost looks as if the store could open up tomorrow.

The Methodist church was erected in 1882 and was the only Protestant church in Bodie.

E.J. Clinton of San Francisco restored the Methodist church and held the last service in 1932.  Since then, the interior has been badly vandalized, and the Ten Commandments painted on oilcloth which once hung behind the pulpit (“Thou shalt not steal”) has been stolen.  A Catholic church, also built in 1882, burned down in 1928.

Cars, trucks, wagons, carts, wagons and equipment are strewn all around Bodie. I bet this 1937 Chevy coupe was a hot car in its day.

A clever poet could write a requiem for these abandoned vehicles and pieces of equipment. It just seems sad to seem them sitting in the dust.

Our last trek was to the cemetery, which is actually three cemeteries; Ward’s (the first undertaker), Masonic and Miners’ Union. We were free to wander around the graves and had to be careful not to disturb any of the little colored flags that we could see between gravestones. Those flags depicted unmarked graves that human remains detection dogs had alerted to.

One of the weather-beaten grave markers in the cemetery. The smaller one at the foot of the grave might have been for a child.

Bodie’s Cemetery:  Lives Within told several stories about some of the inhabitants of the cemetery.  A.C. Robertson died 1880. Tried to thaw out frozen powder in his oven.  Chatto Encinos, 1880. Killed by Sam Chung for raiding his vegetable garden.  James Kennedy, 1880. His fumbled draw and bad aim put him six feet under.  One headstone is outside the fenced cemetery. That is of Rosa May, a prostitute, who died in 1911 or 1912. To this day, people leave money on and around her headstone.

The visit to Bodie was enlightening and I am very glad that no one is allowed to move, pick up or take anything from the park. It’s great to see these artifacts in situ and to imagine folks going about their daily business during the mining booms.