Tag: Wildlife


Jan
2016

A Family Trip to Monterey and More

categories: Travel
Well, hello! It's been a while since I've posted, but I'll re-kick off with some more travel blogging. On Sunday, January tenth, our family went down to Palo Alto and met up with Grandma Susie and Grandpa Bob to see the Rodin sculpture garden and gallery there and the chapel at Stanford University. On Monday, we went to the mission of San Juan Baptista, and on Tuesday to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I thought I would share photos large today rather than in collages – after all, I am very happy with my new camera and its great pictures. Please tell me in the comments which you prefer, this or collages.
 
Sunday
This is the front of the chapel at Stanford. It was really amazing to stand there looking at it and realize that that is all mosaic!
 
Although most of the Rodin statues are in the gallery/sculpture gardens, the Burghers of Calais are near the chapel.
 
I thought that the pose of this one of the Burghers is quite interesting. He appears to be wondering at the fate he has volunteered for, and almost surprised. Seeing all these statues by Rodin, I thought it was very interesting how different it is seeing such things in three dimensions, not only two. It is very neat how you can really walk around these statues, and they are almost on a level with you.
 
Here is the Thinker. Another thing that was interesting looking at Rodin's statues was how they are actually not quite perfectly proportioned. In the Thinker, as well as in the Burghers of Calais, the hands and feet are too large compared to the rest of the body. The effect is quite intentional, though, and they would not be quite the same if they were perfect. After all, you might say that that non-perfection is what Rodin's statues, so different from the classical and neoclassical statues favored at the time, are about.
 
Monday

The front of the Mission church of San Juan Baptista. It is still used as the parish church for that area, and is really doing quite well when you think that it is over two hundred and thirty years old although restoration work has been done.

The gardens at the Mission are so peaceful, even now. San Juan Baptista is now the only surviving mission with a fully enclosed courtyard.
 
I wonder what this view from the Mission hill was like, three hundred years ago? Probably nicer. Grasslands, I suppose.
 

In the afternoon, after we got back from the Mission, Grandma and Grandpa showed us how to play miniature golf at the free course in the KOA we stayed at. We all liked it, not just the little ones, but Mom only took pictures of them. All the others are mine, but I didn't take any of the miniature golf and she borrowed my camera then because she forgot hers. Aren't the Littles sweet?

 

Tuesday

Before we went to the Aquarium, we ate lunch at overlooking Monterey Bay. Where we were, there had been a beach when we were there before – but not now, as tide was up.

I saw a piece of kelp get washed around by the waves. It was interesting to see it get apparently taken up and moved but then end up at about the same place it had started from.
 
We saw a sea otter! It was a ways away, but I was able to get a decent picture.
 
I don't have very many pictures from the aquarium, partly because the lighting is not that great in there – of course they have a whole bunch of fish that are not used to nearly as much light as we are.

This fish swam right up near the edge of the kelp tank. Aren't his eyes weird?

 

They really do have a lot of fish in there.

 

Do you think the fish ever eat each other? In the other big tank, there is a big school of sardines. Every so often, a shark or other big fish would swim right through them and they would make way in all directions. It was really quite funny, and I hypothesized that maybe that was the big fish's entertainment.

That's all for now, but I have some other posts in the works and hope to be posting more often in 2016!

 


Aug
2015

Day 14 – Tundra, Hiking, and Seeing Mt. McKinley!

categories: Alaska, Happenings, Travel

On Sunday, July 19, we rode the bus into the park for about three hours to get out to where we were doing a discovery hike. We saw several moose and a few bears from the bus on the way in, almost all of which I got pictures of.

The hike was in a tundra area of the park, which was especially great as I have not even seen tundra outside of pictures. It was very neat, and the spongy texture of the ground was quite interesting to walk on. I saw many new flowers, plants, and lichens, some of which the guide told us about and some of which I have identified from a book. It was very foggy on the tundra, and visibility was fairly limited. However, the fog did lift a bit at times, allowing us to see somewhat of the area. We also saw some caribou on the tundra, and more on the way back. It was really neat to hike on the tundra, which is a terrain I have not experienced before. It is spongy and wet, because of the moss, but I saw many more flowers and caribou than I expected. We also saw dwarf blueberries and willows. It was strange to see willow as a small shrub, and blueberry looking like a very small plant!

After the hike, we rode a bus a bit further on into the park, to Eilson visitor center. There, we watched a very interesting short film about what climbers face when ascending Mt. McKinley.

When we got back to our campground, which was still quite wet, although the day had mostly been pretty nice, we decided to just pack up and head back to Palmer, though we had been planning on staying one more night and leaving in the morning.

We stopped at two Mt. McKinley viewing stations on the way back, but were not able to see the mountain. When we stopped at the second, though, we were able to see the mountain quite well. Mt. McKinley is Huge! It is also very beautiful, and we saw it at a really neat time. It was about 11:00, which meant… sunset! There was the mountain, and right in a dip next to it, the sunset. The yellow cloud seen in my pictures actually glowed golden, but my camera doesn’t do well with clouds or lighting. Sigh. The mountain was beautiful, however, and I got plenty of pictures. Fortunately it was still light enough to take good pictures.

These are pictures from the drive in:
  1. ‘Twas a misty, moisty morning…’
  2. A bull moose!
  3. What a beautiful view from the bus! For a bit, a picture of Denali was on my homescreen – but I like this one better, as it has more higher up, instead of mostly just a screenfull of sky.
  4. A view through the front windshield of the bus
  5. Another moose
  6. Bear! Unfortunately it was a ways away, but I was able to get a picture that I could zoom in on enough to let you see it.

 

And pictures from the tundra hike:

  1. Monkshood
  2. Tall Jacob’s Ladder? [The center went in, not out – as it appears to]
  3. Arctic Dock
  4. Mountain Avens
  5. Rosewort
  6. Some kind of a geranium, I think (The ranger told me, but I cannot remember except that it is a sign of approaching fall on the tundra)
  7. Capitate Valerian

 

Assorted photos from the tundra and Eilson visitor center, as well as one of a mountain.

  1. Caribou lichen and –
  2. Caribou
  3. Check out that fog!
  4. A beautiful set of quilted art depicting the seasons of Denali
  5. This moose skull, displayed outside of Eilson visitor center, has quite the teeth!
  6. This is approximately where we took off for our hike, although we went along the road to the left of the gravel pad observable at the bottom of the picture to avoid crossing the creek by the taller shrubs. When we started, the fog had not come as low as it later did and we were able to see the lay of the land somewhat.
  7. Aren’t the colors on that mountain beautiful? And yet, this (due to my camera) is not as lovely as the real thing!

 

And now for my pics of the mountain! (And sights on the way to it)

  1. Mt McKinley!
  2. A mountain, the name of which I do not know, but which was lovely anyways.
  3. In a drop to the left of the mountain, from where we were, there was a beautiful sunset. The cloud merely looks yellow here, but it glowed golden in real life.
  4. I just had to take a picture of this cloud-scape which we saw while driving from Denali National park to the viewing spot where we saw the mountain.
  5. A more zoomed out photo of the mountain. Mt McKinley is the large peak, and you can also see the sunset from the other photo.

That’s all about Alaska! Thanks for reading about it, and I’m sorry it took so long to get this out.

 


Aug
2015

Day 13 – Exploring Denali National Park near our campsite

categories: Alaska, Happenings, Travel

On Saturday, July 18, we were up and on our feet just about all day long. (Or at least it felt like it)

On a trail that we had hoped to take to the visitors’ center, we had our first real Big Animal Encounter. Fortunately, no blood was involved. We came around a curve – and saw a moose! It was very big, and had two young calves. As it was practically in the trail, there was definitely no question of continuing in that direction. Dad took some pictures, which I was unable to do since I had left my camera at camp. Although Dad had told me that we were going to be out all day, I had not brought my camera, but Dad allowed us to go back to camp and get it, as it was not much out of out way to go to the visitors’ center a different way. We ended up riding the shuttle bus to the center, which we did a fair deal of that day.

In the morning, we reserved tickets for the hike and bus ride we did the next day, and then explored the visitor center and saw a presentation, given by one of the rangers, about ravens, both mythically and actually. She also told some Athabaskan stories about Raven as a figure in their legends. Did you know that, while crows have a wingspan of up to three feet, and most ravens have a wingspan of about four feet, the ravens in Alaska have a wingspan of up to five feet?

The visitor center was quite interesting, and I definitely learned some stuff. They had trunk samples from both the black spruce and the white fir – at least I think these were the trees. Although the spruce was older, it had lived in a much less hospitable environment and was much smaller.

After lunch and finishing exploring the visitors’ center, we rode another bus out to the kennels, where we saw sled dogs, and even got to see them pull a sled with one of the rangers. The sled dogs do real work each winter, and even in the summer demonstrate daily. The ranger talked about the dogs, and also about different types of sled. The one that was used for the demo was a more historically styled sled, with the bed high above the runners, but had some wheels added as it was used on a gravel path. Now toboggan style sleds are used, which have the bed just a little above the runners. They are easier to steer, and can be used with more weight.

After this, as we were all cold and wet, and it had been raining all day and kept on till the next, we went to a small restaurant near the visitors’ center and each got some thing hot to eat or drink. Dad got beef stew and coffee, Gregory got hot cocoa, and I got seafood chowder. Based on my own experience and the reports of others, it was all delicious. 🙂

Now that I have made you do all that reading, you get to see the pictures. Unfortunately I did not have my camera when we saw the moose, but I have photos from the rest of the day.

  1. An old menu that had been laminated and put in the visitors’ center, most of which was set up as a small museum.
  2. Some fossils from the area. A label said that the small brown one near the bottom is of a fern, and the dark grey one with white bits, above it, a family of squid. I could see the fern impression on one, but the other does not look much like squid to me.
  3. This is the best I have to show you in the way of moose pictures. Aren’t they huge?
  4. A display showing some of the furs and natural materials that were used by the native americans in Alaska. Sorry the lighting here was not very good.
  5. Some Shrubby Cinquefoil that I saw on Friday
  6. Various rocks from Polychrome Mountain
  1. Dog moving! The rangers at the kennels move the dogs this way because, pound for pound, huskies are the strongest draft animals in the world – which means that if they bent over far enough, the dogs would pull their keepers over.
  2. An old sled
  3. Unharnessing the dogs
  4. This is a sled such as is used now, complete with equipment
  5. Another old sled
  6. This is as close as I got to a picture of the sled in motion. Bad timing, Emma!

 


Jul
2015

Day 10 – Floating the Kenai

categories: Alaska, Happenings, Travel

On Wednesday, July 15, we floated the Kenai river with Uncle Chris!

First Mom, Nathan, and I went on a sightseeing trip. After lunch, Mom took the two littles and Dad floated with us three older kids on a fishing trip. Justin and Hannah did not float at all, as Justin decided he as not interested in the boat – and it just didn't seem like a good idea to bring the nineteen month old.

On the viewing trip, we saw a lot of bald eagles – and even a bear! It was wonderful, floating down the beautiful Kenai river.

On the fishing trip, we got out on a small island and practiced fly fishing for a bit. Gregory and Nathan each caught a rainbow trout, which were thrown back because Uncle Chris said that the trout from the Kenai don't taste good. I didn't catch any fish, but I think I caught the hang of fly fishing somewhat and had a lot of fun.

Here are the pics:

  1. We saw several bald eagles!
  2. A beautiful view off the front of the boat.
  3. A young Grizzly sunning himself!
  4. Nathan's fish
  5. The boat itself, all packed up for the fishing trip
  6. The end and bobber of my own rod, unhappily fishless
  7. The small island where we landed and fished for a bit. Gregory caught his fish here.
  8. Another view off the front of the boat