An overnight in Assateague

Beautiful fall weather this weekend!  Johnnie and I spent Sunday and Monday at Assateague State Park.  We wanted to camp in Assateague Island National Seashore but there were no available RV sites.  Assateague State Park had plenty of sites, even some with electric hookups.  We took a site with no hookups so we could be facing the dunes.  Our windows were open, so we could hear the Atlantic Ocean’s waves coming in at high tide.  Very relaxing!

Our site in the dunes

Sika deer were everywhere. 

A Sika deer along a trail

 

The horses were also out.

Horses grooming each other

It was a great weekend for walking the trails, riding our bikes, and taking lots of pictures.

Life of the Forest Trail

 

Life of the Dunes Trail

 

An unfamiliar (to me) butterfly

Belleplain State Forest, Again.

Johnnie and I spent two days and one night at Belleplain State Forest.  Just an overnight trip that was restorative and relaxing.  When we got home, it felt like we had been away for days!! 

Belleplain was quiet on Sunday and Monday.  Johnnie and I were the only campers on Monday in our section of the park.  Rangers stopped by to talk as they made their rounds.  The days were sunny and warm, though the forecast had called for rain both days, and the night was cool enough to need a quilt.  Perfect camping weather!  The trees are just beginning to turn.  In previous posts, I have shared photos of the red in Belleplain:  October in Belleplain State Forest and My Favorite Campground in New Jersey:  Belleplain State Forest. I don’t think I have been in Belleplain this late in September.  The leaves are just beginng to turn and they are a dull read. 

Dull Red

Partial Red

Even the mushrooms are a dull red!

 

Are the reds going to be dull this year or will they brighten as the fall season progresses?  I will have to visit in October or November and see. 

The only bright red I saw was a branch of maple leaves in the sun.

Johnnie and I took a long walk and on the walk (without my camera) and saw two red mushroomms growing in a crevice in the bottom of a tree trunk.  I had seen this type of mushroom in the past and hoped to see it around our campsite.  Site 104 has two wooded boundaries and I have found a variety of mushrooms or funhus (is there a difference?) growing there in the past.  Looking for mushrooms means walking with your eyes down and focusing on the dirt and brush because mushrooms push up through the underbrush and ground debris.  I found the mushrooms that look like coral first.  They are gray or off-white.

The name of this mushroom should be coral mushroom.

Another mushroom looked like plates that just lift up out of the dirt. Others looked like the ones that pop up in my yard after a rain.  My surprise find was a mushroom that looked like a flower. 

Star or flower mushroom?

 

Finally, I found one of the red mushrooms for which I had been looking.  It looked like something had tried to eat it.

The red mushroom

When I was looking for the mushrooms, I did not have my camera.  I was just walking through.  I went back to the RV for the camera and when I returned to the locations, I found I was almost tiptoeing through the area, hoping not to step on any undiscovered mushrooms.  I wanted a well-worn trail so I could be sure I wasn’t harming anything.  Looking for mushrooms and valuing them puts a different perspective on how I looked at the ground and my interaction with it.  My reward for looking down at the ground and being cautious was finding even more red mushrooms!

I.m now curious about the various kinds of mushroom that grow in the Pinelands.  I’ve been to Belleplain hundreds of times and I still am able to discover something new!

What to do with travel photos when you get back home?

I have been pouring through my photos from my August vacation to Arizona.  They are great photos (to me) of family, friends, places I enjoyed visiting, and our RV.  I take far too many photos and then usually just leave them.  When I share them with friends, they then have to sit through multiple shots of the same view, or worse, because I have a new camera, multiple shots at different closenesses.  When I get home, the sheer number of pictures is overwhelming, since a two week trip could easily result in over a thousand pictures, thants the digital camera!

My new camera sorts the photos by date, so this morning I focused on one date.  I was able to delete many photos and to crop some others.  But what to do with them?  For a specific location, I am creating a slide show of the best photos.  I notice that I have recurring themes in my photos, so I am going to divide them into categories.  My categories will be blossoms, cactus, doorways, and mountains.  I use the photos for making greeting cards.  And some photos I have printed poster-size for hanging on my walls at home.  Here is a sampling of the categories from August 19th.

Blossoms

Baja Fairy Duster at Tohono Chul Park

 

Cactus Blossom at Tohono Chul Park

 

Cactus

Cactus growing like a vine at Tohono Chul Park

Decaying Saguaro cactus at Picacho Peak State Park

Doorways

Doorway in Tohono Chul Park

 

Mountains

Part of Picacho Peak

 

Greeting Cards

Greeting card made from photo taken at Tohono Chul Park

 I’m still working on the slide show and I haven’t chosen the photo to enlarge but I’ve narrowed down the choices to 10!

Tohono Chul Park, Tucson, AZ

During our August trip, I spent a morning at Tohono Chul Park in Tucson, AZ.  The park is in a most idyllic setting at the foothills of the Santa Catalina Mountains.  I did not have a chance to visit all of the park but that will guarantee a return visit!  I did visit the Children’s Garden, the Performance Garden, and the Store wih the exhibition space.  The Performance Garden has a sound component and the atmosphere is very relaxing.  In the store’s exhibition area, I saw the exhibit on recycled items and a display of artwork from local high school students.  Unfortunately, photography is not allowed in this area, so I ccan’t share the wonderful artwork of the students from the Tucson high schools. 

Ramada

Gourd Birdhouses

Wind Chimes

 

I was also able to sit quietly with my camera and take lots of photos of flowers, butterflies, and cacti.  Who knew there is a cactus that acts like a vine? 

Cactus vines?

I look forward to future visits to Tohono Chul and am sure it will be a place I take visiting friends and family once Johnnie and I move to the greater Tucson area.

Picacho Peak State Park, AZ

Picacho Peak is one of the mountain views from our property in Marana, AZ.  In our view, it looks like a hog’s head to me. 

This trip we were able to visit Picacho Peak State Park.  I was shocked to see the hog’s head I see from Marana is actually two peaks, one behind the other. 

The part that looks like the lower lip of the hog's head.

The snout, I think.

Johnnie and I visited late in the day.  In fact, the rangers seemed glad to see us because no one was in the park.  It was about 106 and we weren’t going to hike in the park, just stop at a few observation points and take some pictures, and check out the campground for future use.

Civil War Monument. Arizona was part of the Confederacy!

 

Sauaro Cactus!

Assateague State Park and Assateague Island National Park, MD

In May, Johnnie and I spent four days at Assateague State Park in Maryland.  The state park is adjacent to the national park.  When I reserved the park, I was looking for electricity (the only hookup available) and if possible, a total of 8 days.  We got the electricity but not the 8 days.  The National Park was booked for the next four days, so  we went to Janes Island State Park for the final four days of our vacation.

At our site

The beach on the other side of the dunes

 

Our site backed up to the dunes and the weather was perfect for riding our bikes and walking the trails.  Assateague Island National Park is divided into the Maryland part and the Virginia part.  To get to the Virginia part, we drove the 50 miles to Chincoteague, VA.  We also drove to Ocean City, MD because we had never been.

The draw to Assateague is the wild horses.  We got lots of pictures of them.  We also were able to walk along the ocean and saw a rocket launch from Wallops Flight Facility in VA  while standing on the beach in MDover 50 miles away. 

Wild Horses in Assateague

Wild Horse in Chincoteague

Road signs fascinate me.  So often they make no sense at all — like the sign for 279th St. in South Dakota along I-90 in the middle of nowhere!  On a trail, there was a sign for a street but it turns out there was an attempt to build a road from Assateague to Baltimore.  The sign is one of the remnants of that project.

Resting in a tree

Johnnie resting, too

Assateague is a very relaxing place and only three hours from our home — great for a three day weekend!  I have one at the end of September and hopefully, we’ll spend it at Assateague!

Historic Smithville Park — one of the gems in Burlington County, NJ

I bought a new camera and lenses earlier this week and needed to practice using the equipment before vacation in three weeks.  Yesterday was a beautiful day with few clouds and blue skies — perfect for trying a number of  the options on the Canon Rebel SXi.  I have been to Historic Smithville Park for a few programs in the Mansion, but I have never explored the grounds.  What beautiful grounds!  And so large — 312 acres with over 4 miles of walking/biking trails and access points to the Rancocas Creek Canoe Trail. 

When I arrived, a wedding party was finishing their wedding photos.  Throughout my walk, I found people fishing, walking, strolling with the families, canoeing on the waterway, and taking pictures like me.  I spent over two hours photographing the gardens, the paths, and the great blue herons in the water.  I definitely will add this park to my list of places to visit.

One of the many walkways outside of the Mansion.

Just playing with the camera . . .

 

One of three Great Blue Herons on the water yesterday . . .

Getting Started Again!

Now that grad school is over and I’ve begun to relax, I am reviving this blog.  I’ve missed it! 

Today the latest issue of Woodall’s Camping Life arrived in the mail.  I subscribe to Camping Life, Motorhome Magazine, and Arizona Highways.  I would love to write for either of these magazines, but thus far, it seems to be a difficult field to break into.  In the meantime, I read their articles and I want more.  For example, Camping Life’s articles seem to be about 2 pages in length.  I want more.  There is an article on National Parks, with just a blurb about 10 of them.  I can create my own list of 10 and give as much, if not more, information.  I am going to write what I want to read, as well as write about particular trips.

National Parks to Visit

1. Grand Canyon, AZ 
2. Grand Teton, WY
3. Yellowstone, WY
4. Devils Tower, WY
5. Petrified Forest, AZ
6. Mt. Rushmore, SD
7. Saguaro, AZ
8. Assateague Island, MD & VA
9. Cape Hatteras, NC
10. Acadia, ME
11. Badlands, SD
12. Organ Pipe Cacus, AZ
13. Little Bighorn, MT
14. Wright Brothers, NC

These National Parks are in no particular order and Johnnie and I would gladly revisit each of them.  Some we already have!  I have written about most of these parks in previous posts.  In May, Johnnie and I visited Assateague again, so look for a post on it soon.  We have also stayed at some state parks in Maryland  — future posts.  As always, we have spent time at my favorite campground in New Jersey, Belleplain State Forest.  More to come on our recent visits.

It’s 26 days until we hit the road again and now I feel ready to travel!

A Reward

I am giving myself time to write today as a reward for having met some deadlines.  I am in the process of writing a thesis to culminate my latest graduate school experience.  The thesis is on travel, but I am writing with guidelines and deadlines rather than the free-flowing personal nature of my blog posts.  So, my treat to myself is to allow myself the time to blog.  Who knew that when I started on this blogging journey that it would become so important to me?  A year ago the thought of putting myself out here in cyberspace was unthinkable.  Graduate school has had its benefits!

It is too cold to go out in the RV.  This past week the Northeast has been gripped in bitter cold with the night lows in the single digits.  The upcoming week should be better but still hovering around freezing during the day and nights in the teens and twenties.  I long for warmth!

Johnnie and I plan to retire in southern Arizona in a few years.  To begin our transformation into Arizonans, we subscribe to Arizona Highways.  This month’s edition arrived on the coldest day this past week.  After taking off my coat and getting a cup of hot tea, I read the issue from cover to cover in one sitting.  I had to transport myself to that warmth, even if only in my imagination.

Today, we will watch the Eagles play the Cardinals in Arizona, wishing we were in the stands, or at least in the state.  This morning’s Philadelphia Inquirer had an article on Quarterback Donovan McNabb who resides in Arizona.  Other transplants from this area were interviewed in the article and in other articles about people going to the game.   Oh to be warm again . . . .

This time of year I am usually counting the days until our Spring RV trip, but grad school will prevent my usual two weeks off to travel.  I know that I cannot get my work done and travel across the country.  I know that I need to be near home so that I can focus on my writing which given the dates of Spring Break this year (April 10 – 20) is too close to the final due date of the thesis:  April 28th.  I know all of this in my head, but my heart wants to be elsewhere.  I will get over this, but I doubt that I will do it graciously.

So, I read the travel section of the Sunday papers and dream of warmer places — San Diego, this week.  I haven’t been to San Diego but it is now on my list of future destinations.

Johnnie and I have discovered two places that we want to return to — Assateague Island National Seashore and Elk Neck State Park, both in Maryland.  If it ever warms up, both of these are close to home, Assateague 3 hours, Elk Neck under 2 hours.  It takes us nearly an hour and a half to get to our beloved Belleplain State Park and almost two to get to Cape May.   Delaware is inbetween NJ and MD, so we probably need to investigate areas in Delaware to add to our local list.

Then there is still much of NJ to explore from the standpoint of side trips.  Perhaps by my next post, I will have visited something new.

Not abandoned, just busy

It has been almost six weeks since my last post.  I have not abandoned this blog.  I have been busy with work, graduate school, and at one point a sick grandson.  The weather has been weird — warm for a day or two during the week, then cold on the weekends.  Not just cold, but frigid.  In New Jersey, there are few, if any, campgrounds with hookups that are open year-round.  We would have to go nearly four hours to find a place with hookups and lately that has not been far enough to find moderate weather.  We are homebound.

My antidote to being homebound is to plan a trip.  Johnnie had to submit his desired vacation weeks for 2009.  Graduate school will prevent a Spring trip this year.  (The last time we did not take a Spring trip was in 2005 but we needed the time for a trip to Haifa, Israel in November of that year.)  I graduate in May, so Johnnie submitted a request for the next week.  We will watch the weather to see if this week will be a return trip to Nova Scotia with possibly a side-trip to Newfoundland or a return trip to Sugarloaf Key, Florida.  I don’t mind not knowing where we are going; I just need to know that we are going.  In 152 days.  Life is so much more manageable to me if I can count down to the next vacation.