On Vacation...

Will start posting again in August...   Have a great two weeks!

A Mixed Bag

This will be my last post before returning from vacation, the second day of August, so I decided to present one of my usual mixed bag set of photos and thoughts....
   After a "drought" in foal deliveries since June 22, Witch Kraft dropped her filly Friday on Assateague.  She's a beautiful chestnut pinto and her sire is Wild Thing.
   And, for the first time since 1972, a Misty descendant was born on Beebe Ranch on Chincoteague.  Billy Beebe was proud to announce the birth of a filly to Nightmist's Little Angel.  The black pinto has been named Angel's Stormy Drizzle.
    Friday was the annual Tube to Work Day in Boulder Creek, in Boulder.  More than 500 people turned out to ride the rapids in inner tubes on the way to work this year....
    A promising young Thoroughbred stallion was killed by a lightning strike in his paddock on Thursday.  The storm "came out of nowhere" and none of the 8 weather broadcasts forecast any rain or thunder and lightning storms.
   Our local fire, the Cold Springs wildfire, is now 100% contained.  There are still smouldering areas, but no new fire outbreaks are expected.  The two campers who did not extinguish their small campfire caused over $3 million in damages, including the loss of 8 homes, 7 out buildings, several pets, and an untold number of wildlife.  The fire-fighting costs exceed $5 million.
   There have been many headlines stating that Tim Tebow will be speaking at the Republican National Convention, and that he will be campaigning for Donald Trump.  Tim Tebow was very shocked to learn this via the media.  Tim Tebow will not be appearing at the RNC in Cleveland.  Tim Tebow does not endorse Donald Trump's racism and bigotry.
   Beatrice, my room mate - apartment sharer - friend, will take care of my kits while I'm in Virginia.  I'll return to Boulder late on August 1 - but I have 13 glorious days on Chincoteague and Assateague.  I'm taking three boat cruises; I'll be climbing up the lighthouse; I'll see and record the Pony Auction; I'll see friends and family; I'll visit the beach, and walk the trails.  And I will relax.  See you next month!

Witch Kraft and her filly sired by Wild Thing - thanks to DSC Photography

Angel's Stormy Drizzle, a 6th generation Misty descendant

Billy Beebe with Clarence "Grandpa" Beebe's branding iron

Squirrel

Black Star and filly by Wild Thing  -  thanks to DSC Photography

This notice from Beached Paws Photography in Maryland

Tube to Work Day in Boulder, Colorado had more than 500 participants this year

Photos From the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge

The Colorado National Monument

The Colorado National Monument is a National Park near the western border of Colorado and Utah, close to the town of Grand Junction.  The Monument is named after the Colorado River, rather than the state, and it is a relatively small area of eroded red rock formations and canyons.  Immediately southwest of Grand Junction, tributaries of the Colorado River have carved through the edge of the high Uncompahgre Plateau that borders the Colorado for some distance.  The most scenic area, about 5 by 10 miles, is contained within the national monument.  This contains four main canyons, cutting into the plateau for several miles, with many smaller ravines, isolated towers and pinnacles, and a multitude of other sandstone formations.

The Skipjack (or Bateau)

When I was small, Mom frequently talked about taking her own "bateau" out on the Bay and in the Channels.  I have to admit that i always thought a "bateau" was built like a rowboat, only a bit longer and slimmer.  Boy, was I ever wrong.  In doing research about watermen on the Chesapeake Bay, and on Mom's home island of Chincoteague, I have found that what was called a "bateau" when she was a girl, is what I was taught to call a skipjack.  A boat built for oyster dredging - who'd-a thunk?  Not me....  The Skipjack is a V-bottomed boat that was developed in the 1880s, that was slightly larger than a sailing bateau.  The Skipjack was was used to harvest oysters, and, under sail was powerful enough to haul two full-sized oyster dredges.  Traditionally, the skipjack was called a "bateau" by watermen; but in 1900, the newspaper The Baltimore Sun published an article that described how the boats were fitted-out for the oyster season in Baltimore Harbor.  Because of the boats speed and power while under the sail, the writer called the boats "Skipjacks."  The city name stuck to the boats, but locally, the words bateau and skipjack were interchangeable.
   Here are some photos of skipjacks along the Chesapeake Bay:

You can take sailing tours of the Chesapeake Bay from St. Michael's

Oyster dredging in the Choptank River

Skipjack on the Chesapeake

The Rosie Parks in a sailing competition, 1982

The Rosie Parks on a test sail in 1995

The Deal Island Skipjack races

The Helen Virginia

San Juan Mountains in Colorado

Beaver dam pond at sunrise

The Sneffels range

Trinity Lake under Storm King Mountain

Blue Lake

Near Ouray

Jagged Mountain

View from/of Engineer Pass

Recent Island Photos

Looking north, up the Chincoteague Channel, today

Two of the rides at the Firemens Carnival

Gokey Go Bones and Yankee's colt - he has 4 socks plus the sea dollar on his side

Pedestrian crossing on Chincoteague Main Street

Shrimper in the Chincoteague Channel

Jellyfish

Gull with lunch

A Nice, Quiet Weekend

For once, I had no other animals to care for this weekend, so the kits and I (and Beatrice) had a nice, quiet, pretty-much-at-home kind of weekend.  I read two books and started a third,and loved all of them.  Decades, a television station, showed a marathon of the old Peter Gunn series, and I got to enjoy the fantastic music of Henry Mancini all weekend.  I cooked supper for Saturday and Sunday - preparing Chicken Parmigiana, with mashed potatoes and buttered, steamed green beans with crunchy bacon bits on Saturday; I don't usually make mashed potatoes on back-to-back nights, but the pork chops I baked Sunday gave the makings of a rich gravy, so I fixed glazed carrots and mashed potatoes to go with them.  When I took the pork chops out, I put a nice pan of gingerbread in for dessert...  Everything turned out well.
   Nedi and Lovey were very content, as both Beatrice and I were home, almost the entire time, to wait on them and see to their needs.  Nedi wanted in and out onto the balcony, Lovey wanted to touch me at all times.  Nedi wanted chin scratching and stroking, while Lovey wanted to try eating everything that entered my mouth.  She discovered that while she likes the sauce that comes with baked beans, she does not like Tropical Blend Diet V-8 Splash.
  Yesterday afternoon Beatrice and I went to the cinema - the first time I've been in 18 months.  We saw, of course, The Secret Lives of Pets.  We laughed hugely at several points, and giggled through several others.  In scenes where the pets were in danger, I was like a small child, trying to lend them my strength.  Happily, it had a very happy ending and we left the theater feeling satisfied.  If you want to see a sweet, cute movie about pets, this is for you - even though there are a few scenes that might be a bit traumatic for very small children....
   Getting ready to go walk Rosie, and I'm watching the helicopters carrying dump buckets and the planes carrying fire retardant pass overhead on their way to the fire in Nederland...   sigh....

Nearby Fires - Photos

The first four photos are from the Cold Springs/Nederland/Sugarloaf Mountain fire.  I can easily see the smoke from my windows and balcony...

 This is from the 15,000+ acre fire at Beaver Creek today

This is the fire that closed I-70 and C-470 today

This is a photo of the Hayden Path fire in Fremont County today