I thought I’d share a few takeaways from our trip on the Queen Mary 2 and our 9-day wander through British history.
October is a great month to book on the Queen Mary 2 and walk around southern England. Not too cold. Not too crowded.
Get a starboard cabin if you are on an eastbound transatlantic passage of the QM2, imho. The winds are usually blowing out of the north, so it made for more pleasant balcony experience.
Never leave home without a tiny tube of superglue. 🙂 On day 2 of our trip the earpiece on my eyeglasses broke off. The weld at the metal lens frame just gave way. I was on a boat for 7 days where the only stores sold expensive bags, art, and watches. Fortunately, the QM2 worker in the store who I asked was one of the jewelry designers. She whipped out her toolbox that had some flexible jewelers adhesive. A dab of that got me through the week, when they broke again. I hit the first Tesco on dry land for my own tube of superglue.
It isn’t always raining in England. For us, it only rained on two of our travel days, and one afternoon when we walked around Portsmouth Southsea along the coast. We, and our luggage, are pretty waterproof so it was fine. Ok, I just did the math, turns out it rained one third of the days we were in England. Which, in retrospect, is a lot. Oh well, it was nice to have the beautiful sunny days that we did. I remember them more vividly than the rainy days.
Be flexible.
Check closure schedules ahead of time for the places you plan to visit.
The British National Rail Two Together Railcard paid for itself several times over. A better deal than 2 Senior railcards, if you always travel together. We took the train 6 times.
We have driven by the Palo Duro Canyon State Park many times on trips to and from Colorado over the last 25+ years.
This week we took a little road trip to go see it. Palo Duro Canyon is the second largest canyon in the United States. It’s located in the high plains of North Texas; the Llano Estacado. The elevation at the rim is about 3500’ and the floor of the canyon lies about 800’ below. It is called “the Grand Canyon of Texas” and the steep, layered rock walls sure echo those of its namesake.
We took the 8-hour drive up and stayed in a cabin on the floor of the canyon that was built in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps.
Cow Camp cabin #4 – our little bit of paradise
The park is stunningly beautiful. Being in the heart of nature for a couple of days was unforgettable.
Sunrise at cow camp cabin #4Sunrise lighting up the canyon wallSunset view
The visitor center provided a nice introduction to the geology and history of the canyon.
One of the Texas Longhorn herd
And oh the stars! We sat outside for hours watching the sky.
Milky Way!And more Milky WayOrionMoonStar gazer
On the way home we made an overnight stop in Lubbock. We enjoy visiting the McPherson Cellars tasting room whenever we are in the neighborhood. We can always find another couple there to talk with over a glass of wine.
We stopped in lots of tiny Texas towns to check out their antique stores, historic county courthouses, and Main Street cafes.
I spied an old postcard in an antique shop that foreshadows a road trip that I just booked!
My main intent for this trip to Seattle was to see my 7 great nieces & nephews. ✅✅✅✅✅✅✅
I also spent some good time with all but one of my nieces and nephews, and my sisters. I got a chance to visit my friend Irene again. We surprised her mom who I last saw at our high school graduation too long ago. What a special treat.
The Pacific Northwest is beautiful. It never disappoints.
Sunset at Everett MarinaFog at Port Townsend harborPears at Rachel & Matthew’s homeSilver City Brewery in BremertonSmoky view across Hood Canal
The flooding that hit the Hill Country this month brought terrible destruction and loss of life, especially along the Guadalupe River.
The highland lakes’ series of dams were built to contain floodwaters for the lower Colorado River. They’ve been doing exactly that and now Lake Buchanan is 100% full. Lake Travis has risen to 90% full, up 38 feet in the last two weeks, only 6 feet short of full.
As someone who has spent a good part of the last 20 years on the lake that has experienced too many droughts, this brings me joy in the midst of the sadness from all the loss.
Today we went out to the lake to take it in. And it’s a beautiful thing. The docks are close to parking lot level now, which is certainly a treat. Next week the marina will move all the individual docks back to their respective locations.
Lake Travis st 675’Schlep no more!
We went for a long sail on Nirvana with Kurt, Kevin, Gordon, and Scott. The wind was up and we had a really great day.
It’s nice to have our lake back, for however long it lasts.
We made a trip to Port Aransas this weekend for their wooden boat show. I always enjoy our time spent there. The weather was still pretty hot for the end of October. Shade was in short supply.
The historic Tarpon Inn is where we like to stay. No TV or clocks in the rooms. But it’s in the middle of everything.
The porch of the Tarpon Inn outside our room at sunrise.
We enjoyed fantastic meals at Tortuga Saltwater Grill and Venetian Hotplate, I highly recommend both. And thankfully found the best coffee shop in town at Barefoot Beans (they open at 6AM!).
We toured the UT Marine Science Center exhibits and outdoor wetlands displays.
We checked out the sand pumpkins on the beach.
This morning we spent a couple hours at the Leonabelle Turnbull Birding Center and saw over 30 species, including the American Flamingo that has become a local.
On the drive home today we stopped for BBQ at Smitty’s Market in Lockhart. The Subaru looked so tiny parked amongst the big Texas PickUps. 🙂
Back home now watching a sad Seahawks game unfold. Oh well. It was fun weekend nonetheless.
I’m happy to report that things are picking up in the travel department. Before COVID we happily welcomed regular visitors to Austin and made our share of trips. Four years later, it’s feeling a bit more normal. We took a trip to Denver in January. Noreen and David visited us this Spring. I did a girls’ trip to Santa Barbara. Monte made a guys’ trip to the BVI. We flew up to Seattle in June. Laura came for a visit at the beginning of July. Last week we finished a road trip to see family and National Parks in the midwest.
Monte and I took the Subaru on another road trip. 3000 miles. 8 days and 7 nights. 9 states (well 10 if you count passing through the corner of Oklahoma, Missouri, and Kansas – aka OKKAMO). Made my first-ever visit to a Great Lake. Earned 3 new geocache state badges. Visited four more National Parks, bringing my total to 30. Still lots more to see.
It is nice to reflect that this year alone we have had in-person visits with all of our siblings, most of our nieces and nephews, and even a few grandnieces and nephews. What a treat.
Gateway Arch NP was much more interesting than I expected. The construction of this monument was an engineering marvel at the time, and it is MUCH bigger than I imagined. We took the tour up to the top, and even the tram system was an interesting innovation to learn about. The view from the top was amazing. I was a tiny bit freaked out to look out the window and see both feet of the arch below us(!)
View from the top of the Gateway Arch. The muddy Mississippi River to the east is at the top of this pic.
Indiana Dunes NP was a lovely stop for about 4 hours. We tootled by the homes from the Chicago Worlds Fair in 1933 that have been moved to the lakeshore and are now privately owned and lived in. We scored an amazing parking spot by the beach. And we walked up and down the beach, which did have dunes, but lots of rounded rocks. I waded into Lake Michigan, another first.
The south shore of Lake Michigan. No sea glass was to be found.
Cuyahoga Valley NP was a highlight for me. It commemorates the Ohio and Erie Canal system, with locks, and a tow path for the mule-pulled canal boats. The canal was dug by hand in the early 1800s. It was fed with water from the nearby Cuyahoga River, and carried goods between the Ohio River and Lake Erie, putting Ohio on the map for commerce and transportation. The canal isn’t operating anymore. It was wiped out by floods in the early 1900s and eventually made obsolete by the railway built alongside it. But its footprint is clearly visible and the miles and miles of tow paths make for amazing walking and biking trails. The park is located between Cleveland and Akron and I expected it to be an urban park, but it is in the middle of beautiful forests and hills. It is spread out, so do your research beforehand to pick from the many spots you may want to visit.
We spent 2 half days there, starting at Boston Mills Visitor Center, then visited Brandywine Falls, and the Everett Covered Bridge, walked along the towpaths, stopped in Peninsula to check out the town and to visit Lock 29, and made a visit to the Canal Exploration Center, which helped us to understand the whole canal operation and its history. They have rebuilt a working lock there to demonstrate how they worked.
I’m envious of the people who have this park in their backyard. It’s a beautiful place to get out and explore. If I ever make it back, I’ll bring a bike. And take a ride on the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railway.
Brandywine Falls @ Cuyahoga Valley National Park
Everett Covered Bridge @ Cuyahoga Valley National Park.
A rebuilt, working lock at the Canal Exploration Center @ Cuyahoga Valley National Park.
Mammoth Cave NP. Having driven by this park probably a dozen times, it was time to make a visit. We took the Historical Tour – a 2-hour, 2-mile, guided tour that took us through the cave at numerous levels of its 400′ of depth. It is different from other caves I’ve visited – a “dry”cave – in that it doesn’t drip water from the surface. So, no stalagmites nor stalactites. Rather, the maze of caverns has been cut from adjacent rivers that flow through the cave. It was amazing to experience a tiny bit of its vastness.
A view inside Mammoth Cave along the Historical Tour.
On this trip, we stopped in Rising Sun to visit Gary & Judy, Mary & Megan, and Bryan, and in Gobbler’s Knob to visit Susanne, Lanny, and Mica. We spent an afternoon making peach jam, and brought some home!
It was a great trip, indeed. I have already drafted our national park road trip for next year!
Monte planted a couple of rose bushes this winter. We got them from Antique Rose Emporium in Brenham, Texas. They have a booming mail order business but we drove to their gardens in January to pick them out.
This is a bloom from the Dame de Coeur rosebush. So pretty.
I am not one to complain about all the great rain we’ve gotten this week. God knows we need it. Yesterday was mostly overcast but dry. It was a good day for a drive in the hill country, and for a pickup party at Becker.
Some National Parks are created to preserve a rare species. Others are created to preserve a uniquely beautiful location. I’m sure there are other reasons that motivate a place being enshrined and protected as a US National Park.
Sequoia National Park was founded in 1890, to “protect giant sequoia trees, the largest living trees by volume on Earth,” according to the National Park Service website. In the early days of Sequoia NP, fire suppression was a major focus. It was fascinating to learn that in doing so for upwards of a century, we were actually threatening their existence. It turns out that the seed cones of the giant Sequoia trees require the high-temperature heat from wildfires to release their seeds. And natural thinning by wildfire is also needed to provide adequate sunlight for the new trees.
In the end, modern researchers have provided better guidance to preserve these gentle giants, who are obviously resilient to fire. It was hard to find one of these up to 2000-year-old trees that hadn’t been scarred from fires at some point.
This is an important lesson to think about on this 54th Earth Day. We should act with preservation and conservation in mind, but learn and adapt to the best methods. Sometimes we are wrong.
The North Entrance along General’s Highway greeted us with hills and canyons full of fire-damaged trees.Nearly every giant sequoia bears the scars of wildfire (they are over 2000 years old!) Some don’t make it, but many do.A balance of nature.
As we roll into this year’s Earth Day, I find myself coming home from a whirlwind trip to California where I experienced four national parks in four days with Lori, Doray, and Laura.
The first park was Yosemite, where I got a glimpse of the amazing scenery of El Capitan, Half Dome, Bridal Veil Falls, and Yosemite Falls. We walked through the Yosemite Valley, along the Tuolumne and Merced rivers.
El Capitan to the left. Bridal Veil Falls in the middle, with Cathedral Rocks above it. And Half Dome way in the back between them. Taken from Tunnel View.A better view of Half Dome 💙
We stayed at the Wawona Hotel. It was comfortable, but the shared bath/shower house attached to the Hotel might not be for everyone. There’s no elevator, so pack light, because everything must be removed from your vehicle at night to prevent attracting bears. The restaurant meals were good. The scenery everywhere was amazing.
The next park was Kings Canyon, a deep glacially-formed canyon where the ‘kings’ are gigantic monarch sequoias, including the one called General Grant. We enjoyed up-close views of these giants, and hiking through incredible groves of trees.
General Grant monarch sequoia.
The next park was just down the road, Sequoia National Park. Snow and downed trees had kept the connecting road, Generals Highway, closed this season until just an hour or two before we arrived. This was a much appreciated surprise which saved us hours of driving.
Inside Sequoia, we stayed at Wuksachi Lodge for two nights. It was comfortable, but we schlepped everything up and down stairs here, too. The restaurant and lodge was convenient for breakfast and dinner. But we made our own lunches to eat on the go. We visited petroglyph rock, the Giant Forest of 2000+ year old sequoias, and its museum. We had lunch at Beetle Rock, overlooking the San Joaquin valley. The highlight of Sequoia for me was the hike to, and up to the top of, Moro Rock and its 360 degree views of the canyons and surrounding valleys. It was breathtaking.
Lunch stop atop Beetle Rock.Moro Rock taken from the foothills. We made it to the top of this bad boy @ 6700+ feet above sea level
Even though we were pooped, we made the trek down to see the biggest known single trunk tree, by volume, in the world, General Sherman. Impressive. But I sure wish it wasn’t downhill from the parking lot at the end of day three. 🙂
The next park was Pinnacles, which featured rugged peaks formed from volcanic eruptions. We didn’t spend much time here but we enjoyed lunch and a hike. We didn’t originally plan to hit this park but realized it was close enough to include in our trip after we arrived.
Taken inside Pinnacles NP from Peaks View
We started and ended the trip in Santa Barbara, which allowed us to see Laura’s beautiful new home.
I’m back home now. And scheming my next park adventures.
Recently, a friend shared that her daughter and colleagues were starting a used and vintage online book shop. Wanting to support them, I signed up. After taking a look, I was intrigued. The company is called Vignette Books (@vignettebookshop on instagram, http://www.vignettebooks.com). Their approach is that customers self-select an “Edit;” which is essentially a category of books. They have a quiz for customers to find out which Edit most matches their interests. I took the quiz and found the “Natural” Edit was a good fit for me.
So, you select an Edit, and then order a set of 1 to 3 books that Vignette Books picks from you from a curated set of used and vintage books in their inventory.
My order came a week or two ago and I was pleasantly pleased with the selections. One was a book about whales, their evolution, and history. I read that one first. I think I could now have a chance in any Jeopardy category about whales 🙂
The second was a biography about Rachel Carson, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I knew Carson wrote Silent Spring, but I didn’t realize that her background was marine biology and that she had written 3 award winning books on the ocean, sea birds, and other sea life prior to writing Silent Spring. So, now I’ve begun reading them. See how that expanding horizons thing works?
The next book of my three from Vignette Books is in the on-deck circle, and it is a story of a trek through the Arizona desert to find a stone carving of a maze similar to one found in Wales. I’m looking forward to that one, too.
If you, too, are intrigued, check out Vignette Books!
We drove straight to Colorado on the way north, about a 15-hour drive, and stayed with Julie in Denver for a night. Then we headed to Gene and Jo’s for two nights. We made a side trip to Estes Park as well. The family get-together was very special.
On the way back south we had another nice visit with Julie.
Dinner and desserts with Julie in Denver.
Then we broke up the long trip home into a couple of days including stops at two national parks.
Great Sand Dunes National Park – snow on the dunesWhite Sands National Park – a truly unique place
We stayed in Ft. Davis for a night with a reservation to attend one of the McDonald Observatory’s star parties. The skies were not cooperative for viewing at the observatory, but we had fun.
McDonald Observatory socked in with clouds.
We left Ft Davis on Wednesday well before dawn, and on the drive up to I-10, I noticed that the clouds parted, opening up a clear, starry sky. So we pulled over in the middle of pitch-dark range land with coyotes howling all around and enjoyed a full-sky view of the Milky Way.
We enjoyed the view for a few minutes and then resumed our drive. A few minutes later the skies were filled in with thick clouds again. It was a treat to get that brief moment of star gazing.
A successful road trip, but it’s always nice to get back home.
Sheila365 