We were treated to beautiful autumn color on our trip to Louisville. One of my favorite songs to get stuck in my head is Nat King Cole singing Autumn Leaves.

Photo manipulated with Brushstroke iphone app.
We were treated to beautiful autumn color on our trip to Louisville. One of my favorite songs to get stuck in my head is Nat King Cole singing Autumn Leaves.

Photo manipulated with Brushstroke iphone app.
Another great thing about autumn in Texas. I could eat these all day.


🙂
Since we are (mostly) unencumbered by commitments, we took a road trip over the weekend to Louisville, to attend our niece’s wedding. We extended it a day or two to squeeze in a couple of additional visits in Indiana and Kentucky before heading back home. It was a beautiful and heartfelt wedding. The fall foliage was beautiful. We were able to play tourist a little bit. And we are now back home safe and sound.
Mary Anne and Chris did it up right. We enjoyed the ceremony, the reception and, most importantly, the time spent with family visiting and telling stories and laughing. Not everyone could be there, and Gene & Jo were sorely missed.

We visited some wonderful places in Louisville.
The Louisville Stoneware factory got my potter juices flowing:

The FlameRun glass-works gallery and working studio:

The Louisville Slugger factory & museum:

The Big Four pedestrian (former railroad) bridge over the Ohio River:

And then we popped over to Indiana to visit Charlie & Kathy, and enjoyed the night life and autumn beauty of Madison.
Will Carter and Trisha Gene Brady performed at Red Bicycle Hall.

This is the amazing view of the Ohio River valley from their living room!

Then we stopped in the hills outside Bowling Green for a day with Lanny, and I scoped out all the birds I could find. The bird on the left is a lifer for me – a white-breasted nuthatch; a carolina chickadee on the right. I do love the birdies!

Another trip in the books. It’s also nice to be home 🙂
I took this picture over the weekend while hiking in the nearby greenbelt. The original is a pretty, bright green and yellow tinged shot looking up through the leaves that are backlit by the sun.
I decided to post in black and white for Halloween, and after just hearing about yet another senseless, mass killing of people, this one in NYC. Be careful out there.

I caught a glimpse of the crescent moon this morning as the sun was coming up behind it. Only a week ago I was watching the moon rise, just past full, over the desert. It made me think about how Time passes and Life happens. The James Taylor song Secret o’Life popped into my head. Give it a listen here. Enjoy the day.

In addition to having a wonderful visit with old friends, I did see birdies while visiting Palm Desert last over the weekend.
Right outside our house there were 2 palm trees on an island in a large pond on the golf course. Every night cormorants and egrets would come and roost. They came late and left early. I counted at least two dozen at one point. This is a shot from one morning as the sun was rising.

An American Kestrel visited me while I was drinking coffee one morning; he’s backlit by the rising sun. This is the first picture I have ever gotten of one.

A blue heron made an appearance. There were a number of mallard ducks in the ponds at the golf course. I saw a belted kingfisher flying away from the pond every night. We had a couple of bewick’s wrens scolding us when were out on the patio. We had many hummingbirds buzzing around. A flock of Canada geese flew over us on the way to the airport. There was a flock of unidentified colorful birds that stopped in a Joshua tree while we were in the park, but I didn’t get a good look. I also saw a verdin, and a cactus wren; both firsts for me.
Today was another lovely day in Palm Desert. Irene and I took a long walk this morning and found two geocaches along the way. We all had massages this afternoon and then grabbed a bite to eat while watching the end of the Seahawks game at a restaurant nearby. We won!
Back at the house we did our best to finish off all the food and wine we had bought for the long weekend. We stayed in the hot tub again looking at the moon and stars til we were pruned.
We also face timed with Keeto, a first for both of us. Goodnight birdie!
We visited Joshua Tree National Park yesterday, drove the entire length of the park, from south to north, and stopped to explore all of the varied terrain and plants. The park is ruggedly beautiful, and marks the intersection of the Colorado Desert and the Mohave Desert.

We had a blast. And took a bazillion selfies. I’ll share some photos, but also wanted to share this cool interview I found this morning…. it’s 10 minutes long… of Steve Averill, the guy that designed and photographed the album art for U2’s album The Joshua Tree, which is celebrating its 30th birthday this year. I think this guy has my dream job. 🙂
A fine example of the namesake of the park, said to look like Dr Seuss trees:

Another peek from beneath the rocks:

I love exploring new places, and I love hanging with my girlfriends. A perfect day.
I’ve met up with Irene and Linda, two girlfriends from high school, in Palm Desert for the weekend. We are having fun catching up on three decades of our lives while enjoying this beautiful oasis.
This is the view from our patio. Lucky us. This is looking east across the Coachella Valley towards the Little San Bernardino Mountain range.

This is the same view, later last night as the full moon was rising.