2010

We began our day yesterday in Seattle on a typical rainy over cast but wonderful day in Pike’s Place Market. The night before it had been closed so we were planning on squeezing out every drop of Seattle goodness from this brief visit. We bought all kinds of fruit including my favorite, the giant sweet Fuji apples. I have to say, Pike’s Place Market has the most amazing flowers I have ever seen. It is a feast for the eyes and the nose. It is amazing to walk through there smelling the flowers and looking at the vast variety of flowers. I would buy all of them if I could. ...

We started our morning out by going to Gonzaga University in Spokane Washington. We walked around the campus and enjoyed checking out the church. It was a pretty nice little school. After that we decided to drive to Mount Rainer National Park. After having a nice lunch overlooking Mt. Rainer we went out on a hike to Nisqually Vista trail. It was an amazing hike through a meadow of wildflowers and finally to an overlook of the Nisqually Glacier and the river that came down from it. ...

I couldn’t post last night because we were staying in Silver Gate Montana just one mile outside of the northeast entrance to Yellowstone National Park. We started our day with the Enchanted Highway whihc is almost to the border of North Dakota and Montana. It is a thirty two mile long road that is peppered with statues ranging from ones like this to huge pheasant statues and fisherman. It i really interesting but we only saw the very begining and had to move onward to Roosevelt National Park. ...

We spent all of this morning venturing through Yellowstone National Park looking for wildlife. Before we even left the house this morning guess who showed up behind our cabin again? You guessed it, the red-tailed fox. He caught me by surprise yet again as I heard my mom yell again, There’s a coyote! So as I frantically dashed to the car yet again to get my camera I yelled back, It’s the fox again, not a coyote! ...

Today was the first day of our road trip back home to Santa Cruz and we stopped for the night in Bismarck, North Dakota. Along the way during our 15 hour-long day we saw a lot of interesting things. We started out with Amnicon Falls State Park in Wisconsin which was really beautiful. The falls were really running and the water looked like a mixture of coffee and cream. ...

By 5 a.m. tomorrow morning my mom and I will be on our way back home to Santa Cruz California on a week-long road trip. We will be heading across the top of the US all the way to Seattle and then straight down to home. I am excited to be on the road again and to go home in order to see all of my friends and family.However going home is bittersweet. I will miss Bootjack dearly, its serenity, its untainted beauty, and all of the wonders of our compound. I will miss the lake and the water. I will miss the bald eagles. I will miss the flowers. I will miss the storms that come sweeping across the lake. I will miss my grandpa until I see him again. I will miss the library. I will miss everything. So thank you Bootjack for a nice summer, I will see you next year.

My little brother and I were having fun jumping on hotel beds and trying to get some air-borne pictures. He was doing tricks and just having fun jumping around while I took photos. So this is a shout out to my little brother, thanks for being weird and going along with my shenanigans all the time. Stay golden pony boy, stay golden. P.S. whenever you landed on the bed it looked like you were being eaten by the mattress or as if a black hole was sucking you in that happened to be at the center of the bed.

My mom and I happened upon this peculiar yellow mushroom on a hike above the Hungarian Falls in Upper Michigan. It really did look fake, like a rubber mushroom.

As I said before in my earlier post, The Horrors of Butterflies, butterflies are so creepy yet so beautiful. It is this deceiving nature of the butterflies beauty that I find horrifying just how easy it is to look at a butterfly and fawn over its beauty only to realize just how truly scary looking and ugly they really are. Here are a few more photos of butterflies that illustrate not only they beauty but their ugliness as well.

One of the most amazing things about Michigan is the majestic bald eagle. The bald eagle is a frequent sight were I stay in upper Michigan and we love every second of it. These birds are truly amazing and beautiful. I have to say though they seem a little creepy at times because they are always so aware of your presence. Whenever I go near them they always watch me and never take their eyes off until they fly away. I love seeing them and for those of you who don’t get to see them often, here is one of my best shots of him this year for all of you to enjoy! ...