Christmas 2011

Happy Holidays and Warmest Season’s Wishes from the Taylor home, still on wheels. Greetings and hugs to our family and friends! And welcome to our other visitors, too!

We’ve added another year to our personal chronicle, and wonder…How could it have flown so quickly, yet given us so many new experiences and memories? We’re now having a bit of cool weather and welcome rain here in Austin. It’s perfect for a good hot soup and sharing a few 2011 tales.

2011 Main Stomping Ground: Arizona – far enough north to touch the Utah border on the way to Monument Valley; and New Mexico – four passes through, including a hop north to Rico, CO. In Texas, we were east to Bastrop and south to Port Mansfield. That’s a sport fishermen’s town on the Gulf, where our previous boat home for 21 years is now at the dock. She’s no longer called La Mouette, but she may travel again!

Number of 2011 Campsites: Thirty-one. This includes brief stops and longer, but we rarely rush off before we’re ready. We’ve been tethered to Austin for medical biz and follow-ups, three visits. 

Here are a few 2011 superlatives.

Good Friends: We shared our time this year with many we visited on our travels. It’s always wonderful to connect with family, with sailing, radio and camping friends, and even one of Gigi’s college roomies. Happily, they’re to be found all over the country, especially in the southwest. We track them down. Too many to embarrass them all with their pictures here!

Favorite Campsite: El Morro RV, Ramah, NM. In August the woods, ground cover and flowers were fragrant, campsite casual, hiking handy and sights nearby include Morro Rock, Zuni Pueblo, Spirit Wolf Sanctuary, Art Gallery, more. This busy crowd was always there – at our two feeders! 

Zuni Pueblo: At the Old Zuni Mission, men are buried to the left and women to the right. Traditionally, men are responsible for the spirit and ceremonial; women for the home. These craftsmen sell light switch covers.

Spirit Wolf Sanctuary: Sadly, many  people want to own a wolf-dog mix, so people do breed them. Most end up in shelters or in sanctuaries. Here there are full-blooded wolves, too, like this white one (typical big feet).  Some come from small zoos that go under or can’t handle them.

Produce market at Ramah: Held weekly outside the community historic museum. Yum.

Favorite Place Revisited: We were heading south to Gallup through the Navajo reservation and meant to pass by until we saw the sign. Our wheels turned down the road to Historic Toadlena Trading Post, where owners sell daily goods as they celebrate and support the weaver’s art through exhibitions and more. We arrived in time to join a collectors’ tour of the current exhibition, and to view the owner’s residence and special pieces.

Best Parade: In Gallup, NM, the annual Inter-Tribal Indian Ceremonial parade included Native American tribes from the US and Mexico. We’ve seen it before, and enjoyed it again. Later in the day, the Rodeo and dances were pretty much rained out!

Most welcome departure: At the Tijeras, NM campground east of Albuquerque, we had snow…but had to stay two more days because, well, we were paid up!

Easiest Park to photograph: Monument Valley, where you cannot take a bad photograph! Eons ago, this land was beneath the Sea of Cortez, Mexico.

Awesome-est Place: Canyon de Chelly National Monument. It was also the toughest park to photograph. It’s just too grand to express through the limiting lens. But I tried. And tried. Left pix: There are ruins in the low dark alcove. Right: Spider Rock below, 800 feet high.

If you go, take a tour of the Canyon! The road in is also the river bed. 

 

We chose Antelope Tours, and saw several ruins and many pictographs. Ben, our guide, took us to his family home, located next to Antelope ruins. Maybe because we liked his stories so much, he did a u-turn to give us an extra view of Standing Rock, located in a family pasture lined with old apple trees that the bears love. Here, a small Navajo group fought to successfully escape the Long Walk, the most terrible part of the tribe’s history and a shameful tactic by US troops that led to the death of thousands.

Thinking of Christmas:

Nice potential gift for her (silver hair ornament):

Nice gift for him (pick one only) Belen, NM:

Happy New Year!!!

Keep Austin Weird

    

Sometimes towns in Texas are so Texan that their unique character is masked. Not so Austin! Beneath the modern skyline, this city loves to be unique. Eccentric. Weird, even. And they’ve got a lot to work with!

 

Our temporary town is a multi-ethnic melting pot with 48,000 University of Texas students, museums, fine hospitals, historic sites and neighborhoods, parks, great restaurants, natural food markets and fresh produce stands. It’s also got permanent and mobile food trucks by the hundreds, artists and musicians seemingly numbering thousands (many busy needling tattoos), quirky shops, gas stations converted to restaurants, preserved old store signs, lots of ethnic food, and more thrift shops than we’ve seen in anywhere! The state capital is here, with the excitement of debate and demonstrations. It’s all seasoned  with Texas’s do it my way rebel nature and cultivated impulsive, tough cowboy, go-for-it character. 

 

                     

Though outsiders, we think that the “weird” Austin gumbo had its roots in the 60’s with the music industry - a roux of rock, soul and country music (think Janis, Willie) and 60’s youth culture. Ah, they and we were younger, then!

Here’s this week’s festival!

 

Youth accordion contest at Texas State History Museum. Wild, talented, amazing!

 

The Pecan Street Festival. Music. Artists from the South. Clothes from Asia.

  

Happily, Austin remains both weird, yet classy, and it’s a fine place to stay for awhile. Except during the summer heat with 100-plus degree weather!

But I confess that I’m totally over the University of Texas paraphernalia, which is everywhere!

   

Earth Laughs in Flowers

     … Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is it a coincidence that Lady Bird Johnson had the same initials as her husband? He was a powerful and enigmatic man who left quite a legacy. Lady Bird has a legacy, also – one that is still growing!

Lady Bird had a passion for the environment, and worked tirelessly to foster the preservation and use of native plants, particularly wildflowers. In 1982, she and actress Helen Hayes founded the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center to protect, preserve and teach about North America's native plants and natural landscapes. The Wildflower Center, in association with the University of Texas at Austin, is a special place that demonstrates the beauty and diversity of wildflowers and their importance in the ecosystem. We spent a morning there last week amid birdwatchers, walkers, school kids and nature lovers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Native stone architecture integrates gardens and plants that flourish through an amazing water catchment system with slanted roofs, gutters, aqueducts, rivulets and ponds. There are trails, a learning gallery, art gallery, shop and café with memorable oatmeal cookies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Perhaps because we are temporarily staying in Austin, I found this place just incredibly peaceful. Did you notice the insect on the cactus?

Sadly, Southwestern Texas is suffering from a multiyear drought, which we saw also in Arizona and New Mexico. This year, there are few wildflowers along the highways and in the meadows. The plants in the Center’s many gardens gave us a taste of those we’ve missed elsewhere! At last, a bluebonnet!

 

Each of these small plots is planted to a theme. By flower color, for instance, or deer- resistant (no guarantees!). The plots include plants that bloom in spring, summer or fall.

 

 

 

 

In the art gallery were watercolor images on cut paper with a three-dimensional effect by artist Shou Ping.

 

 

 

 

At  http://www.wildflower.org/ you can learn how to avoid planting invasive species, see what flowers are native in your area of the US, and more. The online Native Plant Information Network offers a US map you can click to find out about native plants in 49 states.

 

Wait a minute! Forty-nine? Somebody’s left out! It’s Hawaii! I thought about this for a moment. Could it be that all of Hawaii’s plants are native to somewhere else? NOT! Websites describe native Hawaiian plants that arrived eons ago through winds, birds and currents, and have uniquely evolved since. I was born in Hawaii, but decided not to be miffed. I looked closer at some native Hawaiian plants. And I must admit, these plants do not look like wildflowers! Maybe Hawaii is truly unique in having NO wildflowers!