How We Roll--A Summer Camp/Raft Trip Part I

On June 30 we headed out on a 5-day camping trip with our son-in-law, his three children and a fourth grandchild. We were pulling a trailer with all our camp gear plus 3 rafts and equipment for our raft trip down the Middle Fork of the Salmon River. Our son-in-law was pulling his pop-up trailer behind his minivan. Our caravan was quite a sight I'm sure--suburbia meets the Blue River hill-billies.

Mike had planned our trip by renting cabins around Oregon on our way to Idaho using recreation.gov. So these cabins vary in sizes and upkeep. Most have housed Forest Service folks in the past, and some are on high elevations providing wonderful vistas.

The cabins vary in appearance from "creepy" to "adorable" to quote the granddaughters. Creepy included bugs, spiders, and deserted barns full of various animal turds. Adorable included cottontail bunnies, baby birds in a visible nest, and a great creek to play in.

Creepy 

Adorable (inspite of name--Murderer's Creek)

We were traveling during perhaps the hottest week of the summer. At the end of a day sitting in a car, to arrive at a new cabin/campsite, when the temperature was 106 degrees, Hannah wasn't the only one who felt like having a fit. But after a good night's sleep and a cool morning, all of us felt refreshed and ready for the next day's adventure.

The great thing about a trip like this is that the grandchildren get a different view of of the world. We covered a lot of territory and saw some of the most rural parts of our state. We saw desert, forest, mountains, lakes and rivers. We saw wildlife: elk, deer, antelope, cottontails, bald eagles, sandhill cranes, and one marmot. I know they will remember this trip for all they saw and did on this vacation including meeting this precious foal in the ghost town of Granite, Oregon.

We crossed the border of Idaho on July 3 and picked up my daughter, Rachel, at the Boise Airport. With another 2 nights of camping, we ended up at Boundary Creek (at nearly 6000 ft. elevation) where we launched on our Middle Fork raft trip, taking 11 year old Angelica with us. The Carter family saw us off, and then after pulling the pop-up trailer up and down the mountains of Oregon and Idaho, went home to trade in the minivan for a 4-wheel drive!

May 2013 Trip, Part I--to Bath and Beyond

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 5, 2013

May 2013 Trip, Part I--to Bath and Beyond

Who could resist this angel climbing a ladder up the side of Bath Abbey?

 

Climbing To Heaven
Watercolor, 8 x 10

My sister Barbara joined me on a 3 week trip to Europe. A large part of the trip was a cruise paid for by my teaching watercolors to the guests, but it started with short jaunt to England.

We had a frustrating start to the trip as our plane taking off from Eugene was delayed by nearly 6 hours. Sitting in the Eugene Airport at6 AM with an unknown departure put us on edge. Would we make our flight to London? Nope. Would we be able to make it to Bath, England for a prepaid hotel? Only if we could get to San Francisco by 7:00 pm. Tired and worn down, we did make it to S.F. to catch the last flight to London and were greatly relieved to be airborne for the U.K., with a great hope for catching some zzz's. 

 

"My suitcase is where?"

Thinking we were over our travel frustrations, Barbara was in shock to find out her suitcase was still in San Francisco as we were preparing to leave Heathrow for Bath. We were told it would be delivered to Brocks Guesthouse in Bath the next day. "Can I borrow undies and a nightgown?"

 We had a great treat waiting for us as we stepped out of the airport. My sweet husband had gone online and ordered us a car to drive us to Bath, about a 2 hour drive. Since it was probably the one and only time this will ever happen, I took a pic of our driver holding up a sign with my name. We happily got into the vehicle and promptly slept through most of the drive.

 

Luckily, we arrived in Bath by late afternoon and were able to sight-see for a few hours. This is where I fell in love with the climbing angel in the blog opener. This Abbey Church was built in 1499 by the Bishop of Bath who, as the story goes, had a dream of angles ascending and descending into heaven, hence the decorative sculptures.

 

 

Bath is a beautiful town with more to see than the Roman Baths. Here is a shot of Pulteney Bridge crossing the Avon River.

 

The Roman Baths were built 2000 years ago and were a feat of great engineering. Many decorative features have been recovered and are displayed throughout the Museum.

 

 

After a wonderful Indian dinner in the basement of a basement, we were happy to get back to our B & B with the determination to catch up on sleep. 

I had booked online a tour (Mad Max) of Stonehenge and some quaint villages for the following day. I have to say, it was a perfect way to spend the one day we would have in the area. Not only did we learn a lot from our tour guide, but we got to see a lot of English countryside. New to me info, Stonehenge existed well before the Celts and their religious order, the Druids, arrived in the area.

 

 

We also visited Avebury, another much larger circle of rocks. This was constructed in the Neolithic period, but was partially buried by the Church in in the 1200's, to be resurrected in the early 20th Century.

 

Our day with Mad Max continued with visits to some very old and charming villages. First was Lacock (lay-cock) where some scenes inHarry Potter and Pride and Prejudice have been filmed.

 

 

Our final stop was in Castle Combe, population 350. It has also been the backdrop for films such as Warhorse.

 

And Castle Combe presents this charming scene,

of hill, woods and meadows cloth'd in green.

Here grand terrestrial scenes, almost celestial nice,

makes Castle Combe, sweet vale, an earthy Paradise.

                                                                   Edward Dowling (19th Century)

After our full day of sight-seeing, we ended our day with another wonderful meal and a good night's sleep. We wanted to be well rested for our trip to Southampton where we would board the Independence of the Seas.

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An Art Project Good for Ages 5 to 64--Step by Step

The artist has to look at life as he did when he was a child. If he loses that faculty, he cannot express himself in an original, that is, a personal way. (Henri Matisse)

Today I was trying to think up an art project that would work for both my 5 year-old grandson and my 8 year-old granddaughter. Using a light box seemed like something they could both use for tracing, and sharpies are always fun no matter what age. I put those two activities together with the concept of creating a self-portrait. To my delight, the children rose well-above my expectations. Noah's self-portrait is above. His less steady hand and creative framing made his art so authentic. Then his idea of coloring his lips red, really perfected this sweet picture in my eyes.

The first step was choosing a photograph from the many we have on the computer and printing a full sheet. Next we did a simple outline of the head, hair, facial features and shoulders directly on top of the photo.

The next step was setting up my large light box on the studio floor where we could all sit around and trace the felt-tip markings on our photos onto nice drawing paper. We did this in pencil, so any errors could be erased. After we had our pencil drawings, we went over the pencil lines with felt-tips.

The final part was decorating our portraits, making frames or designs or patterns. This was a very unscripted part and the children followed their own ideas.

Marin enjoyed this so much she decided to do another portrait using the same method, but this time using watercolors to finish her picture.

At the end of the day, we played around substituting our portraits for our heads in these photos.