Weekly Ephemera #156

• This week's highlights were visits from family and friends.  On Tuesday the MoH and BM dropped by on the way to their vacation.  We spent the evening digesting the superb steak dinner the Wife prepared while engaging in spirited conversation.  It is fair to say that none of the world's problems were solved.  Our guests treated us to breakfast the next day before they traveled on.
  
  Today, the Wife's best friend since high school is visiting.  Craziness will ensue.
• The HVAC guy came by this week and checked out our furnace.  Except for a dirty temperature sensor, everything is in good order.  We are now ready for the winter, though the weather for the next ten days or so is more summer-like than fall-like.
• This week I will be turning off our sprinkler system.  They will be blowing out the system in a week or so while we are traveling.  Potted plants and patio furniture will be brought in and the deck will be power washed.  Everything will be ready for winter when we leave.
• I did not walk this week and I will not walk next week.  I'm taking a break from walking until we return from our travels.
• I haven't really watched anything good on television.  But, I did watch some "Alfred Hitchcock Presents".  It's some easy background noise and it's fun seeing some of the old actors when they were young and new.  The writing is a bit hit and miss but my favorite part is Hitchcock introducing commercial and station identification breaks.  It is obvious he is not fond of the breaks interrupting his storytelling.  (For those who do not know, Station identification breaks allowed stations to let you know what station you were watching.  You don't see them much today because of the invention of the station's logo bug in the corner of the screen.)
• We are both getting ready for our trip.  We will be leaving on Thursday.  I hope the tropical storms off the coast of Georgia are gone by then, since our flight to Athens is through Atlanta.

Happy Autumn!

Today summer comes to an end in the northern hemisphere and Autumn begins.  It's been a hot summer here in the middle of America and I'm looking forward to some cooler temperatures.

Happy Fall Everyone!

Weekly Ephemera #120

Not much happened this week which, frankly for once, feels nice.  A few highlights:

• We were invited to Thanksgiving Brunch at the Wife's niece's home today.  It was a nice departure from the major dinner on Thanksgiving Thursday.  We all had a great chat about 'things' and I came home with a new red dog hair coat - Thanks Ruby!!!
• I walked two times this week.  I would have done three but Monday was rainy and windy and I just stayed home and hunkered down.  The walks I did totaled 24.8 miles (39.9 km).  They were a nice meander around the downtown area of the city.  I was going to cross the pedestrian bridge and walk on the Iowa side but the bridge is being worked on as they add an extension.  Temperatures are finally feeling like fall but that won't last as colder winter temperatures are coming this coming week.
• In between the walks I watched some television.  The Wife and I watched the latest seasons of "The Great British Baking Show" and "Blown Away".  We enjoyed "The Remarkable Life of Ibelin" (⭐⭐⭐),  I watched "Star Trek: Prodigy" (⭐⭐⭐), the director's cuts of "Rebel Moon" parts one and two (⭐⭐), and "Madam Web" a Sony/Marvel movie (⭐½).

That was it for this week.  Have a good week everyone!

Weekly Ephemera #119

• I power washed the deck and spread winterizer on the lawn this week finishing the winter prep.  It was cold and windy when I washed the deck and I did a half-ass job on it, especially on the underside of the deck.
• An insurance field adjuster came this week and did a second inspection of the hail damage we got back in July.  He caught everything the first adjuster had missed and what we had asked for from the insurance company.  This is the same damage the desk adjuster, after looking at pictures, said she didn't see.  Not sure what was going on with the desk adjuster.  There was a heated discussion between the adjuster and my roofer.  Fortunately they smoothed it all out and shook hands at the end of the inspection.  The second field adjuster handed us a check covering the missed damage which made the Wife and I very happy.  The actual repairs will probably be done next spring once it starts warming up again.
• I deleted my Xitter account this week.  Since it seems I have to have at least three social network accounts at any one time I also opened a Bluesky account (@homerstravels.bsky.social).  I now have accounts on Discord, Mastodon, and Bluesky.  Most of the people I have been following on Mastodon also have Bluesky accounts.  While I don't really need Mastodon I'm probably going to keep it since I like to have a non-corporate run, multi server social network as a backup.
  
  I also switched from the free service IFTTT.com to the paid service dlvr.it to distribute my posts.  It is a little expensive ($99 per year) but it will post my blog posts to all three of my social media platforms and it does it in a nicer format than IFTTT could provide.
• I hiked two times this week.  We are in that rainy, windy, and cold period before the snow has arrived when walking is hard to do.  I was going to walk three times but an all day cold and windy rain kept me indoors for part of the week.  I walked a total of 25.3 miles (40.8 km) this week.  The second walk was over 15 miles (24 km) and was my longest walk since November 2022.  It nearly killed my legs.
  
  On that long walk my phone died.  The phone got stuck in some sort of loop.  By a strange coincidence I was only a couple blocks from my cell phone store and they were able to revive it. Phew!
• I spent some of the rainy days watching more episodes of "One Piece".  The Paul-Tyson fight resulted in us subscribing to Netflix a couple weeks earlier than I'd planned.  I will now start binging a few shows there this week.

Weekly Ephemera #115

• 
  We received our ballots for the upcoming election in the mail this week.  We filled them out on Friday and I dropped them in the  ballot drop box yesterday.  Nebraska is one of two states that divide their electoral votes by how the political districts vote.  The district where Omaha is located is known as the blue dot as, in past elections, it often goes to the Democrats.  The rest of Nebraska is as red - i.e. Republican - as they come.  There are scenarios where the Democrats win the presidency by one electoral votes - Nebraska's blue dot - but I hope it doesn't come down to one district in the middle of the country.
• I resumed walking this week.  I walked three times totalling 26.3 miles (42.3 km) so I walked a very slow, five day long marathon.  I'm happy that I was able to restart so easily.  Now I just need to do this next week ... and the next  ... and the next.
• I started to watch the second season of "Rings of Power" on Prime.  It's interesting even though the Lord of the Rings books have never really interested me very much.
• We will be have our first frost/freeze over the next few days.  Glad to see Fall finally arriving.  We brought our plants in today and I'll be turning on the furnace (it was checked out earlier this week and everything is working per specifications) later tonight.
• The first Great Britain post will drop tomorrow.

Happy Autumnal Equinox

Happy first day of Autumn to everyone in the northern hemisphere.  We missed being at Stonehenge during the equinox by around a week.  Not sure this is good or bad as people tend to congregate there during the equinoxes and solstices.  Instead we will be celebrating the start of the season with all the fans in Wrexham.

Happy First Day of Fall Everyone!

Happy Autumn!!!

Today is the autumnal equinox ... the first day of fall.  Fall is my favorite season.  Daylight and nighttime are roughly equal.  A very balanced day.

I hope you all have a balanced day and a pumpkin spiced fall season!

Welcome To The 2022 Autumnal Equinox!

Happy Fall everyone.  Autumn has always been my favorite season (I'm sure I've mentioned this before).  The crispness of the air, the color of the changing leaves.  I love the crunch-crunch of walking on paths covered in fallen leaves.

Some Fall colors along the Appalachian Trail.

I hope the Wife and I will go leaf peeping in New England some year.  I got a glimpse of the beauty near the end of my 2019 Appalachian Trail hike.  I would like to get a complete view someday.

Some more colors of Autumn.

My Favorite Season Arrives Once Again

The fall equinox has arrived and Autumn has arrived once again.  Cool air.  Colorful leaves. Shortening days.  The Harvest moon (a few days early).  What's not to love.

A few days ago the sun gave us a preview of some of the colors coming soon.

The reds, oranges, and yellows of the approaching fall.

Happy Autumnal Equinox Everybody!!!

Autumn Equinox

We reach this autumnal equinox shrouded by the passing of the Notorious RBG and an election struggling under the weight of a manufactured crisis.

If only …

May we all survive the changing of the seasons during this unending, and exceedingly cruel, year.

Swish - Crunch

I returned to Indian Cave SP yesterday and saw that the colors had faded to shades of brown.  This is the time of year when the visual delight of fall colors gives way to the auditory one of the swish - crunch, the sound made as my feet move through the carpet of fallen leaves covering the hiking trail.

A ladybug on my hairy arm.

I exited the trail on the way back to my car when I was surprised to see a thin cloud of swarming insect.  I sat on a bench to rest and was immediately joined by four or five ladybugs landing on me and my cell phone screen as I was taking pictures.  I don't think I have ever seen so many ladybugs at once - the closest was in 1996 on the ladybug trail in Sequoia NP though those were huddled on the ground warming themselves in the sun.  These were buzzing around me as I sat on the bench and as I walked the miles or so back to my car.  A few even joined me on the drive back to Omaha.

A ladybug on my pants leg.

The ladybugs were a nice ending to a rather tough 8+ mile (12.8+ km) hike.

Crisp Air

What a difference a few days make.  After a fairly substantial 3 inches (7.6 cm) of snow on Sunday, the temperatures finally stabilized at a comfortable and slightly crisp fall-like 60℉ (15.5℃).  Combine these temperatures with the changing of the foliage and I'm finally getting into the Fall spirit.

A red tinged leaf with morning dew on the trail in Indian Cave S.P.

Over the past three or four weeks I have been going to Hitchcock Nature Center and Indian Cave State Park and over this period I have watched the trees turn gold, yellow,orange, and red.

Indian Cave has the most colorful foliage.

In the past I have always been either too early or too late to see the Fall colors in 'full bloom'.  Hiking a couple times a week has given me the opportunity to admire the change.  Hitchcock's colors are predominantly gold and yellow.  Small bushes add pops of dark red and parasitic vines added orange.

Orange leaves of a parasitic vine.

I wish the colors would stay all winter but the leaves will soon be falling.  On a walk earlier this week I walked on some sidewalks covered in green leaves that fell after the Sunday freeze, never getting the chance to turn colors.

A pop of yellow at Hitchcock Nature Center.

Fall has always been one of my favorite seasons.  This year has been a bit strange with the higher than normal temps and rain.  The Fall has also taken on some melancholy hues with the memories of 2016.  Nevertheless, I still have a warm place in my heart for this change-filled time of the year.

First Snow !?!

The weather this fall has been weird.  Record high temperatures followed by record low temperatures.  I always look forward to the crisp fall days but this year we haven't had them yet.

A late fall flower wondering what this white stuff is falling from the sky.

Today we had our first snow of the season.  It was supposed to be a light dusting but it turned out to be a bit more substantial triggering a Winter Weather Advisory.

Our oak tree's leaves haven't changed color yet but they are covered in heavy snow.

It's a bit early for snow here.  I do remember a snowfall this early sometime in the last ten years but I don't remember which year.  Usually the first snow is in November or December.  Like the last time it snowed this early, it won't last long.  This week - a month late in my opinion - the crisp fall air will finally arrive bringing the temperatures back to normal and melting all the snow.

Visibility is a bit limited by the falling snow.

I wonder if this is a preview of the winter to come.

Happy First Day Of Autumn!!!

It is the fall equinox today and I went out to celebrate with a hike at Hitchcock Nature Center.  I've been going to Hitchcock once or twice a week for a while now to train myself for hill climbing.  I've been training with a 35 lb (15.8 kg) backpack to give myself a good workout.

We've had a hot August and the past few weeks have been tough hikes.  Between the heat, humidity, and clouds of starving mosquitoes, it's been a struggle to meet my distance goals.  Fortunately fall has arrived and with the changing of the seasons the temperatures have dropped nearly thirty degrees.  The lower temperatures and the blue skies made today's 6 mile (9.6 km) hike much more enjoyable.

Over the past few weeks I've seen the Monarch Butterfly migration come through.  Soon birds will start migrating through the area and the leaves will start changing.  I think I seen something different every time I visit Hitchcock.  I even saw some Iowan Hemp this hike - might explain why Iowans are so happy.

A little Iowan Hemp along the side of the trail.

I think Autumn may just be my favorite season.  I hope you all have a great first day of Autumn!!!

Happy Autumn???

I was going to write a post wishing everyone a happy first day of Autumn but it's

96℉

36℃

outside and that's just wrong.

Camp #12: Letting Off Steam At Indian Cave

As I mentioned in my last post, I was planning to go camping to celebrate the election.  I almost didn't do it after seeing the results of the election but, after encouragement from a few friends and the Wife, I changed my mind and went to Indian Cave State Park for the last camp of 2016.

Of the three places that have backcountry camping in my area, Indian Cave is the most remote both from my home and from civilization.  Civilization around the park consists of small towns of less than two hundred people.  This meant a nice and quiet night for camping.  Owls and coyotes were the only sound I heard.

A few remaining fall colors at Indian Cave.

I arrived about an hour before sunset and, starting at trailhead 10, hiked up East Ridge trail to the first campsite.  Hike is a strong word since it was only a half mile (805 m) but it was a climb - sometimes steep - up 480 feet (146 m).  At the top of the ridge is a campsite I'd passed several times during my hikes here.

The campsite has changed quite a bit over the years.  The first time I passed it there was an adirondack shelter, a fire ring, and a bench that faced the setting sun.  The bench is now gone (it had been pulled out of the ground by vandals a few years ago) and the shelter apparently had been vandalised and no longer provided safe shelter.  The fire ring was still intact though and I set up my tent where the bench once stood.

The hills and trees of Indian Cave.

From the campsite the views are majestic.  To the west is a large expanse of forest.  Some of the late fall colors remained.  To the north-west there are views of the Missouri River.  The skies were clear blue and everything was tinged with the orange of the setting sun.

The Missouri River.

I collected firewood and built a fire just as the sun was dropping under the horizon.  I sat on the edge of the shelter and boiled water for my evening meal: Beef Stroganoff.  For dessert I had a bag of homemade trail mix.  The first star made it's appearance.  It was actually Venus but I wasn't picky ... I made a wish on it anyway.  It was joined by the Moon.  The Moon would be blotting out some of the stars tonight but I didn't mind too much.  The Moon is on its way to becoming a supermoon on Monday - the largest since 1948.  It won't be this large again until 2034.

The last of the day's light, my tent, and the first star of the night.

Then I let off steam.  I asked the Moon "What the heck is going on?"  I pleaded with the stars to tell me what I should do.  Yes, I did this out loud - I do talk to myself often.  I ranted and raved about how crappy 2016 was turning out to be and the Universe didn't care.  But I did feel better after talking my way through a few things.  That was why I'd gone camping.

Despite the bright moon, there were still stars to witness my rantings.

The fire burned quicker than I expected and I was out of wood and fire by 7:30pm but all this soul searching wore me out so I climbed into my tent and fell asleep.  It was a cold night with temperatures near 37°F (2.8°C).  I was in my long underwear bottoms, long sleeve t-shirt, socks, balaclava, stocking cap, sleeping bag liner, and sleeping bag.  Around 3:00am I woke up and I was cold so I put on my fleece jacket and snuggled deeper into my sleeping bag.  The fleece did the trick and I was able to fight off the chill the rest of the night.

I woke up around 5:00am to the sound of wind.  Lots of wind.  I spent the next hour dozing in and out and thinking how I would stow the tent in such a high wind.  I packed my backpack and crawled out of the tent.  As soon as my weight was out of the tent it took off.  I grabbed it before it could fly off the ridge and ran for the groundsheet that took off as well.  I stuffed the groundsheet under my pack to hold it in place while I walked around the remains of the shelter to find a place out of the wind.  I managed to find such a spot and I stuffed the tent back into its bag.

The Sun's first light over the path forward ... but I went the other way back to the car.

I poured the remainder of my water on the still hot coals of the fire and headed down the trail back to the car.  After a stop at McDonalds for my customary hot cakes and large OJ, I headed home back to the real world.  I think the camp probably did me some good.

This will probably be the last camp for the year and probably the last until I start the Appalachian Trail.  This may change if we have weird warm weather this winter but I'm not expecting that to happen.

Pictures were added to the end of my 2014-2016 Camping in Iowa and Nebraska Google Photos album.

Camp #11: Preparation Canyon Sunset And Sunrise

My eleventh camp was in Preparation Canyon.  I've camped here two times before and I've always liked how remote it feels.

Preparation Canyon Sunset.

The park is a fairly small park but is is surrounded by farmland and the nearests towns, Moorhead and Pisgah, Iowa, are small.  The area is rural.  It is also Trump country based on the number of political signs I saw going to and from the park.  I was hoping it would be a quiet night but I forgot it is harvest season and the distant sounds of combines harvesting corn could be heard all night (I think I still heard them when I woke up at 2:30am though I might have dreamt it).

The campsite looks small when seen from a nearby trail.

Like the other campsites I have used in this park, there was no real level ground to pitch the tent on.  This meant I would wake up to one side of the tent in the morning.  I found the best spot I could up hill from the picnic table, opposite the fire ring, and put up the tent.

I like fall camping.  The temperatures are crisp, the skies are often clear, and the stars go on forever.  This fall camp was a bit odd.  First of all the temperatures were above 70°F (21°C).  Secondly the low temperature for the night was 56°F (13°C) which is much milder than I expected for this time of year.  Lastly there was a whisp of high altitude clouds that obscured, but did not totally block, the stars.

A nice fire to contemplate life beside.

I lit my fire before the sun went down.  The wood that I collected was very dry and the fire burned hot and quick.  I had to collect more wood over the next hour to keep it going.  I sat at the picnic table and ate my Spaghetti with Meat Sauce while watching the sun set and the fire burn.  On my other camping trips I usually do a lot of reading by the fire.  This one I just sat by the fire, looking into the flames, and letting my thoughts wander.

A leaf covered trail brings back memories of youth.

Once the sun had completely fallen below the horizon I layed down on the picnic table bench and looked up at the stars.  I'd hoped to see a lot tonight as the forecast was for clear skies but the wispy clouds blocked some of the view and dimmed many of the stars.  Nevertheless the stars still shined and I saw a lot more than I can from the deck of our house.

I got in the tent early (8:00pm) and read a little of my ebook before falling asleep,  I slept surprisingly well and only woke up a few times during the night.  I got up just after 7:00am, before the sun came up over the horizon, broke camp, and poured the remainder of my water on the cold ashes of my fire.

I returned to the car walking on a leaf covered trail.  There is something about the sound of fall leaves crunching and shooshing under my feet that makes me feel content.  Maybe it's a memory of jumping in piles of leaves when I was a kid.

I drove home making only one stop along the way - my customary McDonald's hotcakes and large orange juice that I always have after camping.  It was a good camp and, weather permitting, I will have one more in November. (Pictures have been added to the end of my 2014-2016 Camping in Iowa and Nebraska Google Photos album.)

After every sunset there will be a sunrise.

Photograph: "Color Explosion"

The odd summer and fall weather we are having seems to be delaying and extending the fall colors this year.  No complaints from me.

"Color Explosion"

by Bruce H.

Photograph: "Shadows Of Autumn - 1 & 2"

Imprints of fallen leaves.

"Shadows of Autumn - 1"

by Bruce H.

"Shadows of Autumn - 2"

by Bruce H.

Photograph: "Walk Of Fall" {Colors Of Fall 2015}

One last photograph in the Colors of Fall 2015 series.

"Walk of Fall"

by Bruce H.

A tree lined walkway displaying the colors of fall.  I little bit of every color on display.

This picture, a part of a series {Colors of Fall 2015}, was taken in Tom Hanafen River's Edge Park in Council Bluffs, IA on the 16th of October 2015