thematic photographic no. 194

Here are a couple more on the theme Strong Lines. And like yesterday's, these photos were both shot on a trip to San Francisco. I guess I was working on a theme without even knowing it.

Fort Funston graffiti

Gnarly tree, Golden Gate Park

Now go on and check out some of the other fine work at Carmi's blog, Written Inc.

wordless wednesday no. 22

camp cactus excursions, inc.

You know how it is when friends come to visit. You take them out and show them the local geography and points of interest, both personal and touristy. They tag along on errands and walk around the neighborhood, and the best guests manage to merge seamlessly into the rhythm of your everyday life. When I go visit friends, I like to see where they hang out, and how people live in a place, not just the places a guidebook says are interesting.

My sister in law and niece have been in town for a few days, and we've gotten around more than we have in ages.

The other day we drove up to Mt. Saint Helens and checked out the crater and the movie at the visitor's center on Johnston Ridge, the area directly in the path of the gigantic eruption in 1980. The view of the crater was spectacular, but the movie suffered from a seemingly tiny budget and a little too much special effects envy.

It seems a little odd that the government would spend millions of dollars building a visitor's center so close to a still very active volcano, but hey- I'm glad they did. It saved us a very grueling hike.

All around the area the destruction is still quite apparent, even after nearly 30 years. Ridges miles away from the blast are still covered with the carcasses of giant fir trees that were toppled like matchsticks, and dried mud flows over a hundred feet deep in some places smothered the forest and changed the landscape in a matter of hours. The power of Mother Nature is very sobering, indeed.


On our way home we stopped at a local restaurant on the Washington side of the Columbia River that's known for its great river views and unique artwork, which is everywhere:

(And this is just the art in the women's restroom.)

Too bad we couldn't talk Dave into taking pictures in the men's room. Stay tuned for our trip to downtown Portland and the X-rated sandcastles.

not exactly disney world, part 2

Yesterday, following this prompt from San Diego Momma, (What is your craziest travel adventure?) I started telling this tale from my sordid past. Scroll down to read part one. Here's part two:

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(photo borrowed from this guy)

After we'd regained our composure in the restroom of a gas station in nearby Pittsfield, my boyfriend (always looking ahead for an opportunity to mooch) suggested, that since we were in Massachusetts with no place to go, I should call up my aunt and see if she was up for a visit. My aunt (actually my great aunt, the matriarch of my father's Irish Catholic family) lived in New Bedford, an old whaling town on the coast near Cape Cod. I had not had any contact with her in a couple of years, but I was pretty sure that she had heard rumors of my fall from grace, ie: my leaving home and school to travel around like a vagrant with my hippie boyfriend whilst thumbing my nose at responsibility and polite society. The thought of calling her up out of the blue (and it would have to be a collect call) made me a nervous wreck.

My father's side of the family (particularly the older generation) seemed to me to have very high standards of moral conduct. Maybe it was the proximity of New Bedford to Plymouth Rock, the original landing site of those uptight pilgrims who founded our country.

Or maybe it was the vision of my aunt's (a retired schoolteacher) stern countenance and upstanding character and the fact that any moral misconduct would be most likely be reported to my father that turned my knees to jello. In any event, the LAST thing I wanted to do was to call my aunt and ask to use her place as a crash pad with my hippie boyfriend and gay sidekick. The boyfriend, in his infinite wisdom, cajoled me into calling her (collect) and telling her that we'd be no trouble...we had a tent, and we could simply pitch it in her backyard and she'd hardly even know we were there.

(photo borrowed from this site)

I made the call from a phone booth somewhere between Pittsfield and Springfield. It did not go over well. Perhaps I didn't have the powers of persuasion that my boyfriend so obviously possessed. Maybe I didn't really want to go there. In any case, my aunt's response was unfailingly polite, but firm. That of course, she'd love to see me, but my friends would have to find alternate arrangements. The tent in the backyard was a definite no. I was relieved, but now I had to face the boyfriend and tell him we had no place to stay. His response was not exactly repeatable.

At this point, my gay best friend suggested we check out Cape Cod. We were headed that direction anyway, and he'd heard it was a nice place to pick up guys hang out, a gathering place for artists and others with alternative lifestyles. Maybe we could camp out there on the Cape for a couple of days and check it out. Next stop: Provincetown.

We rolled into Provincetown that afternoon, our ride dropping us just outside of town on Hwy 6. The weather was warm, and before us spread sand dunes rolling gently out to sea. It looked like the perfect place to camp, and was illegal but free within walking distance of town. We climbed over the guardrail and hiked out a ways, up and down the dunes, and finally pitched the tent on the lee side of a small rise overlooking the ocean and invisible from the road. It was a lovely spot, and we left shortly to check out the scene in Ptown.

We checked out the galleries and gift shops, and as darkness fell, the bar scene picked up. Not being a drinker, and being underage kept me outside on a bench while my boyfriend and friend (who had fake id) checked out the nightlife. As jailbait an underage girl in a gay resort town, I was at least relatively safe alone on my little bench, and after a couple of hours we decided to head back to the tent, and walked back along the road, now brightly lit by a full moon. As we came to the bend in the road where we thought we had set off across the dunes, it was apparent that we had sorely misjudged our wilderness camping skills: the tide had come in while we were out partying, and the water now came almost up to the road, the tops of the dunes just peeking out above the water.

This did not deter my best friend and my boyfriend, who by this time were both three sheets to the wind. They took my hands, and dragged me, whining, into the current, wading waist and then shoulder deep through the tide and up and down across the dunes. We had no idea if our tent was even still where we'd left it. I was positive we were all going to die.

We didn't die, and miraculously found our tent, but I was not convinced that the tide was all the way in, and couldn't sleep most of the night. Someone had to stay awake and keep watch while the two drunken idiots slept like the dead. At one point, a small boat with a searchlight on it motored by (I was convinced it was probably a police patrol boat looking for illegal activity) but they apparently didn't see our bright orange and green tent.

I suppose I did fall asleep for awhile, because I woke up to warm sunlight on the tent, and two snoring guys next to me. I quietly crawled out of my sleeping bag, and felt around for my glasses. When I started to unzip the tent screen, I came face to face with the biggest tick I had ever seen. It was on the outside of the screen, and it was then that I slowly realized all the hazy spots covering the tent I'd noticed before I put my glasses on were actually many, many more giant blood sucking bugs. I lurched away from the tent door, falling over my friend, and started sobbing. I'm not a wuss when it comes to bugs, but this was just too much. I figured these things could probably drain the three of us in about 30 seconds and leave our empty shells for the next high tide to take out.

The boys woke up, probably stirred by my now uncontrollable shaking, and complained loudly. When they realized what was happening, they both sobered up immediately. My boyfriend tried to tell me that they were just flies, and I was being a sissy, until he put his glasses on and gasped. My best friend, on the other hand immediately grasped the situation, and joined me in sobbing hysterically. My boyfriend (ever the knight in shining armour) then took control of the situation and went outside to scrape the ticks off the tent, while we cowered inside. When the coast was clear, we packed up and hiked back to the road, where my best friend promptly stripped naked and begged me to inspect him for ticks. The three of us looked like a trio of monkeys going through each other's hair looking for parasites.

By that summer, I had taken the GED, got my high school diploma, moved to California and enrolled in college in San Francisco.

My boyfriend hooked up with my best girlfriend and mooched off her, crashing in her dorm in upstate NY.

My gay best friend found a sugar daddy in Greenwich Village and took to spending winters in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

c'est la vie.

not exactly a trip to disney world...

Over at San Diego Mama's place, it's Prompt Tuesday #52, and the theme is: Craziest Travel Adventure...here's one:

Now, being a starving artist most of my life, I haven't exactly been a world traveler, but I've had one or two adventures here and there.

(photo borrowed from this guy)

Back when I was a young and stupid 16 year old high school dropout with a 21 year old boyfriend, I did a bit of hitchhiking around the countryside. Unemployed and unencumbered, we'd take off on a whim (mostly his) and head out on the open road. Sometimes we'd go places on our own, and other times he'd sweet talk friends into coming so we could mooch off their relations on the trip. Generally there were drugs and alcohol involved, and the transportation of choice was always hitch hiking.

I know what you're thinking. He was a jerk. An asshole. A child molester. Yes, yes, and yes... to all of the above. I know that now. (Actually, I figured it out about 35 years ago) I'm pretty sure I had an inkling then. But I was 16. I was looking for love in all the wrong places (more on that another time).

So, one fine, late spring day we he decided we should take a trip up to Massachusetts to visit an old friend and neighbor of his, Mrs. Green. Our rent was due, and and since neither of us were employed (I had gotten fired from my job shoveling french fries at McDonald's, (and I'm pretty sure he had never held a real job in his life), and considering that we hadn't paid the rent for a couple of months previously, it seemed a good time to get out of town travel. Mrs. Green had bought a cabin in the Berkshires, in hopes of retiring there someday, and was a good prospect to hit up for money friend who might let us stay there for a bit. We were joined on this trip by our roommate, (my best friend) who was another unemployed 16 year old art school drop out, in the midst of discovering his homosexuality.

We hitch hiked up to the Berkshires from Queens, arriving at Mrs. Green's mountain hideaway just as night fell in the middle of a drenching downpour. Mrs. Green was not in residence. Or maybe she was smart enough not to answer the door. In any event, things were looking bleak. We had the forethought to have brought a tent, but for some reason (Who knows? I certainly was not the one making the decisions) we spent the night in an apparently abandoned car on the dirt road leading up to her cabin. The next morning dawned clear and cold, and we were rudely awakened by an irate Massachusetts hillbilly slamming his fist on the windshield, demanding to know just what the F**K we were doing in his car? We high-tailed it down the muddy road as fast as we could, making tracks for the state highway, and the closest town. Apparently, people don't feel the need to lock up their cars in the country.

* * * * * *

The trip didn't end there, but good Lord, it's 1:43 am, and I've got to get to bed. I promise I'll fill in the rest tomorrow.

(you can read the rest of the story here: http://buenosburritos.blogspot.com/2009/04/not-exactly-disney-world-part-2.html )