Early October – Kayaking, Bat Yak Dinner – Austin, TX

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Congress Ave bridge

We are on our way to the 3^rd annual Bat Yak Dinner.  This is an afternoon adventure based on seeing small Mexican free-tailed bats taking off from their Congress Avenue Bridge hangout at sunset.

Traffic builds as we approach Austin.  We closely follow one of our fellow kayakers; we are nervous about finding where everyone is meeting for the picnic.  The fortunate thing is our kayaking buddies are easy to spot – kayaks hanging out of the backs of trucks or on trailers are a helpful clue.

Late September – Kayaking, Pennybacker bridge area and Bull Creek

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We are heading into greater Austin for today’s adventure.  Approaching and actual driving through a small part of Austin means sitting on the I-35 parking lot along with other temporary two and three lane parking lots.  This activity reminds us of some of the details we lived through in our past, working life.

Early September - /Kayaking the San Gabriel River near Circleville

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Today is our second expedition with our new found kayaking group.  Waking at 6 to make the rendezvous I am dubious about this trip.  I have no apprehension about paddling; it’s the forecast high of 97+ along with my phone telling me it’s already 80.

Late August 2021 - Kayaking; Killeen Texas

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Through the Pickleball group we belong to, Nicida found a contact for a kayaking group within our city.  The group has a list of 50+ kayakers but like most other groups a smaller percentage of members are actually regularly active.  After trading several emails and determining that group emails headed directly to my trash we got on the list in time for a morning paddling trip on Stillhouse Hollow Lake.

July/August 2021 Trip – The Henry Ford, Mammoth Cave and Hot Spring National Parks

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 The Henry Ford

Fordyce bath house
Hot Springs NP

Approaching metropolitan Detroit traffic builds and roads deteriorate.  Freezing weather, ice, snow and lots of traffic are hard on roads.  We are hoteling near Dearborn the next couple nights to see The Henry Ford - Museum of Innovation and Greenfield Village.  Greenfield Village is a conglomeration of buildings Henry Ford had moved, reassembled and restored representing the early days of America.  They include Ford's birthplace, the Wright brother’s home, their bicycle shop, Thomas Edison’s laboratories, just to name a few.  Arriving later in the day we are only able to spend five hours at the museum.  We could have spent several more seeing everything. 

July/August 2021 Trip – Northern Wisconsin, Pictured Rocks and Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshores

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Northern Wisconsin

Spray Falls - Pictured
Rocks National Lakeshore

My family lives in northern Wisconsin, part of our trip is to see them.  We haven’t seen my sister and her husband since the start of the pandemic.  We had a trip planned last year but nobody felt comfortable given the virus conditions in 2020.

Once in WI we stop for cheese.  We enjoy Henning’s Cheese.  They specialize in cheddar, having many flavors.  We also pick up a few packages of cheese curds.  They are not a favorite of mine but my mom and Nicida love them.  Several bags of cheeses curds disappeared during our brief visit to northern WI.

July/August 2021 Trip – Gateway Arch, Indiana Dunes National Parks, Chicago, IL

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This is an escaping TX heat/visiting family, trip.  We are including visits to four National Parks and two National Lakeshores.

On the way we stop at Elephant Rock State Park in OK.  The campground itself is on Lake Murray, it’s huge, popular for fishing and playing in the water.  We are on a small arm of it, a no wake zone so canoeing, kayaking, fishing and inner tube floating goes on all around us.  We break out our ‘origami/foldable’ Oru kayaks.  While traveling, with a bit of planning and effort, we fit one in the back seat of the truck, the second inside the camper.  With the exception of a paddling class we took a month earlier this is our first opportunity getting out to paddle.

March/April 2021 - Yosemite NP, Saguaro NP, White Sands NP

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Yosemite NP

Moonrise over half Dome

Orange groves and nut trees line the roads heading towards Fresno.  Once through town we see development give way to open ranch land then rolling hills.  The snow topped Sierra Nevada mountains form the backdrop to the east.  Our route is one of the main roads entering Yosemite National Park.  We are here for a photography workshop lead by Gary Hart.  The next portion of my blog is an unsolicited story of our workshop experience.

March/April 2021 - Joshua Tree NP, Kings Canyon/Sequoia NP

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General Grant sequoia

Our goal for this trip is to make it to Yosemite National Park for a landscape photography workshop.  On the way we will visit friends, relatives and several national parks.  We will spend several days at Yosemite for the workshop adding a few days to practice our skills before visiting a few more parks on our way back home.

We face the usual southwest spring weather during our drive across TX, NM, AZ and CA - incessant head wind.  At times the skies are brown from the blowing dust.  Driving through a pass just east of Tucson, sleet and freezing temperatures are added to the wind.  We stop outside of Phoenix for the night on our way to Joshua Tree National Park.  I don’t want to know our gas mileage; I know it is low due to the wind.  I almost see the needle move towards ‘E’ whenever I step on the gas.