Madera Canyon is a desert canyon in the mountains about an hour south of Tucson and just 20 miles north of Mexico. Kim and I stayed a few days in Green Valley, twice making the drive up to the Madera Canyon area to hike. Our first hike of the season on Tuesday was just a few miles, up to a spring feeding a small grove of Arizona Sycamore trees.
This year Bonnie and I added a few sweet pumpkin plants to our garden patches in the backyard. Although the hot and humid summer triggered a battle between the giant leaves and mildew, we still managed to harvest about eight nice sized pumpkins, including a doublet we affectionately named “Butt Pumpkin.”
With the girls in college and busy with summer jobs at home for the summer, Kim and I had a first-ever opportunity to vacation after Labor Day since the girls could take care of the corgis while we were away. For most of this trip, we explored two of Alberta’s beautiful national parks, Jasper National Park and Banff National Park. In Jasper, we tented it at Wapiti Campground just a couple miles from Jasper and tried out our new, smaller tent from REI, and in Banff, we rendezvoused with my younger brother Ross and his wife Gale for a two-night stay at a nice resort above the town. We left Banff together and drove to Ross and Gale’s place in Red Deer, Alberta where our parents have been staying for a couple months in their RV. After the stopover, Kim and I headed south and back into the US to camp for two nights at Apgar in Glacier National Park.
Highlights in Jasper included a hike up Sulpher Mountain (starting from Miette Hot Springs) where we watched a large black bear from the hot springs before hitting the trail. The view from the summit was extraordinary, with a 360-degree view which went for fifty to a hundred miles in one direction. And at the end of the hike, we encountered a modest herd of big horn sheep cutting through the parking lot!
On the way to Banff, we took a detour to explore Lake Louise, a beautiful glacier blue-green lake with a backdrop of high mountains and a glacier covering the rocky ridgline between peaks high above the far end of the lake. And when we got to our resort, Ross and Gale greeted us with a home barbequed steak dinner!
In Glacier National Park, we hiked up and down from Logan Pass into Hidden Lake with a solitary picnic along the shoreline. When we returned to our car 500 meters down the road from the previously full parking lot at Logan Pass, we walked out on the windswept view platform where you can see many miles of the Going-to-the-Sun highway descending and winding westward, and below us and 500 meters away, we observed a large grizzly bear foraging for berries and treetops. A perfect ending to our wildlife viewing on this trip.
On Tuesday, Kim and I visited the century old conservatory at Volunteer Park, Seattle, up on Capital Hill. No matter when we visit, there are wonderful plants to see, growing, blooming, twisting, curling, opening, closing… I especially like the orchids and the desert areas. The conservatory is in need of some restoration, and so if you can stop by and join, enjoy yourself and help keep this treasure in Seattle for years to come.
I took a few photos and posted them in a gallery. Just click the photo below to access the gallery:
Some sunflowers blooming at the conservatory in September
Bonnie set to head to the bus on her first day in a Husky Marching Band uniform.
Husky Marching Band — Bonnie on Day #1
Just back from a short trip to Victoria the evening before, Kim and I set out to regain our bicycle legs, but not overdo it. Continue reading
Kim and I circled Lake Washington again today, via the Redmond Starbucks for large iced lattes, then along route 901 which took us south along the western shore of Lake Samammish, then into Issaquah on a siding road (to I-90). Continue reading
Kim, Bonnie and I went camping last week to Klipchuck Campground on Highway 20 just west of Mazama, Washington. The weather was perfect — highs slowly declining from 75 to about 70 over the four days, clear skies, starry nights. Continue reading
Well… my old blog was scrambled by my hosting company, 1&1.com. I’m still using them, but since they deleted Bonnie’s blog a few years ago in a fit of electron misfires, they really cannot be trusted to host another one. This time I have set up the blog manually and so hopefully I can keep them from screwing it up. We’ll see…