Welcome Fall

Monumental rain records being set with high winds 50 mph plus tonight.  The saturated ground brings promise of a lot of tree toss. 

I am recovering from a nasty cold and took a short walk this morning before the afternoon storms arrive.  In the woods plenty of evidence of broken limbs and leaves and mosses tossed about.

Fall is mushroom time and this is when hunters seek their bounty.  I saw some pretty awesome Lobster Mushrooms while at the beach and had chanterelles on toast for dinner one night.

Today the mushrooms in the woods are bursting forth.  Many look like the downpour of rain has done them in.  snapped off stalks and caps beaten apart.  The Douglas Squirrels will have a lot of work to hang and dry their foraged mushrooms.  That is if it dries up for a few more weeks.

This monster was and example of how big some of the mushrooms are getting.  I am not 100% sure but I think this is a white chanterelle

Not that impressed.  This is the same mushroom holding my phone.

All over small dainty brown umbrella type mushrooms mixed with Big Leaf Maple Leaves.  This log held an array of little mushrooms.  These are slightly soft to the touch and when they become mature a pore will open on the top.  After that they will puff out their spores when rain or falling leaves touch them.

This white gilled cap is being eaten by a Banana Slug.  Go Sluggy!

Little coral-like fingers push up.  I like the large corals that grow east of the mountain.  Those are tasty eating, though messy to clean.

have the spare batteries at the ready for any power outage that might strike.  Heaven forbid it strike when the series finale of Breaking Bad is on tonight.

Walking in the Rain

A rainy Spring weekend.  In high contrast with last weekends sunny and 70, it is low clouds and barely 50.  In the mountains, snow is once again falling so I must stick to the wet side.

Yesterday was Biosurvey at Ohop.  My love for this place cannot even be diminished by the rain.

Newly arrived swallows; Violet-green, Tree, Barn and Rough-wing were found swooping all over the fields.  The Rough-wing traced its way up and down the creek, while the others took higher to the sky.

The creek is flowing deep.  During salmon runs it is fairly shallow.  If you look closely at the creek you will see a line across.  This is a device that counts salmon that have microchips.

We rambled the fields for a soggy 2 1/2 hours looking for signs, sounds and sights of living things.  It was slow going.  I am happy to say my waterproof pants boots and coat really do the trick.  Even they, however, could not keep my electronic data recording device from seizing up.

Another two months and this field will be alive with greenery and, no doubt, bugs galore.  The birds eventually will find great feeding in the hundreds of young trees.

The trees and shrubs planted over the last few years are thriving.

Today with rain coming down in buckets I revisited Washington Park to see my flowers.  The rain was really coming down as I neared Anacortes, but by the time I parked it was a more sedate rain.  I figure as I was going to be in the woods most of the way, it really didn't matter that much.  There were only a few souls out.  All were well protected from the rain by a wide variety of foul-weather gear.

And I got my prize.

White Fawn Lily are abundant in the mossy glades. 

The Calypso Orchids are going strong. 

 

 

I even found a large number of Coralroot Orchid starting to spike.  Right now they look like red asparagus breaking through the forest floor litter.  I found them all along my route and I don't remember seeing this many in the past.

On the south slope the Serpintine soil supports a wide array of unusual flowers.  Yellow Monkey Flower decorate the rock faces

Spring Gold, Sea Blush, Blue-eyed Mary and buttercup carpet the open slopes.

The rare Puget Sound Juniper thrives on these slopes.

A Banana Slug slips easily along the glacier gouged Serpentine rocks.

That is the front of my size 11 Ahnu boot so you can appreciate how big this fat fellow is.

I officially love my boots.  I got a gel insert and now they fit perfectly!  They are comfy and waterproof too!

Perhaps next weekend we will see how the comfy boots face the threat of cactus

Falling for Orange

When looking for ideas for exploration I am usually driven by several factors.  I am enjoying Geocaching in a low key manner and if someplace I am heading has a geocache or two, more the better.   My Flickr photography projects are never far from my mind. 

Currently I am doing two projects; "The Monthly Scavenger Hunt" and a 365 Project where I take a photo every day and post it on line.  The Monthly Scavenger Hunt lists 15 topics, concepts or ideas at the beginning of each month and we try to convey them with our image.  For the 365 Project we receive a "color of the month" and each days photo must feature that color.  Inside the 365 there are some who try to capture the same type subject every month.  At the end of the year you will have 12 images, in different colors, of the same type subject.  I have almost completed a full year of this project and my monthly special subject capture is a house.

This months color is orange.  With Fall colors slipping away I went out yesterday and today to capture some foliage shots.  It is rainy and the dreary gray skies make many things look dull.  How some of the trees would be glorious with a bit of sunshine lighting them up.

I set out for the Chinese Garden at South Seattle Community College.  I knew the garden opened at noon and figured I would visit the Washington Park Arboretum first, then the Chinese Garden in West Seattle after.  Of course in my easily distracted morning mind, I drove out on I-90 and soon found myself in West Seattle at the campus... at 9am. 

I was happy to find a little arboretum right there and since it was always open to the public, I put the Chinese Garden aside for another day.  I strolled around enjoying the nice collection of conifer trees and shrubs of all types.

I always love gardens when they have water ways and bridges.  They always add a photogenic touch.

 I found this Pinus contorta "Chief Joseph" by the little waterway.  This is its normal Fall and Winter colour.  In the Spring the needles will green up again.

Another conifer changing color.  This Dawn Redwood will drop its needles.  I love the disgruntled face in the little cone.

In the entry garden I could not resist trying to capture the raindrops.  Here on a berry.

and an explosion of Dalia

Heading back to visit the Washington Park Arboretum as originally planned, I missed a tricky ramp exit off the West Seattle Bridge.  Ah well, I figured, I might as well go via 23rd Avenue up the heart of the oldest neighborhoods in town.  Along the way it dawned on me that for this month I was going to have to find an orange house ( oh no an ORANGE house).  I eyes instantly started swiveling around as I knew many of the neighborhoods I would be passing through were given to some pretty colorful takes on house decor.  It was not long before I found this little turn of the last century gem.

I ambled around the arboretum for a while and know that I must come back here in the Spring when the Rhodie's are in full bloom.

Today I set out for a good solid hike around the Cougar Mountain Wilderness Park .  At 3100 acres it is filled with many trails, most barely two people wide.  Some trails are open to horses and it is a highly popular with trail runners.  The parking lot was filled at 8am with people who likely cannot accept that "Fall Back" = sleep in.  Hikers, runners, dog walkers, the lot was full.  I thought I was in for a busy day.  I headed out and quickly found myself in wonderful solitude.  I had loaded up about 10 Geocache co-ordinates and I set off for what turned out to be a 4 hour loop hike.  It was drizzly a bit but most of the moisture came from heat arising from wearing my waterproof coat.  I soon opened the vents of my coat, but my glasses were happy to steam up.  I need to keep up these distance conditioning hikes for my vacation next year.  The complex of parks here in the Issaquah area ; Cougar, Squak and Tiger have miles of trails and ample opportunity for long flat distances or good stiff climbs.

The Big-leaf Maples  are dropping their leaves in abundance and the trails big and small were paved over.  A person not savvy to finding their way on the smaller trails might get a little confused, but I had no issues today.  This is the wide main trail that runs down the middle of the park.  small side trails take you off in every direction.  Many of the old coal mines, the old town and community that flourished here are discussed with helpful signs.

But for the most part you wind you way around on little trails that take you to nice waterfalls and viewpoints.  Coal Creek Falls were not running heavy, even though we have had a fair amount of rain.  I have to wonder if the ground and trees are still soaking the water up following the extra long dry season we just left.

The fine drizzle left a lot of pretty drops on the mosses.  I cannot resist moss communities.  For my monthly scavenger hunt, one of the subjects is texture.  I think this photo conveys "mossy" texture pretty well.

Drip drip drip... The Fall continues

Kubota Garden in the Spring

I took advantage of a relatively mild day and visited Kubota Garden. I have not seen this lovely place in the early Spring. I also had "garden" as a topic for my monthly scavenger hunt. This seemed the best place to be. It was a tough choice but the view of Mr Kubotas Heart Bridge was my favorite shot.

I arrived quite early and there were already many cars in the parking lot. I noted that there had been a sale the previous day. I am sorry to have missed that as there is certainly someone I could have bought a pretty plant for. The Kubota Foundation raises money to help support the park and they also need to gather volunteers to take care of the hours upon hours of weeding and maintenance that this park deserves. Next weekend is a Japanese Maple Festival with lectures and tours.

I was dazzled by the variety of maples and astonished at how many of them come into their leaves without green color. This lovely maple near the Heart Bridge was stunning in the weak sun glow.

Takes my breath away.

Last October, when I visited it was green.

Some maples have variegated leaves, others have dramatic bark colors.

There was a lot of blooms both small flowers and big trees. As expected many Azaleas and Rhodies. Some were already past bloom, but some are quite tightly budded and will be wonderful in a week. I had a bit of fun capturing rain drops on different subjects.

Hosta is coming up everywhere.

There were a lot of forget-me-not and a large purple flower that is in the same family as our native Self-heal. I rounded a corner and was greeted by this.

A Purple Tide. It made me think of waves.

This Song Sparrow could not stop singing.

I could not possibly grow tired of this place. It is ever changing.

Soggy Wet Girls Weekend

A soggy wet Girls Weekend with my sisters. We stayed at Olive 8, a somewhat new hotel in the Hyatt chain.

We did our usual rounds of the area, including shopping at Pacific Place and stopping by Sees in Westlake Center.

The gloomy weather made for interesting lighting.

The new AllSaints Spitalfields store window certainly caught my eye. An umbrella comes in handy for killing the reflection when taking pictures through windows.

And no matter what the sign says, this is still the Bon Marche.

Then up to see the windows at Fox's Gem Shop. They have one display I don't remember from before. I love them.

Sushi Restaurant

Sewing Room

There was a lot of wet walking about. I am here to say having sensible shoes is a must, even if you want to get your sparkly girly girl on.

I will never live it down, I am sure.

We had dinner at Tulios again this year. I think we have decided that this is the best restaurant for us. Comfortable with great service and great food. The calamari appetizer was particularly memorable. "A Christmas Story" at the 5th Avenue was fun but certainly does not match the movie it was taken from.

We are having more than our share of weather this season and this weekend in racking up some big numbers in the region for rainfall.

Amazingly enough this is not as bad as some recent years. I had to detour getting home as my usual main road is flooded over.

Hooray for Pineapple Express.

From www.cliffmass.blogspot.com That is downtown Seattle just to the right of the big green spot in the center.