SkyWatch Friday: Summer Sets, Autumn Dawns

Seems it was summer just yesterday! Or at least just last weekend….

But all good things must come to an end, and so the sun has set on another summer season. Literally. I took this series of sunset photos over the course of 15 minutes from the all-but-deserted Sheridan visitors center/rest area off I-90 last Friday evening. We'd gone there to use the free RV dump station after a weeklong camping trip in northern Montana (future post!), only to be thwarted by a new - and premature, IMO - "Dump Station Closed for the Season" sign and a winterized, waterless hose. Oh well, at least I'd thought to bring my camera since the views of the Big Horn Mountains from the visitors center seldom disappoint!

Going...

going...

gone.

But even more spectacularly than it set on the final weekday of summer, the sun rose on the first day of autumn. What an enthusiastic greeting for the new season! I took these straight-out-of-the-camera photos just 7 minutes apart. Amazing how much the sky can change in such a brief time...

06:45

06:47

06:52

That sunrise will be hard to top, but I'll give it my best from now till the winter solstice. :-) Meanwhile...

And happy spring to all you Southern Hemisphereans! :-)

SkyWatch Friday: "Harvest Moonday" Hike, Early Snow

It's been a week of many seasons - Monday and Tuesday were definitely summer, with highs of 90ºF. Most nights and early mornings recently have had the chill of Autumn to them, and Wednesday was a chilly, rainy, Fallish day. Wednesday night and Thursday we were under a Winter Storm Warning and it snowed several inches (14" in our neighboring, higher elevation town of Story and up to 18" in parts of the Big Horns). Though we didn't get nearly that much (about 4" at our house), by early this morning our temp had dropped to 19ºF.

But let's begin with the summery weather and Harvest Moon of Monday, before the flowers, trees and shrubs were dealt such a cruel blow that also likely annihilated our chances for fall foliage.

Monday morning, before it got too hot, we loaded up the dogs and took them walking on a new extension of the wonderful Sheridan Pathways system (on the attached map, it's the red and black path near the bottom right, running between the yellow and purple signal light symbols). This part of the path leaves very busy Brundage Avenue and as it heads toward Sheridan College it takes you into a different world… one of trees and marshes and birdsong and tranquility. And shade - which was our chief objective on such a warm, sunny morning!

Here are BW, Willow and Josie crossing one of two handsome footbridges that cross the marshy stream meandering through this area...

Once over the footbridge (you can just see it in the bottom right of this next photo) and out of the trees and into the meadows, you get to enjoy this beautiful view of the soon-to-be-snowcapped Big Horn Mountains (if you know where to look, you can even see the road that led to our old house on its way over the mountains!)…

Look at that clear blue cloudless sky!

Oops, I spoke too soon. Startin' to cloud up. :-)

And you thought I was joking about it clouding up, didn't you? ;-)

Here's Willow enjoying a rest in the shade back at the trailhead after our walk. Notice her leg draped elegantly over my foot, her way of keeping me from wandering off! :-) …

She was intently watching BW deploy our wonderful PetLoader, which Tess demonstrates...

That night, of course, unveiled the full Harvest Moon, seen here rising over the dry hills to our east...

Rarely satisfied with how my moon closeups turn out, I decided to have some fun and make this one a little funkadelic….

And now for a too-soon taste of things to come, the wintery scene from our patio yesterday…

We covered our front flowerbed Wednesday night, but could do nothing for our large rose bush except pluck this last beautiful, fragrant bloom and bring it inside to enjoy for a while. The bergamot on the right had already broken off when I went out at 5:30am to knock the snow off the trees and shrubs, so I brought it in, too. I think the rose looks sad, and doubt the reassurance that our temps will return to the 80's early next week offers much consolation…

Wishing you a week of lovely skies! 

We'll be spending it in Big Sky Country (Montana) with our dogs and camper! 

Happy Campers!

I am pleased to report that as both a learning experience and a fun outing, our inaugural camping adventure on Thursday with Girasole, our new little T@B trailer, was a success (though not without a bit of unanticipated excitement!) Naturally I had to record it for posterity. :-)

Here's BW putting the finishing touches on setting up our campsite under the watchful - if somewhat baffled - gaze of the girls...

And here BW conducts a final inspection of our portable dog kennel set-up, which met with everyone's enthusiastic approval...

We bought two of these for the kennel, used a few of the interlocking foam mats we'd purchased to go under their beds, and used an old tarp for a shady shelter. And we hauled all of it (plus more of the mats and our folding camp chairs) on top of the Jeep in our new soft cargo bag. BW's package-car loading days at UPS (memorialized on his water bottle, lol) sure came in handy...

The kennel was very handy for keeping the girls both safe and legal (the park has a leash law) while we were busy and overnight, though they were so very well-behaved (as we knew they would be) that they were quite content to just hang out with us, never wandering off or making a sound, even when other people walked by with their dogs. We camped along the Tongue River (I think; I'll explain later!) at Connor Battlefield State Park in Ranchester, about 20 miles north of Sheridan. It's a small campground, and when we arrived at around 2 that afternoon there were only two other campers there. A few more arrived during the night, but it stayed very quiet. Except for the trains! We didn't realize the tracks were just three blocks away, and trains went by all night long, blowing their whistles with gusto. The only thing that drowned them out was the thunder - I know, look at that cloudless blue sky, right? More on the unpredicted midnight storm coming up. Meanwhile, enjoy our peaceful campsite by day, like we did...

We also all enjoyed our walks around the park. Let me take you on a little tour…

This place wasn't always peaceful. This monument marks the site where an Arapaho village of about 500 inhabitants once stood...

At around 8 in the morning of August 29, 1865, in what is now known as the Battle of the Tongue River (or Connor Battle), the non-belligerent village was attacked by Gen. Patrick Connor, commander of the Powder River Expedition, and about 300 of his soldiers. Most of the young Arapaho men were gone, raiding ponies from the Crow along the Big Horn River. The women, children, and mostly elderly men who were left in the village were caught completely off guard by the attack and the indiscriminate firing by the soldiers, and many were killed, wounded, and captured. After the initial attack, the few able warriors in the village managed to put up an effective defense, retreating 12 miles up Wolf Creek while covering the escape of the surviving women and children. Most of the soldiers remained in the village, looting and burning about 250 lodges, while Connor and 30 or so of his soldiers and Pawnee scouts pursued the retreating Arapaho, who counter-attacked. When all was said and done, Connor claimed to have killed 63 Arapaho, including 35 warriors (the latter number one that historians believe was probably exaggerated), with a loss to himself of five dead and two seriously wounded.

The highly observant among you may have noticed that we happened to be camping there on the 149th anniversary of this tragedy, and its victims were very much on my mind. I agree with what this brief article about "The Connor Battle," states in its final sentence: "The tragic events of the past can be felt in this quiet and contemplative setting." And I take issue with calling an unprovoked attack on non-combatants a "battle." It's worth noting that as the Powder River Expedition began, Connor's orders to his officers were, "You will not receive overtures of peace or submission from Indians, but will attack and kill every male Indian over 12 years of age." (Connor's superiors countermanded this order). It's also worth noting that after this, the Arapaho did become enemies of the US Army (understandably!), attacking a wagon train three days later on Sept 1 and joining forces with the Cheyenne and Lakota (Sioux) in their successful attack on Fort Fetterman the following December.

I think the Arapaho may be continuing to exact a small measure of revenge, in that both times we've visited this park we've been attacked by a cloud of mosquitos whenever we stood before this monument. Didn't matter what time of day it was, and we didn't experience it anywhere else in the park!

All that history of violence and tragedy here stands in stark contrast to the playground that now also marks the spot. It was deserted the entire time we were there and so never disrupted the "quiet and contemplative setting"...

The bison appeared to be made for climbing with all its toeholds and handholds,

while the stagecoach was a unique alternative to typical playground equipment.

On the opposite side of the park is this nifty suspension footbridge that crosses the river (or creek?) to a residential area. The dogs were very brave about crossing it a few times, given that it sways and bounces noticeably!  

Despite the bouncing, the bridge provided a great vantage point for taking the next two photos. I have tried to do my homework on this, I really have - but I still don't know if this waterway, which wends its way around three sides of the park, is the Tongue River or Wolf Creek. Wolf Creek is a tributary of the Tongue River and the road that runs along this portion of the river/creek is "Wolf Creek Road." The river/creek is identified on various maps of the town and park as the Tongue River, Wolf Creek, and Five-Mile Creek (where'd that one come from?!) I'm guessing the portion beside our campsite where the water flows more rapidly is the Tongue River, and this more sedate portion opposite is Wolf Creek, but that's the best I can do. It's pretty, whatever it's called, especially with the evening sun shining on it and the Big Horn Mountains in the distance...

The arrow is pointing to our campsite and "outfit," as they call a truck or a tow vehicle + trailer-of-any-kind combination in these parts...

While we relaxed at our campsite that evening, I noticed a white church steeple, nicely illuminated by the evening sun in the distance on the other side of the river, and took this photo of it with my telephoto lens...

Not long after, when we took the girls for another stroll across the suspension bridge to explore the surrounding neighborhoods, we came upon the church, which turned out to have a Mini-Me! lol...

As dusk fell, we went inside and prepared our first meal in Girasole - a complex affair that we slaved over for hours! ;-)~ We've enjoyed various Dr. McDougall soups at home for years and are happy that they, along with his delicious oatmeal, are also perfect for camping (just add hot water)! BW had snagged the chocolate goodies at the health food store the day before, but the beer was a spontaneous purchase. We've been told by several veteran RV campers that some people engage in this activity in order to socialize (so our main goal being to get away from people might prove tricky!), and we'd also heard that the colorful T@Bs are people magnets. Sure enough, we'd barely arrived and were setting up the dog kennel when a man from one of the two other campers in the park strolled over to visit and ask about our T@B, Scotch on the rocks in hand. He was joined later by his wife, who we'd hoped was coming to fetch his talkative ass but no such luck, she was there to join him (with a stinky lit cigarette in her hand, yuck). They were nice people, but a half hour of their uninvited, chatty company right after we'd arrived was a bit much! Anyway, a while after they left I said to BW, "I don't even like Scotch, but damn his drink looked good to me!" And BW said, "I thought so too!" And then together we said, "Let's get beer!!!" :-) Our site had no shade, Mr. and Mrs. Chatty Britches and the other camper having snagged the only two shady spots, and running our A/C really sucked the generator juice, so needing to get more fuel gave BW a great excuse to pick up some Fat Tire ale while he was at it. We enjoyed our simple meal on our new table (having ditched the heavy convertible table/bed platform that came with Girasole, installing bed rails and slats instead along with getting this lightweight folding table), by the light of our sweet new little 3-way LED lantern...

While we were noshing, BW remembered Girasole's stereo and jumped up to turn it on. It happened to be tuned to Sheridan's oldies station and he'd turned it on just as the chorus to Still the One was beginning! "We're still having fun after all these years…" :-) So of course we clinked our beer bottles and sang along! (And you can too, as I've put the video with lyrics at the bottom of this post!) :-)

It's all fun and games till a wicked thunderstorm that no one predicted appears overhead at 1am (a ghostly, meteorological anniversary reenactment of Connor's attack on the Arapaho, perhaps?) BW got up when he heard one of the dogs pawing at the fence (most likely Tess, who is terrified of thunderstorms), and that's when he saw all the lightning in our vicinity. A loud crack of thunder woke ME up, and the race was on. Willow and Josie can't safely or easily jump in or out of our Jeep anymore, so we bought this PetLoader a few weeks ago - best purchase we've made. But we had to get it untethered from the back of the Jeep and deploy it, put a harness on Willow (she still has bouts of vertigo and holding the top of the harness helps steady her as she uses the PetLoader steps), put collars and leashes on Tess and Josie, gather and shake off their beds and put them in the Jeep, and then load the girls - in the dark and the wind (luckily the rain held off), with lightning striking all around us and thunder crashing and banging overhead. Though our girls haven't used the PetLoader very often - and never under such challenging circumstances - they were real champs! Loaded right up and spent the rest of the night sleeping contentedly in the back of the Jeep. We rolled the windows down so they could catch the nice breeze, and although it rained most of the rest of the night we were all lucky that the inside of the Jeep stayed dry. I checked on them at 4 in the morning and wish I had a photo of our little angels snoring peacefully away, all lying with their butts touching in the middle of the Jeep with their bodies fanned out like flower petals. :-)

The next morning we had a muddy mess to contend with, but that's all part of the camping experience. It was chilly and overcast but the rain didn't resume, and as you can see in the reflection of Girasole's front window we even had a few tatters of blue sky flirt with us before it finally cleared up late that morning. I took photos of the pretty, chameleon-like sky and will share them as part of this week's SkyWatch post. Meanwhile, here is BW sipping his hot tea and being entertained by Willow's vain attempts to convince Tess it would be fun to mud-wrestle...

I'm pretty sure that packing up, getting there, unpacking and setting up camp, then tearing it down, repacking, driving home and cleaning everything up took longer than our actual camping did! :-) But it was a great experience and we are really looking forward to our next one, a much longer trek to northern Montana, a little later this month. We'll see if Girasole is "Still the One" and if "we're still having fun" after that adventure! :-)

SkyWatch Friday: May Showers (& Flowers)

"As above, so below" - it's been a hectic, busy week at ground level as well as overhead! Since this is a SkyWatch post, I'll stick mostly with the "as above" part, so here we go...

Our late afternoon skies on Cinco de Mayo were filled with nubes ominosas, but hey, there's always that silver lining…

By the next day it was the forecast that was ominous, calling for rain, snow, wind, and much colder temps through late yesterday. Once we'd gotten all our yard work done and walked the dogs while it was still pleasant, I grabbed my camera and went on a little walkabout to capture the transition in progress overhead:

This was our fairish, blueish, puffy-cloud filled happy sky to the east, on its way out...

While from the same spot, a mere 90º pivot to the west revealed the grouchy, storm-filled sky that was on its way in… 

A short walk along that path leads to the driveway of this property. It's not every day you see a Jolly Roger flying from a Wyoming flagpole! Avast mateys, time to reef the mainsail!...

(The smoke that the keen-eyed among you may have spied in the distance below the Jolly Roger is from the springtime burning of fields. I worry about the wee critters who live in them, and hate the acrid smell!)

No surprise, seeing those threatening skies, that they did indeed open up and pelt us with windblown hard rains that night, and sloppy rain/snow mixes from then until yesterday afternoon. For a while on Wednesday it snowed so hard we couldn't see across the street. (Didn't stick, though, thank goodness!) Anyway, in some news from ground level, the hardy spring flowers in our neighbors' yard didn't seem to mind that the drinks served this week were mostly Slushies...

They put on a happy, colorful Spring parade in spite of the dreary weather!

SkyWatch Friday: Happy houses for "Flutter Mouses!" :-)

Last month, during our long stretch of balmy weather, we took the dogs to the Sheridan VA Medical Center a couple of times for fun romps. The VAMC has been on BW's UPS route for years, and he enjoys taking his lunch break there - it's a beautiful place of panoramic mountain views, lovely parade grounds and handsome old buildings (it began life as Fort MacKenzie in 1898, and the first troops stationed there, in 1901, were "Buffalo Soldiers"). Though BW knows the VAMC well, our off-road hiking led to some fun new discoveries - including a very impressive array of bat houses! We estimated that there were about 50 of them and they stretched for close to a mile. Some looked a bit aged and weathered, others brand new. We have no idea what their story is, but my theory is that they're made by some of the resident Veterans as a therapeutic project. I think that would be great - something that helps the vets and the bats!

By the way, I much prefer the German word for "bat" - Fledermaus, which translates to "flutter mouse!" :-)

On our first visit I didn't have my camera, so I insisted we return the following weekend - Thanksgiving weekend - so I could photograph them (and some other goodies, fodder for future blog posts). As you'll see, we enjoyed quite a variety in weather and skies during the hour or so we spent there...

Living in community 

That large building in the background is the commanding officer's quarters. More staff residences follow the line of bat houses into the distance. Having bats as neighbors provides great benefits, as a single little brown bat can eat 1000 mosquito-sized insects per hour. And that's just one benefit bats provide to their eco-systems, and to humans. The vast majority of bats (2/3) are insect eaters, consuming many insects that are damaging to crops or that spread diseases. Most of the remaining 1/3 are fruit and nectar eaters, making them important pollinators and essential seed dispersers, playing an especially major role in rainforest regeneration. (Read more about the benefits of bats).

Mystery solved!

The actual houses face toward the mountains and away from the VA grounds, so when we first saw them from behind they just looked like a lot of very tall blank plywood signs! As we approached them to see what, if anything, was on the mountain side of them, we could start to see that they were three-dimensional and not just flat squares of plywood, but agreed they were awfully tall to be birdhouses. So I guessed they might be bat houses, and ta da! Indeed they were. I love the little bat image to help clarify it (for the humans rather than the bats, I'm sure!) :-)

Vacancy 

It's definitely the off-season, as bats in temperate climates must hibernate or migrate to warmer places. But we look forward to seeing how many residents might show up with the insects this spring!

A well-planned community

Bat Conservation International provides great instructions and tips on building and/or installing bat houses, and it sure looks like the VAMC definitely did everything right.

No trespassing!

The metal sleeve helps keep any predators from reaching the bat bedrooms!

And isn't the sunlight pretty on the distant dry hills? The views are lovely in every direction.

A vibrant, diverse neighborhood

That huge brush pile on the right, which extends well beyond the edge of this photo, is a popular habitat for many more critters, especially bunnies!

Rooms with a view

That bats are blind is one of the many myths surrounding these misunderstood critters. Though they use echolocation (sonar) to navigate in the dark, which allows them - through sound alone - to see everything but color in great detail, many also have excellent sight vision. So this spectacular view is not wasted on them! :-)

Learn more about the fascinating lives and myriad benefits of bats, install your own bat house(s), and/or help bat conservancy with a visit to Bat Conservation International!

:-)

And, as always, enjoy wonderful glimpses of skies around the world with a visit to...