Parting Shot

I'm back in Monterey; no problem, the weather is nice, it's starting to green up for the winter. I went to the pool today, swam laps and took a siesta in the sun. But I had to include one more shot of the Gulf beaches. This is east of Apalachicola. The sand is pure white, the consistency of sugar. The water is warm and usually tranquil. It's no wonder that several Gulf beaches are rated among the top 10 in the US every year.

Stone Mountain

Yesterday I went to Stone Mountain, a granite monolith just east of Atlanta that is the centerpiece of a large park offering everything from gondola rides to the top of the mountain to golf to granitic slotation to hiking. A memorial to three Confederate leaders has been carved out of the granite. From left to right we see Jefferson Davis; Robert E. Lee; and Stonewall Jackson. The project began in the early 1920s under the direction of Gutzon Borglum; he dropped out of the enterprise after a short time and went on to carve Mount Rushmore. Other artists followed Borglum, but funding evaporated in 1928 and the mountain remained unfinished for over 30 years. Carving resumed in 1964 and the sculpture was finally finished in 1972. According to Wikipedia, the sculpture is the largest bas-relief in the world.

The sculptures are larger than they appear from ground level; they're about 90 feet high. The mountain itself rises to 1683 feet above sea level, 825 feet above the surrounding landscape. To me it bears a considerable resemblance to Ayers Rock (Uluru) in Australia, though it's gray instead of red and in a forested area instead of a desert. But like Uluru, Stone Mountain is a massive chunk of rock, standing alone.

This pic is from the back (south) side of the mountain, opposite the side with the carvings and the gondola. On November 20, the forest around Atlanta was in full fall color. It's pretty around here.

FDRs Little White House

Two days ago I visited Franklin Roosevelt's Little White House in Warm Springs, Georgia. FDR began coming here in 1924, three years after he was stricken with polio. He enjoyed swimming in the 88 degree water; he wasn't cured but the warm springs eased his condition and increased his mobility at least a little bit. He also enjoyed the area and the people, and in 1932 he bought this modest but comfortable house in the woods near Warm Springs. After becoming president the following year, this became the Little White House. FDR visited whenever he could, about twice a year. Here he made many decisions affecting economic policy during the depression, often after driving around the area and talking with the locals. Later, he often conducted the US effort in World War II from here. This is a beautiful area in the hills of western Georgia, and Roosevelt enjoyed driving around himself, in a car with special hand controls for the brake, clutch, and accelerator that he personally designed. A museum here has one of his cars and a host of Roosevelt memorabilia.

Roosevelt died here on April 12, 1945. He suffered a cerebral hemorrhage while sitting for a portrait. He was carried to this bed, in his bedroom at the Little White House, after suffering the stroke. He was 63 and had just been inaugurated for his fourth term as president less than three months earlier. An aristocrat by birth and upbringing, FDR from an early age showed real concern and empathy for the common folk. His 12 year presidency spanned one of America's most difficult eras, starting with depression and continuing with world war. The US emerged from the trauma in good shape politically, militarily, and economically. We need more people like FDR.

Andersonville

I'm home in Monterey now after a couple of cattle car plane flights. But, my last couple days in Georgia I visited some interesting historical sites. This is a panorama of what was the Andersonville prison camp during the Civil War. On this 26 acre site, as many as 32,000 men were imprisoned in the summer of 1864. Early in the war, the Union and Confederacy usually exchanged prisoners of war; the normal deal was that the exchanged prisoners would not take up arms against the enemy again, and in that somewhat chivalrous age, this pledge was usually honored. However, later in the war, when the Union began to win the war of attrition, this system broke down and both sides begain housing POWs in camps, usually hastily constructed and poorly staffed and equipped. In the South, the problem was particularly bad; by 1864 many ordinary citizens were inadequately fed and housed, so you can imagine what happened to the POWs. The Confederacy simply didn't have the resources to support tens of thousands of prisoners. In Andersonville, 29 percent of the Union soldiers who went into the camp didn't come out. This was the worst camp in terms of the death rate, but it wasn't a flagrant outlier; several other camps, both Union and Confederate, had death rates of 15 to 24 percent. This picture is taken from the earthworks of the fort that guarded the stockade. Some of the fort's cannons were trained on the camp to quell any disorders; others were aimed outside, against possible Federal raiding parties that harassed the camp as Sherman drove deep into Georgia in late 1864.

The National Historic Site at Andersonville is quite interesting. In addition to the camp grounds, there is an excellent museum devoted to prisoners of war. Also on the grounds is a national cemetery, where the men who died at Andersonvile are buried, as well as veterans of more recent wars. Do you see something unusual in this picture? Notice how close together the headstones are placed. At the worst time, in the summer of 1864, up to 100 POWs died each day, mostly of disease and malnutrition. All the confederates could do was bury them in trenches, side by side. Records were kept of the dead and about 97 percent of them were identified. The trenches were in areas like this, where the headstones are bumper to bumper.

Another Fine Southern Town

Last night I stayed in Americus, Georgia, only about 10 miles from Jimmy Carter's hometown of Plains (where he still lives). Americus is a pleasant town with many fine old buildings. I stayed in this one...it's a B and B. Very nice. It's actually one of the newer homes in the 'hood... built in 1906.

This place is across the street from the B and B. It's now a funeral home. It dates from the early 1890s.

Here's a classic Southern manse. Where did Rhett and Scarlett run off to, anyhow?

Gas here in Americus is really cheap! Too bad it took a stock market crash to send it down to this price.

A Fine Southern Town

I've been hanging out in Apalachicola Florida the past three days. It's a quiet old town in the Florida Panhandle. Like many cool Australian beach towns, Apalachicola is on the coast at the mouth of a significant river; so both salt-and freshwater activities abound. The town was founded around 1830 and has been a lumber and shipping center for most of that time. There are many neat old 19th century houses, many, like these two, with widows' walks on the top of the roof. The main architectural style is Victorian, but I've seen some Queenslanders...with wraparound porches. The main Catholic church is done in Spanish mission style.

The streets are lined with large, shady trees, primarily oaks draped with Spanish moss. The effect is one of lush tranquillity. Lots are large, giving an air of spaciousness. The pace is slow. I like this place!

Right in the middle of town is the cemetery. Graves date to the 1840s. Many Confederate veterans are buried here. An interesting family plot is the Coombs family. Husband and wife died only about three weeks apart in 1911, both in their 60s. Their mansion sits just across the street; it's now a bed and breakfast. A look at the website tells the story; there was a fire at the house in early 1911, and Mrs Coombs took to her bed shortly thereafter and died in a few days. Her husband, married to her for over 40 years, succumbed less than a month later. But, their home has been beautifully restored...google Coombs House for details. By the way, the Coombs were originally from Maine, and their son, who fought for the north, is also interred in the cemetery, alongside all the CSA men.

Some of the old graves tell a story. This 1860 marker has a poem as an elegy to a young bloke who died in a shipping accident; blow up the pic and I think you can read the headstone. As it turned out, the bloke died about a year before the Civil War broke out. Given that, his chances of living to a ripe old age would probably have been unfavorable.

There's a Piggly Wiggly in Apalachicola! This is a chain of supermarkets that are common in South Carolina; this is the first one I've seen in Florida. Piggly Wiggly used to extend all the way to the west coast. There was one across the street from the bowling alley in northeast Portland where I hung out in the 1960s, but by the early '70s it had either changed ownership or closed, I forget which. But the chain is still going strong in parts of the south.

St George Island

I fulfilled a longtime wish today and visited St George Island, on the northern Florida Gulf coast near the panhandle town of Apalachicola. I had heard that this island has one of the finest beaches in the nation, and indeed it does! The sand is soft and white, almost like sugar. The beach is at least fifteen miles long; the easternmost nine miles are state park, and the last five miles of that stretch are accessible only by foot or boat. I had a nice walk and got in some fine horizontal slotation. It was a cool day, only about 60 degrees, so I had to wear jeans and a sweatshirt most of the time, but the air was crisp and clean...just a perfect fall day!

A crisp north wind was blowing, and had been stronger earlier in the day and yesterday afternoon. The breeze created lee side sand patterns behind the many shells strewn about the beach. To put this pic in scale, each of the sand streaks are only an inch or two long.

The beach at St George, windswept and deserted, presents a myriad of shapes and designs, all created by wind and water. By the way, the lumps in the sand to the lower right of the picture...especially visible if you blow the pic up...are airholes, probably created by critters living under the surface. The Gulf is to the right of the pic...the pond is water that flows into depressions in the beach at high tide.

The interior of the island is covered by forests of slash pine and cabbage palm, as well as sand dunes. The dunes lie between the beach and the forests, and probably protect the trees from all but the most severe hurricane storm surges. The Gulf is beyond the dunes in the rear center of the picture.

Lizard Doin' Dixie

The Lizard really enjoys the Gulf. The water is warm, the beaches are of fine white sand, and there are a lot of The Lizard's counterparts running around. So he feels quite at home here. In fact, I'd say his two favorite habitats are the Arizona desert and the Florida Gulf coast. Here he's hangin' at Honeymoon Island, on the Gulf near St Petersburg. This island is mostly a state park; I saw a tortoise near the road.

Here our saurian friend is...way down by the Suwanee River! Yes, the same one that's in the song. As the lyrics suggest, it flows lazily, indeed languidly, through rural country that is very quiet. I found this area of northwest Florida refreshing after battling urban traffic for two weeks. It's the Old South here; things move, and change, slowly. It's very relaxing to travel here. There are many state parks featuring springs and beaches; quiet towns with just enough amenities; and few tourists.

Here The Lizard has wound up at St George Island, on the northern Gulf coast. Though it was a sparkling Sunday, the vast state park was very uncrowded. It was cool...only around 60 degrees...and this probably kept some of the locals away. A light offshore north wind was responsible for the almost total lack of surf.

Delray Sunrise

Yes, I do have The Lizard on this trip...not Verde as she couldn't fit into my other sneaker. Tougher to pack when you have to fly. Here The Lizard is enjoying the sunrise. I spent most of the week at Delray just hangin' at the beach as conditions were perfect...air and water around 78 degrees every day!

Metrozoo

I went to the excellent Miami Metrozoo earlier this week with my friends JR and Liz. It's a large zoo set in expansive grounds in what used to be a rural area. Now it's partially surrounded by suburbia but it's still a nice, interesting escape from the urban sprawl. We went on a weekday and there were few people there...it was quite peaceful. The parking lots are vast so I reckon it's not always so quiet. As might be expected, the zoo specializes in animals from warm environments such as Africa, South America, and southern Asia. Here are a couple tigers...including a white one...hanging out in their spacious enclosure, complete with a faux Indian temple. A nice touch. Blow up the pic to get a better view of the critters.

It was a beautiful day, warm and sunny but not too humid, with a pleasant breeze. As a result the animals were quite active. JR and Liz say that normally in Miami's heat they just hang out in secluded shady spots, but on this day they were cruising about nicely. You can hand feed the giraffes; here's one chompin' down on his tucker.

Like the vast majority of animals at Metrozoo, the giraffes have a large enclosure...several acres...surrounded by a moat, so they have plenty of room to roam.

The tortoises are low maintenance. They live in an enclosure with only about 3 foot high rock walls around it, which is sufficient to ensure they don't crawl off in super slo-mo. These guys can live 150 years but it must be pretty boring since they don't do much except crawl around...very sloooowly...and munch grass.

The zoo has red elephants, a result of them wallowing in dirt of the same color. You know, there's almost a touch of pink there...nah, I must've been drinking too much wine.

There are a lot of exotic animals at the zoo, but the most common critters are indigenous. White ibises abound! They hang out in many enclosures, and bludge for handouts from the tourons at the food courts. More impressive are the ubiquitous iguanas, which sun themselves all over the place. I saw one in the lions' enclosure that was fairly close to one cat, maybe 30 feet away. The lion eyed the lizard carefully but decided it wasn't worth the effort of lunging and trying to catch a tapa when her keepers fed her perfectly well. This handsome fellow is parked right in a main pedestrian walkway. People also ride rental carts here so I hope he didn't get squashed.

Glades Images

Last week JR and I went to the Everglades and cruised down to Flamingo. There was much more water in the glades than when I last visited, almost exactly two years ago. As a result, the critters were dispersed...most of the glades were under at least a few inches of water so it was not necessary for the animals to congregate around water holes. Nevertheless, there were gators. This one is right by the main highway, with water only a couple feet in back of him. At Flamingo, we saw a crocodile, much rarer in the US. I took pix of him but he was across the water and without a megazoom lens, you don't get a good look at him. It was a good sized croc...we reckoned about a 12 footer.

We walked a boardwalk that went thru the mangroves and then out over the water of West Lake, not far from Flamingo on the Gulf. The mangroves are always cool with their hoop dress style roots.

This butterfly was not in the glades; it was perched in John MacArthur State Park, in Palm Beach county. But I thought it was cool...there were many of them in the forest just inland from the beach.

I was going to say the butterfly was just mauka from the beach, but I realized there are no mountains inland from the beach in Florida. Except...for this one! In the distance is Mount Trashmore, standing sentinel over South Florida. It towers about 200 feet above the surrounding landscape, visible for miles as it soars into the tropical skies. It is, of course, composed entirely of garbage, with a bit of dirt tossed on the top. It's in the southern Miami metro area, near Homestead.

Epcot Visit

I went to Epcot in Walt Disney World last week...met the Bingaman sisters who graciously invited me to hang out with them for a couple days...they were there at the same time just by coincidence, having planned their trip a while ago. Epcot's World Showcase is essentially a permanent worlds fair. It features about a dozen nations, each with an area featuring restaurants, shopping and culture from the host country; each area is staffed by nationals from that country. We had a sumptuous lunch in Italy. Bellissimo!! This is a replica of a tower in Venice, I believe.















Here's a pic of the four of us in Italy. (well, the Florida version) For more, and zanier, pix see Brooke's blog...accessible from my blog page.

This was my third trip to Epcot, and I have always been fascinated by the park's showcase sphere. Its geometric panels constantly change as the light shifts during the day. It's neat to take abstract pictures of it. At night, it's attractively lit.

We stayed at Epcot all day. Dinner was in Morocco, excellent food and wine served by Moroccans. There was even a belly dancer, but my pic wasn't very good. The bloke playing for the dancer was really jammin' on his stringed instrument. At the end of the day, there is an excellent fireworks show. Disney doesn't do anything shabbily...it's all excellent.

More Blue Ridge Color

The last two weekends of October were pretty much the peak for the color in the Blue Ridge. This pic was taken on October 26...two days later the area was dusted by snow and buffeted by wind, putting an end to the leaf show.

Hillsides were naturally impressionist. Blow the pic up for better color.












The previous Friday, Oct 24, the weather was not quite as good in Charleston. The city was the flat rock and the cow took up residence overhead! 6.57 inches of rain fell during the day. 5.7 of that came down in just 7 hours! There was substantial flooding, both from the rain and the tide, which came up onto Bay Street, driven by easterly winds. In fact, the freeway into Charleston was closed that evening! We wanted to tour the USS Yorktown...shown here...but much of the tour was outside, and it was pouring, plus none of us had serious rain gear. So we aborted the mission. As a rule, when the water puddles on the grass, as in the foreground, it's seriously wet. It was so wet that when we went to dinner, Wendy had Erik carry her from the car to the restaurant! We dissed her for being a wuss, but in all fairness it was raining so hard that there were 3-4 inches of water everywhere in the parking lot, so the only alternatives were wading or being carried. Since no Olympic class weightlifters were on hand, The Old Sloat had to wade. Of course, that's no problem since water is his natural habitat.

Blue Ridge Splendor

I've been traveling for almost two weeks, but have had (a) limited wireless connections; and (b) a more intense social life than usual, visiting friends in Charleston, Orlando, and Miami. The young folks in CHS kept me up til 4 AM one night...felt like I was back working a graveyard shift! Wendy, Shawn, Scott, and I had a reunion again, just like two years ago in the same place. Lots of fun, but no time to blog. But I have seen some pretty country. On Oct 25-26 I was up in far northwestern North Carolina, on the Blue Ridge Parkway. The leaves were in full color as these pix show. It's beautiful country, with pleasant towns, friendly people, and tidy farms to go with the fine landscapes.

You don't have to look upward to find beauty in the Blue Ridge. Even the ground presents a palette of color. Mother Nature can do a pretty good imitation of Jackson Pollack.

With clear skies and bright sunshine, the colors are intensified. The weather was quintessentially autumnal; crisp and bright.