Birthday trip

Daughters Rachel (left), me and daughter Leslie at a stop on the Kangamangus highway through the  White Mountain National Forest in New Hampshire. This photo suggests I should change the name of this blog to Big 8-0...  however this the "More". At 65 I told "the girls" I would only count by 5s  thereafter and we'd celebrate with a road trip someplace we haven't been in the USA. So far we've had very good trips starting with California (Yosemite, etc, unforgettable mud baths at an Indian Wells spa), Yellowstone and Grand Tetons (badgers up close/bison), New Mexico (my bucket list first time to ride a horse--up Wheeler Mountain), and we've just returned from seaside Maine and New Hampshire's White Mountain National Forest (but no drive up Mt. Washington because it was clouded in). We mostly explored the Kangamangus Highway (named for an Indian chief).  But also went to the historic Breton Woods grand hotel to see how the 1% have vacationed for some 100 years.

We all like to walk forest trails although I tire quickly on uphills and Leslie has bursitis in one hip, so we did many fairly easy trails-including my favorite actually on Monhegan Island 12 miles off the Maine coast where the forest felt like a fairy tale place. We had the necessary lobster in Maine and in Rockport, NH spent most of a day in the surprisingly large Farnsworth Museum which has many Wyeth paintings (all members of the family), a floor of excellent 20th century superstar painters and a room that had 12 golden Chinese zodiac statues by Ai Weiwei.  What a wonderful museum!!  We didn't have time for their sizable modern museum. (A town to return to!) We stayed in a hotel at a Franciscan Monastery, at a fairly typical motel with a wide lawn down to the water of an inlet and in a  cabin in the woods where we simply could not make a fire start.

After a serious look at the perils of being over 80 --although in a currently quite healthy body-- we agreed we'd all love an 85th celebration to be a cruise to Alaska instead of a road trip ... check back in five years for an update.

Summer Solstice Approaching

Spring may be the most beautiful month (there's disagreement between spring and autumn) but here on Cape Cod it is the most frustrating season. It comes, it goes, it rains, it's windy, when finally everything blooms, the pollen not only makes those with allergies miserable it covers cars (inside as well as out) lawn furniture and window screens.

But, ah, it's very beautiful. A visit to Heritage Plantation, the 100 acre botanical garden in the town of Sandwich, was beautiful where the rhododendron festival was just ending but most rhodies were still in full flower with huge clusters of blossoms, and the more delicate azeleas were like shyer little sisters to the show off rhodies. The day was beautiful too and we did not yet have to deal with a great summer crowd.

Next will come the hydrangias and I have noticed that both domestic roses and the wild rosa ragusa on the dunes by Long Beach are open, red, pink and white as they always do just as the new chicks of terns an sandpiper are hatching.

So far my early morning walks are quiet and I meet only a few people, it feels like my private beach. But schools are ending, the roads are getting crowded, the summer people are coming. Well, why not? Summer is the very best time to be here and I'm so very glad this where I live.