Tag: Photography

Horseshoe Bend, Vermillion Cliffs – Arizona

I was instructed to go to Horseshoe Bend by a friendly local Navajo man. It’s free and if you happen to be in the area you must go see it! Of course the heat was simply scorching and the hike was up a number of steep sand covered hills which I’ll admit were a huge challenge to someone as unfit as myself. Weeks driving a Jeep and eating nothing but PB&J’s had taken it’s toll. I felt like a smoker wheezing and gasping for air, clawing my way upwards like I was escaping Hell! Still once I got to the peak the view was staggeringly beautiful, a circular body of water with another piece of mountain jutting up from its center, so massive I couldn’t take a full photo of it. I walked around taking photos. I had a photo taken by a couple from Chicago and paid back the favor. Then I noticed a couple speaking Dutch which was a delightful change of pace from the Germans I saw everywhere else. Greetings were exchanged and photos were taken. I was just impressed by their intense baby buggy which looked like it might have four wheel drive. That thing was hardcore. And the baby? Most quiet and content new human I have ever seen. Apparently they were travelling from here to the grand canyon as a vacation, bringing their little bundle of joy along. I sort of wish I knew a language other than English. Perhaps someday.

When I walked back I saw some tracks in the sand. I identified them as those of a lizard and I were able to trace them to a rock where two adorable lizards were skittering about. On this little off-path detour I also found a weird bug and more brightly colored lizards. One of the strangest realizations I have had since coming out traveling is the fact lizards are everywhere. Hundred s of varieties, all different sizes, clinging to rocks, ground, and trees. I grew up and lived in New England where if you want to see a lizard you have to go to a pet store or zoo. I don’t think these free range reptiles will ever loose their charm in my eyes.

Let me tell you the hike back was brutal. Being the little wuss I am I took two long breaks and then thanked God when I could finally see the Jeep again. It was hot, I hadn’t eaten lunch, and I was both absolutely famished and thirstier than I’d ever been before.

Driving away from the area I passed and photographed the Vermillian Cliffs and a few other things. Everything was just so surreal. I am not sure I will ever believe I was once in a place so beautiful.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

 

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Antelope Canyon – Arizona

Antelope Canyon is a guided tour done by the local Navajo. It’s a VERY bumpy ride getting there and a bit pricey at thirty something dollars a head but let me tell you… it was worth all this and more. This time I got to actually walk into the belly of the scenery I was admiring. Here was a brilliant red crevice in the rock, worn away in fantastic swooshes by sand, wind, and flood water. With every swirl you could see something even more profound.

It was a very short tour, if one were to just walk through it paying no attention it’d take maybe five minutes, but this would be a waste. I’ve never heard of Antelope Canyon but apparently others had. I shared my tour with a couple Australians and a number of French. One of the little French women attempted asking if I could take her and her boyfriend’s photo. This was done mostly through sign language since my French is pretty much gone (one of my few educational regrets…) I love the French. I love their stubborn insistence not to learn anything other than French. I have long since theorized the reasons French and Americans have such a hostile frenemy relationship is because we’re too alike. Go back to where you came from! BWAHAHAHA. Seriously though – French is such a beautiful language. I smile every time I hear it and am more than happy to snap a few tourist photos to have the privilege.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

 

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Windsor Ruins – Mississippi

In Mississippi I went to the Windsor Ruins. Apparently this absolutely enormous building was built as the largest Greek Revival mansion in the state. It only stood for a few years before it burned from the top down leaving nothing but 24 eerie columns. I tried to go after dark (against park rules) but didn’t make it. Still it was oddly impressive, nestled in some rugged and wild country. It was quiet and so peaceful out there. The columns reached towards the sky with a little plant growing on one. Some of them were crumbled and I guess the metal stairway that was left after the flames was taken by a local church. It was a bit weird in the sense it felt like I was looking at a Greek ruin in the middle of frickin’ Mississippi.

As I left I noticed a dirt road, apparently going to nowhere. Seeing as the road I was supposed to take was closed due to flooding the decision was made to try this one. I travelled farther and farther down this road as it got increasingly worse. It got narrower, the path got more bumpy. It looked like the last travelers through here might have been in a Conestoga wagon. Then, as if I was on some sort of crazy safari I saw something dash across the road at such an alarming speed that I couldn’t even come close to identifying the wee beast. I turned around and took the path more travelled.

As it turns out I think I figured out what the strange blur I saw was. Apparently armadillos are a small, probably mythological, southern creatures with the armor of centipede and the speed of light. I had been wanting to see a live one and in all the photos they look so placid and even slow.. HA! Wrong! I also got to see two deer cross the road and it was broad daylight.

I took lots of photos of the scenery because it was just gorgeous down that way with gorges filled with greenery and vines wrapping around trees. It was a strange landscape. On my way out I came across yet another roadblock, this time on a main highway. I stopped and a very young officer asked, “So where y’all trying to go?” Apparently, “I don’t know.” isn’t a great answer to give someone. He picked up his little list of places to go and ventured a guess, “Arkansas? And you’re taking which highway?” “Uhhh…. Let me see…” This time the GPS was consulted and the cop just started laughing. “Oh you got a Garmin. I had one of those. She told me to drive straight into a lake once.” Comforting thought! Thanks! Apparently the Big Black River had overflowed and I had to go literally an hour out of our way to get back on track.

When I got back into town, and after passing this particular gas station three or four times trying to find an addressless ghost town, I stopped in to fill up. The locals were ever so helpful… “You trying to get to Vicksburg? We saw you pass by a few times…” Great, now I’m being watched! SIGH. Can’t do anything conspicuously these days.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

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Mystic Caves – Arkansas

I am not sure why I went to the Mystic Caves… it’s not as if they were world famous or anything. I mean as far as caves go this one was taking a bit of a piss but in the spirit of writing down every adventure here I go…

I was guided through both Mystic Caves. During the first tour I was with a small group of quiet adults and I took time to listen to the guide and take photos. Apparently the cave was used by local Indians who found one of the chambers sacred and used some slime growing on the wall for medicinal reasons.. Then the white man came along and used it as a moonshine distillery during prohibition… at which time they sooted up the ceilings, broke off a lot of the stalactites to sell during the depression, annnd caused damage when their distillery just up and exploded one day. The place was a mess, a great illustration of how destructive man is, but little else. It was also tiny.. and the staff kept naming the formations after food. “This is our wedding cake, over there is our carrot patch and don’t miss the curly fries!” There was however a number of fossils embedded in the ceiling so go fossils! Woo! I’m sure they were edible once…

Our guide ended the tour by telling us some hogwash story about a monkey being brought down in the cave and then getting stuck to the ceiling somehow. There was indeed something gnarly-looking dangling from the ceiling but a monkey it was not. Everyone listened like, “yeah whatever.” Our guide kept pausing midsentence, as if he were expecting us to say something or laugh. We were a boring bunch and didn’t.

The Chrystal Dome was a little better. It was only recently discovered, in the late 1960’s, and only on active tours since the 1980’s. It was only one set of stairs to the bottom of the dome where you could look up and see intact stalactites and stalagmites starting to form on the floor. This time we were accompanied by a Biblical swarm of 13-14 year old Christian boys, either boy scouts or from some boys only Christian school, who the hell knows. They all had flashlights and were fairly loud and obnoxious. Our tour guide said very little about what was actually known about the cave, instead he started telling stories about a guard Yorkie who got stuck in the rocks, and then a guard turkey, and then a guard alligator, and then a fucking octopus. I wandered off and took photos on my own of this weird slimy orange thing I found, too old to be amused by this, though on the way out I did see the Virgin Mary but I guess that’s to be expected. She’s everywhere.  Our tour guide merely called her an angry wife, pointing to another formation that looked like a guy and two critters, dogs or fish depending on which story you could visualize. Coolest thing here was a little salamander in the rocks and a wolf spider nearly as big, both of which were actually real…

Though it was amusing I doubt I would suggest this cave to anyone outside the local area. There are just a lot of better caves to go to and $14.50 a person seems a bit steep for such a little place. In any event the gift shop was beautiful, had amazing minerals, rocks, and fossils.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

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Arkansas’ Largest Natural Bridge

I saw a number of really huge signs aside the highway reading, “Arkansas’ largest natural bridge!” How could I not want to follow them like a lamb to slaughter? So I took the heavy, overloaded Jeep, and pursued a dirt road that zigzagged in every direction worse than San Fran’s famous Lombard Street. Did I mention it was a mountain road so I was also going down hill at an increasingly uncomfortable angle. I think the Jeep may have been crying, or at least slightly whimpering. Jeeps are tough after all.

Finally I ended up at a tiny ramshackle little mock-up of a pioneer house and a tiny parking lot. Where’s the bridge? I walked in and the attendant, a young guy, jumped up seemingly all happy to see another living soul. He rattled off everything there was to see here and the $5 fee. Then he instructed me to sign the guestbook and seemed not to know what to say next so I meandered out, only after noticing that in the middle of the day I was the only visitor here and had come from the farthest distance by a long shot. I walked out and saw the little recreation of an Ozark classic, the moonshining still, complete with scary wax figurine armed with a shotgun. Above there was another pioneer house, complete with artifacts from the era, including a coffee grinder the size of a dormitory fridge. There was even an antique fly trap! It looked remarkably like a hanging beekeeper’s hat.

So I walked out down this path in the middle of the woods and there it was, signs reading, “Do not climb or cross bridge! Stay on path!” Above that of course was a strange site, a bridge made of stone, a seemingly natural formation but still somewhat unsettling as it did indeed look like an intended bridge. I took a few snaps, walked up the path as far as I could, goofed around a bit, and came back.. Interesting detour.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

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Air Boat Ride in the Everglades – Florida

I decided I should really hit the Everglades and take a look around. I’d yet to see any alligators in Florida and I thought I might see one on an airboat tour. Keren told me about the Miccosukee Indian Village. I travelled from her house to the Miccosukee Casino, the closest thing my GPS could offer. I’d had a hell of a time trying to get the GPS to recognize the address and now I was at the Casino and there was a gas station offering airboat rides. I was adamant I needed to travel further out of the city and into the swamp, that the Miccosukee probably lived in the middle of nowhere, where I wanted to be! I was right; I drove past at least eight other airboat places until I started hitting all the Miccosukee shops and their air boat tours. I was just in time for their last boat out. I forked over $32. As I waited I saw the mother of all alligators swim by, easily twice the size the Carolina ones. He or she was HUGE but swam by too fast to take a good photo. There were a few baby ones near the shore as well as an assortment of odd birds.

I got onto the boat with several other tourists, including an adorable old German woman who seemed super excited. I don’t know what she was saying but it amused me how happy she seemed. Almost everyone was wearing hats, hats that all went flying when the boat was turned on. My bandana stayed on my head almost until the very end. Bobby pins are amazing. The boat was ungodly loud and the other passengers all seemed to have earplugs but I didn’t mind it so much. For some odd reason I’d entered some sort of Zen state and was fine with everything, completely relaxed. Life was good.

I saw lots of birds, cranes and little duck like creatures who were stout and didn’t run too fast when they saw the boat headed at them. I boated past many many birds until I ended up at a mock Indian Village in the middle of the swamp. The whole place was on stilts. I don’t know how anyone managed to build it but there was only one woman there selling beadwork and various Miccosukee made jewelry. I took some time to stare at the water off the sides of the village. There were all sorts of odd little creatures, mostly tiny fish and storks. Then I saw a fish that was maybe eight inches long for a split second. It darted off into the muck so fast that all it left behind was a trail of mud clouds. It was likely a baby gar. I’m still vibrantly freaked out by large boney fish… alligator gar are one of the biggest growing in the US.

So ten minutes loitering and I was back on the boat. I sat quietly and just enjoyed the ride. I went into what I can only call an alligator nursery. Here alligators up to half grown ones were swimming around in a swarm. Some were sunning themselves. Many darted away from the boat coming at them while still others hit the bottom of the boat rushing by when it was lying still. Those suckers were strong! The driver riled them up as much as he could to drive more of them to the surface for photos. They seemed mildly annoyed. There were signs everywhere not to try petting the alligators as if this was a common concern with them being so damn fluffy and cuddly! Funny enough our driver didn’t yell at anyone attempting to do just this. He was a real laid back guy, probably figured if the dumb white boy gets his arm gnawed off by a pissed lizard it’s their own damn fault.

I was still so incredibly chill. I was lathered in a tube of sun block and despite the fact it was one hundred degrees that day I was still so happy to be there. Life just made sense here. I was with my kin – hundreds of baby aquatic lizards. I could be their queen!

When I returned I loitered on the bridge overlooking a canal that was full of life. I were very happy to see an absolutely enormous alligator snapping turtle emerge from the deep, break the surface of the water, and retreat back into the darkness. I wasn;t expecting that! I got a photo too.

On the way out I desperately needed the bathroom so I stopped at the nearest convenience store. It was empty and quiet and had no bathroom. I tried buying some ice cream just to avoid being awkward but it turns out the freezers had croaked and the candy ice cream bars were soup.

Onward I went until I found a gas station, which I know is not a great pit stop. I was wearing my long hippie skirt which very quickly got completely sopping wet with the flood of water on the bathroom floor I didn’t notice. I came out not so happy. I was two buildings away from the Jeep and Ruud was again distracted, loitering on the swamp banks taking photos of an alligator who was panting for some reason, or at least it had its mouth open. To make matters worse I had just discovered Aunt Rosie had come to me three days before her usual arrival. I was abruptly snapped out of my relaxed haze and was instantaneously cranky. I changed my skirt in the car, in an unladylike manner as we were driving. Better.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

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Tidepooling in Key Largo Florida

Initially I put a pin in Key West (on the map) as a joke, because that’s where Robert the Doll lives, but seeing as I have been such a devoted fan of this infamous haunted doll I decided what the Hell, I might as well!

I had already had a very long day when I arrived in Key Largo. It was getting dark and I wanted to find a place to sleep so I could enjoy driving through the islands in daylight. So I found a campground here, by luck, as an internet search prior to leaving that morning revealed most were full and not taking any more people without at least a day’s reservation. The office was closed but some friendly RVers told us that the manager would be around in the morning to collect any fees we were unable to give them during the previous day, as there were spots still available. The campground itself seemed a tiny village of RVs shoved into a series of mini streets, with one other tenting couple beyond a fence where the tent plots were. The spaces for tents were just large enough to contain our tent but not large enough to properly secure the ropes down. It was also on sand but it was accommodated with electricity and water. Unbeknownst to me I was also right next to a little stretch of beach. It was rocky, mind you, and beyond the rocks were gnarls of sea weed but for me that’s the best beach I could ask for. I scoured it in search of shells and life that evening before the sun went down, that night after I did the laundry at 11PM or so, and again the next morning. There was fragments of coral skeletons everywhere, scattered about like common rocks and pebbles. There were also a few tiny shells here and there and one big crab in a burrow that initially looked like a ginormous spider.

And then of course there were star fish. The buggar was as big as my palm and oddly colored. I picked it up but not long after it started oozing orange goo as it tried to ankle it out of my hand. You see, this is why star fish creep me out. They are sooo alien. I put it back before finding a tiny sea anemone, a whole school of the brightest teeny tiny snails you could ask for. There was even a conch-like snail the size of my thumb I also picked up for some reason.

I picked it up and was fine with it when it was sitting still but when it started to ooze out of its shell like a cow tongue trying to come out… well I kind of tweaked a bit and flipped back into the water. I was more comfortable with the hermit crab I found adorned with a fantastically beautiful shell that seemed five sizes too big for it. Of course to make the wildlife all the more amazing there was a swarm of little throat-bobbing lizards skittering up and down the trees giving us that whole Jurassic Park feel. I loved the lizards… as corny as that sounds.

I watched the sun go down sitting on a dock, surrounded on all sides by bath warm sea water gently lapping by. The sunset itself was gorgeous, the most beautiful sunset I’ve ever seen and I got some fantastic photos of that, I’m happy to say.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

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Coral Castle – Miami Florida

The Coral Castle is one of those quasi-obscure tourist attractions that didn’t start out as one. I had heard about it on a documentary when I was child and always wanted to check it out. Basically it’s a castle created by a five foot tall one hundred pound man. That’s not that interesting. The interesting part of this story is the fact he built the castle in the 1920’s with no modern technology or equipment and since he worked on it in the dead of night he also had no witnesses. Some of the stones used to create the outer walls are as much as 30,000 pounds and no one has any idea how he managed this feat on his own. Some people blame aliens. Because that’s clearly what I’d do if I were visiting earth for the first time – I’d appear to one random old man and tell him to build me a castle in the dead of night!

The castle itself is beautiful. He managed to carve moons, stars, and other planetary shapes all around the place, not an easy thing to do in the particular stone he was using which is actually coral. There are three moving stones on the premises, a rocking chair and huge door and a triangular gate that weighs 6,000 pounds and can be pushed by any visitor who wants to try it. I of course decided to try it and believe or not it didn’t take much effort at all, the whole thing just slid as easy as could be (and I am not that strong!)

Of course when you look around you realize this was made as this man’s home. He had a tool shed and a bedroom in a structure that looks very normal and house like (other than the materials it’s made out of ) and then he made all sorts of open air rooms out and about. There were living spaces, a table shaped like a heart, writing desks, a repentance closet with another chair, a bunch of little pools, a bathtub, a drinking well, a kitchen, and a bedroom, complete with adult and child sized beds, including a crib, which freaked me the hell right out, especially knowing he didn’t have any real children – just the ones he imagined up. Apparently there were five of those…

Of course the most interesting part of this whole thing was the fact the man who created it was completely fucking crackers. He had a crush on some heiress, who probably didn’t know of his existence, and he believed she was sending him messages through a newspaper comic. He also was a recluse, pretty much only dealing with people when they came to his little castle and paid ten cents to look around. He must have done this little tour a lot though because by the time he died he managed to amass several thousand dollars. It gave me a lot to go over in my mind. I have yet to figure out why a creative and super intelligent mind is so often disturbed.

The place was small but amazing if you’re one to ponder. The little automated tours were long-winded and boring but the rest was cool. It was also covered in lizards, both native and not and it took every ounce of my willpower not to try and catch one. When I was a kid I spent so many hours learning to catch everything I could… chickens, turtles, frogs, wild birds, you name it. A lizard would have been fun… but I captured them in photos instead. They were adorable and fast.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


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Angel Oak – South Carolina

Angel Oak is apparently a giant tree, the oldest in the state or some such. I went there expecting another kitschy little tourist attractions but I was quite happily surprised. It was hidden on a dirt road, guarded on each side by arching trees. I swear it could have been a scene out of a fairy tale had I been driving a horse and buggy. The tree itself was enormous indeed, fat and stout, with branches hitting the ground from its own weight. Some were propped up, other branches were held in place by cable. Still, despite the fact it couldn’t deal with its own enormity, the tree itself was beautiful and nestled in a really sweet patch of woods to boot. It surprisingly had a lot of people wandering in and out and a small gift shop as well. I took a few photos, perused the gift store, and asked an elderly couple to take my photo in front of the tree. I am afraid my pallid skin and Yankee accent was a dead give always that I was not from the area. The locals are chatty and friendly.

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

 

 

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And so it Begins!

Ever since I was a tween I dreamed about going across the entire United States and soaking in everything it had to offer. I had grown up in a bubble – and as nice as that bubble was I wanted to know what else was out there besides the trees and stone walls of New Hampshire. Was it really like visiting another planet out West? Where the people the same all over? Was there anything that united this society besides the idea of country? As much as I longed to know the answer I kept my dreams to myself until at the age of 25 an opportunity arose and I figured it’s now or never.

Suddenly my freakish encyclopedic knowledge was actually useful! I picked lots of destinations – everything I had ever wanted to see from the geysers of Yellowstone, to the fossils of Butte National Monument, to the charismatic Robert the Doll in Key West. I was going to do it all.

A map was procured, one of those big pastel maps of the United States you see hanging in history and geography classes in every public school. Pins were stuck into desirable destinations like some sort of 2-D voodoo doll and then the waiting… the ungodly anxious waiting as the weather slowly creaked from one bone frigid season to something a little more livable. It begins!

If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!


 

 

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