Two Woodstocks and Magic Meadow

Well, we're back in New York. We're nearing the end of the 3rd week back to school and we're getting into the groove of things but desperately missing travel. So every weekend we've at least been leaving Long Island, and last weekend we decided on a whim to travel back to our past.
For me it was my childhood home of Woodstock, NY.
For Jim it was his summer home, in the bungalows of Bethel County, incidentally where the original Woodstock concert was held. We decided to visit the site of the concert, at the former Yasgur's Farm in White Lake, NY.

We were very happy to be there. You can see our van off in the corner.

This is the hill where the half-million people stood to watch the amazing performances.

This rocky area was where the stage stood.

The plaque with the iconic dove on the guitar, and a list of all the musicians.
Although it was a bit strange and sad to see it commercialized like this, we were very glad in the end that the site was preserved for people like us whose hearts are at that concert, even though we weren't.

After Bethel County, we drove into Ulster County, where the actual town of Woodstock lies. I lived here for a big part of my childhood, and came back often after I moved out of town. It was mostly as I remembered it, with a few different stores, but still with a lot of cool people and shops, and of course my favorite restaurant in the world, Gypsy Wolf.

Everything about it was the same, including the Burrito, so I was very happy. The insides has lots of wooden masks, wooden wolf scupltures, and paintings of wolves. It has a great atmosphere and it's how I learned to love Shirley Temples!

After Dinner, we walked around town and checked out the shops that were still open. We came across this tipi and hippie bus with some kind of tigger shrine.

This is another great restaurant in town, but it's more fast food mexican. The colors of the storefront are fantastic.

We found this signpost pointing to various stores in town, as well as the site of yasgur's farm.

I love it. Peace and Technology can go together!

We walked down to my favorite swimming hole, the Millstream. It was full because of the recent rains, and unfortunately too cold to swim.

Some kind of Art Instillation at the Town Square. Jim is the subject.

We spent the night in woodstock, and the next morning we drove to another of my favorite places up Mount Overlook, Magic Meadow. I used to go on walks with my mom and grandma and the dogs and had picnics and birthday parties. It's beautiful and I'm glad we found it. Somehow I managed to not get a shot of the meadow itself, but I got lots of the forest surrounding it.

This is the entrance to Magic Meadow from a little parking area on the side of the road. You have to cross a stream and climb a hill before you find the opening to the meadow.

We found a nice spot to lie down and watch the clouds, and discovered a spider trundling through. He was about two inches long and looked like a baby tarantula!

In the forest surrounding the meadow, we found a fire pit and remnants of last night's revelers. A nice wine shrine.

The meadow is near a Buddhist Monestary, and there were a lot of shrines to various Boddhisatvas in the woods.
Blue Shrine.

Red Shrine

White Shrine.

A nice big slimy slug crawling around the forest floor.

We had a fantastic time romping through the meadow and forest and watching the clouds and the bees. This is top of my list for our first Full Moon Festival!

Prarie Dog Town and Kansas Plains

Hello, faithful readers. Here is a long-awaited post of our adventures through Kansas!
We saw signs along the highway for "World's Largest Prairie Dog! Prairie Dog Town! 6-Legged Cows! Pet Baby Pigs! 50 Miles Ahead!" and followed them to a wonderfully cheesy roadside attraction/zoo. They had animals not commonly found in zoos, like raccoons and badgers, as well as lots of stuffed (as in taxidermied) animals, farm animals, and prairie dogs running free.

They had a stuffed Jackelope. I haven't seen one in the wild yet, but this is my bigfoot.

A pile of piglets! They were too small to play with, unfortunately. There was also one that was slightly out of place, with deer-colored fur and stripes!

These adorable coyotes were fiends for dog biscuits. Go Figure!

The obligatory goat shot. We probably fed them the most. We're suckers for goats, especially floppy-eared goats.

Prairie Dogs were peeping up all over the place

A very shy bobcat who kept hissing at us.

Sleepy foxes

Sleepy Badgers

The softest Donkey Face ever. He kept following us around looking for more treats. He liked dog biscuits, too!

Kansas had wild sunflowers growing all over the place. This bee decided to take advantage.

Here is the World's Largest Prairie Dog. It wasn't real at all!

A very pointy steer.

The prize of the place, a six legged cow. It kind of looks like a baby stuck in there.

And its neighbor, the five legged cow.

Finally, a nice shot of the plains of Kansas. It was the first state back in the midwest, so it was quite a sight to see after so many weeks of cliffs, canyons, oceans and mountains.

We didn't get a chance to go to the Wizard of Oz museum, but after playing the slots in Vegas I sure had a hankering.

Las Vegas Lights and Big Utah Sky

I'm going to let you interpret these images for yourselves.

Las Vegas:

Utah:

This trip is nearing its end but we still have so much more adventure coming up.

From Big Sur Bluffs to Death Valley Dunes

After the hustle and bustle of Santa Cruz, we headed south to that land of legends, Big Sur. So many of the writers and artists and visionaries of the last few decades found this place inspiring, wild, and beautiful. And it's no wonder. Highway 1 kisses the cliffs for dozens of miles along the coast, often hundreds of feet above the ocean. The forest and the ocean meet and create breathtaking views. We spent the night alongside a creek in Big Sur, then drove south along the coast the next morning.

The southern end of the Big Sur region houses an Elephant Seal Rookery, and we stopped to see them lounging in the sun. It was amazing to see them, after so many nights of hearing seals and sea lions barking in the distance.

Along the highway, we met a French couple and their baby who needed a ride. They were going to Morro Bay, CA, and when we got there they offered to let us stay at their campsite in exchange for the ride. We ended up getting along very well. I got to practice my French and we have new friends in Paris!
Morro Bay itself was also a great place. It is a surfing, fishing, and harbor town. Morro Rock dominates the shoreline, and sea lions come up to the docks to rest at night.

Finally, it was time to leave the Pacific. We waved goodbye and headed east again, this time tracing our path from our last trip Out West, through Sequoia National Park to Death Valley.

Now we are in Pahrump, NV on our way to Las Vegas for a rousing good time. We are seeing Penn and Teller and staying in the Rio, our first Hotel for this whole trip. We made it 6 days straight without paying for a RV park, and now we are ready to splurge. After Las Vegas, our trip is nearly over, with a mad dash for the East Coast in time for the new semester.
Au Revoir, California!

Starstruck by the Perseids in Santa Cruz

We've been in Santa Cruz, CA for the past couple days and we were lucky enough to catch the Perseids zooming across the sky while lying on the beach. I managed to catch the tail end of one on the camera using a 15 second shutter. There were also sea lions barking offshore, and the boardwalk carnival going on behind us. It was quite hypnotic!

Adventure on Highway 1.

For the last few days, we've been driving down the California Coast on Highway 1. It is an absolutely amazing drive, albeit at times nerve wracking because of its high cliffs, narrow roads, and sharp turns.

Free-range cows on an overlook next to the highway.

We spent the morning frolicking in our underpants on this beach. The water is much colder than the atlantic or caribbean at this time of year, but it is still that perfect green-blue.

Red rock beach, a ten minute walk downhill from our overnight spot on the cliff above, and just north of Stinson Beach, CA.We met a bunch of friendly people who were interested in our van and our story, and we found out from them that this was a clothing-optional beach. Naturally, the next day we ran down and jumped straight in the water (well, some of us needed a little coaxing.) There is nothing as liberating as swimming in icy pacific waters in nothing but your birthday suit. Not to mention the sea lion jumping just offshore. It was a perfect day.

To top it off, a perfect Pacific Sunset.