A Quiet Day at Home

The temps have been in the lowers 80’s here & yours truly is most grateful.  I worked on trimming the pines that flank both sides of my driveway.  Gypsy Jane’s Holiday Rambler is a bit wider than her Escaper, it would be nice if it cleared the trees. 

Obviously I’m not quite done, there’s 2 branches on the left & 4 on the right that need trimming plus a final squaring up.  Since this is all high ladder work I cut until the height gets to me, go work on something else & then come back & trim a bit more latter.   Hobbits aren’t fond of heights.

Took a ride to a few of my favorite spots in the afternoon, this was a beaver pond, the beavers seem to have left.

The den is half gone & the water too.  In 2004 I spent the summer checking on this pond weekly – there was a pair of swans raising their cygnets.  Of the 8 cygnets I first saw the cob & pen managed to raise 6  fledglings & at least 4 were still around in September.

This little stream feeds the area.  It held several nice rainbow trout.

The South River is looking good coming out of Shenandoah National Park.  The great egret pair &  several blue heron pairs were nesting in their usual areas. 

Nearby these butterflies were feasting on horse poop.  To each his own. 

There’s a spot along the South River I like to visit, its my forest quiet place.  The hills are steep & covered in cedar, the river narrow & swift moving.  After I had visited my Urchin in Japan it always seemed that if I got to this spot at just the right time of an evening & crossed over the river then there would be a narrow asphalt path up that hill abit.   That path would soon have little stone guardian figures in faded red capes, small stone shrines & signs in kanji.  If I followed that path it would take me to Minobu & then the road to my daughter in Nambu. 

Sunday evening saw a very nice lighting bug rising.  The solitary fireflies that flash 3 short horizontal blinks have now been joined by their cousins who flash a rising “J” pattern.  They were right on time, they appear June 4-6 in my yard most every year.

These are my throwing knives for rendezvous with their new leather handles I cut out from a vegetable tanned belt blank. The knives themselves are “Otters”, designed and sold by a buckskinner trader. They come in 2 sizes, I own the smaller size. These handles are slightly thicker than the original handles and completely cover the tang. (The original handles left about a quarter inch of tang exposed.)   I’ve altered my knife grip & now get a solid stick in 9 of 10 throws with almost half my throws hitting there I’m aiming.

The Goddess of Yard Sales also gifted me with a Western Digital My Book Essential 250GB external hard drive with USB cable & power supply.  Cost $2.00.  I’ve reformatted it & loaded  iTunes on it.  I really need to spent some time getting my computer files better organized, maybe the next to-hot-to-do-yard-work day.  I also got 2 nice white plastic chairs for yard sitting & lightening bug watching from a “For Free” pile of stuff.

Strawberry Festival & Tour de Greene

This weekend everyone & their uncle seemed to be hosting some kind of event.  I’d heard about the the Norfolk Pirate Festival, the Folklore Society of Greater Washington’s Glen Echo Festival, the Waynesboro Street Fair and a Nelson County Bluegrass Pasture Party.  So much to do, so little gas.  So much as I would have liked to go to the FSGW Festival, I opted for the bargain – the Strawberry Festival thrown by the Methodist church in Stanardsville. 

This festival started as a strawberry pancake breakfast 21 years ago. It grew into a 2 day affair with a daily parade, living history demos (yours truly held the fort for the colonial period), craft fair, live dance & music performances, classic car show and of course many many delicious strawberry deserts prepared by the members of the Methodist church.  Well the economy has taken its toll here, so now its once again a one day affair with a strawberry pancake breakfast, various strawberry desserts through out the day, some music & clogging performances, a few vintage vehicles and some craft & public service displays. 

The music area was too crowded for decent photos but the cars were a different matter.

This is a 1970 Mustang with an as sold engine.

A 1966 Mustang with a period performance engine – there is something wrong with a vintage plate on a car made the year I learned to drive!

A lovely & truly vintage Ford

This Chevy reminds me of the cars of my 50’s childhood – the color is certainly a hoot.

Greene being a very rural county, there were also vintage tractors in the show.

This guy seems totally unimpressed by it all.

The Greene Historical Society was also open.  A very modest affair housed in the old county jail, it had very nice displays of everyday things – but was too crowed for pictures.

Back over by my house the Spring Hill Baptist Church was hosting their Tour de Greene.  This is an bike race/tour with circuits laid out for 60, 40 & 20 mile rides.  The 20 mile riders were finishing up as I got back from the Strawberry Fest.  The registration fees all go to the Greene Habitat for Humanity housing projects.

These guys volunteered to get blogged.  The 20 milers all seemed to be having a grand time of it.   I had passed several groups of riders going to & from the strawberry fest, most were in road race gear except one group of 8 teens riding mountain bikes and wearing X Game stuff.  Helmets were required of all by the Tour.

A Road Less Traveled

When I’m going to an event I tend to drive a scenic route but don’t stop or detour much – after all there’s an event at the end of the road!  But driving home is another matter, particularly if I was able to start for home early on.  I left Belle Grove about 7:30AM on Memorial Day, so I had plenty of time to meander on the way home.

Saw the sign for a covered bridge on US 11 & decided to check it out.  I don’t remember ever stopping at this one before.  The bridge is raised quite a bit above the road surface, so getting good photos was a challenge. 

Here’s the river it crosses.  A quiet scene from no particular time.

The bridge is currently roofed with a tin roof, I don’t know if that is “as designed” or not.  There wasn’t a historic marker with any info on the bridge.  I did find the truss system interesting.

The long curved truss is obviously part of the span design.

This shot shows the modern concrete piers in use to support the bridge.  They had to have been built under the existing bridge at some point as a renovation & preservation method.  Over all the bridge is in good condition.  It seemed a good place to fish & there was a picnic table & small parking area nearby.  I’m glad I stopped here.

Preying Mantis

I tend to mark the seasons by natural events rather than the civil calendar.  Thus spring starts when the peepers begin to sing, summer begins when the lightening bugs appear & ends when they stop rising of an evening, fall is marked by the end of new growth & the falling of the leaves, and winter is the season of frozen ground.  Each season has its own cycle of natural events, with summer the Time of  Critters.

This little fellow is about 18” long & hanging out around my kitchen stoop.  It has an all black friend that’s a few inches longer & likes the same area.

I came home from work one morning to find this crawling down my driveway.  I carried it over the creek behind the house away from roads & lawns with mowers.

I’d heard rusting near the Norfolk pine stump for most of May – here’s the source of the sound.  Its about 6” long.

These little guys typically hatch out the last week of May & the first week of June.  Its about 1/2 inch long, so its molted once already.

If you couldn’t see the little fella, here’s a blow up.

Here’s another one taken later on – I saw half a dozen of these on this one plant.

The heat is Ugly right now.  Last night there was a heat advisory until almost 10 PM.  That is just not right.  Not even for Virginia.  I have gotten the fans mounted in my kitchen windows & the room AC installed in my bedroom window, so I’m about as comfortable as I’m going to get.

Prayers for weather in the 80’s occurs daily. 

Memorial Day at the Viet Nam War Foundation

Ruckersville is home to the Viet Nam War Foundation, a small private collection of military equipment.  This is less than a mile from my house & was holding an open house over Memorial Day weekend.  I hadn’t been to see their collection before, so I headed over on Monday once I had unpacked my truck from the SLR Belle Grove Rendezvous.

Several items were set up outside in the field just for the Open House.  Yes the tables & chairs are vintage military equipment.

The sentry post only gets a sentry for events.

The Foundation has over a dozen vehicles, including a helicopter.  All are in running condition.

I found the equipment of daily life in a field unit the most interesting part of the displays.

The interior of a transport – infantry support vehicle

There were also small displays on the south Vietnamese army & the Viet Cong equipment.

Even a vintage VW with newspaper articles on the war protests at UVA in Charlottesville. 

The event was well attended, it was actually hard to take photographs that didn’t include visitors.  The owner of this collection is himself a Viet Nam war vet. 

I learned of my government’s involvement in Viet Nam when I was just shy of 10, I would be almost 25 before it was finally over.  A close childhood friend died there, several of my adult friends served there.  It’s a war that shaped me as an adult in ways that are actually rather complicated, conflicting and very difficult to talk about .

But it was a good visit and a good way to spend a Memorial Day afternoon.

Shenandoah Long Rifles at Belle Grove

Its Memorial Day weekend, so its time for the Shenandoah Long Rifles’ Spring Rendezvous at Belle Grove farm in the lower Shenandoah valley.  The first time I attended this event it was cold, rainy, very muddy & I arrived on my Harley with my gear in my 12 cu. ft. trailer.  Had a wonderful time although getting my Harley back out of the field we park the “mules” in was a challenge.

My Lodge

At that 1st event I was camped on a low cot 6” off the ground under 2 overlapping diamond flies.  My current camp is somewhat less austere.    I really like this setup & don’t plan on adding or changing much – I would like a wooden stew ladle & a cooking fork for the kitchen, 2 more lantern stands & better flap ties on the tent. 

Of course a major part of any ‘Vous is the camp visiting.  Tales large & small must be told, lies swapped & a good laugh had by one & all.

It was dry but hot, so there was even more just socializing between friends than usual.

Also time for couples to just be out & about.

Holly was there – which meant there was a whole lot of laughter going around camp.

That’s Lou on the left, a seasoned hand at these affairs.

Sunday was hot enough that shirtless was the way to go if possible.

And the best way to nap was outside the tent – inside was a sure way to end up heat stressed & dehydrated.

There was rifle, smoothbore, archery & hawk throwing competitions.  If ya shoot it, ya gotta clean it.

Saturday evening there’s always a camp potluck, these folks are helping lay the groaning board.   There was a cold buffet Sunday evening too but later in the day so I don’t have any pictures of it.

A motley collection of rouges & scoundrels.

Flick telling us about plans & needs for the EPR in Tidewater this September before dinner.

There was a Civil War Confederate cavalry event at Belle Grove out near US 11.  A  couple from that event accepted our invitation & came for dinner Saturday.  Both horses are registered Morgans.

I arrived early Friday evening & got back home by midmorning on Memorial Day.  I had a great time even with the heat & have my internal psychic batteries once again charged up. 

P.S. To the fella who reads my blog who actually met me for the 1st time at this Vous – I really enjoyed meeting you, maybe next time it will be cool enough for me to sing.

Life Made Other Plans

OK, so I was scheduled to be at the Old Middlebrook Village Day from 9am until 4 pm on Saturday.  My registration confirmation said I was to set up near the Civil War folks (I’m representing the 1760’s) and that I could camp out Friday night with them on site.  Fantastic.  I packed up all the proper toys & arrived on site at 7 pm.  No one else was there.  No Civil War folks or tents, no Village Day folks, just some food tent setups, booth markers & 2 porta-potties.  Well at least the hooters are here.  As I was contemplating  how to proceed an Augusta County law officer showed up & informed me I couldn’t camp there overnight.  Set up yes, camp no.  Great.  I don’t have the funds to either drive home & come back in the morning or to stay at the local KOA/motel/truck stop.  Called everyone I knew in the area, nobody was home.  Guess I’m a no show for OMVD.

So I called Gypsy Jane who is in Lynchburg this weekend.  I had planned to go camp with her Saturday night after OMVD, instead I headed over there Friday night.  Got there about 10 pm, which made for a rather long day but at least I was having quality friend time.  She’s moving out of her Escaper RV & into her Holiday Rambler RV, so there was plenty to work on Saturday.  About noon her friend Danny said there was some sort of history thing going on across the highway in New London. 

The something involved our OVPR friends, the Itinerate Musicians – the weekend had just improved wonderfully.

I don’t know the mandolin players name, but that’s Randy with the Preacher.

There were all kinds of things going on – a blacksmith, soap making, a Civil War camp, quilting, spinning, 1700’s children’s games, a bluegrass band, various other period crafts, displays on New London’s history and carriage rides.

Some Horse-less Carriages too.  No rides in these though.

Saturday evening found Gypsy Jane & I camped at our favorite site in the Lynchburg IWL.  Sunday we ran some errands & moved her Escaper RV to the camp site so she could finish moving her things into her new home.  Then I headed home to unload my unused historic camp.  The canvas had gotten wet from the rain Saturday night, so now its laid out on my front yard to dry. 

Not the weekend I’d planned but a good weekend none the less.