The weather is perfect, the birds are singing, and my children are playing. It doesn't get much better than this.
https://youtu.be/j_3NAz3NhIE
Category: Photography
It’s oh so quite
The Bunker Hill Retreat is a special place. The quite is the first thing that struck me. No cel service or phones of any kind, no TVs, no wifi, no loud cars, no loud music, and no need to drive anywhere. The retreat is a very isolated vacation spot on Jack’s Fork in southern Missouri.
When I first described it to Archer he panicked a bit. A whole weekend without the internet?! No YouTube? No video games? Whoa. When he put it that way I felt a bit uneasy too. When we drove in the cellular internet started to get spotty about 30 miles away and had completely dropped out about 15 miles out. Now it’s getting serious.
It didn’t take long for the beauty and isolation to win me over. It’s like a small community cut off from the outside world where you can let everything go for a few days. What’s the latest news? Who knows. You don’t have any way to check even if you wanted to. We arrived in the late afternoon and by lunch the next day I had stopped reaching for my phone every five minutes. Its a weird habit until you notice how absurd it is.
The meals were all provided and served family style where we ate at long tables with everyone else who was staying, maybe 15 families in all.
The kids had a great time once they got the place figured out and I can’t wait to go back.
On our first night we played on the rick beach. Griffin had never seen so many rocks to choose from. It took some persuasion to get Archer to be comfortable throwing rocks into the water, skipping them across the top, digging pits, and stacking them however you want. Alice tried to eat them all. It was nine at night with very little light when I took these first photos and I am very impressed by how well my Fuji performed.
Day two was filled with exploring the river by canoe and we finished off the day with a campfire by the water complete with s-mores.
We were all a little sad to say goodbye to our little cabin.
Do you think they can see it?
There was a huge electrical storm which drifted just north of the Morrison Observatory for about 30 minutes. I can’t remember ever seeing a storm with this much lightning in it.
Big mantis
I have seen a few of these adult mantids in the back yard this year. I like to think they are the juveniles I played with last year.
Headed home
Flying home during the day doesn’t quite have the same kick as flying at night but it is still a heck of a lot of fun!
Night flight
This was my first night flight in a small plane. Watching the world scroll by as the engine hums along is magical.
Flora macros
Sporangium sticking up through the pea gravel behind our garage. Each of these things were less than 1 mm across.
I know dandelion macros are cliche but I really like the little curly bits in this one.
CMU Homecoming parade
Tiny little leafhopper
Bugs bugs bugs
Archer and Griffin had a great time playing with these tiny inch worms. The ants finally figures out how to raid the hummingbird feeder and gorged themselves on the sugar water.
