Winter Wonder

This is a random post about something we've been wondering for a couple years.  The past two summers we've driven across the country along I-80 and we noticed these partial fences on the plains along the freeway.  We couldn't imagine what purpose they served and it has taken me this long to research it.  So here is my answer to our question... They are snow fences.  I borrowed this picture from another blog, High Plains Drifter, and I found this article with interesting information on the how and why behind the snow fences.  So now we know. ;)  

Road Trip 2010: Lake Michigan

A couple weeks ago, we decided to ditch this cloudy city and make a road trip to warm and sunny South Haven, Michigan. Some of Ben's family were meeting there to attend a ceremony for his late grandmother. We packed up Thin Mint and scurried along the open road through Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, a smidge of Indiana, and finally Michigan. Since we made a similar (yet much longer) road trip last summer, we didn't take as many pictures of the scenery along the way, but we did take plenty of pictures of the family living it up at Lake Michigan. This trip ended up being a special trip for us because our dearly beloved Thin Mint didn't make it home with us. Last summer, she took us an amazing 7,127 miles back and forth across the entire country. This time she made it 2,892 miles before she decided to make her final resting place a little town called Moline, Illinois. She was a good car and she kept up with my abuse as good as any other. Better, in fact. And she will be missed.  Once we were certain Thin Mint was comfortable in her new spot, we rented a car, loaded the trunk with all our belongings and set off to finish our journey in the lap of luxury with air-conditioning and cruise control. 

Here are pictures from our trip:

Road Trip to Michigan 2010

Cleveland National Forest: Mt. Laguna

Views of Anza Borrego Desert from atop Mt. Laguna

Vegas, Baby!

This week is spring break for us and we were hoping to sail out to the Coronados for a few days.  Unfortunately, the weather forecast didn't cooperate.  So we hopped in the car and drove to Vegas instead.  We stayed three nights at the Mirage, did a lot of walking, enough drinking, and even a little gambling.  I also got to see my first Cirque du Soleil show, Mystere, at Treasure Island (and unfortunately no cameras are allowed at shows)!  This trip was special because it was Lola's first time in Vegas.  It turns out we spotted four other dogs during our trip.  Not a very dog-friendly city, but we had fun anyway.  Check out our pics here: Las Vegas

Joshua Tree

We decided to take advantage of the warm weather and President's Day holiday last week by hopping into Thin Mint and venturing out to the desert. Our first instinct was to camp at the Salton Sea, just west of Anza-Borrego Desert, but upon arriving, we realized how lame the sea could be and headed north to Joshua Tree.  We entered the park from the southern edge...

First stop: Cottonwood Spring.

Then we continued on through the park,

stopping here and there to take in the scenery...

We set up camp at Jumbo Rocks...

And went for a short hike before sunset...

Then we cooked up some grub:

Panang Curry with Mock Duck

We spent the night watching shooting stars

 and headed north again in the morning.

We detoured south for a bit to check out

Keys View (Elev: 5185 ft.)

Then we headed home again...

First Road Trip of 2010 (Videos)

Here are a couple videos we captured on our road trip....

First Road Trip of 2010 (Part Two: Central Coast)

After we left San Fran, we took Route 1 down the coast to San Luis Obispo and spent the night.  The next morning we cruised along the beaches and stopped at Avila to check out the anchorage and the sights.  Then we continued south to Santa Barbara to check out their anchorage and we had some lunch.  Next we ventured over to Ventura to check out the marinas.  And finally we cut through Oxnard and Camarillo before heading home to Mother Culture. 

Somewhere along Route 1

The anchorage at Avila

They don't have a dinghy dock here.

Instead they tie up to the pier and and have to

climb a ladder to get up and down. (eek!)

Cool sign at Avila

The Cave

The Slough in Santa Barbara

First Road Trip of 2010 (Part One: San Francisco)

The crew of Mother Culture took a sponta-
neous road trip on Monday.  We drove about 550 miles north to Novato, CA (north of San Francisco) and spent the night.  On Tuesday morning, we met with a man about a horse (actually, we met with a man about some hard-to-find exhaust pipes for my dad's Benelli, which should be arriving in Connecticut any day now).  Then we headed south to Sausalito to check out the marinas and moorings before heading down to San Francisco.  There we spent the day checking out the sights.  It was my first time in the city so I had to see all the usual attractions: Fisherman's Wharf, Crooked Street, China Town.  We even took a crazy ride on the public transportation.  The bus drivers in San Francisco are officially scarier than the ones in San Diego.  We spent the night downtown, on Van Ness & Lombard, where we fell victim to some Black Magic Voodoo at the bar across from our hotel.  On Wednesday morning, we headed over to Haight-Ashbury before cruising down the central coast on Route 1.  Here are some pics of the sights we saw:

Fort beneath Golden Gate Bridge

Ship near Fisherman's Wharf

Crooked Street

Sign on Garage Door on Crooked Street

Streetcar

China Town

Haight-Ashbury

Motorcycle Diaries: Chapter 2 Cont'd

Here is one last video from our trip to Connecticut in June. This one goes with the ones from my Videos posting back on June, 16, 2009... when Ben and my dad went to Mt. Greylock State Reservation.

Road Trip Pics

For anyone who is interesting in sifting through our pics in their entirety, click the links below. (Disclaimer: ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK- there are somewhere around 600 pics divided between two albums)

Road Trip 2009 (Samantha's Pics)

Ben's Road Trip Pics

Homeward Bound

We took the I-80 eastbound across the country, so we decided to take the I-70 westbound for some different scenery. I've now been through 39 of the 50 states and hopefully I'll get a chance to see the remaining 11 sometime before my time is up. My favorite landscapes were in Utah, Iowa, Colorado and oddly, Connecticut. I lived there for 23 years but I'm not sure I enjoyed the scenery as much as I did on this visit. Perhaps my opinion was skewed by the 23 New England winters I endured while residing there. Illinois was really pretty, too, which surprised me. There is something about the blue skies contrasting against acres of green farmland. Living on water, we get blue on blue, which can be pretty, too, but I always appreciate new color palettes. Utah had beautiful red rock against bright blue skies. The draw of Colorado is obviously the mountains: some green with pines and some capped with snow. Here are some pics from along the way. Obviously, I slept through Kansas and Nevada, so I didn't get any pictures.

Two shots of Illinois Farmland

St. Louis, MO

Colorado Rockies

Utah