City of Rocks Idaho

We still had our English friend from Australia with us and were trying to drive in convoy. We agreed we would stop and have a coffee at Atomic City as we all though it sounded quite interesting. We thought with a name like that it must have something good going on but how wrong were we!!

It was a small collection of extremely derelict buildings and a bar which didn’t look much from the outside and was even less on the inside… when we first went in we thought the place had been ransacked – even by my standards it was a mess!!!

There were a few locals in the main bar bit and they were friendly enough but it was tiny and a bit daunting so we bought pop and carried on. Getting to City of Rocks went according to plan and we were told which were likely camping spots and we went off hoping we would find some shade as the temperatures were hitting the mid 30’s. we checked every possible available camping and only one was left!! As it happens it was quite nice site – limited shade but still quite nice – we moved the picnic table to take advantage of the shade had a beer and waited for it to cool down so we could put up the tents!

City of Rocks is a large area of rocks!! Huge granite lumps making fabulous skylines and a heaven for any climbers. Most of the climbing requires serious equipment so Dr Fred and friend were limited to bouldering but both were very excited.

We had a pleasant evening once it got cooler and the next morning got up early - it would have been hard to stay in bed as the sun was shining and the temperatures were already rising so before it got too hot we went for a walk around the rocks, the boys were looking for suitable climbing places and eventually they found something they were happy with and I found a nice space to sit in the shade and draw this old twisted tree which had loads of twirls and texture. The boys went off to do some scrambling around.

It got very hot very quick, the climbing got hard so we gave up and headed into town and found this cafe called Rock City which looked interesting. There was a old broken down truck sat outside – it even had a wasps nest /honey comb in it – I t just sat there like so much scrap seems to every where you look in the states… Rock City and had a very nice pizza – massively huge and very tasty.

It was so hot we just couldn’t think what to do- 38 degrees and no easy shade… so we thought we would explore the Castle Rocks. We walked round them but it was just tooooo hot and there was practically no shade so we pretty much marched around before we went back to Rock City and had a cold drink before heading back to camp and hoping the shade had hit the picnic table which it had! After hanging out for a bit, Dr Fred went off and did so more scrambling about, we went down to the steak house and had a very tasty steak and pioneer pudding – and then back to camp to have a little party to celebrate our Aussies mates last night with us.

Its been a very hot two days with temperatures in the mid 30’s but amazingly there is still snow up on the peaks.

Alesund

Our final destination stop was Alesund. This is a very pretty town in southern Norway built on a peninsula. All the houses are painted pretty colours and a lot of the architecture is all very Art Nouveau based. This is because the town itself was completely burnt to the ground In 1904 by a fire for which they never found the original cause. The whole town had to be rebuilt and this became a huge National Effort and a lot of prominent and up and coming architects flocked to the town to stick there 20 pence in. Consequently the town is very heavily Art Nouveau which was very fashionable at the time. There is this wonderful Museum just off the harbour which is a very beautiful Art Nouveau house. It has amazing panelling, doors, wallpaper, and it's all furnished with beautiful art Nouveau Furniture. It also house a collection of of enameled Art Nouveau Trinkets,boxes, spoons, jewellery, very very beautiful. There is an interesting collection of old books and paintings a...

Autumnal Garden Days

I love these (rare) warm sunny late summer days and there is all sorts of lovely things going on in my garden... I counted 12 red admiral butterflies whizzing around the over grown ivy which I had been about to hack down but then left until the flutterbies have finished with it... The late blooms add a dash of colour and the daisy strewn lawn is littered with autumnal leaves, debris from my brief half an hour of slash and burn and the stone wall is covered in glorious soft moss all shiny and tactile with a few late nasturtiums loitering. I've hacked out the brambles for this year, sadly I missed the fruit as we were away, ditto the strawberries, we never seem to get the fruit before the birds so I've made space and moved the plants that were getting swamped and so not performing to their potential - hopefully next year they will literally blossom now they have light and room to flourish.

wet weekends...

Another frolic in the damp wet cold depths of Teesdale with a enthusiastic group of foolhardy stargazers who love tunes. Friday night was cold cold and got colder... Dr Fred and I were in the Beryl the yellow peril - known locally as the dirty tatty filthy (racist term) eyesore and we almost got toasty but it was down to sleeping almost fully clothed with a onesie on top and then my down gillet on top on that under a duvet and a couple of blankets... it rained and rained and the van was sat in a very large lake by 4.00 in the morning... too late to worry about sinking in the mud an we just had to brave it out. The completely fearless in our party had intended to sleep in a tent!!!!! but in fact the tent fairly much dissolved in the rain and wind and they ended up in the bunk barn! But .... in spite of the weather we had a great weekend - a really good talk about exploring the solar system from Dr Fred - a new one for me so it was quite interesting and the...

Planet Ruby Starrs

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