Patty's Weblog

If anyone offers to prepare baby artichokes for you, say "thank you", and say it a lot! Look at that pile of leaves!

I made bagels Saturday! The recipe is from "The Best Bagels are Made at Home". I agree with the title!

The Kruger Rock trailhead is in Hermit Park, just south of Estes Park (Colorado). The Hermit Park open space area was established in 2008, but we hadn't yet checked it out. We have been curious about Hermit Park, as you can hike (or bike) from Lion Gulch (one of our favorite hikes) through Homestead Meadows to Hermit Park, and make it a one-way hike by taking two cars and parking one car at the end of the hike. Then a friend told us that the Kruger Rock hike affords a fantastic 360-degree view of the peaks in Rocky Mountain National Park. So, we headed off last Friday to check it out.



The hike is only 2 miles each way, but there is a pretty good elevation change. By my GPS, it was 900 feet bottom-to-top elevation change, but about 1200 feet walking elevation change because the trail goes up and down a few times. A couple stretches were very steep — a few good switchbacks would have been nice! The trail was mostly smooth, with very few hard and rocky steps to navigate.

We got almost to the top and I sat down. To get to the very top, you had to scramble up through a notch in the rocks. Well, I don't like heights, so I said to John "you go on up, I'll wait here". He got up there and yelled down that I just HAD to come on up, that the view was fantastic and it wasn't scary. (You can see him in the "notch" in the photo below if you click on the photo to enlarge it.)



Alright, alright, I'll do it. I left my pack but took my camera.

Well . . . yes, the view was fantastic. Below is a series of panoramas, beginning looking west, then going clockwise towards north and so on back to west. You will see a few rocks in the foreground — if I were brave, I would have climbed on top of them to get better panoramas.













From the top, we could look down and see my car in the parking lot.



And you get a great view of Estes Park.



Time to head down the notch in the rocks.



When we got back to the car, I took a photo of Kruger Rock. Pretty cool!

Plastic shopping bags concern people like me who care about how our environment looks, and how it might function in the future. Besides filling our landfills with unnecessary plastic, these bags escape our hands and end up blowing around the streets and stuck in trees and fences. This one was found near my home:

And on the streets of Africa last fall, the sights were abysmal.


I remember when the big supermarket chains first began offering reusable cloth bags to their customers. I thought: What a great idea! Inspired, soon after an Earth Day somewhere in the 1990s I started purchasing store-brand shopping bags as I could afford them.

As time went on, the design and colors of reusable store-bags changed, but I continued to buy bags from different stores as the whim befell me. Eventually I ended up with a hodge-podge of variously-logoed cloth bags. I was a walking advertisement for many establishments as I handed them to the bagger at the check-out stand.

The bags were stronger than plastic, but the handles tore if you filled them with too many groceries. Eventually the bags became so dirty that I had to wash them. But they shrank! After washing, barely any groceries would fit into a bag. And the printed logos started to fade and crack.

Click on "read more" for more of this blog entry. Click here for how to make the bags: Bag-Lady Bags

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Last fall we first noticed a pair of a different species of bird around our house. The pair left for the winter, then a couple days ago we again saw a pair in our trees and on the shed. These birds have a distinct "coo COO coo" sound and are larger than robins and meadowlarks.

After a bit of web searching and some photo-taking, I identified the birds as "Eurasian Collared Doves". They are an invasive species that was first introduced into the Bahamas in the 1970s. By 1982, they had spread to Florida, and by 1996, 7 nesting Eurasian Collared Doves were found near Denver.

I'm not an ornithologist by any stretch, but I do find this interesting. The websites that I accessed today (links below) don't think that the invasion is necessarily a call for alarm. Time will tell. For now, I'll enjoy watching and listening to them.




Sources:
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology
Eurasian Collared-Doves in Colorado, Yahoo Groups
Bird Source

I admit it, I collect chickens. (Is it because I am a chicken at heart? Is it because my mother collected owls?)

Well, not real chickens, at least I don't think so. I'm talking about decorative chickens, all over my kitchen.

So here I am with plenty of time on my hands so I decide to clean the soffit area in our kitchen. I take down the ceramic chickens that reside up there - some of them inherited from my mother - and dig into the difficult task of cleaning all the greasy grime from their myriad surfaces. The job is so tough that I clean one and then take a long break before I attempt another one. Slowly, clean and shiny chickens join each other on the opposite counter top.

I come to a point when I am almost done. Turning slightly, I glimpse something disturbing. There is a mob of chickens clustered on the counter . . . are they ganging up . . . is that a sinister look on the old rooster in front? . . . is he guarding his clutch? . . . why is that one hen so surprised?

. . . maybe it's time to put them back up on the soffit. Separated.



Click on this link for a past blog entry on my obsessive chicken collection and the Chicken God.

For a photo of the chickens back up on the soffit and a little techie photo talk, click on "read more" below.
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A few updates of interest:

When we toured the village, we said “this is so interesting, it should be an ecotour!” Well, Tammy has done just that: arranged several ecotours. This brings one more small business into the Tsevie area.

Becky decided not to bring her dog back to the US, but the carrier was used by some other PC volunteer.

Tammy’s bunnies had bunnies!



Tammy got a kitty, too. She said “it was stuffed into this cage with all these ducks, and I just had to bring it home.”

John and I realize that not only are we richer for the travel experience, we are stronger. We can travel to a place that is out of our comfort zone. We also realize how much we missed seeing the wildlife of Africa, like elephants and lions and monkeys. This isn’t Tammy’s fault, she offered us the option of going to Mole National Park in Ghana and we declined. But when we got home, a flyer offering a certain tour, arranged through the CU Alumni Foundation, came in the mail. We both looked at it at separate times, and then one evening looked at each other and said: “Let’s go!!!” So next May we are off to Africa, this time on . . .

Safari!

First post in the African trip series.

Africa. Before we traveled to Ghana and Togo, I thought of it as a large dark continent, full of unknowns, unknowns that could be dangerous. Now I can put a name on the dangers, like unsafe transportation, diseases, poor health care support, poisonous snakes and ants, but I also know that west Africa is peopled with kind, helpful, hardworking, and fun-loving people. The interesting people we met made the travel worthwhile. In general, the people are laid-back and friendly, and have a nice slow pace to life, similar to other cultures in tropical climates, such as Hawaii. We never felt threatened, we did not find the locals to be angry or mad or violent. Quite the contrary.

We just scratched the surface of learning about the culture of west Africans, and we liked it. I am so proud of my daughter for immersing her life amongst theirs, learning so much about their ways, and sharing with them some American ways, and helping them learn methods to improve their lives.

I could delve into the issue of the abject poverty that we saw. Are they happy living in the conditions? Yes, mostly, it seems; at least they were not angry. But they have few opportunities to change how they live. Could they, should they? We have such a wealth of ways in which we can spend our days, spend our lives. If we get sick, we can get medical attention. We have freedom of choice and lots of choices. We may get angry at our government, but at least it is not corrupt at every level. I don’t necessarily wish on the rich African culture the hectic, busy, consumer-goods-obsessed ways of Americans, but to me, never to have had the chance to study science, nor have a plethora of foods to choose from, nor be able to travel, nor have a daughter who can devote her life to whatever she chooses, nor have my son cured of cancer . . . I know where my heart is.

I used to think it would be easy to help pull Africa out of poverty. Just start opening factories there, why not? There are a lot of people there who need work. Well, the infrastructure is just not there. Roads, power, stable governments, sewage and trash systems; the issues are mindboggling. When we first got back from our trip, people asked us what we thought of Africa, and John and I both said “It’s complicated.”

And to those who say “the US is becoming a third world country” we say “uh uh, no way near it”. If that’s what you think, travel to one, and you will know.

We are glad we traveled to one, and especially that we traveled to west Africa. Our lives are a lot richer for the experience.

Epilogue.


First post in the African trip series.

Saturday morning we had breakfast at the hotel: good omelets, and some croissants that Tammy got from a place down the street, real coffee. While in the hotel restaurant, we saw Chris and Rachel, PC volunteers who are stationed north of Tsevie. (We had met Chris before at the marathon.) Freshly showered, Chris and Rachel would soon leave for the long trip up north to the villages that they are stationed in.

The hotel was close to the Togo-Ghana border, so we rolled our bags along the sidewalk next to the beach. At the border, we got through the typical passport/visa border rituals, and then walked to the tro-tro station.

This time, we found an actual bus to take us to Accra. It was large, pretty new, clean, had good shocks, had seat belts, and even a DVD screen. It sat probably 20 people. It took awhile to fill this bus - probably 45 minutes - before we could leave. During this time, of course the vendors are trying to sell us stuff.

One woman gets on the bus and in her bag is a chicken. Could that really be what I saw? Why yes, it soon squawked, proving it was there. What’s a trip to Africa without a chicken on a bus?

A little later we hear the apprentice arguing with one of the women on the bus. It went on for awhile. Finally they stopped arguing, and started stuffing a large matress onto the bus. Most of the people on the bus started laughing! This was rare, usually everyone just sat and endured whatever was happening.

So they get the mattress on, and it’s right in front of John, kind of vertical. For a long time, the driver played the same irritating music tape over and over. Then he put on a DVD, on a screen that John couldn’t see because of the mattress (no loss). The movie was locally produced and about a village and killings and witchcraft. Tammy says that this type of melodramatic film is quite popular.

The driver didn’t drive too fast, amazing. But the bus kept getting stopped by the Ghana police, who repeatedly pulled this one guy off the bus for questioning. The police carried guns, by the way. AK47s. Each time, the police checked this guy’s papers and then his bags in the back of the bus. Probably, each time the guy had to pay a bribe. Tammy said he was either Nigerian or a rastafarian.

One time the bus stopped, and everyone started getting off. Finally I figured that this is a “rest” stop. So I followed Tammy to the “restroom”. So far on the trip, when out in public I had always used a restaurant or bar’s toilet facility. And except for once, that meant an actual toilet. Only once was it a “urinal”, and that time, it was a private urinal. A woman’s urinal room is a tiled room, and along one side there is a trough. You are supposed to pull down your pants, squat down, and direct your pee into the trough. This time, I follow Tammy into the restroom facility, and plunk down a coin and am directed to a room that was a urinal. There are about 10 women there peeing. They are all wearing dresses. I start to pull down my pants and then just can’t do it. I went back out and paid more money and was directed to a real toilet. (Men in west Africa often just pee in the street, in the open.)

We hit traffic about 10 miles out of Accra. One time, there was an accident causing the traffic, other times it was just volume. Our flight doesn’t leave until 11 pm, so we aren’t in a big hurry for that, but Tammy had an errand to run for her PC site mate, Becky. Becky supposedly has a pet carrier waiting for her at a certain pet store in Accra and supposedly the pet store closes at 3 pm. (Becky has a dog that she wants to bring home with her to America in a few weeks.)

Tammy looked at a map and figured the general area of Accra the pet store must be in, and asked others in the bus where to get off. Before we are in the heart of Accra, the bus stops, and someone on the bus told her that this is our stop. People in Ghana are really helpful. We found a taxi, and the driver helped us find the pet store, even calling the pet store on his phone and asking strangers inside a local business. Again, helpful people.

We arrived at the pet store at about 2:30 pm. But they didn’t have a pet carrier. The salesgirl called her boss. Finally by about 5:30 pm, the boss came. In the meantime, we had drinks at a bar and then dinner across the street from the pet store. The time was well spent, as we were all together, enjoying food, drink, and conversation.

When the boss came with the pet carrier, he told us that he didn’t take Tammy’s Visa card (the whole point was that he was supposed to take Visa while Becky had been there and they didn’t take Mastercard). The guy was really nice, though, and offered to take us to an ATM so she could withdraw cash. Then, he drove us directly to the airport. That was awfully nice. We all got out and went inside the terminal.

Tearfully, we said good bye to Tammy.

John and I went to catch our plane for Dulles. Our plane left at 11:15 pm. As the plane rose off the runway, I gazed down at nighttime Africa, pale orange lights spotted through the city, and then just large areas of darkness.

Next: Africa, last impressions.

We left Tsevie in the early afternoon on Friday, right after the great tuna lunch at Tammy’s friend’s house. A taxi picked us up at Tammy’s house and took us all the way to the Hotel Phoenicia in Lome. No more bush taxis for us!

After we settled into our hotel room, we walked a couple blocks to the beach, and sat at a “bar” that was sheltered tables and chairs on the sand. As we sat and talked and ate a few snacks, hawkers kept coming by to sell us stuff. Tammy bought some DVDs. One guy was selling cigarettes and viagra. Yup, viagra.

Later, we walked to a restaurant for pizza. We felt kind of guilty for abandoning the food of the local culture, but we were hungry for something other than rice and sauce. We wanted cheese! We had to ask the restaurant workers to turn down the music. I forgot to mention this before, but the Ghanaese like to play loud reggae music through bad speakers. I like music, but it’s hard to hear over it when what you really want is good conversation.

The Hotel Phoenicia had TVs, hot showers, and even wi-fi. They also had a restaurant and bar. Our last night in Togo began a slow transition back to the creature comforts that John and I are so used to. We snuggled into the crisp sheets, cooled by a noisy but effective air conditioner. It's bittersweet, though. We know that tomorrow we have to say good-bye to Tammy.

Next: To the airport.