Been a While...

It has been a couple of months since the last blog post.  The time gets away from me, especially since the weather was miserable April and May and I had a lot of work (still more to do) on our new site at the park.

We took some friends, Sally and Ron, on a ride to Jack's Peak.  Faithful blog readers may remember photos from last year.  This is the site of the big wireless towers which cover this area.  BORRRIINNG ride, mostly county roads but this ride had a new feature:  ladybugs.  We took the trail to the top of the mountain and stopped for lunch.  

Every inch of this pine tree was covered in ladybugs.  One of the weather channels had a radar picture showing a massive cloud of ladybugs so this must be a banner year for them.

I have put up hummingbird feeders, cake feeders for the acorn woodpeckers, and a box-type feeder for loose birdseed.  There is a particularly quarrelsome pigeon which likes to attack the box feeder and fight over the feed.  The fact that the box is full of birds already doesn't discourage additional birds from flying over and trying to land.  There is a dead tree across the lane; occasionally I look out and see dozens of these birds perching, just waiting for us to refill the box.  Makes me think of the old Alfred Hitchcock movie.

Pigeons!


Another interesting and beautiful bird common here is the 
 Acorn Woodpecker.  One enterprising bird has discovered that hummingbird nectar is quite tasty.  

We did another all-day ride with Ron and Sally to a place called the German Mine.  It's a 50 mile ride round trip.  Doesn't sound like much but most of the ride is on rough trails and average speed is less than 5 mph.

The old cabin for miners.

That's my Polaris in front, with the red "ribbon" on the winch.

Mike on an "up" portion of the German Mine trail as we were going back.  The trail is up/down/narrow so no matter where you are, you will encounter one of the above conditions.  I am at a curve looking back down the trail.

On the way back, we detoured to find a "seasonal" pond.  At this time of the year, there's quite a bit of water but by the end of the summer, this pond will be substantially smaller.