Advertisement
Sacred Healing Herbs
This is either mugwort or motherwort. I can't remember which. Lucky I'm not the village medicine woman. The plan was, if I woke up early, I would head to Marin, to Muir Woods. If not, then the Oakland Hills. After 3 nocturnal cat emergencies (I need you to walk me downstairs again, and remind me where my food is again, even though we’ve lived here six years) I did not wake up early. So Oakland it would be. I thought about what, exactly, I wanted for breakfast, since on vacation, you can have whatever you want.
I made pancakes and bacon. I have to say, the pancakes came out perfectly, which is unusual for me. This might be a good omen. By noon-thirty, I was out of the house and driving to the Oakland Hills. Though I missed the window where traffic is light, and both tunnels heading west are open, I still made good time. Instead of the south entrance to Redwood Regional, I headed to Joaquin Miller Park because on vacation, one should see new things. No one was there, but I paid the $5 parking fee at the automatic machine anyway. I wanted to support the park, and I’m positive that if I didn’t, the parking fairy would stalk me.
I consulted my
Branches Everywhere
This tree had branches down to the ground, unlike most redwood where the branches start higher up. Being short, I got this shot from under, and you can kind of see the spiral pattern. I am in love with redwoods. iPhone for trail maps. I followed one, that sadly didn’t go through redwoods, but was still lovely. The weather was perfect. I had sporadic encounters with women walking dogs, most of which were pleasant. One woman had a pack of dogs, five all together. And one of them decided that I was a threat and lunged at me. Fortunately, she just gave me a warning nip before her mom whined NOOOO! ineffectually. I ended up reassuring the Mom that I was fine and all was well, because I’m an idiot that way. Or a very kind person. And the truth is I was fine, so really I was telling this to myself, because otherwise my brain could have a field day, showing me movies of “what could have happened.”
Walking on I realized I was not thinking about work, (which, thank the gods didn't send me into a fit of thinking about work), and I could see all the way to Mt. Diablo, so I should be super grateful. But I was pissed. Stupid dog owners need to leash their animals if they can’t control them. Breathe, I told myself. Gorgeous day, no clients. Calm down. And I did
Moss
I just loved the pattern here. It is one of the patterns of life - that we see in trees, wind or water-swept canyons, in muscle fibers, and moss growing on bark. calm down, till the same lady and her dogs circled back.
Crap. I looked for a place to hide. There was a little footpath off the main trail which I took for all of three feet before I realized it went nowhere. I sat for a moment, then realized this just made my face an easier reach for the lunging dog. So I stood. I was frozen, not as much with fear, though my heart was beating a little fast, but with feeling stupid for being afraid. I couldn’t decide what to do, but it didn’t matter. The lady and her pack were right there on the main trail as I stood three feet off, not hidden at all, next to a tree. The lunger saw me and wanted nothing more than to bite my face off.
Fortunately her dog mommy had leashed her, and was now wrestling with her to keep going. Dog mommy finally looked in the direction her desperate dog was barking and said, Oh hi! Because now we were old friends, and because it wasn't at all weird that I was hanging out in the brush. Whatever. They passed. I reminded myself that I was fine. No damage done. My pounding heart begged to differ. This is probably not what my doctor meant when he told me I should exercise to bring up my heart rate.
DAY TWO, EVENING
I think about another movie, but just because I CAN do vacation stuff doesn’t mean I have to. I have a flank steak to broil and veggies to roast (though the maid service is terrible here, the food is amazing). There is beer in the fridge. I don’t drink much because I have to be ultra clear headed at work, and I am hangover-prone. I would like to have a buzz on vacation. So, no driving to a movie. Instead I will have steak and veggies and beer. Oh and those gnocchi we have in the fridge, cooked crispy in brown butter and sage. Ahhh.
AFTER DINNER
I was right about the food. The chef here is awesome.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.115s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 12; qc: 50; dbt: 0.0779s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Barbomatic
non-member comment
Can I hire the chef?
I'm all in for the food and doing without the automatic canine aerobic heart rate increaser.