Lakeshore

( A few pictures from today, including a close up of a spider. )

( The flowers of Nuevo Rancho Lake... )

As usual, more at the Flickr set

Had a great trip down to Kansas City today with garyomaha and elusivem. I went by their house about 8:30 this morning to throw some laundry in before we took off, and got pictures of ( George, the softball-sized tomato. )

elusivem has about six varieties growing in his tomato patch, and this one really took off.

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We headed down to Kansas City on back roads, initially. Just south of Murray, NE, we spotted ( this camper conversion from the mating of a 1958 (?) Buick and a gooseneck horse trailer. )

It was parked right here. mckitterick, that's within screaming distance of you, I think. A thing of beauty truly is a joy forever, after all!

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We also stopped in Nebraska City, NE to see the Lied Center, where we happened upon ( a snazzy 1929 Model A Ford. )

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Eventually we hit Jack Stack BBQ, the original Holmes Road location. We shared a stack of onion rings and an order ham burnt ends (which were not impressive), then I tucked into the ( three-rib plate of pork, beef and lamb spare ribs. )

The sides were so-so, the sauce was adequate, but the meat was some of the best I have ever tasted.

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From there it was a family errand for garyomaha, then downtown where we stopped at ( the WWI memorial, which featured some lovely sphinxes in mourning. )

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We headed home via ( Oregon, Missouri )

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Along with stops to look at ( a funky silo and a mockup of an SR-71 Blackbird )

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All in all, an excellent day.

(Most of the above photos are geotagged in Flickr, if that's of interest)

Rio Hondo is wrapping up. I'm stealing a bit of bandwidth to let y'all know I'll be back in the world tonight or tomorrow morning. In the meantime, ( here's a few photos to keep you amused. )

Lots more photos to come, as well as other stuff including catchup posts from the Montana trip. Also, since I've been off the grid for a week, please leave a note here in comments if there's something I should see in LJ land, given that I won't even try to catch up on flist as a whole.

13 hours from Portland to Missoula. That's with frequent stops for photography, micturation, caffeine, random woods visiting and a leisurely lunch in Clarkston, WA. The car was alternately raucous and napping. tillyjane, danjite, khaybee and lasirenadolce all in one place at one time with me makes for a bit of a travelling circus.

I'll throw more details and bons mots on tomorrow, but for now I leave you with ( this picture of Russian Creek on the east side of Lolo Pass in southwestern Montana. )

( When a mommy worm and a daddy worm love each other very much... )

( Raindrops on a flower )

More at the flickr set

( Flower photos from San Francisco and Marin County )

More at the flickr set

( Portland flowers near Rancho Lake )

[ flickr set ]

Our first stop on the way to Lolo Pass Road was Geren's [ Google Maps ], between Boring, OR and Sandy, OR. ( There we checked out the welded sculpture of the elephant, not to mention the hatchery and an old tractor. )

Photos by me and the_child. [ Flickr set ]

We've had a couple of evening frosts lately, which is very unusual for right around here. Morning fronts have been routine. ( Here's a few images from today's frost. )

More photos, of course. Mother of the Child pointed out to me today ( a fig rotting on the tree, and an anomalous ground-flowering clematis. )

( A few shots on my way to the post office Friday, along Franklin Street, including (inexplicably to me) a banana tree )

( The November garden at Rancho Lake )

( A few recent photos of flowers from the dry side of the Cascades )

( The camera is finally back, and so I celebrate with pictures of flowers and a spider. )

( More photos from the Hamilton Mountain hike. Be warned, potentially icky stuff. )

( And here you thought I'd forgotten... )

( The sunflower! )

While we were in Omaha, the_child took ( this photograph of a bee. )

Amidst loading Montana photos, I offer ( these pictures of bees taken on my morning walk to the post office. )