The mourning dove I'd been watching on her nest finally revealed a baby bird. These birds never made one sound while using our atrium as a nursery. One morning I heard a little stir out in the camelias and there were the birds learning to fly. By the evening the nest had been abandonned and I haven't seen them since. I'm surprised at how lonely the atrium seems without the birds.
I spent some time taking pictures of ice cubes. I'd forgotten how much fun that is! If you use tap water--not bottled--there will be plenty of air bubbles and lines. No two ice cubes will be exactly alike. Here's an ice cube I particularly liked.
We took advantage of what would probably be the last 'warm but not boiling hot' week-end left of the Spring and headed out to the desert to some four-wheeling. As much as I loved the Minnie, being able to head off-road or just take off on a dirt road that looked good was very freeing! There was no worrying about dead-ends, being able to turn the vehicle around or an impassable road. On the other hand, there was no refrigerator with ice and cold beer and an indoor toilet!
We did our exploring in the Newberry and Roman mountains south of Newberry Springs. These are lava mountains and a beautiful shade of deep red and purple. Of course both dogs went along to look for rabbits and anything else they could chase. Our first sign of life was a Coach snake sunning itself in the road. Immediate 360 in the Jeep--JR to get the snake off the road and me to run it over.
He prevailed and with a little tail-kicking got the snake to slowly move off the pavement. Then, for no apparent reason, the snake turned and came towards me very deliberately. That snake did not have all his shields up! I got some good pictures before kicking if off the road. I just wish I had thought to put the camera down on the road and catch the snake at eye level.
We took a dirt road up a hill that took us over a mile high. What a view!!! We could see a hundred miles in all directions. There were cell towers on the top and the wind was howling. After seeing no one the entire day, on the way down three vehicles converged--all of them Jeep Grand Cherokees and all with the women driving. I'd never seen that before.
Back in Bako I've seen the weather turn from nice to very hot. This is usually my favorite time of year here because it means days of swimming and floating in the pool with the pool bar attached to the float. This year I just don't have the spare energy to do much but get dressed and move from bed to couch. It is an eerie feeling to feel not really here--almost transparent. I assume it's because I'm not getting enough oxygen right now but will see doc in San Diego next week. A couple of days in La Jolla should fix just about anything!
For now, I'll just post some pictures and leave it at that. For anyone who wants to leave comments, all you need to do for the account is give your email address and a password. I've not been bothered by any spam or hassles. It's done to keep rude comments from being posted and then not being able to find the perp.
