Fun Friday: S is for San Diego

Our Blogging for Fun group is doing an A-Z  meme for our Fun Friday (or is it now Saturday Special for me since I am always a day or two late) , and this week, we are working on letter S.

S is for San Diego

and all the other S in and around San Diego, such as:

The Sea and the Snowcapped Mountain

Sunset By the Sea

Splashing Waterfall

Sea Caves

Sea Lions

Seals

Surf

Sea Gulls

Sea Star

Star Fish

Succulents by the Sea

And there are probably more S in and around San Diego that I can add here, however, my other S pictures such as the squirrels and snails were somehow hidden in my portable hard disk drive and unlabeled that I still have to look for them :( 

Hope everyone is having a good weekend. 

Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park, Redwood National and State Parks, CA

In my older posts, I featured the awe inspiring Fern Canyon, part of Redwood National and State Parks, in Northern California which is both a World Heritage Site and an International Biosphere Reserve. Fellow blogging friend Sharkbytes, a botanical enthusiast and a long distance hiker, showed interest in knowing what kind of ferns these are.

Fern Canyon, Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park

If you take a closer look at the picture above (you may click on the above picture to enlarge), you will notice a combination of different ferns. Some of these exquisite ferns are ancient species whose ancestry can be traced back 325 million years.  The 3 major types of fern in the canyon are:

Five- Fingered Ferns

Delicate Lady Ferns

Sword Ferns

Five- fingered ferns shroud the walls of the canyon the most.  However, on the ground, everywhere, the most common is the sword fern. But you will see all these 3 types of fern clinging to the cliffs of the canyon walls. 

What else are in here at Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park other than Fern Canyon? Of course, there are still the tall redwood trees,

Redwoods @ Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park

( if you missed my 2 previous posts on redwood trees, you can see them here and here )

interesting moss covered branches that line the trail by Big Tree Wayside Trail,

drooping moss covered branches @ Big Tree Wayside Trail

( here, the very tall ferns lining the trail are mostly the sword ferns) 

and some hollow trees covered with moss that look like cave.

A Hollow Big Redwood Tree Surrounded by Small Moss Covered Branches

And of course, there is the prairie graced by elks.

Elk Prairie

Roosevelt Elks

These elks are huge that I was at first scared to take a picture of them up close, but after we have an eye to eye, they seemed to understand that we are not going to cause any harm, that they continued grazing happily on grass.

ADT: Our Home Security

by Chay

After comparing the benefits of homeownership versus renting, Jeff and I decided to buy our first home. We started house hunting and were ecstatic when we found an affordable area of town close to the desert and near all the amenities necessary for comfortable living. The neighborhood was quiet and the neighbors knew each other on a first name basis. We were at peace with our decision and enjoying our new home until our peace was replaced by fear for our safety. One Saturday morning, I got up very early to get an early start on my chores. Jeff was still sleeping. I was baking biscuits for breakfast, started laundry in the garage (our laundry room was in the garage), and started pulling weeds in my garden while my husband Jeff was still sleeping. Have I mentioned husband was still sleeping?? lol. It was not unusual for us to leave the garage door open when working around the house. We were at peace with the thought our area was a safe and quiet neighborhood. I never considered the fact I was providing a thief an opportunity to enter our garage, grabbed several valuable items from inside our cars then quickly enter our house and pick up some small items and loose change on our counter top and run away without a trace. To my dismay, I walked into the garage to see the car doors open and then noticed things missing from inside near the front door. My husband was still sleeping, oblivious of what happened. Does anyone think I am resentful of my husband sleeping in on that day? LOL His sleep time ended at my shriek and we immediately called the police. This thought of someone entering my private space and stealing still causes me concern.




We put the house up for sale the first opportunity we got and moved to our present home. When we moved into our new home, the first call we made was to set up utilities and the second call was to ADT CA alarm system. After spending a lot of time researching on-line ADT in California was the easiest choice to make for our protection. The company responded right away and installed a customized system to meet our security needs ending fears from our past. We even have protection when we are sleeping at night in our home.

Cottonball in front of our house with ADT Sign

( ADT also provides signs and stickers for your home. Surveys showed that nine out of ten convicted robbers said they’ve avoided homes protected by a security system. )

After that incident from our first home, we decided to never take our family’s safety for granted. Our family, our dog and our safety has our highest priority and ADT has the complete system to give us the peace of mind we needed. We have a peace of mind knowing that our children are safe at home after school, our home contents and dog are safe while we are at work, and I feel safe while my husband sleeps in on a summer or winter or spring or fall Saturday morning. Have I mentioned my husband likes to sleep in on Saturdays? LOL We now have a 24-hour a day security system working to keep our family and investments safe. It is also important to know that if something happens while we are at home unaware or away, trained professionals are monitoring what we tell them to and if something goes wrong these security professionals will contact the proper authorities to send emergency services without delay.



Now, if you are in Florida and is looking for a home security, you can find ADT in Florida as well. You can check ADT in FL here.

Protect what matters most from… almost a dollar per day, we did and it is worth it!

Fun Friday: R is for River

Fun Friday or Fun Saturday? Every Friday, our Blogging for Fun group does an A-Z meme, and this week, we are doing letter R.

R is for River.

The Colorado River @ Horseshoe Bend, Page, Arizona

I grew up close to the river, and the river for me is always a source of joy. The river then when I was growing up was always a place we can go to after school and recreate. Well, maybe nothing has changed a lot, since today, we actually hiked at San Diego River Canyon and had to cross the San Diego River to Cedar Creek Falls. However, this post is not about our hike today, which I will probably share later, but rather, this Blogging For Fun post is focused on one mighty river that carved so many interesting landscapes in North America, the Mighty Colorado River.

The Mighty Colorado River Behind Me, Page, Arizona

The Colorado River is the source of water of most of American Southwest. The States of Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah all depend on the Colorado River and its tributaries for water. However, the life that the Colorado River brings is probably enjoyed all over US and some parts of the world through agricultural crops from these States. 

These Lemons from California are watered by Colorado River

The headwaters of the Colorado River are located in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado. From an altitude of 9,010 feet, the Colorado River begins its flow Southwestward toward the Gulf of California and the Pacific Ocean. 

Gazing down Colorado River @ Dead Horse Point State Park, Utah

The depth of Colorado River varies from 6 ft to 90 ft, the rapids are the shallow sections, and the calm sections the deepest parts. The Colorado River has helped carved many of the Southwest's interesting landscapes, such as:

1. Arches National Park and Canyonlands National Park, in Moab, Utah

Delicate Arch, Arches National Park, Utah

Mesa Arch, Canyonlands National Park, Utah

Arches National Park and Canyonlands National Park are located in Moab, Utah. Here, the Colorado River winds it way down from Rocky Mountain National Park toward Lake Powell, the Grand Canyon to the Sea of Cortez. At Canyonlands, the Colorado River has carved the Earth so ruggedly unique with a precision of a scalpel. 

Carvings of Colorado River @ Canyonlands National Park 

( the small blue strip afar amongst the red rocks is the Colorado River)

2. The Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona

Colorado River Snaking Its Way @ Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona

The Colorado River has cut deep through rocks that are billions of years old, which created the depth of the Grand Canyon. If the Colorado River carved the Earth so ruggedly with a precision of a scalpel at Canyonlands, here at the Grand Canyon, the Colorado River showed its gentleness and subtlety when carving this canyon. 

These unusually shaped and strikingly colorful rock formations attesting to millions and billions of years of geologic time are some of the most well known features of the ancient lands of the Southwest where the Colorado River snakes through before heading to the Pacific Ocean.

“Follow the river and you will find the sea” -French Proverb Quotes

Fun Friday: Q is for Quest

A Hiker in Quest for Adventure

It was Fun Friday yesterday once again in our group Blogging For Fun. We are doing an A-Z meme, and this week, we are working on the letter Q! As you can tell I am late ( it is a Saturday now), all because we were on a Quest for Adventure yesterday. :) Friday was the start of my 4 day President's Day weekend, and we love always to spend our time out of the doors, spending some time with nature. Exploring our outside world is our form of bonding. Together, we share the fun of exploring our natural world every weekend or whenever we are on vacation :) Let me share with you our Quest for Adventure yesterday :)

Since San Diego County is riddled with numerous ecotones- which are areas between two adjacent but different geographic regions or ecological habitats, such as forest and desert, our quest for adventure yesterday involved exploring two different words in but one place.

We started our day driving to Mt. Laguna, which is in Eastern part of San Diego County. This was the scenery from the trail head.

 Snow Covered Slopes, Mt. Laguna, San Diego County

Our hike started meandering through pine forest, then, slowly, the pine and oak forest changed to low lying chaparrals, and finally to a more exposed slopes of manzanita and mahogany brush. After that, we did not proceed any further, since it would be a very tough and challenging vertical drop to the desert floor.

end of our hike @ Monument Peak with the Anza Borrego Desert State Park in front of us

At the top, we just enjoyed the expanse view of earth and sky. 

Hiker Taking in the Desert Scenery to His Front

The desert view above is totally different from this mountain view below, both taken at my vantage point yesterday.

Looking Back to Our Trail Head at Mt Laguna

This drastic change in environment creates a very sharp boundary between the geography of forest and desert. This type of scenery however, is not unique to San Diego only. There are a lot of this type of ecotones in the Eastern part of California. 

Anza Borrego Desert State Park

 After this mountain hike, we moved down and took another trail at one of the wild hidden canyons of San Diego County, the San Diego River Canyon.

San Diego River Canyon

The hike started with the view of a waterfall to the North.

Mildred Falls

There were a lot of trails to choose from at the trail head, and we chose the one that will lead us to Cedar Creek Falls. I was excited to see hints of a good wildflower season in this trail, there were already some early bloomers, such us poppies, phacelias and indian paint brush. 

Early Bloomers in the Trail

Strange it may be for some to see snow, waterfalls, wildflowers and the ocean in a short distance, but these are some of the special sights  we treat ourselves for living in California. After a long descent along this trail, we took the left trail that descended abruptly and in some parts through slippery rocks towards the top of the waterfall.  

Cedar Creek Falls from the top

I was too scared to scramble further down the rocks to get a good view of this 90 ft tall, 50 ft wide waterfall from the bottom. Some people brave enough and probably with more experience rock scrambling and bouldering would go down from the top through these slippery rocks and boulders. However, that type of adventure was not for us, since we don't feel like we are really skilled to doing that. We could opt to continue from where it branched earlier, that is go down all the way to the bottom of mountain and turn left to follow the creek, but it was already 3:30 pm, less than 2 hours before sunset. Considering we would have a long way to climb back up, we decided to just go back up to the trail head before the sun sets. As we were heading up back to the trailhead, I entertained myself with the amazing contrast of the blue sky and rock strewn mountain in front of me.

Before reaching the trail head, I saw some reflection on this small puddle of water.  

Mildred Falls (looking very small from afar) and Reflection

It was a great decision to go back instead of continuing down, since when we got back to the car, I could feel my legs were aching and really tired, must be from the snowy slopes in the first hike, and the slippery rocks trying to find our way down of Cedar Creek Falls but did not succeed. Had we gone down, I do not think I would have the energy to go back up.
On our drive home ( going West ), nature continued to treat us with the sun setting in front of us and the colors of the sky were changing. The pictures below were taken from a moving car, thus may not be that very high quality, but just would like to share how nature continued to treat us with wonderful sights after leaving the desert and mountains to go back to the coast.

Sunset

Peaceful Countryside of San Diego County

Today, as you can tell, I am just resting my legs :) but the day is still long, and we may end up still doing something outdoors before the sun sets.
Have a good weekend everyone. And May you all have a wonderful Valentine's Day.

The Joy and Fun of Skiing

Now, don't get me wrong, I don't skii, but I do love snowshoeing.

Me, Snowshoeing in the Woods

My fear of skiing is really due to several reasons: 1) I have semi-fear of heights. 2) I have poor balance and afraid of falling ( the falling part stems from fear of heights). 3. And I am afraid of speed! However, I can not deny the fact of seeing happy faces whenever we are in a skiing resort. Also, whenever it is winter, I am seeing a lot of kids trying their skii boots on at REI, and the beam of happiness they are showing in their faces tell me that there is so much joy in skiing and snowboarding as much as I feel so much joy in hiking and snowshoeing. Sometimes, when I get in line to pay for the supplies we bought at REI, I can't help but smile seeing the joyful smiles of kids as they hug their skii board, all ready probably to go to Big Bear or Mammoth, the popular skiing resorts for Southern Californians.

Though skiing requires some degree of physical fitness, but the joy you see from skiers are contagious. One of my co-teacher who is an avid skier would describe to me that nothing can beat the feeling of having accomplished something out of the ordinary, and topped with the beautiful mountain scenery.

photocredit: Ski in Argentina

One of the places on Earth that tops my wish list to see is Argentina.

photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Geographically, Argentina is very diverse, and I know I must go here while my legs are still strong to enjoy its mountain slopes( just hiking and snowshoeing for me, but I must try to practice ice climbing in California Sierras probably so that I can enjoy exploring Patagonia more when I get there :) . Aside from glaciers, rainforest, waterfalls, amazing desert landscapes, Argentina also is a haven of many skii resorts. 

photo credit: Cerro Chapelco Skii Resort

There are numerous Argentina Skii Resorts for skii lovers to enjoy. Aside from Cerro Chapelco, there is also Cerro Cathedral Ski Resort, and many more skiing heaven to enjoy.

Skiing at Cerro Cathedral Ski Resort ( photo courtesy of the site )

For now, I can just dream of seeing the gorgeous mountain sceneries of Argentina, but while I dream about that, I am also enjoying my "everyday feels like a vacation" mode, here in San Diego :)