Summer in Reno

It is really HOT in Reno this summer.  We go kayaking when we can to get out of the heat, but one kayak picture looks pretty much like another, so I won't post any more today.  It is too hot to garden, so today I just took a picture of the bees in the lavender and called that good for my gardening effort. We have six fully mature lavender plants on the back hill and they just hum all day with bees.  I consider that doing my part to prevent hive collapse.

 Since we haven't had any adventures for a while I thought that I would go back and post some pictures we took at Easter.  We were driving back to Reno from Moab in March and decided to stop at 9 mile canyon in the middle of nowhere Utah.  It is home to thousands of petroglyphs, but way off the beaten track.  We stayed at a bed and breakfast at the mouth of the canyon. It was not exactly a "Napa Valley" bed and breakfast.  Here is a picture of our suite, the Elvis room.

Calvin puts up with a lot in my quest for petroglyphs. We stayed on the road in the canyon, which was just recently paved, and saw the main identified petroglyph groups, but we have heard that the side canyons are full of lesser known groupings.  We made our first foray in the evening and found huge herds of deer grazing on the new grass. Deer are nice when they are grazing on someone else's grass.

 This unusual man on the left is called the juggler or the balloon man.  I'm not sure what he is meant to represent, but it was one of the more interesting petroglyphs.

I thought it was interesting that there were many buffalo pictures. I don't usually associate buffalo with the rock canyons of Utah. This one is called "Big Buffalo."

 Probably the most famous panel in this canyon is the Great Hunt. It is fairly recent as rock art goes.

 Calvin loved the flying warrior, so here is a close-up.

And I just loved it all!

Kayaking in June

It must seem like all we ever do is go kayaking.  And that is mostly true on Fridays.  Other days of the week Calvin dutifully pedals his bike to work and I clean house and weed the garden.  Those are good things to do, but not very picture worthy.

The last couple of weeks I have been busy preserving our cherry crop.  We didn't have a bumper crop this year, but we did have enough to make several batches of cherry chutney, which is really the only way I like to eat cherries.  I thought about taking a picture of the cherries, but they look pretty much like the cherries I photographed last year, and the year before.  I picked the last cherries from the tree this morning and began harvesting our raspberries. 

Still, no pictures of the cherries or raspberries, so I'll post a few from our last couple of kayak trips.

On June 14 we had a lazy day kayak.  We didn't arrive at the lake until late afternoon.  The water was a little choppy, but we braved it any way and idled a few hours away on the beach.

 This is the north end of our favorite beach.  The boulders discourage beach walking company from the north.

Here is Calvin looking relaxed on the beach

Here are pictures I took of the beach because I forgot to bring a book.

As the sun set we tried to get a picture of a sail boat sailing across the setting sun with not great results. Look carefully to see the boat.

This week we met Cindy and Bill at Commons Beach in Tahoe city for a paddle.  We've had record breaking heat, so it felt good to get on the water. Especially water this clear.  Tahoe doesn't have very interesting wildlife but the water is spectacular.

Cindy and Bill showing off years of experience paddling the same canoe.

Calvin shows off years of experience paddling our kayak while I play with the camera.

You just can never get enough kayak pictures.