Mountain flora, part 2: along the Divide

A hike with my college buddies along the Continental Divide showed me some different flowers than the ones I showed you last time. But there were some duplicates as well.

For instance, the Heartleaf Arnica you see above was spectacular. Here are a couple more panoramic shots of this gorgeous expanse of these lovely, cheerful flowers...

These weren't the only pretty yellow blooms on display. I think this is a sulphurflower (if I have the name wrong, at least it's apt!). I wasn't able to get anything in the frame for scale, but take my word for it, those little bloomlets are tiny...

Here are some more tiny flowers. I could have sworn that on a previous trip I'd found them in at least one of my flower books (and, of course, not remembered the name), but this time they eluded me...

And here's another patch of unidentified but fabulous flora; this shot doesn't even get the whole expanse...

These asters are especially handsome, don't you think?

That little sprig was 'way up high, at just about the top mark of our hike...

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Hooray! The library's internet is back! However, I'm heading off on a subsidiary adventure soon and won't be taking my laptop, so it might be a while before I can finish off my Colorado postings (think fires and DIY), plus fill you in on my extra trip. So please be patient and stay tuned!

Mountain flora: part 1, around town

First off, I need to apologize for my lack of blogging. I do have good excuses, though! 

For one thing, we were able to host some good friends from college up here for several days, and we rather took lack of internet access as a feature, not a bug, while we visited, caught up, reminisced, and just generally had a good time.

After that group had all gone their separate ways, though, I figured I'd have plenty of time to go down to the library in town and blog. Well, that wasn't figuring with the horribly destructive wildfires Colorado is suffering. The loss of the tower that serves our local library is really one of the lesser tragedies resulting from the giant Spring fire in the SE corner of the state. But it does mean that the internet is even harder to come by up here than usual. (More about another of Colorado's EIGHT fires, one that I got a little close to, later.)

However, I did make the discovery that our local SAFEWAY, of all places, has free wifi! Who knew?! So here I am trying to catch up on some blogging and iTunes downloading before heading back up to our cabin and resuming my painting chores.

Being here at this time of year means that there are lots of wonderful wildflowers to enjoy (later in this dry summer, there won't be much, I'm sure). And I thought I'd share some of my favorites with you. I did my best (with two flower books which often use different common names for the same scientific ones) to identify them, but I'm not really sure about any of the names, so feel free to send corrections!

The lovelies at the top of the post are either yellow peas, golden banners, or false lupines(!). Here's another shot of them, next to a cabin that's being added on to (there's lots of new construction in our little village this summer):

Yellow seems to be a popular color:

I think these are golden asters

Heartleaf arnica

But there are plenty of other hues represented...

clover, by themselves

clover, with a guest

mystery flower that I couldn't find in either book

wild geraniums?

a closer look...wild geraniums?

There's even some wild roses, that smell heavenly, and are just as pretty as the cultivated varieties (and with even sharper thorns!):

I'm pretty sure these beauties, which are quite common around town, are either white checkermallow or wild hollyhock, depending on which book you consult...

The closest I could get to identifying these handsome guys was some sort of Indian paintbrushes, but they're much more delicate-looking than the paintbrushes we have at home. Plus I saw some "regular" paintbrushes along another walk up at the Divide (I'll show you flowers from that one next time). So I don't know, really, what these are. But they are lovely, aren't they?

Well, speaking of paint, I need to get back to work. Maybe the library internet will be working tomorrow and I can get some more blogging done.

Wordless Wednesday: is this heaven?

Wordless Wednesday: misty-moisty

Wordless Wednesday: now that's a root system!

Parting shots

Blooms are...well...blooming out all over in the 'hood lately. So I thought I'd share a couple more pics with you. The Pride of Barbados in my last flower post has really exploded...

Isn't that spectacular?! Such rich and vibrant colors, as well as handsomely shaped blossoms. And there will be lots more, as you can see by all the buds.

This same yard also has a trumpet vine that I've been waiting to see bloom. And it finally has!

Most of the crape myrtles in the area (including the ones in our yard) are just starting to put on their show. But a few are already wowing us, like this beauty...

I hope this taste of semi-tropical floral abundance will hold you for a while. I'm headed to the internet-less mountains for an extended stay out of the heat and probably won't be posting much in the next few weeks. But my schedule does include a few side-trips and surprises, so eventually I'll have some interesting pix and stories to share. Stay tuned!

Braving the heat

Anyone who knows how hot it's been in SA lately might be amazed to hear that we were out two evenings in a row at local sporting events this week.

First up was a US Open Cup soccer match between our SAFC and FC Dallas. Yes, our lowly USL team was matched against a team from what passes for the soccer major leagues in our [soccer-ly backward] country.

That's the way this FA-Cup-styled tournament is supposed to work. And we almost pulled off one of the fun upsets that fans of such events live for.

We really outplayed the big boys, and created several more scoring chances than they did, but their defense was always spot on. So it was doubly unfortunate that just after the second half began, we carelessly gave the ball away at midfield and suffered the game's only goal as a result. I think our keeper would have beat theirs in a shootout.

But it was a lovely evening, as you can see, with even a stiff, constant breeze that made the heat much more bearable. So it was fun.

The next night we sweated a lot more (less breeze and more crowded stands) at our token Missions* game of the season.

only in SA: C5 (?) touch-and-goes provide extra entertainment
throughout the game

We always plan to go to more of these fun AA games, but usually end up only making it once. It is somewhat frustrating that a city of our size only has a team at this level, but they have a loyal following and over the years have seen some pretty impressive guys playing for them.

Like this gentleman on the left, who looks unbelievably young on the banner. Especially compared to how he looked about 15 years later when I saw him enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

It's fun that they put the club's history on view like this. (According to Wikipedia, we were a founding member of the Texas League in 1888!)

It's also nice that they were offering dollar beers and hot dogs last night. I'm ready to head up to our seats for dinner in this pic.

Unfortunately we brought bad luck to another local team here. Uneven pitching and sloppy fielding were paired with rather anemic hitting, and the home team lost 8-2. Still a fun outing though!

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*Although the team is officially the Missions, they often take up an alter-ego and we got to see what has become a wildly popular cultural event that started as a marketing ploy. Yes, we are the Flying Chanclas!

On his way back from a beer run Henry was actually held up by a visit from the main Chanclas mascot (an abuela; read the link above for an explanation, of sorts) in the aisle near our seats...

Unfortunately the "matriarch" had turned away before I could snap the photo, but fortunately he wasn't hit by any flying flip-flops. I couldn't find a picture of her to link for you, but she participates in several of the between-innings activities, including chasing kids around the bases, chanclas in hand. Minor league baseball! Gotta love it!