Palisade Peach Festival

Just a few miles east of our house lies the small town of Palisade.
Palisade is home to many orchards and vineyards, but is probably best
known for it's peaches...especially in Colorado. Every August, the town
holds it's Peach Festival and peach lovers flock in from miles around.
The festival is well run, with great transportation to and from outlying
parking lots. Lynn and I parked near the elementary school and then
walked along the Colorado Riverfront Trail until we came to the festival
grounds at Riverbend Park. It was really sunny and hot, making it a bit
uncomfortable but there were a lot of great craft booths and food stands
for everyone to enjoy. It was a good time had by all.

In An Apricot Jam

Yesterday, our friend Judey was visiting and she brought us
a jar of Apricot Jam that she had just made. Apparently, the
wind we had this weekend blew all of their apricots off the
trees and she had to go into fast-forward-jam-making-mode
and we were the lucky recipients of a jar. Good thing she got
to it when she did because earlier in the day on Tuesday she fell
and broke her fibula in two places! There won't be much jam
making at her place for a while. Get well soon Judey!

Bees!

While we were driving through Palisade today, we stopped and
snapped a photo of one of the most important cogs of the Grand
Valley fruit industry...Bees! Most orchard farmers don't own their
own bees, but have them brought in by services each year to have
their fruit trees pollinated. Without pollination, there would be
no fruit. The bees are so important to the local economy that the
Town of Palisade recently held their International Honey Bee
Festival to honor them!

Fruit Blossoms

It's spring in the Grand Valley and since our valley is known for
it's fruit orchards, there are lots of blossoms this time time of year.
They are especially pretty in the Palisade area. In the next few
months we'll have fresh, locally grown peaches, nectarines, apricots,
cherries, apples, plums, pears and grapes

On the Way Home

At the beginning of the day, I was faced with 44 hours of traveling
to get home. Yes, I like traveling, but even for me, that's a long time.
My "day" would take me from Christchurch, to Sydney, to Honolulu,
to Dallas, and finally to Grand Junction. A very long trip indeed!
My longest layover (9 hours) was to be in Honolulu. I've never
been to Hawaii before so it turned out to be a real treat. My friend,
Liz, who we travelled with in Peru and Ecuador was staying the week
in Hawaii and was renting a car, so she generously offered to take
me on a ride around Oahu.


Nine hours isn't a lot of time, especially when I had to get back to
the airport to catch my flight to Dallas laster in the day. So, to get
a brief overview, we took off to the north shore. Along the way, we
went by the Dole Pineapple Plantation. Much of the center of Oahu
is rural and mountainous, filled with large farms like this one.


We ran across this fun sign in a small town named Waialua. Just a
sign of things to come.


We saw all kinds of surfers off of Puaena Point and the biggest waves
I had ever seen. They were HUGE! I had heard that the waves on
the north shore were big, but it was way beyond my expectations.
It didn't make me want to be a surfer anytime soon, but if there
are any surfers reading this, this is the place you want to be!


All along the rest of the north shore it was really beautiful. Kind of
like the Hawaii you picture in your mind and not the urban, big
city feeling of Honolulu.


We also drove by a number of fruit stands. We stopped at one and
they had great fruits and vegetables of all kinds. Some of which I
hadn't seen before. Lots of Pineapples, Papayas and Bananas.


Liz bought lots of fruit for her week-long stay and we both had
fun enjoying the smells of all of the fruit, including the Papayas.


As a vexillologist, I enjoyed seeing the Hawaiian flag, blowing in
the breeze.


My brief tour of Oahu was soon over and I had to get back to the
airport. Liz and I said our goodbyes and she went her way and I
went mine. Hers, hopefully a fun, weeklong stay in the islands, and
me, many more hours of flying and waiting before getting home.


I wasn't that thrilled with Honolulu's airport. It reminded me a bit of a
more tropical LAX, built about the same time I'm guessing, but at least
it was more organized, laid back and gave you the feeling of place.
I enjoyed the gardens outside of the gate area. Very tranquil.


Before getting on the plane, I noticed this mural. it reminded me a
bit of the Paul Gauguin murals we saw in the airport at Tahiti. It was
a nice calming scene before getting on a 7 hour flight.

Old Habits

We recently had a southbound C-17, which meant
that we received Freshies. On the way out of
the Galley, I spied bananas. I'm not a huge
fruit consumer, but I do like bananas, apples
oranges and grapes so I look out for them. I
went over to the bananas and the first thing I
did was look at the sticker. Where was it from?
ECUADOR the label said. So I grabbed two! Why
so fussy? Well, Lynn and I got into the habit
of eating delicious Ecuador bananas when we
lived there last summer and when we came back to
the States, we only bought bananas from Ecuador.
None of those "nasty" Guatamalan bananas! Would
I have left these bananas in the bowl if they
weren't my favorites? You bet!

Altus

We spent two really nice days at Nancy and Greg's. The weather was
very hot and a little humid, but there was a hot wind blowing most of
the time that made it tolerable. I was taking these pictures of clouds
outside their front door and Nancy told me that I was easily impressed
because they have much nastier weather than these clouds much of the
time.


Nancy and Greg are babysitting Otis, my nephew Josh's bulldog.
A great dog, but he's way too affectionate and slobbers on you
constantly. I'm not a slobber dog person, but he was fun to be
around. Nancy and Greg have four other dogs and a cat as well...


Nellie


Molly


Trixie


Sadie


Scooter


Greg picked up a bushel of peaches that they had ordered previously,
and although the peaches came from Arkansas (who knew that Arkansas
grew peaches?), they made a great peach pie!



Of course, Nancy shook her head as I took pictures of the pie!

Land of Lame Limes

A lazy girl that Lynn is not. Albeit very seasonal, she could make a
small fortune acting as a shopper for half of McMurdo Station. Once
people found out she was staying in Christchurch, the orders came
flying in. Can you please by me this...can you please pick up that.
A friend of mine told me she should charge a 25% surcharge for each
item. For good...or bad...Lynn is too nice to do that and she's been
getting items for people down here for weeks now. Of course they
give me the money for the cost of the item...but hmm...it's kind of
like the Gold Rush Days...the miners didn't make any money...the
people that sold them supplies made all the money. Maybe an
opportunity for another year. Anyway, our friend Bear asked for Limes.
He wants to make Guacamole. Avocados...no problem. A Lemon...no
problem. Limes...a BIG problem. Lynn has scoured the city and there
are no Limes...ANYWHERE. Apparently the shipment from California
didn't arrive. You would think that a country like New Zealand with a
sub-tropical climate up north would grow their own Limes. At least
enough to support a population of a small country like NZ!!! Hmm...
note to self -number 2 on how to make money....Start a Lime Plantation
in New Zealand. Apparently it truly is the land of the lame limes.

Freshies...Glorious Freshies!

When the plane left on Thursday, it deposited amongst other things,
thousands of pounds of Freshies. Fresh fruit and vegegetables.
We actually had mushrooms on salads Thursday night! I LOVE
mushrooms so it was a special treat. If you are a fruit lover,
almost more different kinds than you can imagine! Alas, these
won't last very long, but after having limited fresh produce
for two months, and sharing what we did have with 97 other people
who are now gone, it almost felt like grocery shopping while in
the Galley. Several times I heard people make that comparison.
A trip to the world back home without the high prices that fresh
produce usually brings. Lynn's favorite are the apples and I'm
partial to oranges...but fresh stuff...any fresh stuff is popular
this time of year.