And away we go!

Tuesday was busy with lots of preparation. Packing. taking Zoey for a walk and letting her swim then giving her a flea bath.

Abby drove me to logan airport and Annika and Eric were there to see me off. Although Annika was not happy about it. Thank you Abby and Dave for hosting me and Zoey for 3 days and giving me an insider persective on starting a family.

After checking in and walking Zoey around for a while we loaded her up and headed to the gate. I watched nervously as they loaded her on board

Ready to Go?

Today was my last day at the farm in Bristol. I got everything I was not taking in boxes, and everything I plan on taking in the car. While I was packing up the last few things and getting my small boxes of books tucked under the bed Zoey jumped into the kennel my dad had loaded in the car. She just sat in there and waited. It was as is she was afraid of being left behind. She knew I was going some where and she wanted to make sure she was going too.

Most of my things I plan on storing in the barn at the farm. I bought some bomb-proof storage bins called action packers from amazon.com. Free shipping....so I ordered 10 of them at $27 each. I think this shipment took up half of the UPS truck!

I got everything labled and then took a photo of the label on each box. Now if I decide I need anything I can tell someone where to look for it and they can ship it to me.

Mold

Vermont is green and beautiful because of all the rain we get. But sometimes there is too much. I had some boxes I was storing in a friends basement. Two of the boxes got a little wet. I am not sure if it was just the humidity, or when their basement got flooded. Anyhow all of my high school yearbooks are gone, along with many books that I had collected and a nice blue wool sweater which fell to pieces when I tried to watch it to get the mold out. My Journal that I kept when I was in India was also a little damp and moldy, but not as bad as everything else. I preserve what was left of that experience I took a photo of every page in the journal. Some of the pages had bleed through so I won't be able to read them, but now at least I have a digital copy and have one last thing to store and lug around next time I move.

Above is a page from my journal showing some sketches of birds after a trip to a bird sanctuary.

Family

I am so lucky to have such a large a loving family. My Aunts Sheila and Brenda threw a going away, happy birthday, good luck and congratulations on your Master's party. we had a nice dinner and then cake and ice cream.

Yum... cake, I will eat the left overs for breakfast, and with lunch and after dinner.

New Hampshire

On Monday I visited my friend in New Hampshire who is working for the Nature Concervancy. We stayed at the Forest service station in Bartlett NH where I used to work studying birds. It was really nice to see and old friend and visit my old stomping grounds.

I used to always see moose on the side of the road in Crawford Notch. This trip was no exception.

We hiked to Zealand Falls from Crawford Notch. It was about 5 miles round trip. It was a nice flat hike. It felt good to get out. I have not been hiking because I have been so busy packing and it has been so rainy.

I think Zoey had fun.

My friend Tim is a nature photographer. He has taken some great shots. You can check out his work at http://www.inthemomentnaturephotography.com/.

We also visited my favorite swimming hole in Bartlett where we used to go swiming after a day of bird surveying. That summer was great. get up a 5 am, work until 2 pm, go swimming, make dinner, go for a short hike, repeat.

We have to cross the railroad tressel to get to the swiming hole. As we crossed over, wondered out loud how often the train comes through. While we were swiming the conway senic railway train pass overhead.

Then I continued on to Southern New Hampshire to visit my best friend from college. She has a two year old and a two month old. After spending less than 24 hours with them I question my desire to have children. Don't get me wrong, they are great kids, but I do not know If I want my life to change that much!! I mean she couldn't even find time to make muffins, it was so hard to juggle both of them. I don't know how moms all over the world do everything that they do!

Rainy Weekend

No hiking. No Biking. No canoeing. No fun. It has rained off and on all weekend the only bright spot yesterday was a rainbow. I have spent most of the weekend packing... I mailed off four boxes of dried food stuffs to myself so that I will have something to eat when I get there. I wish that I had taken photos of all the boxes that I have sent. But I guess I can do that when I get there and see them all stacked on one place. That might give more of an impression anyhow.

Art on Main

My friend and accomplished artist Terry Z, had an art opening at Art on Main in Bristol on Friday. She makes stained glass...

One of the conversations that came up was about how people want to see inside of an artists mind by getting a peak at their workspace. Well here it is:

Oh that's my dog. She has a little black dog too...

Bread and Puppet or a bunch of Liberal Vermonters

On Thursday I went with to Burlington to see Terry and enjoy a free concert in the park. On the way to the park we were able to bear witness to a Bread and Puppet parade. What is Bread and Puppet? Well... I think Wikipedia does the best job of explaining that... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_Puppet_Theatre

Getting Ready for the Tundra

On Friday I went up to Burlington, (The coolest city in the world! In my opinion) for some shopping. You know July is the perfect time to go shopping for winter clothes. I got some nice flannel lined carharts, some down booties on sale at Lenny's. Then on to my favorite store: The Outdoor Gear Exhange. http://gearx.com/ They carry a lot of closeout and second hand stuff. I took up my old Limmer Boots, which wrecked my feet, an old LL Bean sleeping bag and a nice external frame pack that I scored at a garage sale. Anyhow I found some awsome stuff for Alaska. First I found this nice down jacket for $75... it was origionaly $250... what a deal! Then I found these amazing boots... if these things do not keep my feet warm when it is -60F Nothing will. These things are rated to -149F or -200C. Well I am not sure about that, but I hope they do the trick. Do I look Ready?

Zoey is getting ready too. Today she tried her doggie Booties on. She has a little bit of a hard time walking in them though.

Zoey is getting more comforatable with her kennel. The other day I went to hook her lead and she ran into the kennel... She hates being tied up. Doesn't she look thrilled?

Evening with the nieces

Last night I drove out to Shoreham to spend some time with my nieces. They are 9 and 11 years old. They have been raising Bunnies to sell to the pet stores. They are very cute.

We got some dinner at a greasy food snack stand out in the country side. Zoey made lots of friends here. Here is Zoey with her fan club:

After eating and giving Zoey the remainder of our creamees we drove out to the Lake Champlain bridge. Zoey got to swim in the nations 6th largest lake... it should be one of the great lakes, it was once an inland sea. Whale fossils have even been found near the lake!

My nieces were worried about Zoey swimming in deep water over her head. Would she drown? They were surprised that she could swim! They do not realize what labs a breed for!

We loaded up the wet dog into the car and continued over across the bridge into New York State where my brother owns a home. We walked down to the pier and the girls played in the water some more. My Brother, their father, has a big dog...

Craig's list Rocks

So in less than 12 hours of posting my car on Craig's list it was sold. I drove this car back from New Mexico. I sold it for $500 less than what I paid for it. I love cars that do not lose their value! Subaru's Rock! The reason my car sold so quickly is the fact that it has not seen a Vermont winter, or summer for that matter. Winter and the salt and the year round humidity is hard on cars out here. After about 10 years the body starts to rust out. In the state of Vermont cars have to pass an inspection every year. Some cars do not pass simply due to rust alone.

Of Merlins and Small Spaces

This morning I made it out to Vergenes with Eli to check out the Merlins nesting. We arrived there a little after 7 am. It was quiet. We did not see any signs of the birds. I walked around and found one of the adults on top of a big willow. Then I looked back at a nest tree, there were three or four birds sitting out on a limb.

After a while the chicks made their way back to the nest.

Eli took theses photos with his Superior camera and lenses.

Then it was off to the outhouse races... yes that's right Bristol Vermont is famous for its annual fourth of July outhouse races!

I was quickly bored with the outhouse race so I wandered around the park where there were various vendors and such. Then the parade, and a picnic at uncle Donald's house.

After the picnic I came home and spent some time with Zoey. We went over to the ice pond where she found a family of ducks. I think she scared up about a half dozen or so half-grown ducklings and chased to mama duck around the pond for at least 6 laps. At fist the mother flailed around as if she had a broken wing, but she could clearly fly and kept a comfortable lead on Zoey.

I was going to take her for a walk to the swimming hole, but I figured this was enough exersize for her. So then I decided trying to get Zoey acclimated to the kennel she will be flying to Alaska in.

First I throwing in treats. She quickly reached in and backed out. So to encourage her to come in I decided to show her it was not so bad. I climbed in and called her in with me. I got her to stay in there with me for a while.

I hope that if I do this a little each day and if I keep leaving treats inside, she will begin to be more comfortable in the kennel.

Soggy Day

By the time I was ready to leave the house today it was raining. The pot of decaf coffee from my grandmother's coffee stash was not cutting it so I headed over to Eli's where there is always a fresh pot of full test. I headed up to Burlington to visit with my artist friend Terry before picking up my cousins from the airport. Terry has her own stained glass studio. Check out her work http://www.burlingtonglass.net/. After my visit with Terry I headed over to Petco to check out a travel kennel for zoey to fly to Alaska in. Although the petfood warehouse had a better price. It was $139 for a 40"X27'X30" kennel. I have not been able to get her to lie down in it though.

From there I went striaght to the airport to pick up my cousins where they were waiting outside. It rained most of the afternoon.

It must have stopped raining sometime in the evening, so after dinner my aunt and I walked out around the barns. Zoey found something fresh to roll in so I decided to give her a bath in the stream. I straddled the stream. It was a bit of a stretch but I was able to make it across without getting my feet wet. I tried to get zoey in the stream in front of me I grabbed at her collar as she jumped across the stream in front of me. Her boney head bonked mine. I lost my balance and fell face first in the stream. Zoey must have thought this was funny, she bounded back and forth on the banks of the stream as if she was laughing at me! Finally I grabbed hold of her collar and pulled her in with me. I was already wet so I just stood in the stream and spashed water on her to clean her. This made for a soggy evening.

Wild Day

This morning I woke up and thought there is nothing that I have to do today. So what am I going to do... I started the day by walking with zoey around the farm barefoot. That's right no shoes. It was wonderful to feel the dew on the grass. Not a goat head or cactus for miles. (Well that's not true my grandmother has a cactus in her garden she dug up in AZ years ago.)

I decided to do some laundry, my least favorite chore. But there were no parking spaces in front of the laundry mat so I went to go see Eli instead. Eli is a friend of my father's who has taken a serious interest in birds and photography. He had taken many wonderful photos of birds. Check out some of his work:http://www.whiterockphotos.com/ . Anyhow after telling me about the porcupine Kujo tangled with and the woodchuck that is no more, we made plans to check out a Merlin nest in Vergenes. (vergenes is the smallest city in the US, one square mile.)

A Merlin is a Medium sized Falcon.

We found the nest. There appeared to be at least 2 fluffy chicks in the nest, but we could not see any of the adults. The nest was in the top of a large white pine and the branches made it difficult to get a clear view. Maybe we will go back another time to get a better look.

After dinner this evening I took a walk up to downtown Bristol. on the way home I saw a dark figure at the edge of the gravel pit near the mill where my father used to work. Two large ears stood tall. A moose? It can't be. maybe it's just a big deer. But then it turned and I could clearly see the characteristic hump on the back and profile of its big head. I could not believe my own eyes. I wanted some one else to see it so I could verify that it was indeed a moose. A few cars past by me as I was standing there staring, but they paid no mind.

I continued on home and there was a deer in the Christmas tree field back at the farm. This deer was much lighter in color, smaller and the ears were positioned differently. This helped me confirm in my own mind that I did indeed see a moose! (sorry no photos to prove it.)

Zoey had fun playing in the river today. We found a nice deep pool where she could really swim. We played fetch for a while and she really got into it. But the mosquitoes started to bite so I knew it was time to head home.