Today was just a bonus day. We were all so thrilled we lived after lightning struck so close to our campsites, that my friends and I mostly relaxed at Cedar Breaks Park today.
Poor tree! Just a few feet from our friends!
I spent a lot of time taking photos of plants and insects all day. Especially fun was a walk around Lake Georgetown with my old friends Hella and Jennifer. I shared some stuff I knew about plants, and they helped me spot things like delicious dewberries. Hella’s dog, Mocha, also enjoyed the fruit!
I’m pretty sure she had as much fun as we did.
Probably our favorite find was this vigorous vine with big, purple flowers. It was new to us all. It’s just gorgeous, violet twining snapdragon (Maurandella antirrhiniflora).
Caterpillar that almost got me.
We saw dozens of plants, but my favorite photo was this one. I think I’ll print it.
White prickly poppy and bee!Hella and Jen on the karst
After our walk, I mostly just hung around talking to friends and enjoying nature. I enjoyed a variety of butterflies and birds, mostly familiar friends, but charming nonetheless.
Turkey vultures kept flying right over usNotice: two chipping sparrowsAnother dapper sparrowYellow rumpled warblerGood ole ucjeyeCheckered whiteHaistreakPretty black spider
Now some people have said, “Eww,” to my favorite discovery today. I was absolutely thrilled to see this new and exciting creature. It’s a giant desert centipede (Scolopendra heros). Wow, it’s big and colorful. Be sure to watch the video.
Giant centipede in action
It’s quite beautiful here in the familiar geography of where I lived for so many years. Such variety!
Jennifer amid cedar sage, a plant only found in these cedar brakes.
There’s so much more but I’m too tired to keep going. Another day camping with my old church friends awaits!
After work and the horses getting bodywork done, Lee and I fired up Seneca and took off for another camping expedition, this time to Cedar Breaks Park, one county over near Georgetown, Texas. We’d camped on the other side of the lake from here before, but never at this site, which is a Corps of Engineers park (yay, free entry with my Senior Pass).
Pretty Lake Georgetown
I was really excited about it, because I was going to get to see some of my friends from a previous stage of my life when I did lots of stuff with a Unitarian Universalist Church in Cedar Park. One tradition I really enjoyed were the camping trips they’d do a couple of times a year. We went to some pretty places from the time my kids were little until we got our original RV and camper.
This is also a pretty place!
My friend Jennifer (who is a regular reader of our chatty little blog here) has done most of the campout planning for years, and I really appreciate the effort she makes to decide on places and get things lined up. Now that we have Seneca, we can camp again, so we decided to go to the next one she scheduled.
So, here we are! It has been raining off and on all day, which is how Apache managed to roll in muddy spots and turn himself into an Appaloosa horse.
Check out my new spots
It alternated between sun and rain all the way over here. It was sunny when we went into the grocery store to get supplies, then rained hard while we were inside, then was sunny when we came out. Fun weather.
Nice to see full lakes
It stayed fun once we arrived, where Lee impressed the folks who’d also arrived today (official start is tomorrow) by backing into our space like a pro. I reminded the folks that he IS a pro, having driven “big rigs” for a living for a few years.
What a pretty site, right on the lake
After hugging Jennifer a ridiculously long time, I caught up with other friends I’ve missed from church and toured everyone’s campsites, RVs and trailers. That was great fun. Our Cameron friends Mike and Martha also came along, as I’ve been camping with Martha as long as I have with Jennifer, since all our adult children were young.
Two happy friends
Mike inherited a very cool vintage motorhome a while back and has restored it to functioning again. It’s quite funky and very well designed, I’m so glad he got it up and running so they could join us on this long weekend get together.
My dear friends under the very nice cover each site has
Other excitement for me and Jennifer was identifying a summer tanager using the Merlin’s Bird ID or eBird app, then finding it in a tree. I got blurry photos, but you can tell they aren’t a cardinal. This was a first for us, and it was just wonderful to find it with my very first birding friend!
TanagerTanagerNot a tanager
While I was showing Jen Seneca, we realized the temperature had gone way down, really fast. Yep, the real front was coming through. It was also going through Cameron, and we have reports of frightened dogs at home. Lee and I went inside to watch the weather coverage on TV when BLAM! A boom louder than when Sandy the Squirrel hit the transformer rang out, I texted Martha and Jen. Were they ok?
Where we areCameron is in the red
Yes, they were ok, but lightning had struck a tree right behind the cute vintage motorhome. Mike reported that there was a bit of flame, but it went right out. When it stops raining, we’ll check into the damage. They’re pretty sure the power to their campsite also went out, so they are using generator power. Yow!
I tried to take a picture of the weather. I got raindrops, but it looks interesting!
Next it started hailing. Lee is wishing Seneca was back under the cover at the ranch, but we’re here now enjoying the sounds and the light show. There will probably be more rain this weekend, but hey, I’m on a lake, there are birds and flowers, and more friends come tomorrow.
Just before the rains, this immense flock of gulls flew around and landed in the water, very noisily. Lee saw the whole thing, but I at least saw them milling around in the lake. Best photo I could get.
After the craziness of this week, of COURSE lightning struck!
The Hermits' Rest 