Category: nature

February 5, 2019

I am a traveling dog…

Tynan the traveling dog in Hatch, NM — Can’t we ever just walk by weird things? Of course, not. (I remind you of the **Uranus Fudge Factory** she made us stop at in Missouri.) Notice she’s holding my head so that I’ll look at the camera. Anyway, this is Hatch,across the street from the famous Sparky’s Restaurant with its aromatic smoke.

Tynan the traveling dog back for a third week! Woof! Unfortunately, the idiots have no plans for us to go anywhere anytime soon. Bummer. But, as promised, I thought I’d catch you up on our Arizona trip, show you how I added a state to my repertoire, as it were.

If you’re not all caught up, check last week’s post, a quick summary of the trip, then sit back in your armchair while I drive for a change.

We left Albuquerque on Thursday, January 2, by about 10:00. The time was more tailored to ensure lunch at Sparky’s in Hatch, the chile capitol of the world. He’d never eaten there. Me, I got to sit in the car while the smoke coming from all those burgers and pork wafted in through the cracked car windows strangling me with its perfect aroma. It was not an auspicious start for the trip. In retaliation, when they ~~waddled~~ walked me around later, I peed on Sparky’s. Not my finest moment, I admit, but peeing on my people really wouldn’t have worked. Then they made pose for pictures in front of the kitschy stuff near the restaurant. Whatever.

At last we were off again. It’s a long ride to Tucson, and I snoozed through most of it. Finally, we arrived at our destination, the Best Western-Tucson Foothills. Apparently, she and my lady friends from the Adobe Wool Arts Guild (AWAG) prefer this place when they make their annual pilgrimage to the Old Pueblo Rug Hookers Hook-In. (Hook-in, yes they really call it that.) There is a reason for their fealty to this particular hotel: free booze! Yep, the place provides a gratis happy hour (more like three hours), and you know they aren’t passing by that. Wouldn’t you know it, we arrived during sed happy hour. So off to the “cafe” we go thinking the idiots will pick up a glass of quaffable, free wine and sit outside or, more realistically as the sun was already going down, head back to the room to drink then argue over who would go back to get the next round.

Tynan the traveling dog on the hotel bed. — Best Western-Tucson Foothills: Four paws up for the comfy bed. Pity the master kicked me off every single night once his **World of Warcraft** character bit the big one (over and over).

But then the beautiful bartendress sees me, and she says these magical words: “Oh, he’s so cute, Of course, he can stay.” She caresses my chin and whispers, “Would you like to go home with me? I can give you your own downy hotel bed, barbecue on demand…” Sorry, I digress there, maybe fantasize a bit. The point is I was invited in to happy hour all weekend. Nice touch, Best Western-Tucson Foothills. Oh, especially, that popcorn machine. Loved the popcorn machine!

Drinks drunk, we head back to the room so the idiots can rest. (Wow, tough day: eating, driving, and drinking.) Anyway, he takes over the desk with his laptop; she and I claim the bed. This traveling dog is really starting to love human hotel beds. They’re lower than the one back home, and they’re BIG! She doesn’t care if I take 2/3s of it. Very comfy.

Saguaro cacti in the Coronado National Forest. — On the way up to Mount Lemmon in the **Coronado National Forest**. Check out all the crazy **saguaro cacti**! Have you ever seen so many in one place? They even constitute a cactus forest!

Next day, we’re off to Mount Lemmon, Tucson’s tallest mountain. Back maybe 16 summers ago, they were vacationing in Tucson, checking it out for possible future residence. They tried to drive up but were turned back by officials. The mountain was on fire. Not this time! Of course, we had to drive in stops and starts since she had to take all her freaking pictures. Fortunately, there was some pretty spectacular scenery. And I got to get out of the car!

Rock formations on Mount Lemmon. — The topography changed on our way up to Mount Lemmon. The cacti gave way to juniper bushes and then pines. There were interesting rock formations on the way up. You could climb on them!

Cool tree on Mount Lemmon. — She captured this old tree for her friend Karen Miller of **Karen D. Miller Studio** in Ontario. I know why I’m fascinated with trees, but them????

View from Mount Lemmon of Tucson. — This is the view looking over Tucson from near the tree. Quite…expansive.

Mount Lemmon Ski Area. — This is what a **skiing area** looks like in…Tucson. We saw three people ski across that hill. Three. Can you say “ice”? Unfortunately, the rest of the road to the top was blocked here with snow. No telescopes for us. But we got pretty close.

Man in front of restuarant. — The master after a fine lunch at the **Iron Door Restaurant** across the street from Mount Lemmon Ski Valley. Notice that I am not in the photograph. Perhaps someone should alert the authorities regarding how often they leave me in a vehicle while they stuff their faces.

Tynan the traveling dog on snow hike. — After lunch on the mountain, the pudgy ones decided to work some of it off with a hike. I’m always good with that. And unlike them, I miss snow, so this was a fine activity.

That night, my AWAG ladies finally showed up at the hotel. At happy hour, of course. Mary R. brought me gifts, and…the popcorn machine was working! Nan watched me while the idiots went for food. She let me on her bed. I love Nan. Plus, she brings toys for me when she comes to our house.

Saturday morning, we drop the mistress off at the La Paloma Country Club for the hook-in. Looked like a swanky place for something with such a stupid name. He tells her not to spend so much at the silent auction this year. Right. (Later she called not breaking $100 a win. He did not.)

Back to that day, he decides to take us to some park; he’s already forgotten the name. (At least she wouldn’t have done that.) We get out of the car. Something is not right. He wonders why I don’t want to do the usual who-peed-here sniffs, but something smells really bad at this park. “Come on, ” he tells me not particularly patiently. He calls me squirrely, mocks me with that word. But I’m trying to tell him, I think there are f-ing rattlesnakes here! They paid for me to have that hateful training, but it did work. I smell their dirty asses (not that I’m exactly sure where a snake keeps its ass). Finally, he’s fed up with me; we turn around. There is a god! We head back to my favorite Best Western. Frankly, I think he just wanted to get back to his stupid laptop and World of Warcraft. Whatever, I got the bed to myself.

That night we do happy hour with the girls again. Folks fawn over me especially when they hear what he did to me. I appreciate that. Sunday morning we’re off for home. She gets an idea that she wants to take a different route, not the one we came on. He’s skeptical, but of course, she wins. We turn the car to the north. At first it’s nice, sleep-inducing. We stop at McDonald’s for their “quality” brunch, then get into some more remote country. I’ll let the pictures (she took soooo many) tell the story.

El Capitan Pass in Arizona. — Excuse me for waxing poetic, but you have to drive around this great country of ours to really appreciate how big and beautiful it is. This is **El Capitan Pass** in Arizona. Things were getting pretty desolate out here, and no, there was absolutely no cell service to call AAA. (We were in another rental; he didn’t dare risk driving his ancient Honda Accord on this trip. She wouldn’t have let him forget it if the damn thing broke down.)

Snake River Canyon in Arizona. — Okay, this killed about an hour, but she insisted it was worth taking all the photos then hanging at the visitor center. While they’ve been to and even hiked down the Grand Canyon farther north and west, they didn’t know crap about the **Salt River Canyon**. It and the many switch-backs it took to get down to the river were admittedly impressive.

Snake River in Arizona. — A view of the Snake River down at the Visitor Center.

Traveling dog at Snake River in Arizona. — A view of us practically under the old and the new bridges where Route 60 crosses the Snake River. How many of pictures can one person take of the same thing?

And yet another one of the Canyon after we’d crossed the bridge and started to climb out of the Salt River Canyon.

Cliffs in New Mexico. — Finally! We get to something in New Mexico! And it was suitably impressive. These cliffs and rock formations were in the **El Malpais National Monument**. (They didn’t know anything about that either.) Driving through there was even more desolate than going through Arizona. Again, thank God for the rental car!

Malpais arch. — Incredible as **La Ventana Arch** is, she didn’t spend a ton of time outside, though she still took way too many shots. It was cold and windy; she was dressed for Tucson. Ha! It’s always good to wear just one outfit your entire life. Me, I’m ready for anything in my naturally red and white fur coat.

At least we made it home before dark, and now I’m coming to terms with my lack of hotel beds and popcorn machines.

Hooked rug. — She’s still not letting me sit on her current rug, the “**Big Boucherouite**,” and get a treat for sharing it with you, but she’s got this tiny photo for you. Looks like all the others if you ask me

I hope she’ll let me come back again sooner than later. I enjoy sharing my travels with you. And you make good witnesses as to how the idiots treat me.

Later,

Tynan the traveling dog

January 29, 2019

Tucson was terrific!

Dog on hotel bed in Tucson. — Author Tynan here. You know, I’ll be 11 this year, and I’ve only recently been allowed the pleasure of hotel beds. This one belongs to my friend Nan. She took the photo while I was spending a little time with her Friday evening. I look gooood. Tucson was terrific!

Tuscon was terrific! The idiots sidelined me less than usual; even better, I was allowed into happy hour at the hotel! And they had a popcorn machine! One of my ladies Mary R. brought doggie bagels for me too. And Nan babysat me for a while Friday night while the idiots went for some food. (They did NOT bring any back for me. 🙁 )

Because the mistress is rushed this week getting her rugs ready to take up to the Española Valley Fiber Arts Center (EVFAC to you and me), and typing is difficult for me given my lack of thumbs, this is an abbreviated post. She insists that next week, I’ll be able to tell you all about our Arizona road trip. Okay, and the Old Pueblo Rug Hookers’ hook-in too.But I was allowed to post a couple of photos to whet your whistles.

Dog and woman on Mount Lemmon, Tucson. — Again, just to make you eager for my post next week, here’s one of the mistress and me up on Mount Lemmon in Tucson. What a view. And there was snow!

She’s insisting that I suggest strongly that you make your own road trip up to Española starting Saturday. The scenery’s beautiful up in that part of the state what with the snow on the mountains and all. There’s New Mexican food there at El Paragua. Oh, and don’t forget to see her “window” at EVFAC. Don’t forget too – she’ll be teaching a 4-hour introductory rug hooking class on Saturday, February 16. We hope to see you! (As if they’ll let me in.)

Till next week,

Tynan

December 5, 2018

From incredible scenery to…the couch

Unfortunately, International Rug Hooking Day finds me sitting alone on my couch. I’d much rather be out at Albuquerque’s BioPark, the Botanic Garden specifically, doing demos and spreading the the rug hooking gospel with the Adobe Wool Arts Guild. That wasn’t in the cards; instead I’ve had the privilege of falling asleep to old movies like “Camelot.” There was a crapload of overacting in that one. And I’m pecking this out one-fingered on my tablet. I make no promises regarding quality.

Hey, the reality is that I wasn’t ready with a post anyway. Sunday morning Tom, Tynan, and I had to make a sudden trip up to the kid in Durango. That’s in southwestern Colorado if you’re new here. She slid on some ice going to work and put her minivan into a tree. Yes, she’s fine, but not the van. After pondering on it a few minutes, Tom and I decided to go on up and get her a car so she could stay there and keep her job. We figured it was best for all involved. Nothing good would’ve come from her returning to New Mexico without a ride or a job. Okay, and I just got that studio/guest room set up. Freedom is expensive.

Now while the trip in no way helped my then burgeoning cold, it did remind Tom and me why we moved to New Mexico. I love Durango in summer and fall, but in an almost-winter storm, it’s cold!!! Still charming, but cold! And the driving pretty hairy. They don’t salt the roads, and their use of sand is meager at best. But the mountain scenery around it is incredible. And the sights driving back through New Mexico aren’t too shabby either. I figured I’d share a few. Enjoy while I go cough up a lung. We’ll talk again next week. (Hopefully.)

The view on the road between Cortez and Durango in Colorado. The mountains are the San Juans. Sorry about the focus issues. Jumping out of the driver’s seat without a lot of breakdown lane to use a cell phone camera was nerve-wracking and cold. At that point Tom was ahead driving the kid and her new old car back to Durango.

It’s been a while since I’ve driven through snow squalls.

Fortunately, the snow evaporated as we drove southward. (Well, Tom drove and I crocheted.)

It looked as if we were approaching the start of another world…

Tynan the Welsh Springer spaniel enjoying the mountain scenery — And as always, the trusty passenger, Tynan. At this point he was wondering why we kept stopping and I kept getting out of the car. Pictures don’t take themselves, dude.

September 11, 2018

River cruising in Bordeaux – Nature

Bordeaux river cruise — This is a bridge in Bordeaux, clearly an OLD bridge. I include it under the NATURE category, because the Garonne River is a tidal river. For our boat to go under that bridge, the captain had to have exquisite timing. At low tide.

If you’re a regular reader, then you know that Tom and I took our first really GOOD vacation in ten years in early August. No kid, not even the dog. (Don’t feel bad for Tynan; he had himself a fine time at a guild mate’s “doggie spa.”) Amazingly, neither of us had even been on a plane in five years – when we were scouting out Albuquerque before our move here in 2015. If you consider that this year we celebrated 25 years of marriage, you can see why it was time. So, we headed to Bordeaux, yes, the one in France, and boarded a Viking long boat for a wine cruise. And, yes, it met every expectation that we had.

Boat in Bordeaux — This is the clearance the boat had emerging from under the bridge in Bordeaux on our way to **Cadillac**. Thank goodness for a LOW tide.

We saw all kinds of things: vineyards, a big city (Bordeaux), tiny villages, 18th century forts,sculptures, chateaux, and so on. Got lots of pics to share. So many that I blew out my new Dropbox. Guess I have to pare down some. I don’t want to bore anyone, so I’ll post them according to themes. This week we’ll try NATURE.

Ultimately, we cruised along three different rivers near Bordeaux that week. Two met up at at the Gironde estuary not far from the Atlantic coast. Sadly, there were some, but not many, sea and river birds. I never got a good answer as to why that was given the estuary, but it might have something to do with the region’s agricultural practices.

Being in a world-famous wine region, of course, we toured several wineries. There was one which specialized in Sauternes wines – unfortunately, not my favorite, too sweet – but it was beautiful.

Bordeaux wine cruise — A wine chateau in the **Sauternes** wine region.

Mind you, chateaux in the Bordeaux area are not at all like those in the Loire valley. While those are about opulence and architecture, the ones in Bordeaux are more about commerce and the making and selling of wine. Often, there’s not a lot going on inside other than rooms for weddings,banquets, and wine tastings. These are real working farms and wineries. To that affect, see who we found at the one in Sauternes.

Karen Miller of Karen D. Miller Studio likes to post cool close-ups of leaves and trees and things. I managed to get a couple of tree pics for her.

And always, everywhere, things were growing!

But we didn’t have to be on land to enjoy nature’s bounty.

There was the captain of the Forseti. That was the name of our river boat.

Damn, I can get a bunch of posts out of this trip. Next time we’ll talk old buildings or something. I mean, we saw the ruins of a castle from the Middle Ages. You don’t see that every day in New Mexico. Till then, Tynan brings you this week’s rug on the frame.

Tynan presents to you my new “thistle” rug. I started it last week during the workshop that **Sharon Smith** presented to the **Adobe Wool Arts Guild** here in Albuquerque. **What’s on your frame???**

July 17, 2018

She told me to tell you that she’s taking some time off – Tynan

Tynan here!

Tynan the Welsh springer spaniel with a hooked rug. — Tynan here with this week’s “What’s on the frame” (and the blog).Like last week, she’s still working on the dog bone commission. Has she made one for me? I think we all know the answer to that one. Oh, and BTW, she’s taking some time off.

So, you know how she went on and on last week about how busy she is? As if the whole world isn’t over-scheduled. (Right, I’m not overly busy at all; dogs are smarter than the average human!) Anyway, this week she’s soooo busy that she told me I had to write the post up and get it out. Clearly, she was afraid to tell you that she’s decided, what with everything going on, including a nice vacation on a riverboat in France!!! – no dogs allowed – she’s about to take her annual summertime blog hiatus for a few weeks. Look for her again sometime mid-August. In the meantime, she insists that she can be reached and “seen” through the Facebook page, Instagram, and email.

I want you all to know that I did her bidding, but I’m not happy. 1) I don’t get to hang in Bordeaux on a riverboat eating goat cheese and drinking wine. 2) They wouldn’t let me explore the cave I found yesterday. See, we went hiking on an obscenely easy trail in the Cibola National Forest on the other side of the Sandias. (Okay, the master’s still babying his gouty toe.)

Cave off train in Sandia Mountains. — Here’s the mine shaft opening on the **Tecolote Trail (No. 264)** in the Sandias. Contact me if you’d like to investigate it one day.

As usual, I’m leading the way up the mountain. I’m scanning the trail for the usual suspects: bears, bobcats, mountain lions, geckos. Don’t laugh, those little bastards can sneak up on you and scare the shit out of a dog. Anyway, I take a gander to my left and what do I see – no, not a giant gecko, smart-asses – but a cave. Cool! Who knows what kind of snacks might be hidden in there. I adjust course and head for the opening. Cautiously I enter and next thing I know…someone’s got my tail. Damn, I hate that. “Tynan, get your ass out here!”

Turns out it’s an old mine shaft entrance. But who knows who lives in there now? Not that anyone would let me investigate. Chicken shits! They insisted that we take pictures of the cave, but that’s all. Damn. I just want everyone to know that I was willing and brave enough to find out what was in there. Some others…were not.

On that note, I wish you all a good rest of the summer. Like I said, we’ll be back to the blog mid-August. She’ll probably make me write that first one too. I hope that you and your dogs (okay, maybe the cats too) enjoy your vacations even if they’re staycations. And if you’re taking your dogs somewhere cool this summer, PLEASE comment here. It’ll give me more ammunition for next year.

-Tynan