We’ve had lots of activity in our backyard these first two weeks of July. Bees and Butterflies are frequent visitors to the butterfly garden.
Ruby Throated Hummingbirds and Northern Cardinals are two of the birds we see every summer around our back yard. Snow Egrets are frequent summer visitors to the salt water creek. Roseate Spoonbills first started coming to our area a few years ago. I’ve seen them two years in a row now so hopefully they will keep returning each summer.
This July “Seasons” will be the theme for the entire month with a different season featured each week. Amy is starting the challenge with “summer”. For this challenge I’m taking a trip down memory lane to some of my most memorable summer road trips.
When I was growing up my family took a road trip every summer to visit relatives. However, the most memorable summer road trip from my childhood didn’t revolve around visiting family. In the summer of 1959, when I was eight years old, my father’s work required him to spend several weeks in California. My whole family went with him on a cross country road trip to see America. I spent many hours sitting between my two brothers in the back seat of our Ford station wagon as we made our way to the west coast. We stopped at national parks, a Santa Claus village, prairie dog towns, and bought cowboy hats. While in California we panned for gold, went to Disneyland, San Francisco, and Yosemite. On the return trip back east we saw more national parks and many more road side attractions. There’s more about my 1959 adventure at Revisiting My Childhood in Pictures.
Our family of 5 traveled cross country and back in this Ford Station wagon in 1959Old Faithful Lodge in Yellowstone National Park, 1959 ~ photo from my Dad’s digitized slideSan Francisco street, 1959 ~ photo digitized from my Dad’s slide
Now flash forward to 2006 when Henry and I made our first cross country RV trip. Our main destinations were the Grand Canyon North Rim, Yellowstone, Glacier National Park, three Utah National Parks, the Black Hills and lots of places in between.
Grand Canyon North Rim Roosevelt Point OverlookWandering Dawgs at Old Faithful Geyser in Yellowstone National Park in 2006Arches National Park – Delicate Arch (Utah)
Our biggest summer road trip was our four month long RV trip to Alaska in 2013. Truly the trip of a lifetime!
Watching for whales in Haines, AlaskaPolychrome Overlook, Denali National Park, AlaskaMama bear looking for more fish near ValdezA pair of Orcas on Columbia Glacier tour from Valdez
Sadly, this summer there will be no long summer road trips for us. Stay tuned for more about a short weekend trip we have coming up next week.
It seems like we’ve been going non stop since we returned from our trip to Ireland and Scotland on May 23. Once I got caught up on laundry and got over the jet lag, I’ve been able to enjoy the summer.
With very little rain while we were on our trip, my garden was suffering when we got home. After a few days of digging in the dirt and a little watering, it is now thriving.
Zinnia
Daylily
Fiddler Crab on milkweed
Zinnias in the butterfly garden
Zinnia
Some days are perfect for a boat ride.
High tide in the Georgia Salt Marsh
Driftwood on a Georgia sandbar
The hummingbirds come by each day and a painted bunting bunting pair and other small birds come by the feeder regularly. Wading birds are frequent visitors in the neighborhood.
Wandering Dawgs 
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