Name:Charlie Location: Seattle, Washington, United States
Interests:Photography - both digital and conventional. Trains. Rodeo. My lovely wife Jayne, she is my best friend. Expertise:MYSELF Occupation:Artist Industry:Entertainment
"A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself he always appears to be doing both." ---Francoise Rene Auguste Chateaubriand
Being a person who likes to explore old cemeteries, not because I am morbid but because there is a lot of history in reading old tombstones, this was quite a find for me. This structure is called The Afterglow Vista. It is a mausoleum that was built by John C. McMillin to memorialize his family. He was the founder of the lime kiln industry in Roche Harbor on San Juan Island. It is located on top of a hill just outside of Roche Harbor above a very old cemetery that is the coolest cemetery I have ever seen. It is located right in the middle of a forest. There are actually trees growing right out of some of the graves. I suspect that in the 1800's people were buried only in pine boxes and some of the graves are so old the box deteriorated and rotted away and the grave has sunk in and created a shallow hole. Most of the graves are unmarked but just about all of them have a picket or wrought iron fence around them. In the center of the mausoleum pillars is a round table and 6 chairs made of cement. In the base of the chairs are interred the remains of the McMillin family and the table represents togetherness in the life after. There is one missing pillar and that represents the unfinished business that man leaves behind when he dies. The structure was suppose to have a dome on it but after John McMillin passed away his son canceled the order for the dome as he felt the company did not have the 20,000 dollars needed to purchase it. Being in the middle of the forest made this a very quiet and solemn place. If you would like to read more about the history of this place and the McMillin family you can go here
Leaving Seattle’s 60 degree summer skies and arriving in Denver at noon to 95* was both welcome and HOT! We met Linda and Al at the baggage claim and was out to their house in Brighton by 1:00 PM, a quick lunch and then we were on the move to the town of Boulder to the Coors Brewery and bottling company. We had to wait about 30 minutes in the sun for the transport but once in side the self-guided tour was a cool way to spend the afternoon…the three free beers at the end was no joke either! After the tour we walked around Golden and eyed the beautiful architecture and had dinner at a café where we sat outside. It was still close to 90* but was so comfortable.
July 22, 2011
Saturday morning we drove into to downtown Denver to take lots of photos of the train before we boarded for Cheyenne. We were in the third card “The City of Los Angeles” which was a dining car. This made for a nice four-way table conversation and a nice way to have our continental breakfast.Once we got to the Rodeo grounds we took a behind the chutes tour after a great bbq lunch which was more like a brunch for us due to the timing.
The train ride from Denver to Cheyenne was a three hour trip. This was the highlight of our trip!!! It is so funny that Charlie loves trains, he is into model railroading, and is a rail fan. This is the first time he has ever rode on a train!! This was
Our seats in the stands were in the shade! Wow, what a great relief. Again the temperatures in Cheyenne were in the upper 80s and hot! Linda was able to watch her first and probably her last rodeo.
She thought it was interesting and she would probably have liked one that gave more attention to the specialty acts. This rodeo is fast paced and doesn’t stop for anything.We headed back to the train to take more photos. We had a nice snack and a couple of beers on the train as we headed home.
July 23, 2011
Sunday morning was a chance to sleep in, coffee out on the patio, brunch and the time to read the newspaper…what a great morning.
Made it to Brighton Depot in time to get set up to video and photo the train making its way back to Cheyenne. It went speeding by and barely got the photos. Jumped into the car and chased the train up to Greeley where it stopped for water. Had time to set up the video camera and capture it firing up and leaving.
We went to the model railroad layout museum for HO scale and wondered around oooing and awing. Later we did a virtual cache and another cache introducing Al and Linda to the world of geocaching.
July 24, 2011
Monday: up fairly early for a day trip to Rocky Mountain National Park. On the road at 8:30. First stop is Boulder, CO. A short 3-block walk down Pearl Street to check it out. It has changed a lot since Charlie was last here in 1981. Next we head up Boulder Canyon, with a stop at the trail to Boulder Falls. After this stop we head up to Barker Reservoir Dam outside of Nederland, where there is a cache hidden. After a quick find of the cache, we head on down ( or I should say up) the road to Rocky Mountain National Park, as our final destination ends up being about 12, 300 ft in elevation. Just getting out of the car and walking across the parking lot to the visitor’s center leaves you breathless at that elevation if you are not used to it. On the way up we make a brief stop at St Catherines's Chapel at Camp ST Malo.
Making it to the top at the visitors center we look around the visitors center and gift shop. Then we head back down the mountain to where the air is more plentiful. A stop in Estes Park for a short look around (this has changed a lot since Charlie was last here also). We thought about dinner but opted to hit the road and head home for a homemade meal. We took a different route home and got to see some different country.
July 25, 2011
Flight home, leaving Denver at 8:20 in the morning. All in all we had a great 4 days and did get to do and see a lot. The train ride being the highlight of the trip.
As many of you know Jayne and I are involved with the Rotary Youth exchange program. We have been host parents for several of them over the years and now she sits on the district committee and we organize and chaperone the California trip in the fall of every exchange year for the inbound district students. Every year in September we meet and greet a whole new group of students and every June and July we have to say goodbye as they return home. Every group from every year has their own character and they are all great but for us this year the saying of goodbyes was extra hard. This year between the inbound orientation in September and the District Conference in June we as the adults had spent more time with them as a group than anyone. What was different about this group is that they were comfortable in including us in a lot of their activities. The events that they attended as a group during the year were bonding times for the group, but also for us.
In the year that they (students) are here the transformation that takes place is amazing. Some of them do not even speak English, and the some that do, not very well. Some are shy, and some are in total amazement. Most of them gain weight (poor American eating habits and too much fast food), fortunately after they return home to their native food and eating habits they loose it. At he end of their exchange year they have matured so much, and most of them realize it. they say things like "my friends and my parents will not even know me". It is such a joy for us to be able to see this transformation. They turn into such young adults.
There have been times that we have been accused of being to close to the students (emotionally) and maybe we do, but how can that be when you have a passion for such a great program. There is a story behind this thought, much to long to tell here, but it is my personal observation that if every student in the world could go out on exchange by the time their generation were adults, and they were in charge, there would be no more strife in the world. They learn to see that we are all alike no matter where we live and are not the image that our governments and the media portray us to be.
It has come to the end of another exchange year and we have to say goodbye. We have made many great friends in Rotary and definitely great friends throughout the world in former exchange students through this program. One day soon, when Jayne can retire , we will have the time to travel around the world and visit our students and their families. As we say goodbye we wish each and everyone of them much happiness and the best in life. We will miss you all, and love you all. We will see you soon. I just have to remind myself not to cry because it is over but to smile because it happened.
Just little over a year ago I was talking with someone who lives in a pretty remote town. During our conversation I asked them what they did for fun in such a remote area. They said they went geocaching. I said "what is that?" and we, or I should say they, spent the rest of the conversation explaining what it was all about.
History - the short story - In 2000 the government eased the restrictions on the use of Global Positioning Satellites (GPS) and with that came the commercial use of handheld and vehicle GPS units to locate where you are on the globe (longitude and latitude). Just for fun a gentleman down in Oregon took a plastic bucket and filed it full of goodies and a log book and hid it in the woods. He posted the coordinates on the Internet and asked people to find it. Geocaching celebrated it's 10th anniversary in 2010. For more detailed information on the history of geocaching go to:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geocaching.
All of the intrigue of looking for treasure and using GPS and mapping and all that had my interest and soon I was off to investigate. After reading the geocaching website (www,geocaching.com) and a couple of books on the subject I was off to purchase my first GPS and search for my first treasure.
After I made my first discovery I was so excited. I became hooked and now have found over 100 caches and have 5 of my own hidden. I do not go out as much as I would like to but it does give me something to do when I travel with Jayne and do not have to actually work. My finds have been in Washington, Nevada, and British Columbia so far. Now I must say at this point that all the caches are not necessarily full of valuable treasures but some do contain some interesting trinkets. The idea is to trade items. You also have to sign the log to claim a find. After you have found it you log your find on the Geocaching website. Also not all caches have items in them, some just contain a log book. Another type of cache that a geocacher can create is a virtual cache. The post the coordinates on line of an interesting landmark or location. You usually have to answer questions about the location or maybe even take a photo of yourself at the location to prove that you found it.
The real excitement in geocaching for me, as I suspect it is for most geocachers, is the journey. It takes you places and lets you discover things that you may not otherwise go to see or do. When people ask me what my hobby is I tell them I use multimillion dollar satellites to look for Tupperware in the woods.
If you think this is something you might be interested in check out the Geocaching website, there is a lot of information on there about the sport. Also I recommend the book "An Idiots Guide to Geocaching" before you start. There is no charge to sign up for the website however you can get a premium membership to get some more benefits. It just depends how serious you want to get about it. We can always use more Geocachers, after all there are 1.4 million cashes (worldwide) to be found.
Lifetime
