My contest entries...

I spoke earlier in the week of turning in some of my vacation photos for a contest the "Skill Center" at work was having. The "Orange Moon", the "Malibu on the Floating Bridge and the "foxglove?" white flowers I posted yesterday were 3 of them.

There is a (longish) story behind the other 3.

Back in grade school, the one I used to walk to when I lived in this house (before we moved when I was in 5th grade), I read a lot. My "Friendship 7 Summer Reading Program" card from the summer of '62 has all the slots filled out (maybe 25 books, I haven't seen it for a while) with a little Mercury capsule stamped for each book I read, but the front of it is covered with dozens of stamps for the ones there was no room to write in. Someday I'll find it and scan it...

I don't know if it was that summer, or later, but in that library (and I remember it being that library) was one about Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys. I don't remember much of it, but that was my first memory of Vermont.

All these years of going to Vermont I've passed things by getting there. Niagra Falls, the Air Force Museum at Dayton along with the Wright Brothers sites that are there, the Erie Canal. Two trips ago we stopped at the Bennington Museum on the way out coming home, and even Dottie was glad we had (Bill was with us that time). Last time (2004)I tried to stop at the Bennington Battlefield Monument, but missed the closing time by a few minutes. (Someday...)

That last week before we left I looked up the Old Rhinbeck Aerodrome. I had seen it when Neil Armstrong did a PBS series called "First Flights". It is a museum to the first two decades of aviation- with flyable aircraft or replicas. Though open all week, they only fly on the weekends. It's a bit south of Troy in New York State.

The weekend was already taken by an anniversary party for Ed and Jane (their 25th), so that got demoted to someday...

I also printed some short haul rail excursions that run in Vermont and their prices. Time didn't allow for them, either...

The night before we left I googled Fort Ticonderoga, thinking of Ethan Allen, and Vermont history, etc.. I found a website and printed some things including a map and the hours, etc..

Deb and Verne, Dottie's two youngest sisters, have always been wonderful about putting up with my camera and I. In 2004 it was Deb who said "when I come home this way I get a really nice view of Camel's Hump, if there's a sunset tonight it might be perfect". It was, I shared it with you all a while back. Verne took me to Lake Iroquois; you have been there as well with me.

When they found out I wanted to go to Fort Ticonderoga they worked it out so that the day before we left, the two of them, along with Verne's husband and two sons could all go as well. We loaded our Malibu and Verne's SUV on a ferry and crossed Lake Champlain, then drove about an hour south.

The fort and the battlefield park surrounding it were amazing! There are still trenches there from 1758 and what we call the French and Indian War. The memorials to the soldiers that fell in those battles have fresh flowers on them, 258 years later!

Then after you pass the memorials and plaques to these earlier battles, you come to the fort itself.

Which brings me to my other contest entries (finally...hope you're still with me).



That may be in the half dozen "best things I've ever shot"...

You enter through a wonderful gift shop/snack bar (really good food as well). There are re-enactors, there are guided history tours...the museums that are housed in the fort structure itself have some amazing things I'll share in the next few days.



That one I actually had to let them pull because I turned in 6 prints and hadn't read the fine print, I was only allowed 5. One instructor wanted to pull the Malibu on the bridge out, but since that's what we build for a living, I told him to pull the fife and drum corps instead, and kept this next one in as well.



Sometimes you get lucky...

Our weekend plans are up in the air; we're trying to keep the 3 grandkids on Saturday night so John and Noel can have a "date night" before school starts again the middle of August. So far they haven't committed, but if we don't we have lots of things we can do. I might get a chance to visit some of you over the weekend, but most likely won't be posting again until Monday (now if you got this far you can breathe a big sigh of relief. Dottie's sisters have always complained about how long it takes me to tell a story).

Lovely weekends to each of you!

alan