No rest and prayer request

Last night was the final night of the Golden Triangle Writer's Conference held at the Elegante Hotel in Beaumont. My friend Debra Harris Johnson, center, won First Place with her short story, First in Non-fiction, and First with the Writing Jar. Way to go girl!
With us is teacher, Jessica Ferguson

I presented two seminars, The Writing Process, and Journaling and Memoirs. Both were well received. Attending authors held a signing party with our books available to the public.



I will be signing my new book, A Venture in Faith, Texas to Alaska, at Barnes and Noble on Dowlen, Nov. 7, 2009, from 1-3 PM. Hope to see all of you.

On Sunday, Oct. 18, I had an informational table at the Golden Triange Baptist Association Missions Fair, held at First Baptist Church, Nederland. Many visitors have an interest in Alaska.

Author and friend, Laurie Kolp, has a story in a newly released anthology, Christmas Miracles. Here Laurie is holding her book at Barnes and Noble. She will be joining me signing on Nov. 7.

Laurie wrote a glowing interview with me on her blog, conversationswithacardinal.blogspot.com. Thank you, Laurie!


What I get myself into. I was Assistant Scout Master with Chris's troop in Houston. Now I'm home and available to "volunteer" to sleep on the hard ground, in a tent, and eat kid friendly, high colestrol, calorie laden camp cooking. I joined my boys, Ryan and Kyle and several other Scouts, to spend the week-end at a camporee at Camp Urland. The weather was chilly, the sky ultramarine blue, and the exercise welcome.

Don't the boys look like they are having fun?

Yes, that's a lizard earring on Jimmy.

Darrell, my adopted son is now 27 years old. He is blind and profoundly retarded due to child abuse, shaken baby syndrome.

Darrell has had a series of grande mal seisures. He aspirated fluid and a lung collapsed. He is also fighting an infection. He now struggles with a trach and ventelator.

Darrell spent a couple of weeks in the hospital and is now in a long-term acute treatment facility where he is being weaned off the ventlator and receiving therapy. His very limited mental ability makes all this very confusing for him.

PLEASE PRAY FOR DARRELL'S RECOVERY.

Several years ago after receiving Darrell's medical and children's protective service records, I wrote his story.

I know that God's purpose for Darrell's life is that his story be told to help parents understand the devastation of shaken baby syndrome, how to handle the stress of parenting and to offer encouragement to families of special needs children and adults.

Photo Fans, Blogger's fixed!

My youngest daughter, Cora, fixed blogger! So now I have a couple of weeks of catching up to do. On our last day at Camp Baldwin while we were preparing the waterlines for minus 50 degrees this winter, our young bull moose came to visit and eat the seeded yard. Because of their short necks they get on their knees. I think he's praying that hunters don't make moose-meat out of him.

Leaving Alaska, we drove the AlCan Highway through the Yukon, spending the night at Whitehorse Wal-mart, and then drove on to Watson Lake, famous for the sign post forest. Although this is my fourth trip to Alaska I had not added my sign to the 65,000 plus signs.

I hope I can find it again! It's above Sassie and directly behind the Martin's sign.

We left the AlCan and turned south on the Cassiar Highway, a narrow, mostly gravel road, much like the AlCan on my first trip in 2002. The fall colors, golds of aspen, birch and cottonwood, contrasted with the reds of ground plants and the black/green of the spruce. Magnificent.

We stopped at Jade City, British Columbia, (in the rain). This area of mountains produces the largest quantity of jade in the world. Jade is not only green, but white, pink and black, too.

The figure below is made of stacked raw jade rock. It is called an inookshook. The figures were made by the Canadian First Nation people as trail markers. You still see them today. The inookshook is the symbol of the winter Olympics which will be held in Vancouver.

Near Stewart, BC, we made a short trip back into southeast Alaska at Hyder, population 80, (unless residents have flown out for the winter). We drove an old gold mining road to see the Salmon Glacier, and fish creek. There were no bears at fish creek because the salmon had already run for the season. Last year a bear killed a camper in his tent.

Dale obligated the photographers by ducking under an overhang of a small glacier.

This is one of the many waterfalls exiting the high valley glaciers.


Proceeding south we left the Cassiar Highway for the Yellowhead Highway and continued through the Fraser Gorge. The scenic highway is cut along a canyon wall. Between the river and the highway, the light ribbon is one of two railway lines. Tracks on each side of the river proved for trains to travel in opposite directions.

In Bellingham, the Martins and I shared a farewell lunch and a (almost) tearful good-by as we wnnt our separate ways. They contined south to Seattle, while I turned east.

It's difficult to sift through pictures of Bellinghan, and Seattle, but I chose this one from the Honey Creek campground in Washington.

The cypress trees were so large that I couldn't reach even half way around the smaller ones. Ferns grew out of the tree trunks, with fronds three feet long. Fallen trees had new growth growing straight up out of the horizontal trunks.

Washington, Oregon and northern Idaho were harvesting apples, pears, apricots and other fruits. Vinyards surrounded the highway.

And then what a contrast. Salt Lake City. I drove onto Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake by crossing a causeway from Salt Lake City. The water level in the lake was very low due to summer evaporation. The salts and minerals thickened the water. The island itself is rugged and dry.

To reach the lake and walk in the extremely salty water, I passed through this picnic shelter and walked on the mineral encrusted sand that you see through it. At the horizon is a narrow tan line of dead vegetation, and then the shallow water. Quite a long hike in the brilliant hot sun.

Here are some of the antelope the island is named for. There are also free roaming herds of bison, and many migrating birds.

I was fascinated by the clarity of the sky and the colors of sunset.

The air was so clear that sounds carried for quite a distance.

Then on the visit Arches National Park.

Here is one of the many balanced rocks, left from volcanic extrusions.

Some of the formations look like groups of people.

There are many natural stone arches caused by wind and rain washing away softer rock.

Leaving Utah I drove through southern Colorado and into northern New Mexico.


This metal sculpture of Native Americans is at the visitor's center in Durango.

I've wanted to visit the Georgia O'Keefee museum in Santa Fe, since I visited Ghost Ranceh several years ago. In the city, I quickly learned that even with a GPS, it's impossible to drive a motor home through the narrow streets lined with adobe building.

I spent a wonderfully cool night at Glorieta conference center, and two night in Glen Rose for Camper's on Mission Texas rally, then on to HOT, HUMID Beaumont.

Hot and Humid

Followers,
I'm terribly sorry but blogger won't accept my photos to upload.
Anyway. I got home safe and sound late Friday.
Saturday was spent cleaning out the RV.
On Sunday I drove Cheri's truck to church and later we went to buy groceries. A few minutes after unloading the truck and while we were putting things a way, a man banged on the front door yelling "Your truck's on fire!"
Sure enough Cheri's truck, that she'd just paid off, was in flames. 911, police and a fire truck joined neighbors with water hoses. It was a total loss.
THANK GOD NO ONE WAS IN IT!

This weekend I'll try to get someone to help me load pic on bloger, until then,
Carol

On the Road Again - Texas Bound

Just a quick note since it's been almost two weeks since i have been able to get on the internet.
Last night iIstayed at the Glorieta Baptist Conference Center in New Mexico. I'm now in their parking lot taking advantage of emails.
I'll send lots of photos of Canada and the North west as soon as I can.
Until then!!!! Texas or Bust.

Denali National Park

We left Wasilla on Tuesday after picking up our entries in the Alaska State Fair in Palmer. Tuesday night we parked near the new home of our long time friends, Anna and Mickey. Wed. morning we were on the Parks Highway heading north for a much too brief visit at Denali National Park.
The aspens, birch and cottonwoods were a blaze of gold in the bright sun, a contrast to the dark green of the spruce.Dale spotted a road-killed porcupine. We stopped so he could pull the quills. Lynne and I have been making earrings from the quills.

Denali National Park's 6 million acres are accessible by only one road, primitive, largely unpaved, winding through the wilderness.

After a brief stop at the Wilderness Access Center to arrange for camping at the Savage River Campground, and for a bus tour to Eileson Visitor's Center, we proceeded to travel slowly through the taiga and forest.

Chores never end. I cooked dinner for us in my rig.

The sky was clear and temperature quite chilly. We took a walk around the large isolated campground enjoying the solitude and quiet.

Ducking under a large white spruce, I discovered the largest burl I'd ever seen. Caused by a virus that attacks the tree, the tree compensates by growing this huge woody appendage.

A spectacular sunset was an indication of a beautiful tomorrow.

Early the following morning we doned coats, gloves and carried packs of snacks and lunch to the bus stop. Drivers are not permitted to drive personal vehicles past the Savage River Bridge unless they have a permit for the Teklinika Campground or a hiking permit. By restricting visitors to big green buses, more tourists can enjoy the park with a minimum of intrusion on the wilderness.

Our bus must have originated in Japan! Most of the tourists were speaking languages unfamiliar to me.

This picture taken at one of the overlook stops shows several of the Japanese wearing masks. were they afraid of Swine flu? the cold brisk air made that threat unlikely.

Our first glimps of Mt McKinley, also know by the Native name Denali, was from the highway as we traveled along. Only 35% of visitors are privileged to view the mountain as it is ususally shrouded in clouds and mist.
We were fortunate to be able to vies and photograph the mountain from several stops.
The Sanctuary River and the Savage River are examples of braided rivers. the wide bed criss crossed by ever changing flow causes the rivers to be unstable and dangerous.

Wild life hunting is fun for every one. some more serious photographers than others.
Dall rams on the cliffs of Primrose Ridge.

scene of our bus and another from an over look. See the herd ofhomo sapiens!

Mt McKinley from the Eilerson Visitors Center.

Bald Eagles are rare in Denali because they prefer fish and their ususal habitat is near the coast. Golden Eagles are frequent to Denali.
This grizzly is crossing a ridge on the tundra. We saw other bears but they didn't photograph well.This red fox ran along the tundra and then in front of the stopped bus. It ignored the tourists hanging out the windows to take its picture.

Look carefully at the lowe left corner of the picture to find another bus traveling far below us. We would soon follow down that winding road.

This is only a brief overview of the majestic Denali NP. For more pictures see me when I arrive home.

We are now back at Camp Baldwin preparing camp for winter by hiding anything a rodent might find edible or nesting material, draining water lines, and preparing for minus 50 degree winter weather. This morning the temperature was 28 degrees with a frost.

Week of Aug 30-Sept 6

What a week this has been. Monday the Martin's rig was in the shop. while it was being worked on I spent several hours at the Nataive Heritage Center. These two young folks are demonstrating some of the events of the Eskimo Olympics. The girl will kick up, balancing on her left hand and kick the ball. The record by a male is eight feet, meaning that his body is vertical and hand off the floor, sorta an upside high jump.Here the young lady is perparing to kick the suspended ball with her left foot while holding her right foot and balancing on her left hand. Confused? They were so fast that I couldn't get good pictures. The games are to increase their strength and endurance.

The strangest was the ear pull, designed to increase tolerance to pain. A loop of rawhide is placed around the opponants opposite ears while they are sitting. Then both bull untill one lets the rope pull off. Like when your mom pulled on you ear to get you to behave, but much more painful.

These women are dressed in Kuspuks and wearing mukluk boots. They use dance fans of feathers to accent the mothions of thier dances. The drumers keep rhythum on flat seal skin drums while they chant. The map on the wall depicts the five major cultures in Alaska.

Alaska's Native people are divided into eleven distinct cultures with twenty-one different language.

This young man shows one of the Tlingit/Haida drums with the black, red and teal stylized designs. He waid that the teal color is from crushed copper rock with fish slime as a binder.

The designs are historic. He explained that American's distroyed maost of their masks, but some were taken to Russia and France.

This is a replica of a Tlingit/Haida community house. The door is an oval hole in a huge log.

This replica of an Alutic common house is similiar to to the homes of the Yupik, and Inupik cultures. Constructed partially underground the homes were well insulated.

The log house and food cache are representative of the Athabascan culture, and of settlers. Today many residents still live in log cabins and use caches to keep food from the bears. Wealthy Alaskan build wonderfully insulated "Log cabins" with triple paned panaramic windows.

Lynne joined me to travel down the Kenai to the Alaska Wildlife conservation Center. Here injured or orphaned animals are treated to be released.

I have too many animal pictures already but was impressed with this bull caribou.
One more moose picture. This huge bull will soon be in rut. His antlers are shedding the velvet. That yucky stuff hanging off his antlers is the velvet that he is rubbing off.

Dale's rig was repaired in record time. Bonnie and Charles joined us with their motor home for a quick trip down to Homer.

We camped overnight at Willowaw National Forest. Red Salmon were spawning in the shallow waters of the stream that ran through the campground. Later we stopped at the confluence of the Russian and Kenai Rivers where combat fishing for salon takes place when they are running.

The weather was cold and damp.


From the windows of the rigs we had view of glaciers and waterfalls. We were tempted to climb but the temperature and dampness and our mature bodies restricted us to walks around the almost deserted campground.

We arrived in Homer. Despite the could cover we enjoyed the distand mountains and glaciers. If the day had been clear, we would have been able to see Mt. Redoubt across Cook Inlet. It is still smoking but not erupting.

Passing through the small fishing and arts/crafts town, we drove onto the Homer Spit which divides the Kachemak Bay.

A crazy Alaskan blew up the front edge of his parasail and let the wind pull him on a surf board out into the bay.

Luckily he was wearing a wet suit.

Early the following morning I walked Sassie along the beach and was awed by this magnificent sunrise.


Near the end of the spit, Dale spotted this eagle working to repair it's nest.
Dale's binoculars let him identify sea otters on two floating mats of kelp. This guy was by himself. His head is to the left. Those are his feet to the right.


We hated to leave Homer without seeing the glaciers and volcanic mountains with clear skys. Of course as wwe returned to Anchorage, the skys cleared and the sunshone brilliantly.

Later this week we again helped Sharon and Henry in Wasilla prepare for winter by getting his snow blower attached to a small tractor and putting things under cover.

On Saturday, we returned to Anchorage for a trememdus stage production of the "Lion King". You have to see it to beleave it. Of course no photos were allowed.

Today we leave to return to Delta and winterize. Yes winter is coming. It was 41 the other morning.