The Gardeners Anonymous Blog

Me in Machu Picchu

I'm back.
But I was there. I was really, really there. I was in the Lost City of the Incas Machu Picchu.
It seems like a distant dream now, partially because I'm lying in bed with the flu. A present from some tourist on the plane ride home.
This was my first visit to Machu Picchu, one of the new seven wonders of the world.And my first long trip away from my family.
More later, when I can breathe through my nose again.

Adios. I'm Off to Peru

Here is a photo of a flower.

It is obligatory, because of my blog name. Other than that, this article has nothing to do with gardening.

It has to do with fear. Yes fear, Silly unreasonable nonsensical fear.At 4:00 Saturday morning I will leave for the airport with a group of my friends and fly to Peru. I will leave my husband and my children for ten days.
I will go to a Spanish immersion school. I just want to laugh when I say that out loud, Spanish immersion school. I have a lot of nerve going to a Spanish immersion school.

I have enough trouble with English.

I have never left my boys for more than one day.

When I was pregnant, several people told me that having kids would change everything. Some things do change in big ways. Like, you are no longer the center of the universe. Some little drooling, bald, round human—with no teeth and who can’t speak English—takes your place.

But there are subtle changes that happen, also.

Before I had kids, I wasn’t afraid of anything. I would get on a plane with fifty bucks in my pocket, no hotel reservation, and some distant relatives’ old address in my backpack and just go. I would travel to third-world countries with nothing but the smile on my face. I slept in train stations, on beaches, on buses, on benches, in hostels, in campgrounds, in cars, and in trenches.

O.K. Enough of that.

Mount Shasta Vacation

Every year my family and I spend a week camping near Mt. Shasta.
I have to admit that my favorite thing to do next to fishing (yes, I like to fish) is go into the nearest town.
The nearest town is Mt. Shasta City. My husband calls it Berkeley North.

For garden lovers, Mt. Shasta City is heaven.
It is a small town, but full of culture and history.
There are a couple casual public gardens located in the middle of town.
There’s a beautiful little nursery.
There are a handful of surprisingly good restaurants and a natural food, herb or crystal store on every block.

There are some really cute garden gift stores.
The best one in my opinion is Petals.
Petals is located on Alpine street between a bead store and an antique store.
These shops live in tiny cottages in a row, each is a different color.
They look like little jewels against the backdrop of Mt. Shasta.

I walked up to the front door of Petals and was greeted by a rather boisterous shop cat. I followed him in where the shop owner was telling him to hush.
Her two-year-old daughter was in a car seat asleep behind the counter.

Ah, I remember those days.

Petals is a small store but you could spend a lot of time there because the longer you look the more you see. I’m a sucker for these kinds of stores.
Oh, and there were flowers, the store was also full of flowers and plants.

Petals is packed with wonderful objects. The kind of things that you find in small privately owned florist gift shops. I stood in Petals and was mesmerized by all the goodies. Everything in the store was so artfully arranged and colorful. I was like a crow surrounded by a bunch of shiny objects.

I wanted to buy everything—but I settled for 3 handmade stained-glass stars from Africa.

Yosemite Hike, Don't Feed the Squirrels

It’s not hard to think of a way to write a post about Yosemite and tie it into gardening. After all, it is one big garden that a fortunate few get to play in for a few days a year.

In my opinion, there is only one other place that compares with the beauty of this place and that’s Yellowstone National Park. I have not been to the Grand Canyon yet, but I hear that it’s close.

Our first stop was the grassy meadow that lies beneath El Capitan, the largest piece of exposed granite in the world. I took a few shots here of the wildflowers and El Cap.

Soon I stopped snapping pictures. Why? Because my husband is the all-time obnoxious tourist and he takes enough pictures for the both of us. But I guess if he didn’t take pictures and make sure the cameras had batteries—we wouldn’t have any pictures.

I wanted to do something other than take pictures. I wanted to climb Half Dome, the landmark that Ansel Adams made famous through his amazing black-and-white portraits of Yosemite.

We were only staying in Yosemite for two days. So the first morning my ten-year-old son and I started the ascent up Half Dome. My husband and eight-year-old son accompanied us to the top of Vernal falls.

My family stopped at Vernal Falls for a foot soaking in Emerald Pool at the top of the falls. We ate some dried fruit and drank some water.

There were signs posted telling hikers not to feed the ground squirrels because they may exhibit unnatural behavior. And the type of food that people fed them may not be part of their natural diet. My family and I heeded the warning even though it was hard to keep from feeding those charming little animals.

My ten-year-old and I left my husband and younger son behind. We hiked another mile and a half up to the top of Nevada falls. Anyone who has done this hike, or made it all the way to Half Dome will tell you that this is a difficult hike. It is almost straight up—on steep, uneven granite steps. After 4 miles my ten-year-old and I were weary and giddy and we sat down for another snack of trail mix and water.

I pulled the package of dried nuts and fruit out of my backpack and sat back to survey the breathtaking Yosemite Valley. It seemed the view of my trail mix was equally awe inspiring to my new ground squirrel friends. The cute furry creatures, with big pleading eyes had surrounded us.

Oh, maybe they’re hungry. Maybe they’re starving, I thought, ignoring the fact that they couldn’t keep their humungous bellies from dragging on the ground. I looked at my son and said. “Let’s just give them one nut.” Because that’s what they would eat in the wild and since they were already showing unnatural behavior, hey, why not.

The first squirrel took the nut very politely and then we fed a second and their friends must have heard about it, because they came running from all directions. The squirrels were all around us, some begging, some looking longingly at us. I was starting to feel like Gulliver. There was a commotion in the ranks. The sea of ground squirrels parted and a rather hefty squirrel appeared. I like to refer to him as Sumo Squirrel.

I handed Sumo Squirrel a nut and he jumped right in my lap. He was as big as a cat. He knocked the wind out of me. Sumo stared straight into my eyes. All of a sudden he didn’t look so cute and innocent anymore. I thought he was going to start talking to me like some scary Disney movie. He would say. “Hey sister, got any more of them nuts? I know these seven dwarves, see? And they got this mine see? And it’s loaded with jewels see? Well, maybe I could do ya a favor.” At that little piece of imagining, I jumped to my feet and sent Sumo catapulting into the air. I thought I heard him say, “Hey, you’re not Snow Whiiiiiittttteee.”

I pulled my son up by his arm, knocking some trail mix out of his hand much to the delight of the furry pigs below us.

We turned and walked back toward the trail. Twenty-five ground squirrels were following us. We did the walk of shame past the other hikers who now knew by our vermin escort that we had committed the sin of feeding the wildlife.

I should really thank Sumo, because he was the impetus that started us off again. My son and I ended up hiking another 2.2 miles, bringing our grand total for the day to 10 miles: a very respectable hike for a ten-year-old boy. We never made it to Half Dome. We stopped about three-and-a-half miles short. We'll make it to Half Dome next year.

I hope Sumo will be waiting.