John's Island: June 2018

Welcome to John's Island

Rock And Roll Marathon

The Seattle Rock and Roll Marathon took place on June 9. This year the runners went right by my place. It was neat to see thousands of folks running by. This popular race has rock bands set up every few miles along the route.

Great day for a marathon.

About an hour after the race started I went down to the street. The guy in
red shorts has just passed the 1 Mile Marker and is taking a moment
to chat with one of the race officials. One mile
in an hour and three minutes. Nice pace!

Farmers Market is Back

The Magnolia Farmers Market is Saturdays, June through October.
Here, on June 2, the strawberries look great!

$15 for a bouquet of flowers ... how does that sound?

Got a kick out of the little boy waiting for his breakfast
of mini pancakes. These things ARE delicious!

Flowers are Back

A few snaps of flowers in the neighborhood taken on walks ...

Do you like irises?

Woodpecker is Back

Do you remember the woodpecker story from my March 10, 2016 post? He's back! He loves to perch on the neighbor's chimney and alert the entire neighborhood to his presence.

Check out more critter pics at Saturday's Critters. Thanks to Eileen for hosting!

Cruise Ships are Back

The Alaska cruise season is underway. Ships are in port here in Seattle nearly every day for the next few months. My best photo ops are in the early morning as the ships arrive.

Holland America Amsterdam
June 10th 5:07 AM

Carnival Legend
June 12th 5:23 AM

Holland America Eurodam
June 2nd 5:03 AM

Carnival Legend
June 12th 5:27 AM

Royal Caribbean's Explorer of the Seas
June 15th 5:01 AM
Be sure to note the Giant Screen TV Midship!
Wonder if anyone was watching at 5 AM?

Washington State Ferry
June 10th 5:06 AM

Historic Ship Watch

The Palaces of the Pacific

As you can imagine, my fascination with ships is carried over to my collection of vintage travel memorabilia. The Palaces of the Pacific brochure is fairly rare. It was published by the Great Northern Pacific Steamship Company in 1915. There are some really neat pages detailing tours to Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks.

Brochure published 1915 by
Great Northern Pacific Steamship Company
for
SS Great Northern
SS Northern Pacific

Palaces of the Pacific
between
San Francisco and Portland

Typical interior page.
Love the lower photo of cruisers on deck.
Note the attire!

Sky Watch

May 28th 5:02 AM
As the full moon was slipping below the clouds I unexpectedly caught
the AirLift Emergency Helicopter as it passed through the scene.

A sunset over the Olympic Mountains from the archives.

Check out more sky pics at Skywatch Friday Thanks to Yogi for hosting!

Looking Back

Snapped this five years ago today - June 16, 2013
Volunteer Park, Seattle, WA
Lilly Pond

Closing Thought ...
Maturity consist in no longer being taken in by oneself.
Heimito von Doderer

Thank you for stopping by John's Island.

Welcome to John's Island

The month of May included more travel than usual for me. A little cruise up the West Coast, featured in my last post, started things off. Then a road trip to Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho, gave me a chance to visit Yellowstone National Park. My first visit to the Park was 29 years ago in 1989. In the years since, I haven't visited every year but, yes, most years, and probably at least 20 of them, sometimes more than once. If you've followed this blog for a while you will know that I'm fascinated with Yellowstone and have put together a little collection of memorabilia, especially postcards, books, and vintage travel related publications. The series of photos below includes some of my new pictures taken this year and, of course, I can't resist including some related older items from my collection.

West Entrance welcome.
Most folks like to stop and get a selfie with the sign.
I've done that before ... this time it's mostly for this introduction to the post.

Monday, May 14th, the crowds have not arrived yet and the traffic
level is marvelous.
The day was partly cloudy and mild temperatures prevailed.

Still snow on the sides of the road in places.
No snow ON the road ... nice dry surfaces.

Mt Haynes from the viewpoint just across the Madison River

From Wikipedia: "Mount Haynes el. 8,218 feet (2,505 m) is a prominent peak adjacent to the Madison River in Yellowstone National Park. The peak was named by then Yellowstone superintendent Horace Albright to honor Frank Jay Haynes (1853–1921), the first official photographer of the park. Prior to being named Mount Haynes, the peak was unofficially called Mount Burley for D. E. Burley of the Union Pacific Railroad."

When I got back home I looked through the postcard collection to see if I could find a card featuring Mt. Haynes. The one I found has a photo by Haynes himself, but it is so old he entitled it Mt. Burley. Haynes probably did more to show the beauty of Yellowstone to the world than any other photographer. Mt. Haynes is just one little scene in Wonderland and yet it always catches my attention when I'm in the Park.

Great Falls of the Yellowstone
This was an amazing scene made even more amazing by
the lack of a crowd at the viewpoint. Stopping for a moment
and enjoying the beauty without a lot of chatter nearby
made it a memorable moment!

By the way, an old friend has challenged me to do the stairs with him from the top of the Canyon down to base of Lower Falls. It's called Uncle Tom's Trail and is a wonderful trail that takes you from the top of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone down to the base of the 308-foot-high Lower Falls. You can almost always see a rainbow cutting through the falls' mist. Tackling the 328 steps on the way down is a breeze -- just remember that you have to come back up. But don’t worry. There are many benches and steel platforms to rest upon while covering the roughly 500 vertical feet. I should mention that Uncle Tom's Trail is now closed for reconstruction and is scheduled to reopen in July.

Grand Canyon and Great Falls from Artist Point postcard by Haynes.

There are two falls ... upper and lower.
This postcard shows the Lower Falls also known
as Great Falls of the Yellowstone

Can you help identify this bird?
I spotted this bird while at the Canyon and used max zoom
on camera to get this shot.
Osprey?

I like this shot of a buffalo taken in Hayden Valley.
At first I thought he was looking at me, but then ...
see the enlargement below. :-)

This little bird goes in the dictionary next to "No Worries"

Haynes vintage postcard.
"Buffalo - American Bison"

If you love critters be sure to check out Saturday's Critters and thanks to Eileen for hosting!

Most tourists want to see bears.
In the past they fed bears garbage and were proud of it.
They stopped this kind of thing long ago.

Back of the Brown Bear Card above.

Bears near Old Faithful.
Notice how tourists were allowed so close to the bears.
Rangers will not allow you to get anywhere near the bears today.
I really don't think bears are agressive unless they feel threatened or
they are protecting their little ones.

Back of the Bears Near Old Faithful Card

Another Feeding the Bear card.
This must have been early 1900s.
Can you imagine doing this?

A great one-day trip into YNP starts at the West Entrance and rolls around to the Lake Hotel where you can enjoy an excellent lunch in the hotel dining room.

My photo of Lake Hotel taken May 14th, 2018
Compare to the vintage postcard view below.

Interior, reading/relaxing area near dining room.

There is a display case near the hotel main desk
with a collection of old memorabilia.
I like this Supper menu from Friday, July 18th, 1924.
Description card accompanying the menu is shown below.

Here are a couple of old postcards featuring Lake Hotel, or, as it has been called in the past, Lake Colonial Hotel or just Colonial Hotel.

Lake Colonial Hotel Yellowstone National Park
This is an early postcard ... probably 1920s or so.

Description on back of card above. In those days they
called it the Lake Colonial Hotel.

Colonial Hotel, Yellowstone Lake, Yellowstone Park
An even older card in the style of the day, sepia view.
Another photo by Haynes, of course.

Walked across the road in front of Lake Hotel to snap this photo of
Yellowstone Lake.
Still covered with thin ice.

While looking through my cards to find some related to the Lake area
I found this one of the speedboat Adelane. This is a pretty rare card.
Pictures of the old larger tourist boats are common but this
speedboat is not seen so often.

The theme this week at Postcards for the Weekend is "anything you wish" so I'm linking up and thanks to Maria for hosting!

Another "curiosity" card ... Handkerchief Pool
No, that's not just a white spot in the middle of the blue spring.
It's a handkerchief. The story is told on the back of the card shown below.

As you might expect, they try to keep the location of this feature quiet and
they certainly don't want you to try it out if you do find it! :-)

Sky Watch

A beautiful morning, May 14, 2018, and I was on the way to spend the day in Yellowstone Park. The early morning light presented a beautiful view of Sphinx Mountain along the way. Thanks to Yogi for hosting Skywatch Friday where you can see other bloggers' sky photos.

Not YNP but not too far away in the Madison Valley of Montana.
This is Sphinx Mountain in the Madison Range
near Cameron, Montana
May 14th 6:14 AM MDT

Ship Watch

The largest passenger ship to visit Seattle arrived this past week. She is NCL's Norwegian Bliss. She docked at Pier 66. The ship was especially designed for the voyage between Seattle and Alaska and was Officially Christened in Seattle on Wednesday. Twenty stories tall, 4000 passengers, 1800 crew. She departed for her maiden voyage to Alaska on Saturday, June 2nd.

May 30th 5:00 AM
Norwegian Bliss Arriving Port of Seattle
Largest Passenger Vessel to visit Seattle so far.
Elliott Bay Marina in the lower part of the photo.

News media photo of Norwegian Bliss at Pier 66 on May 30th.
Photo taken from TV Station Helicopter.

Clippers Through the Panama Canal

Here is the story: I first learned about the Clipper Race around the World back in April when the boats arrived in Seattle and I featured it in my April 22nd post. Since then, I have been watching the race via their website as they completed racing down the West Coast to near the Panama Canal. I am fascinated with the Canal and have become a frequent visitor to their webcams. So, I really wanted to see the Clippers transiting the Canal! The Clipper website revealed the transit schedule. I then used MarineTraffic.com to see exactly where the boats were located. Finally, clicked over to the Miraflores Locks Hi-Res Camera which allowed the following series of 13 photos.

May 31st 9:50 AM Panama Canal Time
Notice the lock on the left ... low water level
[Be sure to click for larger view]
Note the time stamp in the upper left corner.