T Stands For Crane Beach

The Eldest had a vacation week around the time of her birthday the second week of July. She asked if I wanted to go with her to the beach. It used to be if you wanted to go to the beach, you packed a bag, towel, and chair and drove to the beach. Now you have to make reservations. It seems local residents complained about the Summer people getting all the parking spaces. Reservations come in the form of day passes which get scooped up quickly or 2 hour passes. Nice if you live close to the beach but not practical if you have to take an hour and a half ride to get to the beach.

The week the Eldest chose also happened to be prime vacation time. I told her about the reservations, but she had no difficulties securing a day pass to Crane Beach in Ipswich, Massachusetts. We left early on a Monday morning, and had a little hassle with commuter traffic.  When we got to the beach, we were one of the first visitors and hardly anyone was there.

A seagull

claimed his spot on the beach

We took a selfie to remember the day

The Life Guard crew were holding contests to see who could paddle out to the buoy 

and back to shore first.

It was a perfect beach day. Though the weather was hot and humid at home, it was quite breezy at the beach. We set up our chairs and I made a little cabana to try to keep us out of the sun.

It had been decades since I had been at this beach with Teague. One thing I forgot about was this beach was notorious for Green Heads, a type of Horse Fly. They have emerald green heads and giant teeth! Apparently, the Green Heads decided to return a few weeks earlier than normal to correspond to our visit. 

By the time we left, I was covered with so many bites I looked like I had chicken pox.

I found a beautiful snail shell

There's a snack shack along with a clean beach house so we decided we didn't need to drag along a cooler for lunch. We did bring water. 

The Eldest was going to treat me to lobster sandwiches for lunch, but they were out of lobster. I opted for a veggie and hummus wrap with a peach ice tea. The wrap was delicious, but I'm not a fan of peach flavored things though I do like peaches. All that could be said about the tea was it was wet and cold. We had a nice lunch underneath the pergola.

While the Eldest was swimming, I met a young woman a few years older than the Eldest. Her name as Tanya and she had also brought her mother for an outing. We had a nice chat.

How many seas must a white gull sail

before she sleeps in the sand? (apologies to Bob Dylan)

Despite the Greenheads and the sunburns, we had a nice day at the beach.

See ya later! 

Only if the Greenheads are gone!

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s blog to find out what the rest of the T gang is up to. If you want to play, include a beverage or beverage container in your post. Don’t forget to link your blog from Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s page.

Monet and Me

 

are tracking a polar bear through Fahlo. I had been seeing ads for tracking animals and wondered if it was worth it. I thought it would make a fun gift for the girlies for their birthdays. Then my friend, Andy Tiberius Fish, said he was tracking some animals and got some for his adult sons. Well, monkey see, monkey do.

For the girlies, I chose a pink bracelet with a dolphin for the Eldest. The dolphin is a male named Per. For the Young One, I chose a blue bracelet with a penguin, another male named Luc. Why should the girlies have all the fun?

Monet is modeling the bracelet I chose to track a polar bear named Bobbie. A portion of the sale of the bracelet goes to conservation efforts for the animals.

Bobbie is an old broad like me. She's a 20 year old polar bear, one of the Churchill bears from Hudson Bay, Canada.

Once a week or so, the tracking app on the phone, sends an update map as to where your animal is 

Sometimes there are also some factoids about the animal and what they would be doing at this time of year.

There's also some tracking stats and a mini bio about the animal you are tracking. A bit of fun and a good cause to help endangered species.

How Does Your Garden Grow?

We had a couple of visitors to the yard, a deer

and a hawk. The hawk was probably a Cooper's hawk as we've seen him/her from time to time.

This picture of Quill could work as a cartoon with the bunny in a thought bubble. Quill dreaming of bunny rabbits. Or the rabbit blissfully unaware how close to death s/he is.

A Monarch butterfly hung out for a while

How does your garden grow?

How Does Your Garden Grow?

A delicate moth or butterfly in the lettuce. It almost looks like the lettuce is flying away.

"A" came over to help Himself with yardwork. He weeded this area in record time

The next area to be weeded

and the next.

Hydrangea doing nicely

A couple of more blueberries

Pokeberry

Corn

tomatoes

cherry tomatoes

eggplant

peppers

How does your garden grow?

T Stands for Grumpy Clerk, the Beach, and a Smash Burger

After Saturday's washout, Sunday turned out to be a decent day. Not a great beach day. It was a little on the cool side, but at least it wasn't raining. 

Our first stop before the beach was lunch at a sandwich/pizza shop in Wells, the next town over from Ogunquit. On the menu board was a Thanksgiving Turkey Sandwich. Turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce a favorite sandwich of Teague. She ordered it and the Counter Clerk snapped at her, "We don't have that!" She ordered a regular turkey sandwich with lettuce, tomato, and mayo

I felt like I was in the Seinfeld episode where there was a particular way of ordering soup from the Soup Nazi.

I ordered a Crispy Chicken Sandwich with lettuce, tomato, and yellow mustard. I also ordered an iced tea and a bag of chips. He grunted at my order, but didn't yell at me.

After lunch, we headed to Ogunquit Beach. It was still a little early in the season so there weren't many people on the beach, and it was later in the afternoon, and the tide was coming in so half the beach would be underwater.

We found a spot by the wall to set up so we wouldn't have to move our stuff every half hour as the tide came in.

I watched the antics of a sparrow hunting and pecking for some goodies. I've never seen a sparrow on the beach before.

One of the things I forgot to take with me was my beach chair. I walked right by it and didn't give it a second thought until I was loading my stuff in Teague's car. No biggie. She loaded her husband's chair into the car. He was participating in his annual field day for Ham radio operators, and she said he wouldn't need his chair, but he did. Oops. She took a picture of us so he could see that we actually used his chair.

The water was too cold to go swimming, but we did stick our toes in the water.

Later that night, we went to dinner at the Brickyard Hollow Brewing Company. Last year (or maybe the year before) we had a fabulous Margherita pizza. This time around we ordered hamburgers. I had an Arnold Palmer and a Maple Bacon Smash Burger. 

Smash Burgers seem to be all the rage though I don't really get it. This burger consisted of two hamburger patties that were flattened on the grill. The result was two dry hamburger patties. By smashing them flat like paper, you lose all the juicy goodness.

Drop by hosts, Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s blog to find out what the rest of the T gang is up to. If you want to play, include a beverage or beverage container in your post. Don’t forget to link your blog from Bleubeard and Elizabeth’s page.

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Walk, the Stinkbug, looking like a gigantic monster on the outside of the kitchen window.

Mr. Bluebird hanging out on the corner of the sunroom roof

A lone turkey hen enjoying some of the birdseed I toss on the ground

The hydrangea bush starting to bloom

A surprise Hollyhock. Before Ink, there was Mitty. The hollyhocks were Mitty's favorite place to hang out. The large leaves gave him a shady and safe hidey-hole. It was cool by the foundation of the house, too.

Giant pokeberry outside of the greenhouse.

Borage.

Nasturtiums

Calendua

Zucchini flowers

A bumblebee enjoys the milkweed flowers

Samwise busy mowing the lawn

We have blueberries! We might get 3 each!

How does your garden grow?