Our second vacation this summer was also spent with our good friends Gary & Gail Chittaro. We visited The Blue Ridge Parkway near Asheville and visited the Biltmore House as well.  Next our trip took us north along Skyline Drive in Shenandoah NP.  While camping near Lynchburg, VA we also decided to get in a little cultural history and took a tour of Appomatix Court House where the treaty ending the Civil War was signed.

Please visit our photographs in the Photo Gallery.  We are always adding those we think you will enjoy.

The entrance to the Blue Ridge Parkway at the northern end.  The parkway is 469 beautiful miles long - without one stop sign.  I wish we could say we drove the whole thing but at 35-45 mph we would probably still be driving.  We did see many great vistas and waterfalls in the portion we did drive - probably 150 miles or so.  Much of the first 2 days were spend in the rain but it didn't dampen our spirits or keep us from making photographs. 

Here is Terri standing by our mode of transportation.  Her sisters like to call it the 'Travel Castle'.  This truck, a Chevy 3500 HD Duramax Diesel is a great upgrade from our last one - a 2500 HD. At 9-11 mpg fuel stops are expensive.

This is Appomatix County Court House. Originally built in 1846 it was destroyed by fire in 1892.  This is a replica although many of the buildings such as the stores, jail, law office and residential houses are original.  An actor played the part of a Union soldier who was at the surrender April 9, 1865 and stay in character even during questioning after his performance. If you into visiting Civil War battlefields this is one you should not miss.

We just completed a short vacation with our friends Gary & Gail Chittaro.  Visits included Zion, Bryce and Grand Canyon National Parks as well as Antelope Canyon in Page, AZ.  Although we only had 4 days we had wonderful weather and were able to make many interesting photographs. Look at all our photos in the latest galleries.

While visiting our oldest son Chris and his family in San Benito Texas we decided to visit Laguna Atascosa Wildlife Refuge.  The refuge is on a major flyway and over 400 species of birds have been recorded.  Although overcast and the wrong time of day we were able to see and photograph an Eastern Screech Owl seen at the left.  He/she was nestled in a drain pipe from the roof of the visitor center. Below is another nice picture of a green jay as taken in the blind at the visitor center.  And lastly, while driving through the park we got a picture of the quite ugly Turkey Vultures sitting in a tree.  This is one of the few times we have seen them not flying and using the thermals looking for road kill.

We spent Labor Day weekend at Chain o Lakes State Park near Albion, IN.  The remnants of Hurricane Isaac were to come through and we were worried about a lot of rain.  It didn't happen so we got some great flower photos because of the cloud cover.  During a hike on the new trail 9 we came across a field of flowers with 20-30 hummingbirds darting in and out.  What a sight seeing them chasing each other and stopping to observe us - as we observed them!

On a business trip to the San Francisco Bay area I had a few hour break so I spend that time with my college friend's wife, Janet Whalen at the Americas Cup preliminary races.  My college buddy, Zach Cartozian had to spend time in Chicago for work.  As bad luck would have it this was his only trip this year. Here are a few pictures.

We've just posted a few new images to the Bird category!

Take a look around and you'll notice we've also included stealth updates to many of the other galleries as well.