A little bit of Arizona

One of life's big questions...why don't most European cars have automatic gearboxes? Driving is easier, more relaxing and safer. Low speed limits can sometimes make US driving seem slower but, once you have accepted this, driving becomes a real pleasure and you still get to places quickly. So it was with the long morning drive to Arizona. The landscape had evolved into desert conditions - broad sweeps of sage bush scrub, low plateaux and mesas, cowboy country.

I thought this was going to be the weak part of the trip. I had already been to Monument Valley on my Route 66 romp, and didn't like the sound of "Lake Powell Resort Hotel" where I was staying for just one night. I am happy to say that I was very wrong.

After hours of driving, Lake Powell, a massive reservoir behind the Glen Canyon dam upstream from the Grand Canyon, appears like an amethyst jewel glistening in the desert, an ultramarine oasis. The resort was right by the lake, a massive spread,  I was SO lucky to be at the very furthest edge, surrounded by desert and the lake. I snapped the view from my terrace above. It was swelteringly hot, well over 100deg F, so hot I had to drive a few hundred yards just to get lunch. I booked a cruise to Antelope Canyon at 4.30 and dinner for 8pm. The remains of the day, indeed.

Down Antelope Canyon

Navajo Tapestry

On the boat, I met another couple - just like another biker pair I met in a lay-by in Zion (PINK ON, Gloria). A lovely, bubbly, chatty lady with strong, silent husband. He never spoke a word during the entire jaunt, but looked nice! Wafted by cooler breezes, though still baked like potatoes, we cruised over the water and I was just beginning to get a bit bored (now, what to snap?) when Antelope Canyon came into sight. The sun was setting slowly, bouncing off the rocks, locally called the Navajo Tapestry, leaving a blaze of flame orange and gold, against a deepening blue sky. As we snaked into the canyon, the walls closed in to give us some shade and the contrast with the sunny areas dazzled. The other end of this canyon, where the boat can't go, is an incredibly beautiful slot canyon - I had already explored one
of these at Tent Rocks in New Mexico. Pity I didn't have time to do this the next day BUT all the more reason to come back.

Summer solstice

 The sun was setting as we made our way back across the becalmed lake - I realised it was the summer solstice in this most magnificent of settings. Dinner at the resort restaurant was the best meal of the trip. Who could resist 'spiced chicken with mango butter sauce, prickly pear drizzle, red cabbage-jacana slaw with cilantro lime couscous'? Yummy.....

Spiced chicken and prickly pear drizzle

Tomorrow, I was to be staying in a tiny place only just on the map called Bluff. Strolling back the new moon was the tiniest slither in the sky and it felt so good to be alive.

Journaling to Bryce and Zion

So the journey continued to tourist-packed Bryce Canyon. Not as tacky as Niagara Falls (see a later blog when I write about these!) but the worst side of US culture in abundance with huge, characterless hotels, vast tourist shops full of junk and a very false novo-cowboy style which just doesn't work. BUT, on escaping this heaving mass, I made for Bryce Canyon National Park, following the instructions from a DVD I'd bought from one of the many excellent Visitors' Centres (full of information and manned by helpful local rangers) which was brilliant, and guided me all around.

Red Rock Canyon 

There are few words to describe the colours and shapes here on a hot sunny day. The sky is an impenetrable blue, the golden oranges and yellows of the row upon row of rock stacks  like organ pipes gleam like tangerine neon, there is a feeling of inexplicable beauty and wonder here. This place is magical. It should be on everyone's bucket list. Miles and miles of oceans of spires and steeples, pine and juniper trees clinging with tenacity, bright buttons of vivid green against the complimentary orange. Deep shady canyons, hikers like tiny Lilliputians strolling through the cool depths.  This is erosion at its most awesome. I took a zillion photos.

Journalling on this sort of trip is hard. Ideally, I would love to pause and draw endless views, trace rock strata, capture the colour of the sky. But I just haven't got the energy for this, too. Everything goes into just BEING there. So I filled the journal with maps, pages of geology, notes, photos and memories as well as accounts of the day, people, conversations and funny moments and so on. Now that I am at home, these photos inspire me to create art, to make big visual journals, to paint and draw. They fill my mind with endless possibilities - I am still working on the talent side.........

               

Zion was totally different. Imposing, white-capped peaks tower high into the sky above. At Bryce you are at the top - here you are at the bottom.....I gave the packed tourist buses (no other cars allowed) going up into the canyon a miss and opted for a sunset safari - a hair-raising jeep drive up onto the top of the plateau to watch the sun hit the distant rocks in a concerto of pinks and purples, surrounded by wild turkeys and (apparently) aggressive, rabies-plague-laden squirrels. Another white-knuckle ride down a tiny track, hurtling towards the core of the earth did not allow for much appreciation of the scenery but it was fun. I loved my hotel here - set in the valley with lovely gardens, bright flowers and hummingbirds visiting the water feeder on my balcony and met some lovely people whom I hope to visit one day soon in the great cafe next door.

The peaks of Zion

 The next day I had to leave, heading south in ever more arid landscapes on and on into Arizona...... 

My lovely hotel right in the canyon- room on the end, first floor

Capitol Reef and Toothache

 I loved Capitol Reef. But even more I love the open road. Me, a car and a feeling of total freedom, a forgetting of all worries and just the exhilaration of the ride. I was well into the rural outback when I stopped off at this little cafe - we chatted and they asked me to stay on for another hour or two because they loved my accent!

Capitol Reef may not be the most grandiose of Utah's parks, but I loved it. How can one place be so panoramic and vast, yet feel cosy and accessible at one time? The biggest plus was the absence of other tourists. All the other places were packed but here it was peaceful and solitary. The geology was still stunning, the baked earth and ochre colours lived up to my expectations and I even managed to get in some good bird watching with advice from the local naturalist. My kind of heaven -  a lasting memory will be sitting in front of the old Mormon homestead, eating home-made ice-cream, watching cowbirds, Say's Phoebe, and mule deer in the sunshine. Bliss. I guess I love solitude....

But very good moments must have their balance. For every positive it seems there must be an enormous negative. Let me state here and now that I know I have just a few, awful teeth. I am the person your parents use as an example of someone who didn't look after her teeth. I did come prepared with some, I thought, strong Portuguese antibiotics. But they weren't a match for the maple syrup pancakes at breakfast the next day. Capitol Reef on my doorstep and only 24 hours left there. What did I have to do? Give in to the awful fact that the toothache wasn't going to go away. Lay on the bed and feel that familiar pain spreading around my cheeks and jaw.

Say's Phoebe

By the evening, I knew I had to act and went to reception of my Great Western hotel. They were kind and caring. Did lots of ringing round. Eventually I was dispatched to the Tooth Ranch a couple of villages up the road. Then came surely one of the worst pain experiences of my life up to now...I won't go into detail but it HURT. The cruel-to-be-kind dentist scoffed at my meds and gave me something stronger 'for the road' - for I was venturing even further into the outback. The ordeal was over. I was back going towards Highway 12, with vistas of the Grand Staircase Escalante - where the history of the planet reveals itself in coloured steps in vast horizons of pinks and oranges. I realise now why I never put on weight when I am traveling (as opposed to the present forced sedentary lapse).....I am constantly getting in and out of the car to take photos. Thousands of them. Every one worth it.

New Beginnings.....

This long, grey winter continues and is getting everyone down. I am living through one of the worst generators of stress...trying to sell a house and land. So stressful that I have lost my creative muse for several days now but want to keep busy. I have finally decided to act on the huge sign on my cork notice board above the computer "DO BLOG". It's also a chance to relive some of my better adventures during the last year - and to look at some of the journalling I've been doing. I can't imagine travelling now without my journal - it's a record of not just what I do and see - but a chronicle of people, of interactions, of kindnesses and conversations. So where to resume?

Maybe with a journey. A fantastic journey all alone into the wilds of Utah to see landforms and landscapes - twin loves in my life. Beautifully planned out and mapped by my travel agent, a car was waiting for me at Salt Lake City airport and I arrived at a very upmarket hotel downtown. With one day to sightsee, the decision wasn't hard. Temples and Mormons or craft stores and art galleries?.....The amazing concierge prepared a whole list for me of ideas for art stores, craft stores and all sorts for me to visit.
Above is just one wonderland for detailed exploration......

The mountains around Salt Lake City were spectacular, real peaks with snow in June. I love to see how the tree species change with altitude, leading to a sea of greens of every hue. In my journal, I wrote, 'The spruce look like church spires in a lime-green aspen sea'. Every road was prepared for an amateur geologist such as I - information boards at every lay-by explaining rock formations and types in detail. I just soak these things up and go into some sort of uber-excited dream state of heightened happiness. Days like that day should never end. Back to Salt Lake City - as clean and hygienic as Donny Osmond's teeth, twice round the square to look at the tabernacle, then a picnic supper in my posh hotel bedroom....I'll resume the blog tomorrow, too!

Art of Abstraction


Among the myriad of projects that I am trying to apply myself to daily, whilst trying not to get too side-tracked whenever the going gets a bit tough, I have been doing an online course called 'The Art of Abstraction' from the US artist Alissa Burke. I just came across this while browsing and so far, it's the most enjoyable yet. Somehow, in a very short time, she has conveyed the essence of how to produce a simple, colourful daubing that is both fun to do and which the creator actually likes. This is the very essence of what I want. I do it for fun and for my own eyes only. So why am I plastering this on a blog I can hear the resounding voices of those few friends who read this (...thanks...) ? I can't come up with an answer to this blatant contradiction - other than it gives me great pleasure to do this, too. It's perhaps a very safe way to show off a bit without inviting or risking nasty comments (well, I hope). A way to justify sloshing colour on a white page with a brush or, more often, my hand, for hours on end?

I have so far done only the first two chapters out of six. So, much fun to come alongside the Creative Sketchbooks course and several others. There is another called 'Bloom True' by Fiona Bowley which is also enjoyable. 


.........or maybe this is all a giant ruse to get me out of gardening yet another year????????

Just a page

...from a past journal but the poem resonates over and over, and I think it might for other people too!

A Tale of Two Oaks

Just outside where I stayed in France, across the tiny lane, stand two oak trees which seem to guard the cluster of very old houses. Billy told me that the oaks are, in fact, quite famous, and have stood at least since 1750. The branches are a little spindly but the trunks are amazing - deeply furrowed like curvy waves and testament to the years. Home to thousands of insects and a collection of fungi, moss and lichen, they glow golden yellow in the mellow sunset.

In the bushes opposite the oaks, at the entrance to Studio Preniac, you can just see this very old weathered cross. It is a Druidic cross, marking the presence of a very old Druidic settlement - it has stood guarding over and protecting the old houses for centuries.

EVER so quick - have changed the settings (my mistake) - and now, hopefully, anybody who feels like it can write a comment. In fact, I would LOVE you to!

La Belle France

I am not long back from a fascinating trip to France. I felt as if I had been washed in perfumed soapflakes and hung out to dry in the fresh, fragrant air and warm sunshine. I billowed, an urge to spread out and fly over the lush fields.  I was seeing the verdent landscape through much cleaner spectacles, not the usual rose-colored lens, so that everything sparkled and shone. I don't think I have ever seen so many shades of green in one glance; one could spend a month mixing blues and greens and still not come up with such a variety. I was seeing 'Spring' for the first time.

 I stayed in a gite in a tiny hamlet called Preniac, near the beautiful hilltop medieval village of Montcuq which itself is about 25km southwest of the historic town of Cahors on the River Lot. The first week was a course with the textile artist Ruth Isset, mainly working with colour, learning how to dye using various methods, then layering and sewing our multi-hued pieces of material. We worked hard from early morning until just before dinnertime, spurred on by the knowledge that we were due for another culinary delight that night. Wine flowed freely, too, with appreciative slurps and gulps. I felt ashamed of another of my 'one' weaknesses (in the words of the Post Mistress of Lark Rise to Candleford)....my rejection of red wine due to chronic migraine problems and my guilty addiction to Coca Cola (well, at least Diet Coke)....

Studio Preniac

Our enthusiastic group

Dyed with a 'y'

 We were not blessed with the best of weather but I had a wonderful week, made some lasting new friendships and came home several kilos heavier due to our hosts' (Billy and Liz) gourmet cooking. It was without doubt the most delicious food I have ever eaten. I stayed on in one of their cosy cottages for a few more days to explore the area.

My home

At last the sun came out, the top of my Megane convertible was lowered and I sped through the country lanes feeling on top of the world, breathing in the scents of the wildflowers, bedazzled by the glare of a million scarlet poppies and assailed by the calls of thousands of birds. It was a magical experience.

Sarlat

I ventured up into the Dordogne area, too, delighting in the sheer beauty of the river valleys and the perfection with which these ancient French towns and cities have been preserved.

Market Day in Montcuq

Sarlat was unforgettable - a town of dark, shadowy alleyways and arches, squares lined with ancient stone and wooden-clad houses, colourful shops selling local produce - pate de foie gras, ceps mushrooms, oils, truffles and a huge array of preserves and compotes. A town to explore and be transported back 800 years or so.  LaRoque-Gagiac and Lauzarte are also places I would recommend, likewise Cirque Lapopie and Domme - in fact every village and town is worth a serious visit with several camera memory cards.      
                                                                                       

TOOTHACHE and HEARTACHE

After a bout of bad toothache last month, I sat down to try to portray this. I drew one tooth (one of my few remaining!), which reminded me instantly of a picture I saw in the brilliant Visitor Centre beside the Rio Grande Rift Valley in New Mexico near Santa Fe. So I incorporated the two ideas into one. It was also near my dear Roy's birthday, and I had been thinking about him a lot, so I then got to thinking about the whole concept of 'pain' and 'ache' and the different ways we feel it. As I was doing this, the TV was on in the background with a girl singing the old song "It must be love". The words resounded like a massive bell tolling in my head. I went to the net, copied down the lyrics which seemed to mirror word for word what I was feeling that moment. So, for me, this page started off with toothache and ended with heartache....