This Beautiful Place: Deception Falls Pt 2

Here is the second photo dump from the Deception Falls hike! I allllmost didn't cross this bridge! It was very difficult to take pictures on it so I mostly shot blindly while death gripping the railing up to my elbow. Both the falls and the hike were incredibly beautiful. One thing I loved and couldn't get over were the skunk cabbages!! Skunk cabbage, lysichiton americanus, is known for having the largest leaves - two feet wide and four feet tall! Cresting a incline to see a miniature valley of these abnormally large, vivid green plants just feel magically prehistoric!

 

Cute ferns!

All rolled up!

 

Skunk cabbage plus foot for reference 

 

Some beautiful coloring and forest patterns!

Looking at the path ahead

I made a blurry gif! River from the bridge!

What I Wore: Climbing Trees

Hey I'm in a tree! This is a combo out and about adventure slash what I wore. We visited Saint Edwards State Park which is huge! And very beautiful. The park has tons of activities and encompasses a decommissioned seminary and grounds. Additionally there are miles of trails including waterfront paths and vistas of Lake Washington. It was quite lovely!I thrifted this sweater coat a few weeks back for about 12$ and I really love it! It's a great light layer for Spring and Fall or rainy mornings. I like that from far away the pattern isn't too crazy but the closer you get the more detail you see, almost a geometric pattern.

These earrings are poppers!!! Eee! Or at least, that's the name they go by. The best thing about working at Pike Place Market is the exposure to unique and one of a kind art. I really do have a passion for the market in that I've always had a passion and appreciation of unique, locally made, hand crafted, one of a kind goods. This is my first piece of jewelry by Vickie Clark and definitely not my last! I coveted these earrings for MONTHS! Just waiting for my color to come along and right at the perfect time - voila!

I have to share the story of this shirt. I love this band, El Ten Eleven, and they were going to be in Seattle on my birthday, touring with Bonobo! Sadly, the show sold out so fast I couldn't get tickets but on the day of the concert, just by random chance I met the merch manager for Bonobo while at work. She was super awesome and ended up putting me on the list plus one so not only did I get to see El Ten Eleven, I also got to share it with a friend. I got right up front and danced away for El Ten Eleven, it was such a great show!! And I also met Tim for about two minutes, squee!

So I love this belt. I have had this belt for about 13 years, which means I've had it for more than half of my life. Which is kinda crazy. The best crazy part about it - IT'S FUZZY!!!! 

Pencil Jump! I'm not exactly sure what face this is here but it was a great spinning shot so I kept it! Enjoy the sun! 

Out and About Adventure - South Lake Union

South Lake Union is great for an afternoon of free entertainment, strolling, seeing and for me it turns out, swimming (more on that later). Boats of all shapes and sizes dock together on the south end of the lake by the Center for Wooden Boats (free!) and many will allow you to come aboard and tour! They also have a wooden canoe on display as it's being made and a small pond with motorized boats to play with. We brought some snacks and sat down by the water watching the seaplanes take off and land. There's a tiny dot of a plane getting ready to land while this one takes off, and yes, that huge storm on the left eventually did come for us.

Love the kitty on this boat! I've actually been down to the center and on the boats before but this time there was a particularly wonderful boat, whose name I can't find but I will, that I really enjoyed seeing. The boat is an inn that you can stay on, decorated like a little oceanside B&B with a lovely common room. Some rooms were occupied while I toured but each room I did see was so quaint and inviting, I really loved it! 

I did not enjoying getting off the boat, as my wonderfully clumsy foot stepped into the space between the dock and the boat which causes one to fall off of the boat, hit the dock and land in the water, or like me suspended between with bottom half in and top half holding on. It was hilarious and cold and painful all at the same time. I think I frightened the boat keeper with my hysterical laughing, it was just too funny. I had a big purple bruise up the inside of my leg and under my butt for about two weeks, ouch!

But how cute are these rooms?! The first picture I think is the main suite but I love the little bunk beds just as much! I love boats/houseboats because all spaces are functional and purposeful, but they also took great care in adding special details to make each room welcoming and comfortable. 

This Beautiful Place - Carkeek Park

Life lately has been a fairly good balance of working hard and playing hard. My new summer schedule is underway and I'll still be adjusting over this week but it's been working out so far. I recently had a birthday and today my special present came! So, in celebration, and because it's Saturday, and because it was absolutely gorgeous out AGAIN, and because we both had the day off...we set out to test the new pack, to Carkeek Park! This park has great beach access but this time we took the South Ridge Trail to the South Bluff Trail for an amazing view of Puget Sound and the Olympic Mountains. The woods are vibrantly lush and knee high grasses are thriving under the tall tree canopy, which tickled us with fluttering leaves and it felt like if I twirled fast enough in this magical green place I could fly away with the leaves too. At the end we laid in the grass and laughed at the daisies.

This picture doesn't really look like anything but lots of green and a leaning tree. But it's really domino trees! We actually heard these two leaning trees, creaking loudly with the wind, before we came across them and I bet they don't last much longer, especially if we do end up having some stormy weather soon. I definitely want to go back and check soon! Other things of note on the walk: an occasional burst of rhododendrons (and/or azelias?!), heavenly smelling lilacs, the sun on the Sound, a big brown slug, some freaky trees, and the wandering path - I love coming into a clearing and looking back into the wild, before heading into it again.

 

 

 

Happy Adventuring!

Star Power

Rawr!

I don't know where this deep rooted love of loafers is coming from but it's there. Possibly it began with the, still coveted, cat loafers but one thing's for sure, I'm really diggin' em for summer! In the summer I'll be able to wear whatever shoes at work but I think there's several reasons I'll probably stay away from sandals. I think I may have found a happy medium!   

I picked this shirt up at an outlet billabong store a few years ago, it's got baby stars all over it! Coincidently, got this belt at the Volcolm outlet next-store! (yes, yes that is..a terrible pun. heh. )

This was supposed to be an afternoon outing at a local public garden which turned into a bad situation. It could have been much worse so really the sun on ma face was too glorious not smile about. Yay vitamin D, yay for that star power! (Yes, yes that is another terrible pun, baahaha!)

PS - this is my last post with long hair!! Cause oh yeah...I did somethin kinda craaazzzy!!

Out and About Adventure - Alki Beach

Tidepool! Anemone! Eee! I like tidepooling - and even though I've probably seen thousands of anemones, broken muscle shells, and barnacles I still enjoy them. Each pool is a unique world of which, for a moment, I am the all-seeing eye. I'll play with pool after pool after pool, because you never know if the next world will have something spectacular! A really good find, say an octopus, makes each pool worth it. Sometimes, it's just cool stuff to look at - like the colors of this anemone!

So, I'm mucking about in the tides..head down and all of a sudden I see a really dark seagull flying above - BALD EAGLE! I got really excited because I wasn't expecting to see him, plus this is the first bald eagle I've seen up here. I wish I had a better lens but it was cool to watch him surf the updrafts along the beach! 

I saw this crow flipping shells and cawing so I knew he found something good and I went to check it out. It looks like someone overturned the bigger rock on the left and the crow was right there to feast. I feel bad that this world basically just had an apocalypse but the crow sure didn't. Under one shell was about a dozen hiding crabs!   

There's at least three crabs in this picture, can you find them?!

Another thing I love about meandering the beach is taking time to observe the strange textures. I love how distorted and alien the beach landscape is, especially when it takes something familiar like the roots of a tree (below) and changes them.

Alright, what were you thinking in this picture? "I claim this laaand...for SPAIN."