weeeeekend

What a looong crazy weekend!  This is how my weekend went:

Friday:  I opted just to relax and slept in, went to the beach, and then played silly games with silly friends for the evening...as for my photo of the day?  I totally and completely forgot for one entire day to take a single picture...oops!

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Saturday: This was the Great Sierra River Clean-Up - an event that the South Lake area AmeriCorps volunteers partnered with Clean Tahoe, South Tahoe Refuse. Cal Trout, and a bunch of other great area organizations to put on.  We hosted clean-ups on 14 river and lake sites in South Lake and has a turnout of nearly 200 volunteers who collected over 2300 pounds of trash!  Hurray for clean and healthy beaches and streams!

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Sunday:  After the clean-up on Saturday I picked up my stuff and left on ,my first ever wilderness back-packing overnight with a friend of mine in desolation wilderness.  We hiked out to Ralston Lake from Echo Lakes on Saturday evening, made a warm dinner of soup and tortillas with cheese and then curled up in our sleeping bags for a night under the nearly full moon.  This morning we had a leisurely breakfast and then took off climbing up Ralston Peak from the lake.  Our route zig-zagged up the face of the mountain, over huge scree fields and through the little stream breaks then up the ridge line to the trail to the summit.  

Taken Saturday on the hike in, the sun is setting over Echo Lakes

Sunrise from camp

Ralston Peak...we climbed right up what you're looking at.

Scree Field!

View from the top

I made it!

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small strings

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more small things

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small things

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apple blackberry jam

tonight i took the blackberries and apples i collected yesterday and I made them into jam so that I can make my pb & j's for the week.  I started with diced and peeled apples and a few handfulls of frozen blackberries and a bunchhh of sugar and I boiled it into jam....here it is...start to finish:

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Sunday Brunch!

Today I made brunch with a friend of mine, we had stuffed french toast, fresh strawberries, orange juice, and coffee.  Here is our spread:

The stuffed french toast was delicious and extremely easy, from a recipe given to me by a friend a few months ago.  You simply cube some bread, put half in a pan and save half out, then mix up some eggs, milk, and spices (I used cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla - my favorites for the fall!) and pout half on the bread on bottom  Then warm some cream cheese and combine it with a bit of milk and some maple syrup until  its smooth and spreadable.  Spread the cream cheese on top of the bottom half of the bread, top with the remainder, and then pour the remaining milk and egg mixture over that.  Let sit for at least an hour (the recipe said over night but I didn't have that kind of time) and then bake for 45 minutes at 350.  Enjoy with or without syrup,,,it'll be pretty sweet either way!

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emigrant lake

No better day for a beautiful hike than today!  We took a trail from Caples lake dam, along the side of the lake, and then up the ridge to the pristine and beautiful emigrant lake (pictured behind all the green but before the snow below, and behind all the people below below).  

first view of the lake

our whole hiking group, taken by me with my mini tripod and self timer.  We're all laughing because shortly after this picture was taken the very wet (and antsy) dog started jumping up and getting everyone rather wet

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i've done it again, missed a bunch of days....but I did take a picture for every day and so i will post them all now.  

First...the cheesecake!  It came out great (in my opinion....) and it didn't look half bad either...

(this ones for wednesday)

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Next is for thursday, which was the CTC 25th anniversary party on commons beach, where I snapped this shot:

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next is today, sunsets and sand.

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Locals Season!

Today was our last day of BMI (water bug) sampling at work.  We were way up on the West shore of Lake Tahoe in a little creek that will be a project site next year collecting pre-project data.  When I dropped the meter into the water at 8:00 this morning the temperature read 8.4 degrees C.  Thats about 47 degrees F.  I know that doesn't sound that cold...but it felt pretty cold to me.  That temperature meter told me that for the next 2 hours I would be up to my elbow in 47 degree water, digging through rocks and algae and trying to collect little water bugs in my net.  Thats a long time, and let me tell you, it gets pretty cold.  So after our first 150 meter reach of frigid water and slightly disgruntled bugs, we took a break for "elevensies" (which is like lunch but at 11:00, and usually followed by an actual lunch) and to wait for the feeling to return to my fingers.  We were all chatting and the consultant we have been working with mentioned that this cool air (and water!) means that Autumn is really here and that it is what is affectionately referred to as the "locals season" here in Tahoe, when the weather turns cool, the hiking is great, and the tourists go home.  The Autumn-y-ness of today inspired me to make an Autumny dessert for the dinner we're having here tomorrow night.  Soooo I opted to make a peach spice cheesecake.  I sorta made up the recipe as I went along, starting with a peach and chardonnay reduction seasoned with cinnamon and nutmeg  and some sugar (which I totally made up and don't know if it'll be good on the cheesecake, but it tasted good when it was cooking), then I made a plain cheesecake (about 16 oz of cream cheese, 2 eggs, a dash of vanilla, a cup of sugar, and a bit of nutmeg and cinnamon) and blended in a bit of the peaches to that.  Poured it into a graham cracker crust (butter, graham crackers, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg) and baked for 35 minutes then let it cool for 10 and then poured on the rest of the peaches.  Tomorrow I'll make some fresh whipped cream with the left over cream from the truffles.  I'll let you know how it goes...anyway here are some (not that good...) pictures.  When I get better at taking more appetizing pictures of food, then I'll become a REAL food blogger!

Cheeeeeesecake!

Homemade Peach Sauce!

Okay, that looks gross in this picture, but wait till you see it tomorrow, all cut into slices, it'll be great...i hope....

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i betchu wonder where i've been!

You're probably thinking "one photo a day project?  I don't know how to tell you this Shelby, but its been several days since you posted a photo, and you didn't even warn us you'd be gone.  You probably totally forgot about updating this...didn;t even mean to miss all this time!"  And to that I would say "wow...I'm honestly surprised at how much you care, in fact I didn't even think people read this!" and then I would change the subject away from me forgetting to update for...what has it been? 5 days now? Goodness...and I have been trying to be so good about it!  At any rate, I took some pictures over the course of the weekend I promise, but because I took a hiatus without warning, I will impose a penalty on myself, and I will count them all as only one.  Soooo without further ado, some photos:

Thursday: Beaver officially deceived!  The white pipe is last years construction (deemed too small and not effective enough) and the barely visible black pipe is what we installed.  I'm going back in a few days to see if he has rebuilt and if the deceiver has been effective.  

Over the weekend: I made mint chocolate truffles to donated to the Tahoe Resource Conservation District Autumnfest Silent Auction to benefit the Tahoe Demonstration Garden.  I also made chocolate peanut butter pillows (same as the ones I made here) and mini sized chocolate chocolate chip muffins (recipe here, slightly adapted for a mini muffin tin) for the bake sale at Autumnfest.  A few recommendations:  The muffins would probably have been better if I had not used whole wheat flour, which while healthy, tends to add a bit too much of its wheat-y flavor to these little muffies.  The pillows were far more challenging this time because for some reason the chocolate dough on the outside was super crumbly (not at all the case the first time I made them) so instead of flattening a ball of the chocolate dough and then wrapping it around a ball of the peanut butter dough, I mushed the dough into little cups (that I should have take a picture of, sorrrrrry!) and dropped the ball of peanut butter in the middle then crumbled the sides of the cup down over it and called them chocolate lava cookies because the peanut butter oooooozed out through the cracks in the chocolate dough like lava.  Still tasty as ever, slightly more annoying to make, but all in all a good solution.  

This is a little moth that was hanging out on my screen,   I liked him so I took a picture.  PHOTO OF THE DAY!

How many have I taken?  Lots more than 226, but thats ok.

How many do I have left?  Roughly 139...thats lots!

Sorry for the delay Ace!  But now I'm (going to do my best to be) back in business and on time!  Hurray!

just another fine day at work....

So today we spent most of the workday dismantling a beaver dam with an ax and our hands.  Obviously my photo of the day has to be that, because it was pretty fantastic.  Here are some of my coworkers showing us how its done!

**PS. No beavers were harmed during the making of this photo.  We are simply removing an existing dam to put in a Clemson Leveler (Beaver Deceiver) that will allow some of the water to travel through while still making the beaver feel like he's dammed the river.  He wil be able to build it all back by tomorrow night...and we didn't take down that big one behind them, just the one in the active stream channel.

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surveying

Today I learned to survey cross sections on Trout Creek.  I snapped this shot through the viewfinder of the autolevel across the creek and into the willows.  

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"Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul."

Its only appropriate to start this one out with a John Muir quote, as he traveled to and loved all the places in the Sierra that I'm about to show you (and many others that I haven't had the opportunity to visit yet...), but more than that, he is quite possibly the reason many of them still exist today.

Friday:

Spent the morning at work, that afternoon packing, and the evening on the road to Mammoth.  Here's a shot from my morning at work, taken of Lake Tahoe from the Upper Truckee Marsh...if you look closely you can see a raising hot air balloon in the center of the photo:

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Saturday:

My first day in Mammoth!  We spent the morning on the Owens River (me learning to fly fish, everyone else successfully fly-fishing...) after a few hours I got impatient with the wind impeding my learning and read a book instead.  So as not to feel as though I was wasting the $12.50 I had spent on a fishing license for that day I gave it another go before lunch and then threw in the towel after lunch and we took off to check out some local attractions:

The Owens River (aka. our fishin' spot)

Convict Lake (where we went after, so named for a gang of fugitives who escaped Carson City Prison in the 1870's and holed up in the mountains around this lake)

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Sunday:

After getting up early to hit the dusty trail, we hiked into the John Muir Wilderness and out to Sherwin Lakes, then to a pond, followed by Valentine Lake.  We met a couple on the way who warned us that Valentine lake was small and disappointing, all grown in and not that exciting.  We think maybe they made it to the pond and mistook it for Valentine Lake...What do you think?

John Muir Wilderness!

The Pond (still pretty beautiful...)

Valentine Lake (even more gorgeous than this picture in person and, in my opinion, well worth the 10 mile hike)

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Monday:

That brings us to today!  Another morning spent fishing by the Owens but since my fishing License was expired I spent it reading a book and painting in the beautiful river valley.  After we left Mammoth at lunch time we headed off to Lee Vining to see the famous Mono Lake (a Sierra salt lake whose glassy surface and unique "tufa" make it a California favorite) which I found to be incredibly beautiful despite its large fly population and pungent odor.  Next we headed home over Monitor Pass and then it was "back to life" time and I spent the evening unpacking and unwinding and getting ready for work tomorrow.  

Mono Lake

View from the top of the Eastern Slope of Monitor Pass

View down of the Western Slope. if you click and enlarge you can see smoke in the middle of the mountains from what we can only assume is a small forest fire...apparently they are commonplace to these parts but I'll never find then anything short of arresting and unnerving..)

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break

My life has gotten sneakily stressful lately because of the approaching deadline to determine what I will be doing next and the added distress of my inability to contact my African host family out of fear and cowardice.  I have done and redone my resume about 12 times and looked at plenty of options, but been very picky about applying.  I will not be forced to apply to a job that I don't want just because I can!  So with all that in my head I have decided to take a little break since this whole "job-hunting" thing has been really cutting into my leisure time.  I was invited to join a friend of mine on her trip out to Mammoth to meet her brothers.  Because her brothers will come visit her and I can't get my family out here for my life, I have decided to join her and borrow her family for the time being.  This means I'll be leaving tomorrow evening and probably not coming back until Monday, and I'm not sure if I'll have access to internet but I'm thinking either way I'm not going to bring the computer.  SO a photo will be taken every day, but it is fairly likely that none will be posted until Monday night.  Thanks for your patience, and since I'm back on the job hunt, please send me any ads you see for jobs that you think I might enjoy!  thanks all!

Todays photo:

Epilobium Brachycarpum

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souvenirs from better times

I missed a call from a friend in Africa the other morning and I realized that its been over a year since I left and I have still been too much of a coward to call my host family and just show them that I care.  Its not that I got here and forgot them or didn't need them anymore, its just that its painful to think that they're there and i'm here and there's probably very little chance that I will ever see them again...ever.  And that hurts too much to make it real by calling them and hearing them and talking of hope and ending with "see you soon" and pretending that i'm not collapsing inside with grief while we greet and pretend our lives still make sense to one another.  

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