Huntington Beach State Park AND Atalaya

This was probably my favorite of the tours we took. It really was a neat place with a neat story. We also had a very enthused tour guide at Atalaya to tell the story of its inhabitants.

As we came into the state park we crossed a salt marsh area and both times we crossed it we got to see an alligator or two moseying around. We started with a picnic in a very mosquito infested area. Other than the bugs in the shade it was very nice. Then we took a walk out into the marsh on a board walk to see if we could see some wild life. We saw quite a few birds but no alligators. When we got done with our walk we hurried over for the 2pm tour of Atalaya. While we waited for the tour guide to arrive we read about the people whose home we were about to tour. Archer and Anna Huntington. They were both artist. His was words and hers were sculptures. Archer was the son of Collis Huntington a very ambitious man. Collis started his financial rise by getting tools and the things men would need into California for the gold rush days, then he got into railroads, then coal mining and shipyards. Always quite successful. Archer's mom, Arabella, was quite a creative lady and didn't trust him to anyone else to raise so she home schooled him. They did a lot of traveling to learn about what they were studying. Archer learned quite a few languages this way and this is what influenced the style of this home. They used Atalaya as a get away and a retreat for Anna's somewhat fragile health. It was very much in the middle of nowhere with a view of the ocean. To get there from their home in Connecticut they would use a modified camper to sleep in along the way and haul their menagerie of animal companions. A family of monkeys, always quite number of dogs, a horse and sometimes a bear and a few birds. Anna was really into a certain breed of dogs she introduced to the U.S. from England, they are a huge rangy type that I can't think of the name right now. They had a 100 or so at their home in the north. Some of the animals happened to be with them because they were models for Anna's sculptures.

When they started work on this place Archer wanted it to look like some of the Moorish homes he saw when he was growing up. He didn't use an architect to design this place instead he tried to tell some of the local workers he had hired what he wanted. Then he left them for the winter to go run the shipyard. When he returned he didn't like the way it was looking so he had them tear it down and they started again, one of the main things they were doing wrong was cleaning the joints between the bricks. He wanted a straight but sloppy look. This was during the depression, they didn't have any work so they stuck at it and tried again. Archer and Anna were the biggest employers in this part of SC during the depression. This is the Atalaya, the watchtower. It is in the center of a large courtyard with a hallway running most of the way through it. On three sides of the courtyard are the family rooms and the servants rooms. At the end you are looking are the stables, garage and other service buildings. One of them being a building just for the shelling and cleaning of seafood. They really enjoyed that and had someone hired just to keep them stocked with seafood. All around the courtyard while Anna was there she kept large pots with flowers growing in them, between each of the palm trees.

This small room was at the very end of the house facing the ocean. When they were there you could see the ocean but it has grown up with a lot of trees and brush blocking that view now.

Here is something I had never learned about before. During world war II the homes and businesses along this coast and the Gulf of Mexico had to black out their windows for their safety. There were many German U-boats patrolling these waters and blowing many ships out of them. So many interesting things were mentioned on this tour. I have now just read a book talking about this more in detail, very interesting. Looking out from the lookout above the family room towards the sea. I love brick work in homes, and although this place was certainly in a bit of disrepair you could still envision a lovely place to live here. And now it is time to leave Huntington Beach State Park, someday I would enjoy getting to browse around here again.

~Anna

Airborne and Special Operations

Here in NC right next to Fort Bragg we went to the Museum of Airborne and Special Operations. Without these brave guys we wouldn't have made it through many of the wars we were involved in. This place had a ton of things to look at. We could have learned so much if we had had more time and patience. I only read a smattering of the info boards there was so much detail. The displays were very well designed and fun to see. Did you know the army used these gliders to deliver men and jeeps and whatever other supplies they needed. They dragged them behind a big airplane and then let them quietly float on in to where the supplies were needed. Later when the opportunity arose they gathered them back up by dropping a line down as they slowly flew by and pulled them up into the sky and returned them to the ship. There were helicopters, an airplane and Parachuters overhead as we walked through the years of war scenes. Did you know that some of the hardest obstacles they didn't expect were the hedgerows? They were growing there for hundreds of years of sturdy bushes that didn't want to be crushed by tanks and provided the opposing forces with great protection at all of the corners. Did you know in Vietnam they wore this type of sole so the natives thought they were natives? I am so thankful for people who are willing to give their time and lives to protecting me and my freedoms. Oh, the many blessings I have been given, just by being born here and now!

~Anna

Our family covered 4000 miles this month in our van. We got to see a multitude of wonderful things in God's amazing world. I am so thankful we live here in a country where we have the freedom to travel as we wish and see so much. I just pray our country can remain great! The trip ended up being quite educational. We took several historic type tours and then life in general is very much a learning process.

I am going to blog about our field trips along the way here in the next few days, I hope. I had hoped to start sooner, but while I was absent blogger changed some picture up loading processes that I couldn't seem to figure out so, this morning I finally took the time to go in and change some settings and now I upload pictures the way I did when I first got this blog. At least pictures are going up.

~Anna

Touring a Hog Farm

Well, we went to visit Grammy and Grampy and while we were sitting around talking about all the neighbors and what had been going on in the area since we were last back to visit. Grammy mentioned a descendant of the people who had originally lived on this farm, in the old farm house, had called and wanted to come out to see what was still here. Turns out, all of the house is left, they just built hog barns around it. The house has been used as storage. It was like a bee in Margaret's bonnet, she really wanted to see this old house. So when it was about time for us to leave, Grampy took us up there in his truck and we had a tour. It has been the home of raccoons it looked like for sometime. After we felt our way around in there for awhile. We checked out the rest of the place. We saw the farrowing house and how it worked. We saw where the piglets grew into pigs, where they got their first shots and surgeries. Here, Grampy is standing on the pit where everything in the yard drained or was scraped and then when it was full they transferred its contents into the honey wagon and hauled it over the fields. Liquid gold. Or something like that.

We hadn't intended on taking this tour, but it sure was fun spending the time with Travis and Grampy in a place that held a lot of memories for them.

Remembering An Evening's Walk

We started with a picnic

 Eating lots of pop corn

 And drinking lots of water.

Then we wandered over hill and vale,

Up ancient stairs of crumbling concrete.

By prehistoric rhinoceroses, which we all took a turn at conquering! 

~Anna, remembering the evening of August the 27th, 2010.

Cameras

I am hoping you can help me! We are wanting a new camera and should get it soon, but I can't quite decide on what I want.
I don't want a big detailed camera that is more than I would understand.
I want one that takes great pictures of people and can also do nice scenery photos.
I want one that is sturdy.
It needs to have a long battery life.
For fun I would like one that takes short videos. That is pretty standard, it seems, though.
I want one that is all in one piece, currently mine isn't. It still works though.
That can take pictures in pretty quick succession. 
 

What is important to you in a camera?
Do you have one you recommend?

Do, Please tell.

~Anna

My Memories of Jackpine 2010

As fall comes into view each year we take a journey to

Northern Minnesota

Near the little town of 

 To enjoy times in God's amazing world.

We pass through quaint towns

 We go under beautiful skies,

 Pass by neat art work we only get to see once a year.

 Get water at an artisan well

 And wait patiently in the chilling breeze for our jugs to fill.

 We won the prettiest campsite "award".

 Bundled under lots of layers to sing around the camp fires with 

 some of our dearest friends and family members.

 Some visited the afternoon away,

 While others built cities and conquered villages in the sand.

 At night we sang and listened to more great sermons in the waning hours of the night. 

Some fell to sleep in awkward shapes.

But woke refreshed to see another morning to sing around the campfire!

Some of my favorite memories are of camping! Do you have good memories as well?
~Anna

Flowers

It is time to deplant and remove a lot of the browning plants around my house.

Some of the flowers still are keeping going even though it is getting quite cool.

The other evening I walked around and took pictures of different flowers that I have been enjoying this summer. I planted lots of marigolds this year because we took off to a very buggy start. They seemed to do their job some. At least they added lots of color!

The echinacea and rhubarb are my exciting ones for the year.
 We have learned what parts to use of the ecchinacea and had a lot of tea with it while some were sick around here. It is virtually a weed so I am happy it is being useful now too. It was nice as just a flower too because where it is growing nothing else was, except for lots of peppermint.
 Then the rhubarb is very exciting because we all love deserts made with rhubarb and don't get it very much because we don't have any growing near here, but now we do! I do hope it makes it through the winter okay. I don't know if I transplanted it at the right time or not, we shall see. If winter holds off for awhile I am going to be tempted to harvest some. It is growing so nicely.