Author Archives: RegenAxe

Zion’s Weeping Rock

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Zion’s Weeping Rock

We’ve enjoyed a few days of frost-free mornings of late. So, it is high time that I commence planning this year’s summer campaign. In truth, I’ve been planning our expedition since Christmas. You have to plan that far ahead to get a good campsite in a national park, come high season. That part is done. We’ve got spots dotted across America picked out that are waiting for us to unroll our sleeping bags under the stars.

Speaking of which, I have a new sleeping bag to try out this year. My forty plus years old one is still serviceable, but it is a summer weight bag and doesn’t keep me warm on colder nights. We also have a new tent. This one is a three-person tent, which should be much roomier than the two-person one that we last bought and because it’s not thirty years old, it hopefully won’t leak like the four-person tent that we also own. Ole Yeller, as I like to call the four-person tent was big enough to sleep the whole family, at least when the boys were still young. It also provided yeoman service on the multiple week-long bicycling excursion with the League of Michigan Bicyclists that we’ve enjoyed. It was big enough to sleep two and also hold all of our gear at night. This summer, we will be car camping and won’t need the extra room inside the tent. Anyway, as they say, camping is where you spend a small fortune to live like a homeless person. 😉

The photo is from last summer’s adventures. Weeping Rock is spring fed, with water drops falling from above, after seeping through the rock face. Weeping Rock is an easy, paved walk-up from the bus stop. The same stop also serves Hidden Canyon, which we also hiked. This trail is across the valley from the more famous Angels Landing and was not anywhere as near crowded. It also has chains, bolted in the rock walls, so you can hangout on a ledge here too.

Earth Day

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Great Blue Heron’s Call-to-Arms

Today, is Earth Day, not quite a national holiday, but a holiday near and dear to us both. Yesterday, we celebrated it properly by attending its festival in Forest Park. We arrived carbon neutral on our bicycles, not bookkeeping our own CO2 exhalations, which were minimal. Anyway, it was the easiest way to travel.

The Saint Louis festival is a conglomeration of booths. Some are nonprofit and some are for profit. It really is a mish-mash. You can be discussing regional bike politics at one booth and then fending off aluminum siding salesmen at the next.

The fun of Earth Day is shopping among these often disparate environmental, political and economic approaches to saving the planet. A class of pitches are from our utilities. Our lovely sewer district was pitching its greenness, with its program to uncross the streams. We were already too aware of this initiative. The electric company was asking us to subsidize their shift from fossil fuels to renewable sources, which is mandated by law. Under the current administration a little consumer push could be in order. I need to research this some more.

Cars are another big category at the fair. In past years, multiple manufactures would ply their higher MPG wares, in an effort to show their greenery. This year only Subaru dared. Separate were the electric vehicles. Headlined by Tesla with its new model 3 and whose sole salesman was overwhelmed by the crowd. 

Man holding dog leash: It’s time to go.
Boy petting skunk fir: I don’t like skunks.
Man holding dog leash and plastic bag: Well, I don’t like holding sh!t.
Booth person: Get use to it, man.

Corporate America aside, it is the more informal organizations that I dearly love. These civic organization’s booths are populated by volunteers. They are generally more closely aligned to saving the environment and they were way more fun to speak with. We had a great time and stayed longer than expected.