August 3, 2019
This was my final morning at Paradise Point State Park. I would be heading home today. As mentioned, the campground was very noisy because of adjacent freeway traffic, but I sure had a good time here nonetheless. I will be back to this area. On one morning while I was here, I scouted out other campgrounds in the area that were a bit further away from the freeway so my nights would be quiet during future visits here.
But today I would be leaving and heading home.
However, before hitching up the trailer to the truck, I took one final morning drive in the truck without the trailer. It is just so pretty in this part of the State of Washington.
I drove by some pasture land with bunches of horses. I love horses. But something seemed odd about that dark horse on the left in the photo below. It had too many parts!
Yikes! A two-headed horse!! How many manes and tails and heads and legs can one horse have?!
Ok, ha! I bet you figured this out before I did. If you count the number of legs, you’ll find out there are actually two horses here, just facing opposite directions and serendipitously positioned to confuse the viewer (me). They sure were nice looking horses.
Those horses (above) all belonged to the house below … and to an organization called “Spirit Horse“. I checked it out online when I got home and I was impressed. The place would certainly be worth a visit on my next trip to the area. And, yes, it’s another place that would love volunteer help. I wish they were closer to where I live.
And then I continued on … more driving, more meandering, more ignoring the map and ignoring my electronic digital map devices … more just driving around and taking the road that seemed the right one to take.
Nice wide open farm land above.
The red “barn” looked interesting so I stopped the truck and took more photos.
That’s a lot of fire wood. And an interesting shape to the sides of the barn.
And then on I went down another delightful road.
The house above intrigued me because it was so attractive. It was just a regular, boring double-wide manufactured home. There are millions of them, everywhere it seems, and most of them are pretty boring to look at. But the deck that was added to this one made all the difference. The place felt like “home”. The deck and the plants were so attractive.
And then later on down the road I found more barns.
And more horses …
Little Towhee (you remember Little Towhee, right?) … well, Little Towhee saw this horse (below) out the window of the truck and screeched at me to stop. “Cheep! cheep! cheep!” So of course I stopped, and of course my truck window was open and she flew right out the window and perched on that fence and started chippering away to that horse.
I thought the horse might skitter away, but the horse loved it. Horses can see through that head covering … the hood is there just to keep flies out of their eyes. This horse picked up its head and walked right over to Little Towhee. I didn’t get a photo of it, but the horse nuzzled Little Towhee and snorted and snuffled. Little Towhee loved it and flapped her wings and cheeped and chittered. Little Towhee makes friends so easily. 🙂
We said good-bye to our horse friend, clambered back up into the truck, and headed on down the road, up the road, around the bend, along the river, through the meadows and the trees.
We didn’t stay out long because we knew we needed to go back to the campground and hitch up the trailer and head home, but we did see one last barn on this outing … it was my favorite barn of this trip.
And then we did go back to the campground and hitch up for the drive home.
The drive home was uneventful. It took about four hours, mostly on that noisy freeway. It was nice to get home and sleep in a QUIET house.
Except that Little Towhee kept twittering at me after we got home. Once I finally managed to stop and listen to what she wanted, she said she wanted to thank me for taking her to that wildlife refuge. She loved it there. She saw so many of her bird cousins, she was so happy. What I didn’t know at the time we were there, but that she then told me at home, was that she ACTUALLY SAW AND TALKED WITH another Spotted Towhee!!
She said she couldn’t tell me at the time because she was so happy and just couldn’t get the human English words out of her beak. Here’s a photo (above) of that other Spotted Towhee at the wildlife refuge. Ok, it’s a photo off the internet, off that link in the last blog post to the list of birds in the refuge, but it is a photo of a Spotted Towhee taken at that very same wildlife refuge. And when Little Towhee saw this photo (above) on my computer screen at home, she swears it is the very same Spotted Towhee that she talked with. And I believe her. Who wouldn’t? 🙂
After this early August camping trip to Paradise Point State Park, near Ridgefield, WA, I didn’t go camping at all again in 2019, because I was busy searching for, and making offers on, and buying a house … and moving! But in 2020, I made up for the lack of camping trips in 2019 with seven camping trips in 2020! Stay tuned, and come on along.
How is it you manage to give horses and birds and even barns interesting personalities?
I am glad little Towhee keeps you company and involves you in adventures.
And who would have thought there could be so many versions of barns during one morning excursion. I have always wondered why most often barns are painted red. Ann, have you ever wondered that too?
Ha! I suspect the personalities of the horses and birds and even barns come from inside me, yes? I notice that most of the personalities I create are nice personalities, so that encourages me. 🙂
RED … yes, why are so many barns red? What a great question, Robin. Ok, who knows the answer? I can imagine that one local paint store might have had an excess amount of red paint, but did every paint store across North America? What a great question.
Looks like the weather has held out for you to take some fantastic pictures this year.
Be Safe and Enjoy the State.
It’s about time.
Indeed, the weather has been exceptional this year, Richard. Not too hot, not too cold … and not so many forest fires this year, at least in the State of Washington. Hope you folks are enjoying your journeys as well. 🙂
I love the barn with the wood in it, cut up into triangles….I’ve never seen anything like that and I’m always looking at barns. You’re having such a good time, I’m waiting for snow to melt and spring to arrive so that I can start camping again!
Those triangles fascinated me too, Dawn. I’ve never seen anything like that before and wonder why it was done that way … for air circulation? I don’t know. Another great question!
Wow, “waiting for snow to melt”. The snow we had here a few weeks ago melted the next day, which is usual for us. Spring is coming, have no fear. 🙂
Interesting about the eye coverings on the horses. I’m glad their owners are thinking of them like that, and that such devices are made.
Yes, me too. Those flies can drive a horse crazy, practically literally, and the flies can carry disease that gets in horses’ eyes too. The hoods look a little odd when you first encounter them, but they are really important and don’t inhibit the horse’s vision very much at all.
Santa Fe specifically and New Mexico generally have a whole bunch of horse businesses like that to help adults in life transitions, or to help kids with their own transitions, or to help adults and kids who are dealing with autism and the like. They are really popular down here, people travel from all over the country. Nice to see there’s another one up north.
How cool is that? I just looked online for horse or equine help organizations in New Mexico and there are LOTS of them! For sure I’ll go visit the one up here when I travel back to the Ridgefield area. Thanks Shawn.
Love that last barn Ann. It looks old. Was there any indication of how old it was?
It looked old to me too, one of the reasons I liked it so much. I couldn’t see any indication of its age from the road where I was parked to take the photo. I was tempted to walk through the gate (there was no lock on it), and there obviously were no animals in the field around the barn, but I chickened out. I would have been trespassing after all, not such a good idea usually. On my next trip to the area, I’ll try to find out which house in the area owns that barn and go ask the folks there if they know how old it is.
Hi Ann, a friend of mine shared your blog with me. What a great find. I am reading from the beginning but wanted to say hi. I am always nervous about writing things on the internet but you seem like a real person and the other people here are so nice. Hope this works.
Hi Reader Ruth, welcome! I’m so glad you found this blog and that you’re enjoying it. I don’t blame you for being nervous about writing online. There are some odd people out there on the internet aren’t there? But this is a safe place … and I’m a real person … and everyone here is definitely very nice, just like you say. Feel free to comment any time, or just read along and enjoy. Best wishes. 🙂