Cawdor Day #10

Cawdor Day #9

Cawdor Day #8

Cawdor Day #7

Cawdor Day #6

Cawdor Day #5

Cawdor Day #4

Cawdor Day #3

Cawdor Castle #2

Day 2 :)

Cawdor Castle #1

When visiting Scotland and England back in 2007 we ended up visiting Cawdor Castle up near Edinburgh. It is in this castle that Shakespeare set Macbeth. Not that it likely happened here, but it is still a nice castle with a great gardens. It was kind of rainy that day (in Scotland?!?! Never!) but that didn’t stop us from hitting the gardens for lots of pictures! So, here is the beginning of 1 picture form Cawdor Castle per day for a little while. Enjoy!

More Smokies Goodness

Pretty Butterfly near the Odgen house in Cades Cove.
The old Odgen home. I love the dove tail joints here. They have stood for over 100 years and likely will a hundred more!
I love the mix of all of the stages of fall here...green, yellow, and red!!!
Fungi....everywhere!
Just a really darned cool leaf
Here are some more goodies from the Smokies a couple of weeks ago :)

Fall Is Here

Well, it is here if here is the Great Smokey National Park. It was 85 in Atlanta today...not really Fall if you ask me!!! My parents are in town though so I took them on up to the Smokies to go leaf watching. At it was incredible!!! Fall has arrive up in the mountains (as well as WAY too many people in Gatlinburg. Wow, that town in scary!) and we traveled for four days (Courtney joined us for 2 of those days) and we saw many a leaf changing color and took even more pictures. All four of us had cameras and I think that at times we may have all even taken the same picture :) These three picture are to start you out in the Fall Feast and were all taken the last day. I was really happy to actually see the 'smokey' aspect to the Smokies in the middle picture. So often the smog limits visibility but real really lucked out. You could see out in the direction of Pigeon Forge that the smog was definitely there but it in most of the other directions the view was incredible. It was much clearer this year than last year when Courtney and I visited over Labor Day. More people too!

The Window to Nowhere

While traveling around in Europe I became obsessed with windows for a while. Each country has such different architectural styles and the winds seems to reflect that. This little door/window was taken in Germany. I love the lines of the 1/2 timbering surrounding the window. It has a very primitive/earthy feel to it.

Down the Rabbit Hole

This weekend I joined a bunch of friends visiting Washington Farms in Watkinsville, GA. We went pumpkin picking and even braved the corn maze--a pretty good one as it took us 45 minutes to get through! At the end of the maze they had the Vortex Tunnel to walk through. It is similar to the ice cave on the Universal Studios Tour. Essentially you walk down the middle through a tube that is spinning pretty fast around you. With dots painted on it. And you get REALLY dizzy. It is really darned disconcerting even if you know what to expect. I took this shot at the beginning of the tunnel. The camera had no chance of focusing on the spinning craziness so I put it on manual and held it as steady as I could for an 8 second exposure. Trippy!!! Click on the picture to see it full screen and feel like you are there!!!

Athens Botanical Gardens

More purty stuff...this time from last weekend at the Georgia State Botanical Gardens in Athens!

Backyard Goodies

I was out in the yard watering for a few minutes today and noticed a couple of pretties that I wanted to share :) After putting in the new screened in porch last year I have been working (with lots of help!) on landscaping a bed that runs all along the back of the house. These are a couple of the flowers from back there. I planted 2 of the clematis vines and I think I have killed one of them-though there is a new sprout coming up at the base of the 'dead' one which is either a new growth or a weed--not sure yet! The other vine is doing well--it lost a lot of leaves on initial planting, but has spread into the trellis well-yea!