Trip to Angel Island 2014

Just got done with my trip with the students. What a great time. I need to give a shout out to the great folks from Environmental Traveling Companions(ETC) who do a great job in helping us kayak across the Bay from Sausalito to Angel Island (about three miles) and then back the next morning. They are just super awesome.

Anyway, here are some pics that I took with my phone (sorry if they are little dark-I get a more updated phone in a month or so). I tried not repeat any pics from last year:

We kayaked that water

Love the colors of this plant

This one of the old bunkers that are still there from when it was an army base

The sun setting in the fog over the island

The old Quartermaster's building. It survived the great 1906 Earthquake

One of the cool houseboats in Sausalito-had to include it.

I always love these kayaking trips.

Male Rockers-Check It Out

Let's see, a male rockers coming your way:

Hope you enjoy your Monday.

An Unusual Bookstore

I was in Downtown San Francisco and trying to race to the BART station when I came across the most unusual bookstore-G.F. Wilkinson Books. Wilkinson Books has a huge online store of a lot of used and rare books. The store is one of the smallest (more like bookstalls) and located in Trinity Plaza. One more thing, Wilkinson Books is open-weather permitting for certain reasons.:

Wilkinson Books

Part of Wilkinson Books

A different part of the store

Books on display

Art for sale

He does have some good titles and rare books on display at "the store":

 

 

Wilkinson Books maybe an unusual "bookstore" but it is cool and unique.

Bringing Back Coastal Scrub

While walking up from Fort Point, I saw all these amazing plants and decided to take some pics of them. They are part of a rehab effort by the Golden Gate National Recreation Area to put in the mix native plants to San Francisco coastal scrub. It is in infant stages but when all fully done, it will offer a beautiful display of our coastal plants and be habitat for birds and other widlife:

A Little Eccentric Music Monday

A little interesting Monday Music For you:

And in honor of the Oakland A's having six players named to the All-Star team:

Have a great Monday.

Happy 4th of July

I hope that everybody has a safe 4th of July. Keep in mind the bold move that our founding fathers made 228 years in forming this country while you are having fun.

This country has been an experiment for all those years in our form of government. George Washington said in his first inaugural address said:

"I dwell on this prospect with every satisfaction which an ardent love for my Country can inspire: since there is no truth more thoroughly established, than that there exists in the economy and course of nature, an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness, between duty and advantage, between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy, and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity: Since we ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven, can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained: And since the preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the Republican model of Government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people."

 

Guarding the Golden Gate-Fort Point

Fort Point was built between 1853 and 1861 as part of the defense for the San Francisco Bay. It's masonry work is considered some of the finest examples of work from that era and it architecture is consider some of finest of military architecture. It is located directly below the southern approach to the Golden Gate Bridge. When the bridge was being built, Fort Point was to be demolished but the Bridge's Chief Engineer Joseph Strauss redesigned the bridge to save the fort, saying "While the fort has no military value now, it remains nevertheless a fine example of the mason's art... It should be preserved and restored as a national monument.":

Fort Point

Some of the hallways in the Fort Point

Some of the brick work

The inside of the courtyard of Fort Point

From the roof of Fort Point

The lighthouse

And some of the weaponry:

Cannonballs

8 inch cannon

Rodman Cannon

Mini-cannon

The round. elevated platforms were for the cannons on top of Fort Point

Magazine Room

And they also have some things that show how life was at Fort Point:

A private's cap

Daily ration for a solider in 1864

Light House Keepers uniform

Hospital Steward Uniform

Officer's quarters