foto of famiglia

A sample photo from our trip.

Famiglia in Castelbuono: Daniele, Vincenzo, his mother, Giovanni, Rosaria, Rosario, Mario

hello from Italia

May 27, 2009
Our trip is two-thirds over all ready. We spent the first week in Sicily,
mainly visiting relatives (whom we have never met before) in Castelbuono.
They could not have been more kind or generous. They fed us huge Sicilian
meals. And they never eat dinner before 8 pm in all of Italy, so we eat
and eat and eat and then go to bed. Meals are never less than four
courses, usually more. And the desserts! Mama mia!

We have also been staying at agritourismas along the way which are working
farms that also let people stay overnight and have ristorantes that serve
food they grow at the farm. Also wine they make from their own grapes. I
will set up a Flicker account when I get home because the scenery is
fabuloso.

On Sunday we travelled by train to Naples from Taormina, Sicily. The
train boarded a ferry to the mainland. The whole trip took about six
hours. Naples is like a third world country. It is dirty and loud, but
with beautiful architecture from past glories. We went to a huge museum
there that housed all of the treasures from Pompeii that the Bourbons had
collected. Incredible. Then we went to Pompeii yesterday -66 hectares of
city have been "restored". How big is a hectare?

Today we are in Amalfi at an Internet Point. The Amalfi coast is gorgeous
with cities built and sheer cliffs into the sea. Amalfi has tunnels and
staircases built into the rock. It is touristy, but understandably so.
It is so beautiful. It is also hot.

We also went to Mt Etna and hiked around and we spent some time hiking in
the Madonie national park in Sicily so it has not all been cities and
towns for us. Tomorrow, we turn our direction to Rome and will spend the
last four days of our holiday there.

Until then, ciao from Italia,
Anita

test for trip to Sicily

I’m leaving for Sicily and Southern Italy on Thursday, May 14.  I hope to post something along the way.  If not, check back after June 3^rd.

 

Arrividerci,

 

Anita M. Barreca

http://thornbushreport.blogspot.com/

 

storms, ponds, and tractors

Needless to say we began enjoying the pond right from the start. In the summer . . .

And the winter.

With the purchase of land comes the purchase of equipment. Roger and Eric were lucky enough to have parents who owned two rental stores in Federal Way and Bonney Lake. They were able to acquire a lot of machinery this way.



And when you have equipment, you must have a place to store the equipment. So Roger and Eric set about building a "tractor shed". Here is a picture of the prototype for said shed.

And here is a pix of the shed as they were building it.

In the winter of 1990-1991 the Northwest saw a series of storms that had long-term effects on the direction of Thornbush operations.

Here is a quote from Cliff Mass' book, The Weather of the Pacific Northwest:

"When Arctic high pressure moves into British Columbia and relatively low pressure builds over Washington, air accelerates southwestward down the Fraser Valley. . .

An example of such a strong Fraser outflow wind occurred on December 28, 1990. A frigid highpressure center had moved into British Columbia, while a trough of low pressure associated with an Arctic Front stretched from Wyoming, through Washington , and offshore of Vancouver Island. The result was a zone of intense pressure difference over southern British Columbia and norther Washington. This pressure difference accelerated cold air southwestward down the Fraser River gap and then across Bellingham, the San Juan Islands, and vicinity. . ., a swath of extremely strong winds, reaching 80-90 miles per hour, struck a large area of northwest Washington . . .On northern Lummi Island, two observers reported winds exceeding 100 miles per hour, and massive tree falls, damage to homes, and extensive power outages occurred. Af few miles to the south, Guemes Island was hit hard: there was a widespread loss of trees over the northern portion of the island, with swaths roughly 500 feet long and 150 feet wide where nearly all trees were downed . . ."

This wind swept through San Juan Valley and our property. We counted 42 trees down.

And so we bought a sawmill. (Learn more of what the sawmill made for us in the next edition of "thornbush retrospective".

Yellow Island

Today, May Day, I was fortunate enough to travel with the "Friday Walkers" to Yellow Island Preserve on a landing craft. Here is a description from the Nature Conservancy Brochure:

"In the Spring, Yellow Island's scant 10 acres display greater floral profusion and diversity than any other comparable area in the San Juan archipelago. . . It has long been a landmark known for its brilliant wildflowers and rustic driftwood cabin."

From late March to early June, Yellow Island's native fescue grassland supports an ever-changing succession of wildflowers. Colors emerge and recede, beginning with yellow buttercups and delicate white fawn lilies. Camouflaged brown and green chocolate lilies, purple shooting stars and scarlet paintbrush bloom in mid-April and are soon joined by myriad blue camas."

Today was we had fabulous weather and all of the above wildflowers were in bloom, along with red sedums and these tiny little violet things. The caretaker tells us that every year, two acres are burned in order to keep the woody shrubs in check and let the wild bulbs emerge.

It was a great day to be in the San Juan Islands.