Sweet Wedding Anniversary

Another year has passed, and Professor and I enjoyed our 13th Wedding Anniversary.  We spent a few weeks trying to plan the perfect night out for our anniversary.  We live where there are many options to do something romantic, adventurous, spectacular, cheap, expensive, exhilarating or relaxing.  It proved to be too many options!  We were so overwhelmed and deflated after each plan ended up not working out for various reasons.  So, I finally suggested we get a hotel room for the night in an area a few hours away, close to some nice nature preserves.  The children would enjoy a change and an adventure and we would like to just relax. So we booked a room with three rooms and two bathrooms, with a kitchen.  I planned an easy but nice dinner to be cooked in our suite and after a nice night and morning, a trip to an Audubon Wildlife Preserve.  We were expecting lots of people to join in on a guided-tour.  We were the only people!  We had a magnificent tour by the curator of the last 17 years.  He was incredibly knowledgeable and a fantastic teacher.  We learned about the habitat, indigenous plants and wildlife, and capped it off with a bird-watching experience.  We all had a great time!  We then enjoyed a nice veggie burger dinner out and then headed home.  It was a fun time.

 We were taught the difference between feline and canine tracks.  We saw both tracks in their specimen tracking area.  So in this particular preserve, they have active coyote and mountain lions, plus some smaller bobcats.

 This plant was used by early settlers and natives for its soap lathering quality.  Can you see the guide's soapy hand?

 Sweet Sis actually found the acorn nut (on the oak shrub) that the guide was looking for!  It surprised him!

 A wild cucumber.  The dried up wild cucumber is shown below.