Red Earth

It rained quite a bit while we were in Hawaii.

We rented a Jeep and drove around Kaua'i on a couple of those overcast days.

One of the stops?

Waimea Canyon!

Before we get there, though, let me show you the gorgeous iron rich red earth that Kaua'i is made up of.

Waimea means red water (wai = fresh water, mea = red) which floods the canyon after it rains heavily.

The red soil was very evident along our way. Our running shoes are still stained with the stuff. In fact, after the hurricane of '92, t-shirts from one t-shirt printing store flew into the red dirt and permanently dyed them red. Now, Red Dirt T-shirts can be purchased on the island.  We got ones with the roosters on them ;)

Okay, on to the photos!

Rooster I

Okay, can I just tell you about the ROOSTERS on Kauai?  The island is infested with them!  I use the word "infested" loosely because I totally fell in love with these guys, so much so that I haven't eaten chicken, since.

The history behind it, is that chickens, wild chickens and fighting cocks were brought to the island by early settlers and after the hurricane of '92, the distruction of the coops set the chickens free to roam the island.  They have since multiplied making them the Kings of the Roads (we even got t-shirts that say that) as there are no natural predators after them.

I miss the cock-a-doodling in the morning (and sometimes during the day and evening)!

Fall

More Paris shots on the way, but first, here are some Autumn shots taken in our front yard.

Brown Paper Packages

Here's a break from Scotland....

We found a bunch of these little guys in our garden this summer.

Castle

The next day it was off to see Stirling Castle! We hiked up the hill to get to it and what a glorious view it was, of Wallace Monument and the rest of Stirling.

The palace within the castle was under renovation so we couldn't see it, but they were washing the limestone so it was nice to see the orginal colour of the castle.

We ended with, what else? Beers and sandwiches at a rather touristy and therefore pricey place just outside the castle.

Earthquake

Toronto experienced an earthquake yesterday at 1:41pm.
(I didn't feel it though, as I was wobbling around on a bosu ball at the time)
It made me think about nature and how easily things can change within a matter of seconds.   So I thought I'd post up some photos from our Grand Canyon visit this past February.   There was SNOW there at the time!

Isn't nature astounding?