fletcher’s blog

On the Road

I love being on the road. When I was a young guy I hitchhiked all over the country. I got to see a lot of the US. Though I don’t hitch anymore, I’ve gotten to see and travel through 49 states; I’ve never been to Alaska. This trip Barbara and I started in California, went through Nevada, saw some sights in Idaho, went through Wyoming, where we got a taste of the Grand Tetons, then went on to South Dakota. We stopped for a few days in the Custer area, where we saw a lot of wildlife, including bison, deer, prairie dogs, and more, the Chief Crazy Horse Monument, and the cemeteries of Lead and Deadwood. There’s quite a bit to do in the area and we could easily have spent several more days there.

Wild Burro at Custer State Park

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Thunder Mountain

On our first day we stopped at a Native American art site just south of Winnemucca, in a town called Imlay. The site is called Thunder Mountain, and some of the work was reminiscent of the famous outsider art installation, called the Garden of Eden, created by S.P. Dinsmoor. I have visited this site in Lucas, KS, a couple of times over the years.

This one had been severely vandalized and the Thunder family has had to put it behind fences to renovate it, but we were able to see most of the buildlings and statuary pretty well. It was built by a man who called himself Chief Rolling Thunder Mountain. Though his original name was Frank Dean Van Zant, which is a Dutch surname, he considered himself a full blooded member of the Creek Nation.

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How Weird

A couple of weeks ago on Sunday, May 4, 2008, the How Weird Street Faire was held on a couple of blocks of Howard Street, in San Francisco. A good time was had by all. Barbara and I went there and took a lot of photos, as usual. You can see a whole bunch on my Flickr site. The following photo was one of my favorites from that day — click on the photo to see a larger copy.

Tomorrow, Barbara and I are embarking on a 3 1/2 week road trip. If all goes well — we’ll be leaving here, going up to Idaho, east to the Grand Tetons, on to Chief Crazy Horse Monument, thru Minnesota and Wisconsin, and ending up in Chicago on the weekend of June 22. We’ll be having a memorial for my mom on that day; she passed away last year. From Chicago, we’ll be heading back thru Kansas, Colorado, Arches National Park, and we’ll travel on rte 50 thru Nevada, arriving home in the Bay Area around the 3rd of July.

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A new era

In August, 2004, I started my first blog, Fletcher’s Folly. I posted almost daily, with a new photograph, and with links to political and social comments of the day. In February of last year I decided to take a break from that daily update. Today is the start of a new era, where, again, I will be posting photographs and other stuff, however it will be on an irregular, but steady, basis.

May 25, 2008, was the annual Carnaval parade and festival in San Francisco. I have gone to this event many times, but in the last couple of years through the efforts of my friend, John Lee, I have been able to go with a media pass. This allows me to walk into the parade route, take pictures, and not be hassled. It’s great. That being said, some of the best photo ops are before the parade even starts, in the staging area.

Below are a couple of photos shot before the parade started.

To see more images, go to my Flickr site. I will have more photos from the parade, and after the parade, in subsequent posts.

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