Photo By Gail
This rose bush grows in a planter bed out front of my apartment building, and it somehow manages to stay alive nearly all year long. This photo was taken in early December of 2017, and I can’t believe I got such a great shot of these tiny Pink Blossoms, and one still-tight bud, covered in a light snowfall. The roses are actually taking a break right now as there’s at least two feet of accumulated snow in the bed, but this photo is a reminder that they’ll be back in the spring.
Photo By Gail
Say you were creating a miniature holiday diorama, and you were in need of something to represent a Pink Christmas Tree. Wouldn’t this flower, which is a variety of Cockscomb, be just the thing? These little pink blooms have been spotted in the public flower beds around First Avenue and 16th Street during the transition into early fall, although the bright pink color fades as they come to the end of their lifecycle.
I think they are pretty rad!
Japanese Red Maple (All Photos By Gail)
The original vacation plan for Summer 2020 called for me to fly from New York City to Barcelona on June 4th. There, I would meet up with my Los Angeles-based sister, and we’d spend two days site-seeing and recovering from jet lag before departing on an adventure-packed, seven-day cruise through the western Mediterranean. Sigh, I fucking love to cruise.
Obviously, those plans changed. In May, our sailing was predictably canceled by the cruise line due to the Covid-19 pandemic. While I was relieved to receive a full-refund on my paid fare — and overjoyed with the bonus of nearly $1,000 in onboard credit for a 2021 rebooking — I was also super bummed to know that I would likely not be getting out of Manhattan this summer. First world problems: they are a thing.
This Glass Holds The Remains of a Very Stiff Gin and Tonic
It cannot be overstated then that my summer was miraculously saved by friends who own a home the Berkshires, where they’d been quarantining since March. They generously offered to host me for a week of doing basically what I do in Manhattan — eating and going for walks — but with way better food and immeasurably more awe-inspiring scenery, not to mention (but you can see I am about to) air that smells like honey, and the absence of blaring sirens. It was the best week I’ve had in three months. Please enjoy a selection of photos from my many nature walks taken during the vacation that restored my sanity.
The Berkshires: Stunning Even When It’s Overcast
My friends live in a private community accessed from a narrow road set about a mile off of a rural thoroughfare. On summer evenings (during any normal year), you can sometimes hear faint music drifting over from Tanglewood, where I saw a fantastic concert by Squeeze with these same friends last August. Sadly, Tanglewood’s 2020 season has been canceled.
Instead, the soundtrack includes choruses of bullfrogs hiding among the marsh reeds, and a rush of wind through the endless trees that can make you look over your shoulder to confirm that no cars are coming.
This marsh and pond are just across the road from a private beach. There, you can take colorful kayaks out onto a lake, which is called the Stockbridge Bowl.
I could gaze at at this view for hours.
Continue Enjoying the Scenery, After the Jump!
Continue reading Nature Photos From My Beautiful Quarantine Berkshires Vacation!
All Photos By Gail
At the end of the Ice Age, the last ice sheet began to melt back from the New York City region about 14,000 years ago, leaving behind a layer of clays, sands and pebbles, as well boulders known a glacial erratics. Glacial Erratics are made up of rock materials not generally found in their immediate surroundings.
This large boulder, found in the Native Plant Garden at the New York (Bronx) Botanical Garden — known as Split Rock — is a glacial erratic.
Split Rock is composed of Yonkers gneiss, which is different from the local bedrock. The split in this boulder was likely caused by an ancient freezing and thawing cycle thousands of years ago.
Photographed on New Year’s Day, 2020!
Update August 15th, 2020: We just got home from visiting the NYBG, which has recently reopened after being closed since March due the Covid 19 Pandemic. It was great to be back! I snapped a couple of new photos for this post which show the Split Rock amid the summer flora! Enjoy!
My Friend, Kat, Waving Hello!
Photo By Gail
One of my favorite sure signs of Spring in NYC is the presence, however fleeting, of Pink Trees! The tree pictured here is not even the most beautiful Pink Tree I have seen, but it is the one closest to my home. I am glad I snapped this photo of it before the rain we had the other night took all the pinkness off.
All Photos By Gail
When I was a small child, growing up in southern California, my parents used to take the family on camping vacations to Yosemite National Park. I probably went there four or five times up to the age of 8 or so. While these vacations are many decades in the past for me now, my very vivid memories of the park and its many tall and fragrant redwood trees, crystal clear shallow streams, majestic mountains, tumbling waterfalls, and other uniquely beautiful natural sights and smells stay with me to this day. Yosemite is breathtaking.
British artist David Hockney must feel similarly, because he has created a new series of vivid iPad drawings featuring the wild landscape of Yosemite that you can see and enjoy now at Pace Gallery in Chelsea. When I stood in front of these uncomplicated yet profoundly compelling drawings, I felt like I was back in the park again. Everything looked so familiar to me.
You can almost smell the trees.
Happy Little Trees.
From the late 1800s through most of the 1960s, Yosemite used to have a summertime evening ritual in the park called the Firefall, where visitors could gather to watch a ball of fire get tossed off the side of the one of the mountains, Glacier Point: like a waterfall, only with fire. They stopped doing it because of the danger of a forest fire, and because it got too popular and folks were trampling the meadows to try and see it. It was pretty cool to experience in person though. I’ll never forget it.
David Hockney’s The Yosemite Suite will be on Exhibit Through June 18th, 2016 at PACE, Located at 537 West 24th Street in the Chelsea Gallery District.
Photo By Gail
Azuma Makoto is a florist and botanical artist, known for incorporating nature into his fantastical and often surreal work. This Bicycle, from the artist’s Botanical series, is covered in AstroTurf, but still functions as a ride-able bike. Each Bike is unique and sells for about $5,000.
Botanical Bicycle, Spoke Detail
Botanical Bicycle, Seat Detail
Botanical Bicycle By Azuma Makoto is on Display Through April 30th, 2016 at Chamber, Located at 515 West 23rd Street, in the Chelsea Gallery District.
Photo Credit: BikeGeeky Team
