An inquisitive old fart with a camera
General observations, generally during dog walks
Awaiting the alambrador (fence guy), I pile old sheet metal on top of logs and other crap to try to convince the big dumb bovines not to enter the area where my garden will soon be, and eat the volunteer squash plants growing there.
Spot a couple of large, odd mushrooms. I know very little about mushrooms; certainly haven’t seen this type before.
Tosca:
… dirt. Actually a type of crumbly rock (my scant knowledge of geology fails me), a mountain of which appeared last week on the rambla, probably for the repair of the collapsing stretch nearby, and destined to devolve into clouds of dust, tooth-rattling washboards, and suspension-testing potholes (pozos).
I found this spot a little more inspiring a couple years ago, with a funky car and graceful pines.
They’ve gone, victim of a storm, as have the railings to the then-new boardwalk. And I haven’t seen that car in a long time either, come to think of it.
Time to get ready for a new planting.
Bright orange-billed terns on the beach that I’ve never seen before, and these plants on the way back. No idea what they are.
Neighbors in the country tell me there is no spring here anymore – winter ends and summer starts.
After a few hours in the country, gathering poles from slash piles across the road, cutting up storm-damaged trees and hauling them, disassembling a collapsing pig house (the word chancho – pig – also refers to the traffic police, preferably not to their faces), I return to the coast.
In my downstairs office (a 90×90 cm table with two shelves next to a window), a cool breeze blows through. I take dogs to the beach for the first time in several days, wearing a light hoodie, in case the breeze is cooler there.
Not a chance. The beach is hot, and equally littered with sun worshippers, surfcasting fishermen, and plastic trash. It’s not summer, so the beach cleanup patrol doesn’t come through first thing in the morning. The amount of trash amazes me: looks like a garbage barge was scuttled offshore.
Piles of sand block the street to car traffic. Apparently the exceptionally heavy rain last week carved out whatever caused the rambla (waterfront road) to collapse three years ago. You can see the new crack forming halfway to the missing chunk. When all is done, they’ll dump in a bunch of sand, pave it (maybe), and that will be that. Until next time.
24 hours later, what appeared to be high tide appears to be low tide.
And the water has changed color completely.
After a day of intense rain and flooding, a day of intense wind, driving the waves all the way into the dunes.
The waves look benign, but with howling wind and stinging sand seemed less so. Then I stepped into quicksand and sunk one foot to the ankle. I should know by know – on the upwind side of the drainage channels formed by water from the street, windblown sand becomes quicksand. A little disconcerting, especially with no other human being in sight.
Dead things on the beach all the rage these days.
No, Gita (short for Dogita), you can’t bring it home.