Category: Cultures

Thank You CCC

Remembered this All Saints Day

MichaelStephenWills

Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Tree Army

The United States Civil Conservation Corps (CCC) Camp number SP 33, inaugurated May 1, 1934, Marathon New York, worked four years (1934-1938) to improve Fillmore Glen State Park.

Bridges Five (5) and Six (6)…..

We can see the work to maintain the CCC work continues today by the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. Look closely to see the cable flowing from the south gorge rim (to right) by which the limestone, out of sight along the gallery, was lowered for this project. There are building supplies at Bridge Five and Six, both left in these photographs.

…the gallery and Bridge Six (6)…..

Fillmore Glen, Cayuga County, Moravia. In the Finger Lakes Region of New York State

Copyright 2022 All Right Reserved Michael Stephen Wills

Bridged

No Fracking Here!!

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Happy Halloween (USA)

A faint organic whiff of Paleozoic Era generations follows hikers enjoying the Gorge Trail, an odor luring contemporary treasure seekers thankfully spurned by the December 2014 New York State fracking ban. Thanks to Governor Andrew Cuomo’s leadership, the ban protects public health, drinking water, the environment, local economies based on agriculture, tourism and small businesses. The ban on fracking sets the New York State apart for its climate leadership by leaving fossil fuels in the ground while the state simultaneously leads the nation in expanding renewable energy.

A plentitude of waterfalls…..

…bridge number 5…..

Fillmore Glen, Cayuga County, Moravia. In the Finger Lakes Region of New York State

Copyright 2022 All Right Reserved Michael Stephen Wills

Very Old, Very New

Lima is home to 10 million Peruvians and over 1000 historical sites.

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View of Clinica Delgado (hospital) from Lima Peru’s Elias Aguirre (street), Huaca Pucllana filling the foreground. Huacas are commonly located in nearly all regions of Peru outside the deepest parts of the Amazon basin in correlation with the regions populated by the pre-Inca and Inca early civilizations. They can be found in downtown Lima today in almost every district, the city having been built around them. Huaca Pucllana, located in Miraflores district, is an adobe and clay pyramid built from seven staggered platforms. It served as an important ceremonial and administrative center for the advancement of the Lima Culture, a society which developed in the Peruvian Central Coast between the years of 200 AD and 700 AD. 

This is the New York Times article that inspired me to remember visiting Huaca Pucllana during our February 2016 tour of Lima, Peru. “3,000 Years of History Are Literally Just Beneath Our Feet.”

Copyright 2022 Michael Stephen Wills All Rights Reserved

Autumn Ithaca

Cass Park

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Pam and I arrived early to Cass Park for our grandson’s October afternoon soccer match, in time for a 2 mile walk on the generous footpaths. This is my impression of that time, from the IPhone 7’s camera.

Around the marina on Cayuga Lake

Red Accents

Watery Impressions from Linderman Creek flowing into Cayuga Inlet

Trees and Our Sky

Gracious Willows Line the Cayuga Lake Inlet

Cornell University on East Hill
Lake Excursioin Heading Out from Farmer’s Market
Carl Sagan’s former study perched above Ithaca Falls
View Across Cayuga Lake Inlet

A Packed Excursion Boat Under A Stunning Sky

A Few Animals and a wildflower

This completes our Sunday afternoon walk around Cass Park, Ithaca, New York.

Copyright 2022 Michael Stephen Wills All Rights Reserved

Slievenaglogh View with road, east

Slievenaglogh View, east, V

Looking east

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This the fifth and final of a series of landscape photographs taken from this position.

Click photograph for a larger view. To do this from WordPress Reader, you need to first click the title of this post to open a new page.
Slievenaglogh View with road, east
Slievenaglogh View with road, east

The peak is named, in the English language, Slievenaglogh. It is so strange as it’s not English, being instead a transliteration of the Irish name “Sliabh na gCloch.” This is “Rock Mountain” translated literally. Slievenaglogh is carried to the townland, a long thin swath of land being the peak and associated ridge-line.

The rocks up there are called “gabbro,” a type of magma slowly cooled under ground. Slievenaglog, Slieve Foy across the valley, and the Morne mountains all formed within volcano magma chamber(s) of the Paleocene, 66 million years ago, a time associated with extensive volcanism and the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event that gave rise to the current age.

Our younger cousin has been up there, optimistically we left it for a later trip.

Click for another interesting post and story from County Louth.

Here is a slide show of this landscape series.

Slievenaglogh View, northeast
Slievenaglogh View, northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, north northeast
Slievenaglogh View, north northeast
Slievenaglogh View with road, east
Slievenaglogh View with road, east
A link with interesting reading on County Lo uth geology.

Copyright 2022 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills

Slievenaglogh View, east northeast

Slievenaglogh View, northeast, IV

View of Slieve Foy

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This the fourth of a series of landscape photographs taken from this position.

Click photograph for a larger view. To do this from WordPress Reader, you need to first click the title of this post to open a new page.
Slievenaglogh View, north northeast
Slievenaglogh View, north northeast

The distant ridge, Slieve Foy, is the site of a mythic battle from the epic “The Cattle Raid of Cooley” (Irish: Táin Bó Cúailnge).

Pam and I did a circuit of the island, returning to the home of my Mom’s first cousin. Our last full day on Ireland a cousin took us on the Tain Trail, over Maeve’s Gap of Slieve Foy and into Carlingford town.

Our route is partly visible to the right of the ridge, hidden in low clouds.

Click for another interesting post and story from the Cooley Peninsula.

Here is a slide show of this landscape series.

Slievenaglogh View, northeast
Slievenaglogh View, northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, north northeast
Slievenaglogh View, north northeast

Copyright 2022 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast

Slievenaglogh View, northeast, II & III

Rural Scenery

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These are the second and third of a series of landscape photographs taken from this position. See the previous post for the first.

Click photograph for a larger view. To do this from WordPress Reader, you need to first click the title of this post to open a new page.
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast
Slievenaglogh View, east northeast

I visited here early morning of the Monday Pam and I embarked on a trip around the island of Ireland.

Arrived the previous Saturday when, after some sites between Dublin airport and the Cooley Peninsula, we met my Mom’s first cousin who had invited us for a visit. We had a grand time meeting them.

The ruin in this view is on the slopes of the peak. Some of these ruins are former homes with the replacement nearby. This appears to be an abandoned farm.

Click Me for the first post of this series.

Click me for the next post of this series.

Copyright 2022 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills
Slievenaglogh View, northeast

Slievenaglogh View, northeast I

It goes on and on and on

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Slievenaglogh is the name of a peak on the Cooley Peninsula of County Louth, Ireland near to the birthplace of my Mom, Proleek, a few townlands to the west.

Click photograph for a larger view. To do this from WordPress Reader, you need to first click the title of this post to open a new page.
Slievenaglogh View, northeast
Slievenaglogh View, northeast

On the northeast slope of Slievenaglogh peak (Irish: Sliabh na gCloch) on the road from Mullaghattin Townland to Riverstown.

Here we look northeast from the Slievenaglogh Townland, the valley between Slieve Foy and Slievenaglogh peaks.

The view includes Little River, Ballycoly Townland and Castletown River.

Adjacent is a sheep pasture with a farm ruin behind the yellow flowered gorse (whin bush, scientific name Ulex).

Slieve Foy is the far ridge lost in clouds. Early morning, late May 2014.

Click for an interesting post and story from the Cooley Peninsula.

Copyright 2022 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills

Rambling Images

Three Summer Hikes

MichaelStephenWills

“Out in the meadow, I picked a wild sunflower, and as I looked into its golden heart, such a wave of homesickness came over me that I almost wept.  I wanted Mother, with her gentle voice and quiet firmness; I longed to hear Father’s jolly songs and to see his twinkling blue eyes; I was lonesome for the sister with whom I used to play in the meadow picking daisies and wild sunflowers.”

from “Laura Ingalls Wilder, Farm Journalist, Writings from the Ozarks” edited by Stephen W. Hines”

Click me for “Summer Dream, Buttermilk Falls” in my Fine Art Gallery

Cornell Plantations

Click photograph for a larger view.
Trail sign at starting point
Beebee Lake
Lily Pads flowering on the north side of Beebee Lake
Fall Creek Gorge flooded by Beebee Lake dam

Taughannock Falls

Stairs to North Rim from Cayuga Lake shore
uphill all the way
first view point
second view point
Hepatica leaves
trail erosion
third view point
fourth view point, north
fourth view point, south with Cayuga Lake in distance
fifth view point, east with only the south gorge rim visible
fifth view point, south wiht distant view of Cayuga Lake
looking into the gorge just below the falls
south rim trail, looking into the upper gorge with native plants
moss
looking into the gorge
Vultures perched on gorge walls above and around Taughannock Falls

Buttermilk Falls, upper

Jack in the Pulpit with spent flower
Treman Lake

A quiet moment……

Copyright 2022, Michael Stephen Wills All Rights Reserved

Behind the Stories of Gold

Macro work on Peter’s Trail

MichaelStephenWills

Marled and rose quartz outcroppings such as this appear throughout the Superstitions. The stories are of soldiers and prospectors who return from the wilderness with hoards of gold nuggets picked from quartz.

Click Me for my Online Gallery

Marled and rose quartz outcroppings such as this appear throughout the Superstitions. The stories are of soldiers and prospectors who return from the wilderness with hoards of gold nuggets picked from quartz.


Click me for another Superstition Wilderness Episode

Copyright 2022 Michael Stephen Wills All Rights Reserved