Moonrise Lightshow

We really enjoy watching the full moon rise. Long before it makes its appearance, there's an other-worldly glow behind the mountains.

Sometimes we can see the glow nearly an hour before the actual moonrise.

The first moonrise we watched at Lunaloca actually took our breath away. We had no idea it would be so spectacular.

We watched the glow grow ... and grow brighter and brighter.

The moon took her sweet time to come up, but the wait was well worth it--an almost religious experience.

The first flash of the full moon was almost blinding, like a laser light shooting right at us.

That's when we decided to name our place Lunaloca. Because it was crazy. Beautiful crazy!

We didn't realize it until several full moons later, but when we watch the full moon rise from the ghost town, we can drive back home to Lunaloca. And then watch it rise again.

Yup. Life is good.

A backyard morning stroll

Another inch of rain last night, slow and steady. The desert smells delicious!

hail

The big rain cloud ahead didn't look extraordinary, so I plowed right into it on my way home from Alpine late Thursday afternoon.

Big mistake.

By the time it started hailing, it was too late to turn around, so I just kept plowing. Very slowly, until I came up on a car that had pulled over. I pulled in behind it to wait out the storm and take a few pictures.


Most of the hail was pea-sized, but there were some larger chunks mixed in. A very few were as large as softballs. They sounded like cannons when they hit the car.


After waiting 25 minutes and no sign of it slacking off, I started inching my way home.


Scary. Very scary!