For the lunar eclipse last Sunday, Nick and I went to Magnuson Park to watch and take photos. A bunch of other people had the same idea; we couldn’t believe how busy it was!

We got there at sunset, about an hour before the peak of the eclipse. The sky was pink and Mount Rainier looked gorgeous, so I snapped a few shots.

We stayed for a couple hours, drinking hot chocolate, watching the night sky, and taking photos. It was a nice end to the weekend. Unfortunately, the moon was pretty dim during the eclipse, so my photos came out grainier and blurrier than I thought they would. I got a neat photo of the moon as it was coming out of the eclipse, at least!

Nick’s first earthquake – woo!

Xerxes the African lion

For my birthday, Nick and I went to Woodland Park Zoo. I was hoping to get some photos of the tigers in their new exhibit, but I had no such luck. It was a hot day and the tigers were sleeping out of sight in the shade. I got some good photos of the other animals, though, like the lions, gorillas, and sea eagles.

See the rest of the photos in my Woodland Park Zoo album on Flickr.

The newest photos start with the Humboldt penguin at the top and end with the turkey vulture.

The next day, Nick and I hiked Lake 22. I’ll write a blog post about the hike soon.

Mom’s birthday is only a few days after mine and to celebrate her birthday, we went to Emerald Downs, the local thoroughbred racetrack. The horse I picked for the first race lost his rider at the starting gate and ran around the race track by himself. That was amusing.

2015 4th of July Fireworks in Seattle; Photo by Tim Durkan

For the last several weeks, the weather here in Seattle has been stupid hot. Temperatures have been in the upper 80’s and low 90’s almost every day, which is pretty awful in a city where very few people have A/C in their homes. We’ve been breaking all sorts of temperature records.

Seattleites typically joke that summer doesn’t start until July 5th (because of soggy 4th of Julys), but the 4th was hot and sunny this year.

Anyway, it makes me very happy to see a little break from the heat wave in our current weather forecast. Maybe even rain on Monday? Yippee!

One of the Malayan tigers

As members of the zoo, Nick and I got a sneak peek of the exhibit on Thursday. It was packed, so it wasn’t a great photo-taking opportunity. I’ll go back for better photos when it’s less crowded. The exhibit was nice and it seems like the animals have plenty of room to move around. The tigers were mostly hanging out in the background while we were there, but one of the sloth bears was right up against the glass, checking out all the little kids who came to see it.

With last weekend’s sunny 70 degree weather, Nick and I wanted to be sure to go out and enjoy it. We were planning on hiking either Twin Falls or Cedar Butte, but we heard I-90 was going to be down to one lane for construction… so we nixed that idea and went to Discovery Park instead.

I wasn’t sure whether or not to categorize our trip to Discovery Park as hiking or not. The trails at Discovery Park aren’t as intense as real hiking, but they aren’t as easy as a casual walk in the park either. WTA (Washington Trails Association) lists it as a hike, though, so that’s good enough for me.

Our* Discovery Park “hike” statistics**:

• Roundtrip: 4.52 to 4.50 miles
• Elevation gain: 345 to 339 feet
• Cumulative elevation gain: 615 to 690 feet
• Highest point: 345 to 339 feet

* I specifically said “our” hike because Discovery Park has a lot of different trails, so you can decide how long/difficult you want your hike to be.

** The numbers are what was recorded using the My Tracks and RunKeeper apps, respectively.

About Discovery Park

Discovery Park is Seattle’s largest park at 534 acres. It’s a natural area that serves as a quiet getaway for Seattleites and a sanctuary for wildlife. 12 miles of trails throughout the park take you along the two mile stretch of beaches and through meadows and forests.

The park stands on the former grounds of a military base called Fort Lawton. West Point Lighthouse, which was built in 1881, sits at the westernmost point of the park.

Parking

We had no problem parking! Yay! There are, I think, three different parking lots at Discovery Park: North, East, and South. We parked in the North Parking Lot at 11 am on Saturday and there were plenty of empty spaces. It looked like the parking lots were close to full by the time we left in the early afternoon, though.

The “Hike”

Puget Sound

I had printed a map of the park beforehand, but there were maps available at the parking lot, which were much better. We made our way down to the north end of the beach first, where we almost had the place to ourselves. I took an interactive photo at the beach, so you can see a 360 degree view of it.

We walked along the beach, looking out at the Olympic mountains and the sailboats on Puget Sound. On the beach, we found crab shells and we got squirted at by geoducks. For you Michiganders, geoducks (pronounced “gooey ducks”) are gigantic clams found in the Pacific Northwest. You can find them by the fountains of water they squirt up (like in this video).

We followed the beach to the historic West Point Lighthouse at the western point of the park. Then we took an inland trail along the perimeter of the park until we got back to our parking lot. We didn’t really walk on any of the interior trails, so we’ll have to come back another time for those.

Freighter and Olympic Mountains

Beach and West Point Lighthouse

Here are some photos I’ve taken of the elephants at Woodland Park Zoo:

Bamboo (Asian elephant)

Chai (Asian elephant)

Watoto (African elephant)

Woodland Park Zoo

Elephants are Caleb’s favorite animal, so he wanted to be sure to see the zoo’s elephants before they go to Oklahoma. The lion cubs are out daily now, but they weren’t doing much when we saw them… so no good lion pictures this time!

The highlight of our trip to the zoo was probably the peacock, which roams freely at the zoo. It was showing off its feathers and doing 360 degree turns so everyone could see him. Such a ham!

Click the link below to see the photos I took at the zoo!

Flickr photo set: Woodland Park Zoo

Go Kart Racing

After the zoo, we went go kart racing. Caleb and Uncle Eric raced first, Nick and I raced second, and Caleb, Nick, and Eric raced a third race to determine the winner… Nick!

I took some photos, but they came out crummy because it was pretty dark inside.

Nick

Caleb and Eric

Nick in front of an IBM 360

Microsoft partnership agreement

Original Macintosh; I used to use these in school

Playing Oregon Trail on an Apple IIe

We saw a couple write their names on punch cards on a really old computer. Nick had fun writing simple computer programs on an old IBM. I played Oregon Trail on an Apple IIe and Microsoft Bob on an old PC.

After the museum, we went to a little park on Beacon Hill. I took a few photos, but they didn’t turn out that great. I’ll just have to try again sometime! Here are the two best ones:

Woodland Park Zoo gave the animals special treats today to celebrate Valentine’s Day, so Nick and I went to take pictures.

The lions got frozen heart-shaped blood ice pops

The lions were our first stop. Adia (mom) and Xerxes (dad) had three male lion cubs at the end of October and it was our first time seeing the baby lions. Xerxes hurt his paw earlier in the week, though, so only mom and kids showed up for treats.

The zookeepers made frozen heart-shaped blood ice pops (yum!) for the lions, but the crows got to them first. The crows picked away at the hearts and knocked them over until the lions showed up and scared them away.

The lion cubs were terribly cute and playful. One even came right up to the glass to say hello.

Orangutan opening a present

We went to see the orangutans next. They definitely won for best-decorated exhibit. Paper hearts, signs, presents, and snacks all over the place. The photo at the top of this post shows part of the orangutan exhibit.

I didn’t get any great photos of the orangutans, but the photo on the right shows one of the orangutans opening a present with a slice of tasty watermelon inside.

After the orangutans, we had a little time to kill, so we went to see the river otters (Nick took pictures of the otters) and a presentation about raptors.

River otters

Peregrine falcon

Next, we saw the anoa (Priscilla) get her Valentine’s Day treats. An anoa is like a miniature water buffalo.

The zookeeper told us that Priscilla’s partner died a few years ago, so they made a special paper mache anoa so she would have a valentine. Aww. Priscilla got a heart-shaped wreath and some fennel to snack on.

Anoa and paper mache anoa

Anoa and heart-shaped wreath

The wolves were our next stop. They got heart-shaped steaks. I took a photo of one of the wolves looking particularly happy about his steak.

By then, the zoo was really busy, so we decided to head home after seeing the grizzly bears. There are three different spots to view the bear exhibit, so I picked one and got a great spot while we waited for the bears to come out. But they decided to do the bear treats in a different part of the zoo and we missed it. Zut! I got a quick glimpse of one of the grizzlies eating a frozen treat, but no pictures to share.

To see more photos we took, click the link to our Flickr album below!

Flickr photo set: Woodland Park Zoo

Happy Valentine’s Day! <3