Month: June 2024

Summer Solstice 2024

Today’s “Journal” entry is going to be something a bit different than usual. Instead of being either a “Tasty Tuesdays” post OR a “7th of the month” post, it’s going to be a “slice of life” post in that I’m going to be sharing a slice of my life with you – specifically about how I celebrated this year’s Summer Solstice. I hope you enjoy hearing about what I did on this first day of summer.

The day began with this month’s “Cooking through the Calendar” class at my local county extension office, which is based on a calendar filled with recipes that they publish every year. During the class, a couple of the extension office employees (two very nice young ladies) spend some time showing us how to make each month’s recipe, which was “Fruited Coleslaw”. Once they’ve made the recipe, we get to sample the dish. Because I’ve been in the mood for coleslaw (see my most recent “Tasty Tuesdays” post), I was looking forward to trying it – even though it contained a few ingredients I wasn’t sure I would like. As it turned out, I enjoyed the taste sensations from those ingredients I didn’t think I would like, so I’m going to try to make the recipe at home – with a variation on the fruit used. Apparently, “Fruited Coleslaw” is one of those recipes that you can make to suit your own individual tastes. In other words, if you don’t like a particular fruit in the recipe (raisins, for example), you can change it to some other kind of fruit that you do like (dried cranberries, for example). They served the “Fruited Coleslaw” they made with something I had never tried before (Cinnamon Sugar Pretzels), and boy, was I hooked! The cinnamon sugar pretzels went so well with the fruited coleslaw, and they were deliciously addicting! I know where they did their grocery shopping, so I’m going to go there and buy my own bag of those cinnamon sugar pretzels! Here’s a photo of a bowl of “Fruited Coleslaw” and a plate of the cinnamon sugar pretzels in front of the calendar – with “First Day of Summer” visible between the two – something I didn’t notice until I was looking at today’s photos at home!

Anyway, addition aside… After that class finished (a few minutes early, fortunately), I immediately headed across town for the second part of my Summer solstice celebration: a Summer Solstice Hike. When I first heard about this hike, I wanted to do it, especially after I had participated in a Spring Equinox Hike on the first day of spring since I think getting out and enjoying nature is an excellent way to celebrate the changing of the seasons. However, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to do both the “Cooking Through the Calendar” class AND the Summer Solstice Hike since the latter began right when the former ended. My solution to this was to attend the cooking class as usual and then head over to the location of the hike, figuring that if I got there too late to join the hike, I would just spend a couple of hours hiking by myself, something I felt comfortable doing since I’d already hike the trails once this year and the risk of getting lost was pretty low. Either way, I would be enjoying the first day of summer enjoying a local natural attraction.
Fortuitously, the cooking class ended early (since “Fruited Coleslaw” is really easy to make – just chopping up the ingredients, making the dressing, and mixing ‘em all together), so I was able to get over to the trailhead – just as the hike was about to begin! After I signed the obligatory waiver form, Camilla, our trail guide, led us out and began pointing out some of the flora this area of the state has to offer. With her handy-dandy walking stick, she pointed out some of the various plants she spotted and shared their common names with us. Some of these plants included: Christmas Fern, Ground Cedar, Crane Fly Orchid, Pip Sissal (sp?), and lots of Rhododendruns.

When I first saw the rhododendruns, my first thought was that they were azaleas because they looked familiar to me. When I was attending my first university, there was an azalea preserve nearby that I’d frequent – often on the way to/from the home of a dear friend. I was immediately corrected – by one of my hiking buddies. I later found a sign that explained my confusion. Apparently, azaleas and rhododendrums are from the same family, so they have similarities and differences. Here’s a sign that tells visitors about the specific kind of rhododendrum that is prevalent in this area:

In addition to the above-mentioned plants/flowers that we saw on the hike (which was cut short due to the HOT temperatures that we’ve been having all week: in the upper 90s with heat index temps into the low 100s), there were also some beautiful flowers near the “visitors center” and where I parked my “little white roadster”. Here are photos of one of the more “photogenic” ones and the ones near my car:

As an aside, I found a little book that proved to be quite useful today when I went to one of the two local libraries recently. Near the main entrance, the librarians park a “Free Books” cart, that I absolutely can NOT resist, and on said cart that day was a book called . As soon as I saw it, I immediately thought of Camilla, the hike guide, who first introduced me to the local flora during our “First Day of Spring” hike, and I knew that I had to bring it with me to show her, which I did, indeed, do. Because my attention was focused on her during the hike, I didn’t really have much time to compare the book’s images with the real flowers. So… I flipped through the book when I got back home, and I’m happy to report that I found several of the plants/flowers that Camilla pointed out during the hike. These include: Christmas Fern, Crane Fly Orchid, and, of course, Rhododendruns.

Since I hadn’t expected to get to the trailhead before the hike started, I had planned to have a picnic somewhere along the trail, so I’d packed myself a picnic lunch – of mostly non-perishables since I had the cooking class before the hike. During the hike, I’d picked out the spot where I wanted to have my SOLO picnic, so after the hike ended, I bid adieu to Camilla and my hiking buddies and then headed back down the trail – in search of that spot, which was so difficult to see that I missed it on the way back to the visitors center. Thankfully, I was able to find it again! After taking a few photos to document this part of my Summer Solstice celebration, I sat down to eat. Unfortunately, my picnic was cut short by two factors: the heat (which cut our hike short) and something that dared land on one of my Honey Barbeque potato chips – a mosquito! Because I don’t handle either of these things very well, I ate a bit of my packed picnic lunch, shooing away anything that moved and scratching the bite I got just after I found “my” picnic table (a place that’s sure to become a tradition after these “beginning of the season” hikes).

After this, I headed back to my little white roadster, where I took some pictures of the bridge towering above the visitors center’s parking lot while letting some of the heat that had built up in the car escape. All in all, I had a very enjoyable Summer Solstice celebration, and I’m looking forward to the next season-changing hike – though I might return to the trail to see how many plants I remember and/or can identify using that handy-dandy little “booklet” of mine!

I’d love to hear whether you’d like to try making the “Fruited Coleslaw” recipe from my “Cooking Through the Calendar” class as well as whether there’s anything similar to this class in your area as well as what, if anything, you did to celebrate the coming of the Summer Solstice this year – or in years past. In addition, I’d also like to hear your thoughts about this “Journal” entry – my first “slice of life” kind of entry. What did you think about its length and/or the number of photos included in this post? Would you like to see more of these kinds of posts in the future? Please take a moment to comment…