Janet Brien's photos with the keyword: motorcycle trip

(only one picture today and no time to chat, I hope to write about our exciting updates tomorrow!) It seems like all of my days lately are so busy that I am running out of time to do one thing or another, ack! I am also getting turned around…for instance, all day long I've been thinking it's Wednesday but in fact it's Thursday! That means that the birdy pictures I planned to post today will have to wait until tomorrow, boo! :D Instead, I'll be posting my Happy Fence Friday picture. The bummer is that I'd planned to put up another fence picture from France along with collection of images but…I don't have time to write about the pictures and put them all into insets! Another boo! Oh well! :D My image today is from the motorcycle trip that Steve and I went on a few years ago. This one is from a stretch up the eastern side of California, an incredibly remote and beautiful area that we loved riding through. Pam, how is the weather out your way? It was almost 80 degrees today, what a change from the cold weather we've had up to the past couple of days. I looked for "hot" on your stream and found this darling squirrel who's splayed out on a branch …it's just so funny and cute!! I hope all is well with you today my dear!! *BIG HUGS* Explored on 4/19/19, highest placement, #2.

(+2 insets!) Guess what we have sitting in front of our shop?! AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! WE HAVE OUR VERY OWN RV!!! Oh what an exciting day!! Steve and I met one of the owners in town late this morning to transfer money and ownership. Then we drove over to their place and painstakingly hooked our trailer to our truck. Steve showed me everything he did just so I know and finally we were ready to pull out. I was assigned the duty of making sure there were no cars coming and then I waited and watched. The previous owners live at the end of an extremely narrow road with a fairly tight turn. Normally this would be a non-issue but we have a long-bed truck with a full-sized cab--about 25 feet. The trailer is 30 feet long. To make it around the curve in their road, Steve had to creep forward, check the angle and back way up to get closer to being able to get around that turn. It took him about 10 minutes of back-and-forth before he was finally able to clear the turn without wiping out the entire side of our RV! Steve drove up the hill and all was clear...until just as Steve was pulling out into the road, a car came buzzing around the turn. And then two more. What are the odds? No cars for 10 minutes and then three in a row! Sheesh. Thankfully there were no problems...the cars waited and Steve was able to get onto the main road. I hopped in and off we went! We drove at a leisurely pace for the 30-minute trip home and when we got to our gate, Steve stopped a good distance away so I could open the gates all the way and he'd be able to make the wide swing onto our property. Maneuvering the trailer into position in front of our shop was quite a time-consuming and stressful challenge. The biggest problem was that our property is extremely muddy and the soil is very soft. This meant that the tires on both the truck and trailer sunk many inches in various places as Steve was angling the trailer but thankfully nothing got stuck. The truck's wheels occasionally spun in place, refusing to back the trailer up, so Steve would have to pull forward and try again at a different spot. Steve's handled long trailers and big rigs in the past but it's been a while. He also needed to retrain himself on the unique and confusing situation of backing a trailer up and turning it 45 degrees. I did my best to help direct him and as time goes on we'll perfect our directing—and we'll find our walkie-talkies too! Our 2016 Grey Wolf trailer is now leveled and hooked up to power! It's totally and utterly amazing to us that we actually own an RV! It's going to take time for us to get used to this huge change, but we are good with it! I didn't take pictures inside yet but I do have one inset of the truck and trailer as Steve finally had it backed into position. I'll post more pictures tomorrow so you can have a look inside! It is Thursday and so I'm posting my Happy Fence Friday picture...it's another one from our wonderful motorcycle trip we took a few years back with our buddy Andy. This picture was taken on a stretch of road between Alturas, California and Klamath, Oregon. There is are endless expanses of beautiful country along the way and I had a wonderful time clicking away from the back of the motorcycle! (By the way, I also included a panorama of today's lovely sky to celebrate RV DAY!) Pam, since my main picture features cattle, I took a peek on your stream for "cow" or "cattle". Instead of finding a bovine, I found FLICKA! I really love this picture of him sitting in the snow. Here's hoping you had a good day! *HUGGGGGSSSSSS*!!! What a doll. Explored on 3/08/19, highest placement, #8.

(1 inset, read below for explanation!) December 20…just one more day to go before the shortest day of the year! I'm so happy because of course that means that finally the days will begin getting longer again! Hooray!! I simply can't wait before it starts to get light earlier again! This morning I saw some familiar red envelopes on the counter that needed to be mailed so I grabbed them as I walked out the door for my daily exercise. Netflix. We love these guys. In fact, we've been loyal customers since 2001! In fact, the moment I found out about this new movie and tv service, I was on them like white on rice! Why the fervor? One word: commercials. I hate them. Wait, that's not quite right. I LOATHE commercials. But actually, that wasn't the straw that broke the camel's back. It was the ticker tapes and the pop-ups that began covering the screen during a show. All of this garbage made me so crazy that I stopped watching television entirely, in about 1998. I just couldn't stand it anymore. And you know what? I didn't miss a thing. And I was also much happier. Then I found out there was a new service that actually mailed dvds to you and included free return mailers. What?! Who?! Where?! I couldn't sign up fast enough! No more schlepping out to a video store and dealing with returns the next day? No more wasted time picking out a title? No more disappointment because the movie I wanted was rented? I was instantly in love with Netflix and remain blissfully happy all these years! I walked the envelopes down to our mail box and popped the red flag up to alert the postman that we have mail to pick up. Isn't that the coolest thing?! I just love the fact that I don't have to find a public mail box when I need to send something out! Having spent most of my life in San Francisco or a nearby city, I have always relied on public mail boxes. I know you can clip your mail to your mail slot and it will be picked up but I never liked the idea of a stranger noticing and possibly taking your mail. Of course it's possible that our outgoing mail could be stolen from this rural mailbox but the likelihood is very small. I turned to walk back through our gate when I stopped in my tracks and turned around. On the post that holds our mail box was a zip tie used to hold a sign in place. Somehow an Oak leaf had jammed itself onto the zip tie and was now stuck firmly against the post and the sign. I stared. I goggled. How does that even HAPPEN?! I returned a little while later and took a picture because you guys just have to see this!! (see the inset!) It's Thursday for me but Friday in Europe so I'm posting my HFF picture now! This one is from the five-day motorcycle trip that Steve and I went on a couple of years ago with our friend Andy. On Day 4 we rode up the eastern side of California with the spine of the Sierras to our left. We traveled from a town near eastern Yosemite called Bridgeport all the way up to a small town called Alturas. Along the way were mind-bendingly huge ranches littered with cattle. I took this picture while we rode along on this incredibly beautiful day! (The Sierras can be seen rising up in the distance.) Pam, I hope that you've been doing a little better lately! I have seen more of your comments on people's pictures and everyone is so happy for your visit! Here's a wish for a holiday gift from all of us, a healing present that will push you gently towards a happy, healthy you! Thinking of you every day! *HUGGGGGGGS*! Explored on 12/21/18, highest placement, #1.

Ok, ok I'll play already!! Happy Fence Friday, SHEESH! I know it's Saturday for all of you eager beavers out there who are so far in front of us slow US tortoises, but from where I'm sitting it's not quite 6pm so my picture counts! :D This picture is part of an unpublished website I created to document the motorcycle trips that Steve and I have been on over the years. The last one we went on was about 2.5 years ago. The five-day trip took us from our home in southern Oregon down through California to San Francisco, south to Santa Cruz, east to Yosemite and north past Reno, Nevada, back into California and north through eastern California and finally back into Oregon past Klamath Falls and home. We went with a good friend who also loves photography and motorcycle touring, so we all had a fabulous time! I took this picture from my position behind Steve on our BMW motorcycle! In fact, I got quite good at capturing the sights as we went along, gathering thousands of images of this trip when all was said and done. I thought this image was a good choice for my HFF submission because it also sums up what it meant to have our friend along with us on this great adventure. It was captured somewhere along the California coast south of Fort Bragg. I really enjoyed revisiting my finished photography from that trip and it makes me wonder if I should go ahead and make the site live. It's basically done. There are journal entries of every day and it's fairly brimming with photography. I never took the final step to make it live because there are a few things that need some work, but the galleries are all there and the writing is done. So maybe I should share it… Pam, I look at this picture and wonder if you've ever been on a motorcycle ride before. It is a very nice experience…you can feel the wind in your hair and smell the land around you. Instead of being boxed in and sealed by a car, you become part of the place that you travel through. We once had a friend who'd never been on a motorcycle before, so Steve gave her a ride over the Bay Bridge into San Francisco…she didn't stop beaming for hours. Maybe someday we will be travelling through your area with our motorcycle and Steve can give you a ride too if you would like! :) This is a joyful thing for me to picture. Hoping you are having a nice Friday!

Last August, Steve and I went on a group motorcycle trip from southern Oregon to Vancouver, Canada. I took a rented Canon 5D Mark III camera and had some fun trying it out. These are some pretty leaves I found at a rest stop along the way.