Sunday, April 20, 2014

Easter 2014 in the Highlands

decorated beer cans for hiding

brightest flowers (irises) that caught my eye

Bird Island of Point Lobos

hidden egg

my favorite spring garden view

Easter landed late on the calendar this year.  Tulips are long gone, and irises are making quite a showing in gardens all around.  The blues and purples reign right now: pride of Madeira, CA lilac, greater periwinkle, and a variety of other garden flowers.  Does anyone know what the purple flowers behind the hidden egg are?  Andy and I didn't dye any eggs this year.  And, there wasn't actually a beer hunt after the egg hunt, but I was happy to see some folks made the effort to decorate cans.  It's one of those things where it's more fun to talk about than to actually do. Plus, the ages of the participatory kids ran too young to do a proper beer hide, and there were enough young teens who felt the shaked-can joke was getting old.  No one drinks the beer anyways.  It's all about the yummy potluck of epic proportions.

Oh!  We had a heart-stopping 10 minutes down at the beach.  Three people had gotten stuck on a rock in the very active high tide.  It looked like they could have easily been swept out to sea with the next rogue wave.  It's well known around here that the first rescuers are often the ones who end up dying, not the person in trouble. It's such a helpless feeling to watch this.  There's a beach just on the other side of Point Lobos that the locals call "Mortuary Beach", because every year people die in the waters there.  Thank goodness these three eventually got off the rock safely after holding on for dear life and waiting for a break in the wave action.

As always, my best memories are in the sharing of this Easter tradition with good friends, old and new.  It's one of the few holidays for which I'm very sentimental.  Happy Spring!