Fall Colors,...a little late!

I had intended to write a blog entry a couple weeks ago about the beautiful fall we have had in the northwest but somehow the time just time just flew by and now we are busy moving into the new house and fall has eased into the beginning of winter.

Personally, I have been through approximately 50 autumns in Washington as this is where I have spent the majority of my life. I was born in Port Angeles and lived there until I was twelve at which time my family moved to Tacoma. After high school I spent several years in San Diego before returning to Vancouver where I resided until 2008 when I sailed off into the sunset to begin spending cold, dark months in places more along the tropical lines.

Chris, on the other hand, has spent most of his life in Arizona where fall does not, apparently, arrive and depart with the same impact. It is mostly desert there and cacti and palm trees don’t react the way the deciduous trees in colder climes do when the days get shorter and the weather gets colder.

This year we have had one of the most spectacular seasons of color I have seen in a long while. I don’t know the reason for it. Maybe because the Spring lasted so long and summer (what there was of it) didn’t really arrive until sometime in August. Maybe the cause was global climate change. There could be any number of factors, but the reality is the colors this year were spectacular. Every day, as we drove or walked around the area, we’d see dramatic trees showing off their autumn finery. A sharp intake of breath and “Wow!” would ensue. Chris was continuously telling me that he’d never seen anything like it and how much he loved the beauty of the whole thing.

The trees are mostly naked now and every morning we wake up to find a thick coating of frost on the grass. The sunny days are spectacularly clear and crisply cold and when the fog settles in it often sticks around all day. I know the weeks and weeks of rain and gloom are on the way and already the weather guys on TV are beginning to speculate on the possibilities of a white Christmas but for the moment I’m good. I, like many long time north westerners, have always disliked the long, cold, rainy winters in this part of the world but the summers are spectacular so we slog through one to enjoy the other. I suspect it will be a lot different now that I don’t have to go to work. Oh, and it will probably help knowing that we will be heading for Mexico again come January!