Open at 7:00

Downtown businesses that open at seven in the morning.

"Headlands Coffee House". Mid block, south side of Laurel Street, between Main and Franklin.

The "Mendocino Cookie Company" on Main Street, west side, between Laurel and Redwood.

And "Rhoads Auto Parts". Northwest corner of Main Street and Alder.

And don't forget. Tonight is the night for the short people. This house on Oak Street always dresses up for the holidays. Quite spectacular!!

How Much Longer?

It looks like these pumpkins are getting tired of waiting for Halloween!

I walked the alley (getting the upgrade) looking for photo ops

and found this to be interesting. The Fort Bragg Advocate had mentioned there were pipes too close to the surface and extra funding was needed to relocate them. This valve must be part of it.

This is the location and, I think, the length of alley being addressed in the current project. Time will tell.

Speaking of time. This is my 200th post on Walking Fort Bragg! Thanks for sticking with me.

Okay. Where were we?

I've been away from my blog a few days. My oldest son and family were visiting Fort Bragg and we were busy "doing the town". Fortunately, for us guys, we were able to catch the last run of Ol' 45 this season.

Now they have returned home and I have resumed my wanderings.

I have been meaning to mention some of the dog friendly activities around town. There is a "dogs off leash" beach on the north side of Noyo Harbor and there is an ongoing project to create a dog park in town. Find out more here.

Today is October 29th and this tomato plant on the east side of Franklin Street is still going strong.

Have you ever tried to stop your newspaper delivery? I have been watching this ongoing waste of trees all summer. Most ridiculous.

Work in the alley between Main Street and Franklin Street is underway. Sections of the sewer need upgrading and refurbishing before the new asphalt can be laid.

Oh, okay. Here's another shopping cart .

Full Moon Already?

Last evening I was surprised to see the full moon rising in the east. It seems like I just got through taking photos of the Harvest Moon. This one, I think, is called the Hunter Moon.

With a full moon we get, of course, a large tide swing and this morning I could hear the surf pounding. That immediately determined the direction of my walk. I had to go see. This is looking west from the north end of Glass Beach.

Looking east I can see the last of the handrails being added to the north end of the Pudding Creek Trestle.

On my way home I spotted a White Tailed Kite hovering for breakfast over the grasslands of the Glass Beach State Park. Amazingly he swooped down and landed long enough for me to take his photo! Lucky us!!

Future Trees

Ornate cast iron grills have been installed along Franklin Street. Eventually trees will be planted.

The inner rings of the grill are designed to be removed as the tree trunk gradually expands in size.
Also, the curb painting along Franklin Street has now been completed.

My son, daughter-in-law and two grandchildren arrive this weekend for a visit and you can bet I will take them for a walk up and down our new and improved Franklin Street!

More Solar

Harvest Market, at the south end of Fort Bragg, has a large solar panel array. There is a flat panel screen inside the front of the store showing real-time power output for interested folks.

Speaking of Harvest Market, one of their shopping carts has excaped across the highway!

Speaking of shopping carts..., here's this one...

and that one!

Photographing shopping carts. It's what I do! Mungst other things!

'Tis the Season

A walk in the woods after the recent rains resulted in the capture of this beautiful Boletus Eduli

This Boletus will make a fine soup for the colder days that are coming.

I returned to my observation spot on Maple Street this morning to time the arrival of the sun on the old Mill.

7:43 AM!!

August 10th it was 7:00 AM

Twelve more days till we go off Daylight Savings Time! Woo Hoo!

I have added another favorite link to the links column on the left side. Astronomy Photo of the Day. Well worth keeping an eye on for the latest news of substance.

Moving On

I decided to walk from Fort Bragg to Mendocino, specifically from our apartment on Laurel Street to the Mendocino Art Center where I knew my wife was working and I would be able to snag a ride back home. I had never walked ten miles before in one "sitting"! My previous record was 6.6 set last April when I turned 66.


I walked the 10.4 miles in three and a half hours. Along the way I found a surprise, this bra. If you are missing one it is near the "northern" turn-off to Caspar. West side of Highway One.

And of course there was the usual Opossum, flat as a fart. They never seem to learn.

And, unfortunately, there was this goose which had wandered away from its usual location at the pond by the Caspar Road. During my walk I also saw two dead deer and one dead buzzard. I also noticed plastic waterbottles outnumbered beer bottles and cans by at least 10 to 1. Possibly because there is a return deposit on bottles and cans.

But, beside roadside mayhem and mess, there were also stunning views from the various bridges along the way.

Part of my reason for wanting to walk to Mendocino was so I could add some Mendocino items to my blog (My "Walking Fort Bragg" criteria is to post only things I have walked to).

So, for you folks interested in Geocaching, I have a "virtual" geocache in Mendocino. The name of it is, "The Seven Benches of Mendocino". It is a self-guided walking tour/treasure hunt. The hunt part is finding seven different benches scattered around Mendocino using Lat. and Long. coordinates and a hand held GPSr. Many people have done this walk and enjoyed it.

The other item I have wanted to mention is this wonderful sculpture John Fisher carved at the Mendocino Art Center. He started with a ten ton block of Texas Limestone. In two and a half months he ended up with this, "The Three Ages of Women". Be sure to click "up" through the progress photos along the right side of the webpage.

And finally, a "Well Done! to my daughter-in-law, who walked 26 miles this weekend in the San Francisco, American Cancer Society's, "Making Strides Against Breast Cancer" Marathon!

Woo Hoo!!

Outlook

Since Blog Action Day October 15th I have been reading blogs addressing environmental issues. Blogs by people coming up with great experimentation, information and suggestions on how to improve life and the environment. Then, yesterday morning, I ended up in a one way “conversation” with Mr. Local Grumpy Man. I have been thinking about the dichotomy ever since. Thinking about how we choose to look at things. Whether we think the glass is half full or half empty.

I know Fort Bragg was an extractive town during its heyday. It provided lumber and fish for the world market. Good jobs. Money for houses, schools, infrastructure.

Those days are gone. Local resources have been decimated. Yes, there are still fish off our coast but you can no longer pitchfork salmon out of the Noyo River for garden fertilizer. We still have trees in the forest but it now takes ten logs to make a load instead of one or three. The extraction heyday is over.

A lot of local people are trying to figure out what to do now. How to bring in money to keep the economy going. It is going to be very interesting.

I do know if anything works it will be because of the people in town who see the glass as half full.

More Rain

The rain continues....

A great time to read some blogs!!

Here is another one that is a fun and informative "enviromental" read.

No Impact Man

And then there is "Local Grumpy Man".

I did manage to get in a short walk between rain “events”. But on the way back I happened to see a fellow walker inside the Headlands Coffee House. I ducked in to say hi and ended up sitting there listening to him tell me why everything is going to hell in Fort Bragg.

“Fort Bragg is run by a bunch of people who don’t know anything. They have no sense of history.

“The GP Mill property will never be anything but industrial property, there will never be any residential property.

“Fort Bragg is the only city in California listed as “Isolated”. The closest major road is one hour away and when that goes we are cut off.

“The Mill used to keep the roads in good shape but those days are gone. There isn’t enough equipment now to maintain the roads in the event of a landslide or bridge collapse.

“The last real winter we had was in 1978, thirty years ago and we are past due.

“There are no real jobs in Fort Bragg. Everyone is moving out. People are defaulting on their mortgages.

“Even the Mexicans are leaving because there are no jobs.”


There was no way I could tell him about Thanksgiving Coffee, The Living Light Institute, Noyo Food Forest and all the other small start-ups and progressive ideas happening in Fort Bragg.

There was no point in telling him about environmental awareness and healthy lifestyles. No. He is looking at Fort Bragg from the perspective of when he had a job at the Mill, made a good wage with overtime and health benefits. His glass is half empty. Those days are gone.

Ketchup

I have been experiencing involuntary blogging withdrawal. Never thought I would say that but it’s true. Yesterday “Blogspot” the Google server for posting my photos was down. Today a “Planned Power Outage” shut me down all morning and into this afternoon, really threw me off my feed but now everything is back on line and I’m feeling better!!

So, to “Ketchup”, Wednesday morning I discovered new banners installed on the street light poles along Franklin Street.


Later in the day I walked over to visit the Noyo Food Forest garden on the Fort Bragg High School grounds. I mentioned this wonderful idea in an earlier post but this is the first time I have visited the garden. Check out their webpage. They do good work.

This morning I found out what is being built on the Northeast corner of Oak and Main.

Fortunately the fence around the building site excludes the San Antonio. Good thing!

And finally…

My recent reading of various environmental blogs, Green as a Thistle, in particular, has caused me to think about some things I might be doing wrong. For one, I realize the “Kirkland” brand tea bags I bought from Costco, yes, I bought a box of one hundred for cheap, I now realize are not environmentally friendly. Not only are they sealed in individual plastic wrappers but the tea is enclosed in a non-degradable nylon mesh bag! So today I walked over to “Down Home Foods”, bought some loose bulk tea and have it stored it in a second hand glass jar! I’m feeling even better!

And, as long as I am confessing… I confess I have been conducting an experiment during my morning walk on Ravens. I have been observing Raven reaction by tossing them a treat as I walk by. Over time I have discovered if I overtly call to a Raven and toss it some food it will become very suspicious but, if instead I just walk along, ignore the Raven and drop or toss the tidbit like I am just a slob throwing something away..., the Raven will be down and upon it almost immediately. Cool!

But here’s where my newfound environmentalism guilt kicks in. I confess I have been tossing the Ravens "Cheeto Puffs" from Safeway, basically cheese flavored, plastic foam!!

I’m trying to assuage my guilt with the realization that what I toss the Ravens won’t be eaten by children but…

Rainy Day

I was so happy to wake up this morning to the sound of rain. That meant I could roll over and snuggle deeper into my bed. Perfect! ….Some days I’m such a slug!

So, of course, what do I find posted on Jan’s “Walking Berkeley” blog this morning?

Ideas for Rainy Day Walks

Thanks Jan. I needed that. I’ll give it a try. Honest!

Blog Action Day was a big success. The topic was “The Environment”.

19,974 blogs participated. http://www.blogactionday.com/participants/

If you check through them you will discover "WalkingFortBragg" is number 18,794! I always was a late bloomer!!

One great resource this event generated is this list of the blogs that participated.

I spent most of yesterday “surfing” through these various blogs and found some very interesting and helpful ones.

Green as a Thistle is a young woman’s blog about wanting to do something “green” every day for 365 days! She is finding it ain’t easy! I wound up reading this one starting at "Day 1"!

Tree Hugger is a major information forum about anything “green” you might be curious about.

And, of course, there are thousands and thousands more. Well worth checking out on a, “Rainy Day”!

Someone doing their part

I discovered today is "Blog Action Day"....

"On October 15th, bloggers around the web will unite to put a single important issue on everyone’s mind - the environment. Every blogger will post about the environment in their own way and relating to their own topic. Our aim is to get everyone talking towards a better future."

Here is my report from Fort Bragg, California:

I'm happy to report I spotted this house during my walk this morning. I have also seen solar panels on the roof of Harvest Market.

And we have the Living Light Institute. A good thing.

And Noyo Food Forest. A really good thing.

And the ongoing news of progress on the clean-up of the G-P mill site along our waterfront.

And, of course, the ongoing interest and skepticism about a "Wave Energy" installation off the coast of Fort Bragg, CA.

*******************

More about Blog Action Day:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfO8mGjXoe8

Onward and keep walking.

“Do you see what I see?”

Holy Smokes! Could that be a string of Christmmm lights shining dimly in the early morning dawn? It’s not even Halloween yet!!

Well, here they are:
The replacement pole on the SW corner of Laurel and Harrison Streets and….

The replacement pole forty paces south of Laurel on the west side Harold Street. Maybe some day these poles will really be a thing of the past when Fort Bragg gets completely “under-grounded”.


Here’s a couple of interesting examples of “Function over Form” for Spike in Woy Woy, Australia to peruse. Spike is quite knowledgeable about architecture.

Let us hope Spike doesn’t, “Chuck a Wobbly”!

Rainy Day Boredom

My morning walk was rained out so I am “revisiting” radio station KDAC which I happened upon last month during a walk.

Here are some more photos I took September 12, 2007.

There was a small uncovered opening in the front door window where I could get a peek inside with my camera.

Abandoned office equipment.

On the left you can see what I think is called a "cart" machine. A rotating drum which holds pre-recorded tapes of advertising and other short clips of information.

Old turntables on the floor.........

In talking to local “old-timers” I have discovered KDAC AM used to be, “Thee Fort Bragg Station” . It carried all the local news and, as you can see from this map,

was important to fishermen up and down the coast.

But times change, FM stations arrived. The AM equipment became out of date, the building was huge, economics probably killed it’s former glory.

This morning I Googled KDAC 1230 AM and ran across some items of interest.

Broadcast and Cable News had the following:

"1250 kHz, 5 kW day/3 kW night FORMAT: KDAC(AM): Mexican;

COMMENT: Starting immediately, Bicoastal Media will program the stations via an LMA.KDLS(AM) and KDLS(FM) Perry (Des Moines), Iowa

PRICE: Undisclosed BUYER: Latin Broadcasting Corp. (Pedro Zamora, president/treasurer); owns no other stations

********************

(No date listed as to when this sale occured but I see they got the frequency wrong; "1250 kHz" instead of 1230 kHz)

************************
I did a Wikipedia search to find out what "LMA" means.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_marketing_agreement

And I found a website of a radio enthusiast who collects call signs. DX-ing they call it.

http://home.simplyweb.net/halls/dx/recent.html

He wrote: "1230 KDAC CA Ft. Bragg - Now Spanish AC "La Maquina Musical" //KLLK-1250, KUKI-1400. All three stations ID together on the hour, with two men taking turns shouting each letter of the 3 call signs. (TRH-CA)