Monday, October 29, 2007

Long Autumn

The subtly changing seasons in the Pacific Northwest are starting to feel normal. September days alternated between what I heard as called "extreme summer"--sunny and temps in the upper 70s--and "nearly winter"--cloudy and temps in the 50s. The leaves started to change then, and now, at the end of October, they seems to be in no rush to finish up. Many trees are still green, many are bare, and many still cling to brightly-colored-but-increasingly-soggy leaves. The long season (and the fact that the majority of our trees are evergreens) prevents us from having the spectacular display of colors I remember so well from three years in New England, but we do have time to enjoy the passing into winter.

Early in October I managed to get out to Tacoma's beautiful Point Defiance Park to grab these photos. I thought I would need to rush before the rain pulled down the leaves. Little did I know that they would hang around for several more weeks





(Don't be fooled, I didn't catch this beast "in the wild", merely grazing from within the fence of Point Defiance's wonderful zoo!)

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