STL DPB On The Road: In The Redwood Forest

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A volunteer dresses as a giant banana slug (for reasons best known to herself) in Henry Cowell State Redwood Park near Felton, California. We spent the weekend visiting my wife's cousin and her husband in Los Gatos, CA, on the edge of Silicon Valley south of San Francisco. They are retired and volunteer as docents in the park. Oh, and why the faux slug is holding a small stuffed penguin was never explained to me. Who would win a fight between a penguin and a banana slug?

Home tonight.

If you were to dress up as a slimy forest floor creature, what would it be?

STL CDPB On The Road: Rainforest

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Mrs. S.T. and I are enjoying a few days on the western side of Washington State's Olympic Peninsula, one of the few temperate rainforests in the world. It's wet and there's a jungle out there. No gorillas in this jungle but there are elk. I got some pix of a couple of baby elk feeding in the forest yesterday. Some of them will go on Flickr if I ever get this truckload of pix edited. Remember John Cleese's line when playing Mr. Gumby in Monte Python, "I would put a tax on holiday snaps"? It would bankrupt me.

Anyway, everybody's favorite little beast in this area is the ubiquitous banana slug, something like a snail without a shell that can grow to several inches long. They live live in the slow lane, peeking around with those eye stalks you can see above. They won't hurt you (or you them) if you pick them up but they will slime your hand. The park ranger in the lower picture knows how to deal with it.

WHAT I'M LOOKING AT WHILE I WRITE THIS: Lake Quinault, Washington.

TOMORROW: I'll be getting to Seattle on Saturday. Could be something from there, could be another from the rainforest. Come back and see.