New Beds, Old House

 New flower beds have been added to the grounds of the Kansas City Museum..  modeled after those that existed back when it was a residence.   Two line the front walkway on the south side of the home.

 Above, a fish-eye was used to capture the beds...the Nikon 10.5mm dx lens.  I don't like to use a fish eye when buildings are involved as it always distorts... some minimal corrections done in this case in Photoshop Camera Raw.  Below, roughly the same view using the 14-24mm lens.  Less distortion and less correction.   The fish-eye is a DX lens whereas the camera is an FX.  The D800 automatically sets itself for the smaller coverage area by cropping.  It reduces the image size from 36 megapixels to 16.

 Above, the Carriage House with its new windows and doors..  a little paint removal remains to be done where the old Hall of Nature entrance was.   Below, the caretakers house where the Museum offices are today.

 Two more new beds are in back along each side of the north side walkway.  The wisteria is done for the year.

 Above the new hvac installation on the west side...

 Above, more of the north side, Below, the east side of the house.

Thanks to Christopher Leitch, House Wizard, who allowed me to skulk around the grounds.

Dogwoods and Mansion

Nature is way ahead of schedule this year... but just as lovely as always. The Kansas City Museum, Corinthian Hall.

Nikon D5000, 18-200 mm lens, ASA 200, exposure unrecorded.

And The Stockings Were All Hung By The Chimney With Care

Corinthian Fall

The well-maintained grounds of the Kansas City Museum always look attractive... particularly with fall colors.... above looking north, below looking west.

Blue, Gold and Wispy White

On a mission to walk 2.5 miles everyday this week.... intend to lose weight or die in the attempt. Deep blue skies and fast moving clouds ruled the day. Bottom pix are of Corinthian Hall again... which has roses that seem to bloom forever. All Nikon D3 and 70-200mm zoom f5.6 to 22 ASA 400 shot at minus one third stop.









Don't know whether the above saucer was taking off or landing........

Save The Date

This is a blast every year and will be even better this time around. The kids just LOVE it. It's from 5-8pm.

Museum Quality Fuel Oil

What's big, buried and forgotten? A fuel oil tank under the grounds of the KC Museum.... A tell tale vent pipe gave it away... at some point Corinthian Hall switched from coal to fuel oil for heat. A little cleaner and a lot easier than shoveling. Over time though the tank was forgotten.... at least until recently when engineers were checking the grounds in preparation for the installation of the new HVAC. The Museum's Engineer mentioned the vent pipe and an exploration of the subterranean parts of the old building revealed a gauge... a switch was flipped and the gauge went to zero and then to 3,500 gallons..... whoops. Today (Fri) a truck was on site to pump out the tank. Wonder what other surprises might lay in wait?

Drive Hike With A Side Of Trail/Museum

Every weekend Cliff Drive is closed to motorized traffic (except for the idiot on the motorcycle for whom closed gates aren't a hint). Bikers, hikers and walkers are out in force. Above the East Entrance.
I took a brief side trek on part of the Indian Mound Trail to see what wild flowers were in bloom.

Above and below.... photographing the greenery is particularly nice in Spring because nothing is yet nibbled.


Above more wild flowers... below an early part of the trail. The Boy Scouts have already been along the trail clearing it for this years hikers.

Above.... a couple of weeks ago one of my commenters talked about May Apples... they are in bloom now... unusual in that the single bloom is below the leaves at a junction of stems.... and yes the resulting fruit is edible... but I think careful preparation is in order.
Fresh leaves above and leaves and stickers below... on a locust tree.

Above two Sentinel Sycamores line the early part of the road. Below another shot of the waterfall.
Below.... the falls had uptop visitors... folks aren't supposed to be up there... but I won't tell if you won't.

Fresh and minty green.

Biker in transit for conditioning.
Above and below.... good old limestone.... our central region used to be under an inland sea... a few million years ago... thus critter remains in rocks.
Below.... skittish Cardinal... wouldn't pose to save his soul.


Hickory blooms above and the last of the redbuds below.

Above.... these two sinuous trunks were bent to the ground in our last ice storm... and, after the ice melted, they just decided to stay that way.... so all their branches grow up not out.



The light today was unusually diffuse for a partial sun day... and worked well for photographs.


Memorial bench along Goose Neck...

Stopped by the Museum to see the Wisteria... which is just gorgeous this year...
The blooms are so plentiful that you can smell them walking down Gladstone in front of the mansion.... these are trellised in the rear of the house.

Not a bad view to the west across the valley.
We could call this Wisteria Lane but I think that has contemporary connotations.
Coincident with my visit to the Wisteria was a Hard Hat Tour of the house.... I'll blog about that tomorrow (or so).