Moominmama's Adventures

Rochester, N.Y. and the Genesee River on a typical cloudy day! In which Moominmama wishes everyone a Happy Mothers Day and celebrates daughter's recovery from surgery... Moominmama is back to mothering for a short time and is pleased to report that all went well with older daughter's surgery. Daughter is experiencing some pain and general discomfort but also knows that this will pass. She remains in good spirits.  While she was getting some much-needed rest, I ducked out on a rare sunny afternoon for a walk in my all-time favorite park, Highland Park. This time of year, it is spectacular, and I'm happy to be here to watch the lilacs come into full bloom in the coming days and weeks.  For those of you who don't know Rochester's Highland Park, it is home to about 1,200 lilac bushes, representing 500 different varieties.  Over 50 new varieties have been developed by horticulturists here but some of the original bushes, dating back to 1892, also remain. Though Rochester...

Wherein Moominmama visits the birthplace of the civil rights movement and comes face to face with the violent history of racism... Driving the Moominhouse over the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma gave Moominmama the chills. For some reason, I thought the iconic bridge would be preserved as a monument and not still serve as the everyday route to Montgomery! But there are markers and memorials at the bridge and along the road to honor the march for voting rights in March of 1965.  Unfortunately, the main "interpretive center" on the road to Montgomery was closed due to COVID, though an outdoor display board noted that the site was once home to a tent city for Black families -- sharecroppers who were kicked out of their homes for seeking to vote.  Come nightfall, the display noted, angry Whites often drove by and fired shots into the encampment. There is no turning away from the history of violence that marks the legacy of racism in this country. A visit to the Legacy Museum and t...

  In which Moominmama follows the pirates and survives a (minor) Galveston storm... Last night, the Moominhouse shook like it was possessed while the sky rumbled, cracked and flickered like a bad lightbulb. Then a firehose of water dumped on us, leaving a splash pool under the open window by the door. Fortunately, it was over in 30 minutes.  The island of Galveston, Texas is defined by its storms -- and by a cast of miscreants including pirates, bootleggers and gamblers. Galveston is the first place Moominmama has seen to boast of its historic red light district and background as a Mafia town. The first Westerner to settle here was reportedly the pirate and smuggler Jean Lafitte, after he and his fleet were chased out of Barataria Bay and New Orleans. The site of his Galveston home, called the Maison Rouge, is proudly marked on Harborside Drive. Galveston is a long sausage of an island on the Gulf south of Houston. The inland side holds the port, and the Gulf side remains a hu...

  In which Moominmama visits one of the bayous of Louisiana and has a scare.... Moominmama had no intention of feeding the alligators and watched very carefully where she put her feet for fear of slipping into the giant alligator feeding dish of the bayou. I was in the Barataria Bay Preserve which is part of the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park south of New Orleans. Moominmama was walking in the steps of the pirates! Jean Lafitte and his crew supposedly smuggled goods in and out of New Orleans using the bayous of Barataria Bay. Even the name of the bay has a crazy history. The name is taken from the novel "Don Quixote," where Quixote's trusty but gullible sidekick, Sancho Panza, is promised an island to govern. That imaginary island was called Barataria by author Miguel Cervantes. The name got applied to this bay off the Gulf of Mexico! I wasn't literally walking in pirate footsteps, however, because the nice National Park Service has built an elevated walkway th...

Wherein Moominmama rejoices to hear live music and learns about Jazz Funerals and Second Lining in New Orleans Music is not a concert hall affair here in New Orleans; it belongs to the streets and squares. Given the devastating effects of COVID-19 in this community earlier in the pandemic, I wasn't sure what I'd find when I arrived in the French Quarter early one morning.  I'm now in the Central time zone with my body stuck in Eastern. That makes me a very early riser in a city known for its nightlife. But I got cafe au lait and beignets from Cafe du Monde and walked around the almost empty side streets until it was time for my tour, led by a young musician and New Orleans native, Eliot Eidelman. Eliot's love for his city is very much tied to his love for music so we learned about New Orleans music along with the history and architecture. Take the term "Second Line," which he introduced to our tour group. This New Orleans word dates back to the pre-Civil War e...

In which Moominmama swims with manatees, meets otters and innumerable water birds while exploring Florida's Nature Coast. Nature Coast, north of Tampa, has unique freshwater springs that bubble up from the limestone underground. These crystal clear lagoons allow you to see into the underwater caves from which they come -- with some brave locals even snorkeling through them, down one underwater hole and up another. The freshwater springs mix with the tidal rivers and salt marshes creating an ecosystem like no other. These springs are the winter home of manatees who swim upriver from the Gulf to the more temperate springs and hang out until warmer weather returns. These are large lumpy creatures, actually related to elephants, and they hang out under the water, rising up periodically to snort out water from their nostrils and breathe in fresh air. It's quite startling from a kayak, but magical from the water! I took advantage of a guided swim with manatees, traveling by boat to o...

In which Moominmama learns about Reconstruction, the amazing life of Robert Smalls and meets a tiny terrapin.... South Carolina is just the other side of the Savannah River, and Beaufort, S.C. is a short drive from there, a part of the Sea Islands, which has a remarkable history on several fronts. Famous women like Harriet Tubman and Clara Barton walked Beaufort's streets and cared for the injured during the Civil War. Chief among the town's claims to fame was its capture by Union soldiers early in the war (late 1861), making it the testing grounds of Reconstruction well before war ended.   As plantation owners and other whites fled this productive agricultural region -- not nearly as well fortified as Charleston or Savannah -- the Union assisted the roughly 10,000 formerly enslaved people to get a toe-hold in the new economy, quickly showing the world, as Robert Smalls would later say: "My race needs no special defense. For the past history of them in this country proves ...