The festival is coming together nicely. All of our pieces are falling into place. We’ve worked long hours in the blazing sun & torrential rains. Lots of mud everywhere. So it suddenly felt incredible when we got the afternoon off!!! Whoo-hoo! Most people went back to their hotel rooms or shopping… I however decided to seize the moment to ride to another beach. I changed clothes, put on another layer of sunscreen, hopped on my bike and pedaled up to Woodland Beach near Smyrna. A nice sandy beach… again, with surprisingly few people. Gotta love it.

And after days of damp, dirty & muddy feet, it felt so wonderful to take my shoes off and wade in the cool waters of Delaware Bay.

One of the many benefits of riding your bike (instead of sitting inside a sealed car) is that you actually get to see, hear, feel and smell everything around you. Including the wonderful whiffs of perfumed morning air from these red “honeysuckle” trumpet flowers that are climbing all over the place.

Well, you know it was too good to be true. And yes, sometimes the weather forecasters get it right. Today the storms rolled through as predicted. Incredible dark clouds, huge gusts of winds and the promise of thunder & lightning was enough for us to evacuate the festival grounds. While most people scrambled for cover… I kinda enjoyed the crazy weather, grabbed my camera and got a few cool shots of the incoming storm clouds.

And huge clouds covering the Main Stage…

And the clouds behind me over the main midway as we made our way to our Crew Compound and the staff exit.

And then I hopped on my bike and pedaled to the safety of my hotel room for the night. Of course I had to stop one more time… as the dark clouds were gaining on us and Dover International Speedway was in its path.

Can’t wait to see what muddy mess tomorrow brings!!!

Some beautiful “local” plants along the beach this morning. Like these really cool mimosa trees with cool “firework” flowers and the nubby buds waiting to explode!

Pickering Beach is one of the small beach towns. So small there’s only about 20 houses and nothing else. Literally… so maybe it’s not even really a town?! But just a beach? Who knows…

Anyway, it was so nice this morning to have the entire place to myself.
Not another person to be seen anywhere up & down the beach.

Okay, so no people… but plenty of horseshoe crabs!
So many of them flipped over on the beach. Trapped upside-down without a way to get back to the water. So I did my duty and started crab flipping. I must have flipped at least two dozen!!!

And just so you can see how big they are… here’s a horseshoe crab compared to my foot!

This afternoon has been wonderful. Crystal clear blue skies with a gentle cool breeze. Enjoy it now… the weather forecast for the next few days does not loos so good. Lots of storms with lots of rain… coming soon to a music festival near you!

Beautiful colors, textures, patterns & shadows in some of the large colocasia plants
being used by our landscaping team here in Dover.

While riding through the town of Leipsic this morning, I noticed some beautiful white clematis flowers in someone’s front yard. So of course I had to stop… and share!

While all of the crab apple trees are done blooming,
there are a few remnants of Spring blooming here & there along the lakefront.
Like the horse chestnut trees and oak leaf hydrangeas.

After a meeting at the Zoo this afternoon, I got a quick glimpse of the newest arrival.
A baby Japanese Macaque who was just named today… OBU.
Pretty darn adorable… too bad he won’t stay quite this cute, huh?!