October 10 -- An Irish Music Celebration in Portal

What? Irish music in Portal? You must be joking... No, I'm not.  Consider: Last night there was a presentation on Machu Picchu, the Incan city in Peru. Later this month will be an Oktoberfest celebration, followed by a musical group that plays music as diverse as "spaghetti western"  (think "The Good, Bad and The Ugly") to surf songs. A hiking club tackles trails every Thursday, a few weeks back we had "Heritage Days", a 2-day celebration of all things Chiricahuan and San Simon Valley-an,  and there are numerous bird walks, astronomy talks and observations (Sky Village with its house-and-observatory acreage is just down the road) -- the list goes on. So yes, Portal is a bit off the beaten path -- but the "outside world" comes to it, and that's one of the things that makes it so special. And let's not forget the fantabulous sunrises, such as the one this morning --

And still before sunrise, the clouds over the Chiricahuas took on a pinkish hue; here's Cave Creek Canyon -- 

And "False Portal Peak", its unofficial name as it has no official name -- 

Just a stunning morning visually. I was pondering what to do about the water feature, and I finally ended up taking the rubber "dish" out and putting the old water feature back the way it was -- for now. I just didn't want to take the chance of discouraging the Coues Family from visiting, and it seemed like the rubber dish was responsible for that. An FB friend said there is a way to get rid of the "new rubber" odor, so I filled it with hot water and mixed in baking soda. She said to let it sit for a day and the smell should be gone by then. Anything is worth a try at this point...I did some weeding with the Fiskar's weed puller -- where you don't have to bend over to pull weeds; it's a device that pulls them up for you while standing --,  put the bike computer on Diamondback (with it predicted to be 83 degrees tomorrow I'll probably go for another bike ride), and took a short nap, as I was due to pick up friends to go to an outdoor concert at Portal Lodge. Yes, this is where the Irish connection comes in... It's the fifth annual Portal Irish Music Week, 5 days of music workshops and impromptu concerts culminating with a concert open to the public. And that concert was this afternoon... Photos of that are to come, but here's some others of the performers; thanks to Susan Mittelstadt, who made the event happen, for these photos -- 

A breakfast jam session at the Portal Cafe

And believe me, these musicians and singers are GOOD... And here is the aforementioned Susan, the one who made it all happen -- 

It was quite a time -- beers,wine, fajitas, beans, rice -- and Irish music. Yes, Portal is THAT special...And I'll leave you with one last photo. These flowers are beautiful, with field upon field of yellow, a second spring after the monsoons --

And do you know what they're called? DYC -- Damned Yellow Composite. So stick that in your pipe and smoke it...