The Wild Center (Tupper Lake, NY) -- June 2018

 I have to thank Mum for making me aware of this place.  Located in Tupper Lake (in the middle of the glorious Adirondack Mountains), this place used to be known as the "Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks" before it was re-branded to the current name.  I don't recall if I ever went here as part of a day trip with the Boy Scouts, which seems like it would've been right up our alley.  Even if we did go, I sure the place has changed drastically since the time when I was in Scouts.  As far as I was concerned, when we went to visit this in June 2018 it was "brand new" to me.

It was pretty easy to get to, as it was pretty much the same road I traveled to visit Shawn when he was going to Potsdam.  The journey there had a lot of nice forest to look at.  The specific directions for the Wild Center were easy to find, and parking was good.  As you can see in the pictures below (which were mostly taken by me, but with some shots from Mum's camera mixed in), it was really a fun place.

The big draw was the Wild Walk, which was an elevated series of platforms and suspension bridges allowing you to look at the forest floor.  Birds and squirrels were present, but I'm sure there's too much human activity to allow deer and other foragers to make an appearance.  The Wild Walk reminded me of (on a small scale) of what the Ewok Village would be like.

I really enjoyed the "giant web" portion of the Wild Walk.  I waited until other people got off of it, and then sprang out into the center and proceeded to hop to see how much I could get this to go up and down.  There was a nice suspension bridge to a large tree trunk too which I found equally amusing,

Inside the complex were various exhibits on the earth sciences and biology of the region, plus some small animal habitats.  Overall, this was worth the drive from wherever you are.

Nature Pictures, Pirates Cove, and Hot Air Balloons (Glens Falls Region, NY) -- June 2018

 This is a random selection of various nature pictures in order to show the beauty of the area.  The first three are of the Hudson River early one morning as I was gearing up to run a 5k on the Betar Byway.  I liked how the stillness of the river made a mirror-like reflection.  The other pictures are of some hills and nice sunsets in the area.

While I was visiting the area, I had to place a couple round of miniature golf at Pirates Cove, and have fun with the mascot.

And lastly, for this post, I got to see some hot air balloons.  This was quite random as I was driving along a road, spotted a balloon flying lower than it should, and then stopped to watch them finally come in for a landing.

King Tut Exhibit at Texas Museum of Science & Technology (Cedar Park, TX) -- June 2018

 These had been posted on my social media page when I took them in order to assist with the promotion at the time.  I'd been involved with the Texas Museum of Science & Technology (aka "TXMOST," previously known as "Austin Planetarium") for a number of years and posted many picture of various events I'd volunteered at.  New job and other factors by 2017 had kept me from having the same amount of time to volunteer than I'd had years previously, but that is a tale for another time.  One of the exhibits they had was on the treasures of King Tutankhamun.  Each of these items had an informational card with them, which unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of so I couldn't tell you what they are now.  Still, there was an awe in viewing these objects which were over three thousand years old.

And as an added bonus, here are some nice bluebonnet pictures which were taken in March 2018 at Camp Mabry.  I was there for one of my 5k races, as snapped a few shots during the warm-up walk I do before the race starts.