A lack of urgency
November 24, 2018 

What is this feeling, this sense of relaxation, of "island time", as they like to call it here.  We awaken and care not for routine nor for anything needing to be done.

We crossed London Bridge - yes, the one from London, but more about that later - to reach our abode of five days on the island in Lake Havasu (In case you didn't read carefully there - it's Havasu, not Oahu).  Our first morning here was lovely really, sliding glass door open to the second floor deck as we wandered in and out with coffee cup in hand. 

A few early risers walked along the water's edge.  The noisome boats of yesterday evening were slumbering at anchor as a few fishermen motored slowly across the no-wake zone.

Other vacationers ventured out into the clement morning; youngsters always eager to meet the day gathered to play pretend lives just below us: Tonka trucks turned a sandy area into a construction zone.  Sidewalk chalk in hand, another adorned the walkway while a rousing game of cops & robbers went one direction and then another.  How reminiscent it seemed of times past when play was such sans electronic devices!

I welcomed the sounds of people chatting and laughing and watching their children.  The lure of water gathered us all there, its energy drawing us to itself.  I admire the palm trees, grateful that I no longer have one in my back yard as I remember the awfulness of trimming those bottom fronds with the dust and spiders and roaches and bugs falling onto me in the process.  How much nicer to look at these palms, nicely pruned by professionals and burgeoning with luscious dates.

From our deck, we watched the usual avian life: great-tailed grackle, California gull and western grebe.

Finally, we decide to depart our nest if for nothing else, we thought we might take a little drive around the island.  I don't know the island's size, but it is substantial.  There is a lot of development on it: condos, resorts, RV parks (they're all called resorts on the island), but a good bit of the land remains open.

Open in these parts seems to equate to ATV heaven.  We have seen the proliferation of ATV recreation in Utah and certainly it is abundant here, too.  I am decidedly not a fan of the vehicles; in fact, I fail to imagine the slightest attraction, but in that, I am a definite minority.

Everywhere hereabouts, one sees dust clouds rising - the incessant deafening sound of their engines is enough to drive a person to distraction.  I see that many of the riders wear protection for their hearing, but their lungs surely suffer seriously.  Their popularity is one of the reasons I prefer to do my wilderness sauntering away from established trails.

Relieved to be away from the dune buggies, we found some interesting places on the island, and some surprises - especially lighthouse replicas.  My languorous state causes me not to do the slightest research on the subject, but I did discover onsite that there are a number (how many?) of lighthouses along the shores of the island, evidently replicas of the larger items resident at waterside.

The one we stopped at was said to be one-third the size of its 1919 namesake, the Split Rock lighthouse on Lake Superior in Minnesota.  A plaque informed us that the Lake Havasu Lighthouse Club is dedicated to improving the navigational lighting on Lake Havasu.

Site #6 . . .

Ah lassitude, as I continue my day of directionlessness, I offer only this photo about Site #6, a place in history that had something or other to do with an early military camp and convalescent center for Army Air Force members in the 1940s.  

A vision. . .

Taking the words exactly as they are written on the Lake Havasu City website regarding the origin of a city that sprang from nothing along the banks of a newly created lake:

"Lake Havasu was formed by the construction of the Parker Dam from 1934-1938. ... In 1963, Robert McCulloch, owner of McCulloch Motors, was flying over Lake Havasu looking for a place to test his outboard engines. He thought that the land surrounding Lake Havasu had great potential for an emerging city."

And somehow (that I also will not research), that morphed into purchasing the 1831-era London Bridge, moving it from its England home and reconstructing it in the Arizona desert, then digging a man made channel under it to create the island.  If that's not a visionary and a getter-done-er, I don't know what is.  Anyone who has a few minutes of curiosity to fill can find some interesting reading online about the endeavor.

I thought it was fun to have a photo of London Bridge with palm trees aside it, something that would not have been anywhere near in its homeland.

Some years back when our Van Buren cousins lived in Lake Havasu City, we brought Mom & Dad Wuehrmann here to visit them and to see the bridge.  This trip, we made it a point to walk across London Bridge and to attempt to get a few photos despite multitudes of foreign visitors trying to do the same while walking and standing in front of us as we waited not-so-patiently for our opportunity.  In the end, I had to edit out someone's hairdo from my photo.

The afternoon was one of driving exploration along lake's shore with stops for treks up, down and around dune hills, bays, coves and marshes.  According to the señor, Lake Havasu's water level remains static, which allows the evolution of reedy, cattail-lined coves that shelter birds and, less obviously, lots of fish.

In various places as we traversed the shoreline with sandy beaches and dunes on one side and scattered vegetation on the other, we added to the trip bird list: yellow-rumped warbler, pied-billed grebe, Brewer's sparrow, blue-gray gnat catcher and roadrunner.

Castle rock was one place that especially intrigued us as a spot to launch the kayaks for some fishing.

We were also intrigued by a vast area of badlands we spotted on the California side of the water . . .

Another side road detour area looked promising for a future back-country trek into some interesting mountains.

A tourist mecca, Lake Havasu offers recreation for all imaginable water sports and fishing, not to mention all kinds of fun overhead.  There is a steady stream of tour planes, ultralights and experimental aircraft . . .

 . . . even the Goodyear blimp.  I haven't seen the Goodyear blimp in years; actually I didn't even know it still existed.