Triathlon

 There is an individual triathlon and a team triathlon.  Each begins with a swimming leg, then a kayaking leg, finishing with a two mile run.

The younger nine year old granddaughter swam the first leg in the team triathlon.

Her mother swam alongside for support.  Then the mother paddled a kayak in the second leg..  

And the father ran the final leg.

The older granddaughter is eleven.  She participated in the individual triathlon.  Competing against about two dozen participants -- men, women and a few kids -- she was first overall in the swimming leg.

One competitor caught up and passed her on the kayaking leg, so she was in second place.

By the final leg, two adult men and an older boy had caught and passed her.  

She finished fourth, the first female to finish.  Grandpa is very proud of her.

Fourth of July

 The Fourth of July ceremonies, parade and picnic were shifted to July 6, since most guests were just arriving on the 4th.  

Red, white and blue were plentiful!

In the parade, little kids are carried in wheelbarrows by the staff.

And these musicians have played for the parade and during the picnic for as long as I can remember.

Rockywold Deephaven Camps

 An old boss's family spent time in the summer on Squam Lake at this camp.  It sounded good, so we decided to give it a try.

We first came here in the summer of 1987 when our daughter was 3-1/2 and her brother was 6 months.  We stayed in Porters Lodge, the same cabin we are staying in this week.

A lot of time is spent in the water.  Both granddaughters are excellent swimmers.  (They are both in a competitive swimming program back in Ridgefield.)  But a new toy this year is this big plastic thing.

My children and my granddaughter all learned to dive from the main dock here.  While they were elsewhere, I watched a young man practicing his back dives.  (He needs to learn to keep his legs straight.)

Attractive planters are scattered around the camp.

Loons

 Loons are marvelous and beautiful birds.  There are only about 270 pairs in New Hampshire, with 14 or 15 pairs on Squam Lake, where my family is spending the week.

As soon as I arrived yesterday, I went down to the lake behind our cottage to see if any loons were there.  This handsome loon and its partner were swimming and diving not far from my dock.

A loon checked me out.  It decided I was not a threat.  (I know enough to give them a wide berth, but some other people here crowd them too closely.)  We heard the loons' wails at night before going to sleep and in the morning shortly after rising.  Click here to hear the four typical loon calls.

Today starts this blog's 16th year.  Many bloggers have shut their blogs down or migrated to other kinds of domains.  I post photos occasionally on Instagram and Facebook, but I find that this blog makes me go outside and look for photography subjects, so I continue.  Thank you to those who look at it.

MoMA

 I don't need more "things."  I have told my family that for Christmas, birthday, etc., I would rather have "experiences" with them than more "things."  Last Christmas, nine year old Hazel promised me a trip to the Museum of Modern Art with her.  What nine year old picks a museum?  Last Monday was the day.

We took a train into Manhattan, then walked from Grand Central to MoMA.  Hazel chose MoMA because she wanted to see Vincent Van Gogh's Starry Night painting, which is on MoMA's fifth floor.  

Mission accomplished!

She is also crazy about Frida Kahlo.  MoMA currently has a big exhibition of works by Frida Kahlo and her husband, Diego Rivera. 

We visited most other MoMA galleries.  One that Hazel especially liked had African photographs.

Fortunately, there is a hands-on place for kids to create artwork.  It gave Hazel and me some time to sit and rest for a while.  It involved putting scraps of colored cloth on a geometric pattern and then transferring them to a small square posterboard.

It was a very special "experience" day for me.  Hazel enjoyed it, too.

Declaration of Independence

 250 years ago today, leaders of the 13 states signed a Declaration of Independence from England.  

The event is captured in a large painting by John Trumbull, a New Haven born artist, that hangs in the Yale University Art Gallery in New Haven, Connecticut.  Thomas Jefferson was so impressed by Trumbull's plan to make a big painting of the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, that he invited Trumbull to join him in Paris, where Jefferson was the ambassador. 

 With Jefferson's support, Trumbull painted the whole committee -- John Adams, Roger Sherman, Robert Livingston, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin -- presenting the draft of the Declaration of Independence to John Hancock, rather than Jefferson alone, which would have been historically accurate.  He also included all delegates to the convention, even those who were not present and those who opposed the Declaration.

Happy birthday, America.

Flags

 The Ridgefield Library and Ridgefield Guild of Artists have a Community Flag Art installation at the Lower Level of Ridgefield Library.

Very cute.