Photo Essay Part?? Glen Miller Park.

(I can't figure out how to get an introduction before the pictures...)

In Richmond I went to the large city park that figured prominently in my childhood. It was where the ward often held ward parties and socials, where the golf course is located, where the fireworks were held each year and probably more...


This is the creek in Glen Miller Park. There used to be a wall with water fountain spigots and people just drank right out of the spigots. The wall is gone, but now there are two pipes that continuously spout water and you can go down to them and fill water bottles. At first I felt really shy about going down to see if the fountains were still there because two guys were sitting on the bridge and talking and I thought if I went down there and the fountains were gone, they would wonder what the heck I was doing. I felt shy enough that I sat in the car and finally drove away, went and did other stuff around town and came back later to check! I am such a dork sometimes. I even felt funny filling my water bottle, but then a couple came and brought a large number of gallon jugs and filled them all! The present I brought back for Michael was a bottle of water from the spring in Miller Park! Unfortunately, after it sat for a week, it tasted like the steel water bottle and not as good as it really does. I guess we will have to go back and visit so he can have the true experience.
This is the little waterfall near where the water pipes are. I regret not taking a picture of the flowing pipes.
When I was small there was a "zoo" in Miller Park. The best feature was a lion. You could hear it roaring constantly and it was so loud you could hear it throughout the park. This is now the lion of Miller Park! When I entered the park there was a sign posted that stated something like, "City ordinance prohibits the dumping of animals or pets, including but not limited to cats, dogs, rabbits and...(maybe reptiles)" I thought it rather odd.
Then as I toured I realized there is a HUGE population of feral cats. These were all in about the same area. There are some food and water containers around like people make an unorganized and littery attempt to feed them. I feel sorry for these poor kitties. It made me feel more comitted to not taking the responsibility for an animal again unless I know I can make a lifetime committment.

The large circle of pea gravel was a wading pool when I was small. All that playground equipment is the new, safe kind When I was little there were metal slides where you could burn your skin off and wooden swings where you could hit some other innocent child in the head and give them a skull fracture easily. What fun! Once when we were there a girl tried to jump backward off a swing and broke her leg. I heard it snap. It was pretty exciting when the ambulance came to get her. In those days playgrounds were just starting to get the canvas "belt" type swings and they had a couple of those. If you got one of those you felt lucky because they were not so heavy and you could go high easily, but it was much more difficult to give those skull fractures.
I went to the park almost first thing in the morning and there was hardly anybody else there. The place is amazingly populated with squirrels. I am surprised the cats don't eat them. I guess the squirrels are too fast. I sat quietly on a picnic table for a long time and enjoyed watching the sqirrels. They were really cute and playful. I also saw some beautiful cardinals and the small kind of woodpecker. I shot some video of the squirrels playing, but it has been trying to upload for over half an hour and it is only two minutes long so I don't know if it is going to work. Maybe I will stop it and try it as a separate post and let it try all night if I have to.

Tomorrow Part ?? (5?) Richmond - other interesting sites.