A New Year of Adventure!

Snow-shoe Bunny?

This is insane! Another year has sped by and a new one is waiting for us to encounter and enjoy. Say goodbye to 2012 and embrace 2013 since it is here and waiting. We, at J & L don't usually agree with new year resolutions since it seems the majority fail to make it two months into the new year, ninety percent if the research is to be believed, but simply think we should try and do the best we can.

What a view!

So as this new year is upon us just take a moment to take in the view of the world before you and take a step forward to meet it with a smile.

Heading Out!

Santa brought the partners of J & L snowshoes on Christmas Day and since neither of us have ever used such snow walking devices we were anxious to try out these new treats.

Trekin'

The trail taken the first day was a 4 mile trek through the San Bernardino Mountains, in the National Forest just south of the small town of Sugarloaf where the partners own a weekend home. The snowfall was not especially deep, a few inches, but gave a good work out in the 18 degree morning and good exposure to wearing snow shoes.

Boldly going where we've never gone before!

This is what a new year is about. To try things you have not before. To experience what you have not experienced before. This is the dividing line between adventurers and coach potatoes. And remember to smile in the sunlight.

Rabbit Tracks in the Snow

There are always new things to find on the pathways of life. Little footprints can lead to new beginnings and isn't that what a new year is about?

Gimme Shelter!

Some may have bigger homes than others but if yours is tiny and warm then don't complain. A house isn't a home and a home isn't a house if love is not there.

Great Exercise!

If you want to make a promise you will exercise everyday then go ahead and do it but don't knock yourself out if you don't. When time arises go out for a walk, smile, laugh, and be with loved ones. This exercise will get you a lot more mileage then giving up on a treadmill with a curse and a frown.

Taking it all in

Again, take in the beauty of the earth and all that you have. That alone will make any new year facing you that much easier to deal with. Open your eyes - look about you- and count your blessings.

Looking over my shoulder

We can not change the past but only the future. Mistakes are over our shoulders but when we look forward with common sense, love, and understanding then that future is ours to make. Have a positive tomorrow or dwell in the past - that is our choice. As always, we at J& L hope you will all make the most of the each day and leave behind that which did not work. Being explorers and researchers we must learn from our pasts - let that be the lesson learned in this new year.

From all of us at J & L we wish all of our friends the greatest New Year you have ever had. We believe that and we know you can too.

Merry Christmas

'Tis the season for a great many things:  for family, for friends, for thinking a little less of oneself and little more of others. But amidst the glitter and the bustle, we often spend far too little time remembering the reason we celebrate at this time of year. Now before you think you've predicted where we're going and quit reading, you might be surprised where J and L found a bit of Christmas Cheer hiding this year.

This has been a year of highs and lows for the partnership of J and L. Very high and very low -- and without putting you through the tedium of detail, let us just say the year has at times put our faith to the test and then resurrected it again and again. We've gained more than we've lost and as the end of the year approaches, we grow more reflective.

Which brings me to my message. It is at this time of the year that we gather together to celebrate Thanksgiving not because we particularly like turkey or participate in great harvest festivals any longer, but because we have so many things for which we are grateful. We take the time to remember this and do so with our families. Even when family gatherings are somewhat reminiscent of a B-movie. And we remain together in spirit and rejoin with our families at Christmas to celebrate our Lord's birth, sometimes traveling significant distances.

And this tradition is perhaps the purest form of love we share as a witness to those beyond the Christian community. We gather together at family functions, at work-place parties, at assorted shin-digs. The last hereditary leader of the Blackfoot, Mountain Chief, perhaps said it best when he described Christmas in 1896. "Was it because the cold weather came, we sit around in our lodges and feast and give honor to each other...or is it because this is when the white man's God was given to all people... born to this man and woman, a baby boy."

This season, let that love be your witness for all who enter your home. May strangers, coworkers, friends and family all feel the spirit of love which unites us more at this time of year than at other. We know full well that this date is arbitrary and yet, by choosing to remember Him at this time, we create within ourselves a renewing of the light He brought into this world during the darkest time of the year. This Christmas, slow down, embrace your loved ones and count your blessings. Isn't that what it's all about? Taking time from the busy schedule of life to actually live and to love one another.

So, from both of us at J and L, we wish you have a Very Merry Christmas and a New Year which brings peace and prosperity for all of you.

Prepare for the Unexpected

On a recent Sunday afternoon the partners of J & L were heading home from their cabin in Big Bear, a small mountain community about a hundred miles east of Los Angeles, driving north on Highway 18 toward Lucerne Valley when they were surprised by an extremely rare event. Right in the middle of the road less than fifty yards from the Toyota FJ stood a large animal which at first appeared to be a deer but within seconds we realized we were looking at a Bighorn Sheep.

There was not only one Bighorn Sheep (Ovis canadensis) but a herd of eight slowly coming off the steep mountain to our right and boldly crossing the two lane black highway. It was amazing as we watched these animals; two must have been well over three hundred pounds, packed with muscle and long thick curling horns, making their way down the steep rocky hillside without any problem.

Pulling the FJ over safely to the side of the road and putting on the hazard lights, we got out of the vehicle to start snapping photographs. Being prepared with a camera for moments like this is a must and as one explorer to another it was truly an unexpected and exciting sight. Living and exploring Southern California for decades there has always been this certain mystique with these elusive and famous sheep which roam the hinterlands of the dry desert mountains. One of the more famous areas to view these animals, if you actually can, is in the Borrego Desert west of the Salton Sea. It is here where many have reported seeing these great mammals but the chance of really seeing them in the wild is generally pure luck. Many a remote camping trips in the unforgiving deserts and mountains of Southern California have always ended as they had begun: not a sight of these beautiful and rare sheep.

The sure footedness of these animals simply amazed the observers as they bounced up and over boulders and then landed on some ledges only a couple of inches wide (the sheep not the observers). It was a real treat to watch these Big Horn Sheep for minutes and understand that we were being treated to a vision few will ever see in the wild.

If the reader ever sees a person stopped on the side of the road in a wilderness area furiously taking photographs of a mountainside, slow down and take a moment to wonder if that may be a good time to stop and investigate. And, as always, be prepared for the unexpected.

Want to learn more about Bighorn Sheep? Try one of these websites:

www.desertusa.com/big.html

animals.nationalgeographic.com/

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bighorn_sheep