Saturday, August 9, 2008

Back from the beach...

When I'm on vacation my two favorite things to see are native animals and art.
The artwork that was my absolute favorite was a 1902 fully restored Herschell-Spillman carousel with 45 hand carved wooden animals of all shapes and sizes. The horses even had real horse hair tails! It is one of the oldest in the United States.
My 2 1/2 year old daughter was fascinated with the sea dragon and had to ride it twice despite my urging to try one of the animals that went up and down.

This gorgeous piece of history is housed in the Trimper
Amusement Park at the begining of the Ocean City, MD boardwalk.










The two other fun things at the beach are wild ponies on Assateague and sea gulls. I think I must be the only person that loves seagulls but I get a big kick out of feeding them and listening to their calls. I didn't have much time to spend with the ponies but I caught a glimpse of these two young stallions by the water.








Okay, now that the fun is over I am back to painting on Monday!
Jen

6 comments:

Christopher A. Klingler said...

WOW Jen ~ What beautiful pictures, especially the carousel!!!

Thanks SO much for sharing with us and glad you had a nice vacation.

PS: Thanks on mine AND make sure you come back to leave a post to enter my "Sundae BOO" PC giveaway...scroll back 2-3 posts.

Hugs,
Chris :)

Blackfeatherfarm said...

Love this post, the photos are wonderful !

minihorselvr said...

Great pics Jen!

That carousel is gorgeous! Thanks for sharing.

Holly Zemak said...

How wonderful to see the ponies on Assateague. Thanks!

Victoria said...

Great photos! The carousel is really spectacular. I have only seen the Assateague ponies once, but would love to go see them again!

LYNDY WARD said...

DOUBLE WOW SPOOKTACULAR on the carousel horses. I have four original carousel life-size animals from the late 1800s. Three Horses & One Bunny. Two are listed in the famous Carousel Victorian Artists Historical Book.

PURRRS & HEAD BUMPS (that go in the night),
Lyndy