Memories for all time: #4, Giant Ladybirds. Ladybugs, actually

Somewhere near Sacramento, May 2006



We're driving the tiniest Dodge RV we could hire, and it's still plenty spacious for 2 adults - one of us is a 6-footer. Everything is bigger in the US. Of which more later.

Our start-point: San Francisco, our destination: Los Angeles. We're driving the famous Pacific Coast Highway, starting with a run up the Napa Valley and back down past Sacramento.

It was a wonderful trip. The Napa Valley section was my secret homage to Ursula K. Le Guin's not-quite-novel "Always coming home" which might be going to be set there. Without meaning to, we found ourselves driving past the great wind farm that had caught our eye from the air days earlier. The turbines are giant ballerinas, dancing a graceful slow twirl in the light air of evening.

Near the wind farm we found a "park" where we could camp, or rather, a permitted open area to park the Dodge and feed the shower with quarters. Not a tree in sight to break that constant breeze ruffling the endless acres of bleached wheat grass.

In the morning, eating breakfast at the massive concrete picnic table, I suddenly realise I am sharing the space with dozens of ladybirds. Or, since we're in America, Ladybugs. They deserve the capital letter because they are HUGE. Each one the size of my fingernail, more orangey than the l'birds at home, but unmistakably my ferocious, spotted totem insect.



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