campinggear-25

Camping
Back To Snippet
Back To SITEMAP

Make Your Own Natural Herbal Healing Salve
Author: Loring A. Windblad
Copyright 2004 by http://www.organicgreens.us and Loring Windblad. This article may be freely copied and used on other web sites only if it is copied complete with all links and text intact and unchanged except for minor improvements such as misspellings and typos.

Do you remember the wonderful world of the Watkins Man coming by your home, showing you all these wonderful salves and remedies and other marvelous things? Have you ever wished you could find the Watkins Man and buy some of those salves? A good Herbal Healing Salve would be a marvelous thing to have around for all the little cuts and scrapes that one gets into around the house. Soooooo – what if you could make your own? What if it was "easy"? What if it might be even better than the Watkins variety?

I'm not really sure what I'd do without my multi-purpose homemade healing salve. I use it on gardening-inflicted sunburns, cuts and abrasions, on martial arts blisters, the grandson's chapped cheeks and hands, insect bites when we're wilderness camping or gold panning, and the dog's scrapes and scratches. Herbal healing salves are gentle, soothing balms made from natural herbal ingredients.

Here's something everyone can do, quickly and easily, at home, with no special skills.

Generally speaking they're safe to use on kids, pets and people. They are naturally soothing and healing. In this sample recipe, herbally infused oil is chock-full of natural healing powers.

Vitamin E oil contributes antioxidants and wound-healing abilities. Tea tree oil (Melaleuca oil) provides anti-microbial, anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties. And lavender essential oil works it's magic on burns and adds soothing aromatherapy.

Basic Recipe:

1 cup herbally infused oil
1 – 2 oz. Beeswax
10 capsules Vitamin E Oil
½ tsp. each tea tree and lavender essential oils

In a small pan, gently heat the herbally infused oil and beeswax until barely melted. Cut or poke the vitamin E capsules open, and squeeze the vitamin E oil into the beeswax/oil mixture. Remove from heat, and add the essential oils. Pour a tiny amount of the salve mixture onto waxed paper or into a container to cool. Test it for thickness – if you'd like it to be harder, add more beeswax. If you'd like it to have a thinner balm, add more oils.

When you're satisfied with the consistency, pour the balm into clean, sanitized jars and let cool. This all-purpose salve can be used for cuts, scrapes, splinters, diaper rash, burns, rashes, or for dry skin.

To make a herbally infused oil:

In a saucepan, combine dry herbs and a vegetable oil (we like extra virgin olive oil, but just about any kind will do). Specific proportions are not important – use a few generous handfuls of herbs and use enough oil to cover them. Heat over lowest possible heat for several hours – three minimum, we usually try for 12 or 15.

Alternatively, use a crock-pot on the "low" setting. Strain out the herbs and use your herbally infused oil to make balms, or as a massage oil, bath oil, or as a great winter moisturizer.

Some Herbs to try: chamomile, comfrey, sheep sorrell, turkish rhubarb, St. John's Wort, calendula.

About the Author

Loring Windblad has studied nutrition and exercise for more than 40 years, is a published author and freelance writer. His latest business endeavor is at: http://www.organicgreens.us

...

campinggear-25

Camping
Back To Snippet
Back To SITEMAP

Make Your Own Natural Herbal Healing Salve
Author: Loring A. Windblad
Copyright 2004 by http://www.organicgreens.us and Loring Windblad. This article may be freely copied and used on other web sites only if it is copied complete with all links and text intact and unchanged except for minor improvements such as misspellings and typos.

Do you remember the wonderful world of the Watkins Man coming by your home, showing you all these wonderful salves and remedies and other marvelous things? Have you ever wished you could find the Watkins Man and buy some of those salves? A good Herbal Healing Salve would be a marvelous thing to have around for all the little cuts and scrapes that one gets into around the house. Soooooo – what if you could make your own? What if it was "easy"? What if it might be even better than the Watkins variety?

I'm not really sure what I'd do without my multi-purpose homemade healing salve. I use it on gardening-inflicted sunburns, cuts and abrasions, on martial arts blisters, the grandson's chapped cheeks and hands, insect bites when we're wilderness camping or gold panning, and the dog's scrapes and scratches. Herbal healing salves are gentle, soothing balms made from natural herbal ingredients.

Here's something everyone can do, quickly and easily, at home, with no special skills.

Generally speaking they're safe to use on kids, pets and people. They are naturally soothing and healing. In this sample recipe, herbally infused oil is chock-full of natural healing powers.

Vitamin E oil contributes antioxidants and wound-healing abilities. Tea tree oil (Melaleuca oil) provides anti-microbial, anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties. And lavender essential oil works it's magic on burns and adds soothing aromatherapy.

Basic Recipe:

1 cup herbally infused oil
1 – 2 oz. Beeswax
10 capsules Vitamin E Oil
½ tsp. each tea tree and lavender essential oils

In a small pan, gently heat the herbally infused oil and beeswax until barely melted. Cut or poke the vitamin E capsules open, and squeeze the vitamin E oil into the beeswax/oil mixture. Remove from heat, and add the essential oils. Pour a tiny amount of the salve mixture onto waxed paper or into a container to cool. Test it for thickness – if you'd like it to be harder, add more beeswax. If you'd like it to have a thinner balm, add more oils.

When you're satisfied with the consistency, pour the balm into clean, sanitized jars and let cool. This all-purpose salve can be used for cuts, scrapes, splinters, diaper rash, burns, rashes, or for dry skin.

To make a herbally infused oil:

In a saucepan, combine dry herbs and a vegetable oil (we like extra virgin olive oil, but just about any kind will do). Specific proportions are not important – use a few generous handfuls of herbs and use enough oil to cover them. Heat over lowest possible heat for several hours – three minimum, we usually try for 12 or 15.

Alternatively, use a crock-pot on the "low" setting. Strain out the herbs and use your herbally infused oil to make balms, or as a massage oil, bath oil, or as a great winter moisturizer.

Some Herbs to try: chamomile, comfrey, sheep sorrell, turkish rhubarb, St. John's Wort, calendula.

About the Author

Loring Windblad has studied nutrition and exercise for more than 40 years, is a published author and freelance writer. His latest business endeavor is at: http://www.organicgreens.us

...

campinggear-24

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

campinggear-23

Camping
Back To Snippet
Back To SITEMAP

Wild, Wild Westerns
Author: Stephen Schochet
In the early days of Hollywood, for studios like Universal Westerns were the easiest films to make. They required very few props and made use of the wide-open spaces available in the area. Even the smallest studio, sometimes an empty space between two buildings known as a lot, could easily film outside. It was a cheap and effective way to involve audiences in wild chase scenes involving pure heroes like the white clad Tom Mix going after dastardly villains. One time a theater was showing a Western, when the film suddenly broke right at the climatic scene. An emotional audience member yelled out," Hurry up and fix it before they get away!"

The master of the Western was John Ford, who felt that the genre was the purest form of movie making. In 1956, he and John Wayne went to their regular spot the Monument Valley in Utah to make the powerful chase movie The Searchers. Location shooting allowed the two old friends to relax by camping out, playing cards and avoiding contact with the studio executives that Ford despised. The only problem was unpredictable Utah climate could delay filming. Ford turned to a local Navajo Medicine Man. "Sir I will pay one hundred dollars if you can accurately predict the weather." The Shaman shut his eyes went into a trance and said,"Rain!" Sure enough it did rain. The grateful director asked him to repeat his efforts the next day. "Mmm, cloudy!" Again success. But on the third day when asked the Medicine Man shook his head sadly and said,"Can not tell weather today" Ford's pipe fell out of his mouth." Really. Why is that?" The Medicine Man replied," Transistor radio broke!"

Ford's relationship with the Navajo in Utah was usually cooperative. He would offer them parts in films and generally provide a welcome boon to a depressed economy. In 1948, while filming another Wayne Western called Fort Apache, he hired two locals to create smoke signals. It took several hours but then finally the technicians finished the task. As the smoke arose from the ground the assembled cast and crew watched in awe. The silence was broken when one of the Navajo Extra's stated,"Wow, I wish I'd said that!"

About the Author

Stephen Schochet is the author and narrator of the audiobooks "Fascinating Walt Disney" and "Tales Of Hollywood". The Saint Louis Post Dispatch says," these two elaborate productions are exceptionally entertaining." Hear realaudio samples of these great, unique gifts at www.hollywoodstories.com.

...

campinggear-22

Camping
Back To Snippet
Back To SITEMAP

Camping At The Castle - Hearst Castle
Author: Pam
Camping at the Castle – Hearst Castle
Read Jetsetters Magazine at www.jetsettersmagazine.com
Read this entire feature FREE with photos at
http://www.jetsettersmagazine.com/archive/jetezine/globe02/usa02/CA/hearst/hearst.html

You're offered three levels of luxury at California's San Simeon State Park campground.

Up at Washburn, there's the undeveloped area, which means there's a tap somewhere and pit toilets. There's the open area that's close to the beach with a tap right at your site and flush toilets just a minute away from your tent. Lastly, the top-level sites offer a paved parking pad for your car or RV, hookups, and proximity to the showers. Guests camped on the open area can use the showers, which are nearby. Those up the hill in the undeveloped sites are discouraged from using them, though I don't think they're actively prevented from doing so.

In spite of this class system, the campground is pretty nice. It's wedged between Highway 1 and the slough, which is a wetlands preserve and you can walk under the freeway to a spectacular and uncrowded strip of beach. I was hesitant to pitch the tent so close to the freeway because of the noise, but once night fell, it really quieted down. Except for the noise from a mid-night run-in that the neighbor's dog had with a raccoon.

This was probably not the sensibility that "The Chief" had in mind when he built his little folly up the hill, but it's not far off. He wanted a place to get away from the city, a place to entertain friends, a place to play outside. He had the good sense to have it built above the fog line. Had we been contemporaries, we'd have woken up to damp Gore-tex and cold, wet, air, while The Chief and his guests were watching the sun break over the hills to the East, the light filtering through Moorish-style shutters. While we were firing up the Coleman stove to boil enough water for tea, The Chief and his guests would be wandering down to the dining hall in response to the breakfast bell.

Actually, it was William Randolph Hearst's weariness with camping that led him to build the magnificent palace on the hill known as Hearst Castle. He telegraphed his architect, Miss Julia Morgan, to request that she design for him a more comfortable place to spend his days at his ranch on the California Coast. Co-conspirators in the execution of this spectacular private folly on the hill, they worked together for 25 years designing, building, redesigning and sometimes rebuilding, the magical place that's now open to anyone who's willing to pay the price of admission.

It's worth noting that I'm not a guided tour kind of person. I prefer to poke around on my own and while I appreciate the insight that a tour guide so often has to offer, I'd just rather not. I'll read the plaques and flip the pages in the guidebook, but I want to be left to my own devices. However, upon completion of the Experience Tour (one of several tour options available), I was ready to pay for the whole thing all over again, just to see the rest of the place. I'd have gone up and down the hill all day, if that's what it would take to get in as many nooks and crannies of the Castle as possible.

We arrived a little too early for our tour. Tours leave every 30-45 minutes from the visitor center and tickets are time stamped. We took our time dawdling around the museum, which presents the life of William Randolph Hearst and showcases a few choice gems from his extensive collection of art and furniture.

We dried out in the sun and poked around in the shops - one is a gift store with postcards and books and t-shirts, the other a museum shop that sells reproductions of objects in the castle, among other things. Finally, we boarded the bus to the "Enhanted Hill" - San Simeon. We were lucky to spot, on the drive up, a few of the descendents from Hearst's private zoo, out grazing in the meadows. We were met by our tour guide on the marble plaza below the well-known Neptune Pool.

I won't go in to extensive details about what we saw on the tour, as the superlatives will sound ridiculous. Friends of mine at home, prior to my departure, recommended Hearst Castle as "worth seeing." I realize now that their understated approach to suggesting we make a stop there on our jaunt along the coast was due not to their being unimpressed, but rather, to their inability to describe the splendor and beauty of this place.

As we wandered through the buildings, past the marble and the carved walnut and the gold inlay, we had progressively less ability to express our wonder. The beauty of the final stop, the indoor swimming pool tiled in lapis lazuli blue and gold tiles - not gold color, but actual gold - left me overcome. I really thought I was going to cry.

Back at the visitor's center, I contemplated taking the next tour back up the hill. Instead, we opted for the 40 minute IMAX movie about the building of Hearst Castle. (The movie is included in the Experience Tour. If you choose a different tour, it's separate, but worth it.) The film contains some footage of Hearst and his architect, Julia Morgan, at the site while the castle is under construction, as well as a number of clips of Hearst's many famous guests. There are some stunning aerial shots of the site, which give the visitors a chance to grasp the size of the compound as well as the magnificence of its location.

At the campground that night, we had new neighbors who were compelled to share with us (and most of the campground) their love of rather obscene rap music. Meanwhile, the neighbors opposite were burning what must have mean a tire as it was putting out so much smoke as to obscure the sight, but not muffle the sound of the rap-loving campers. I was unperturbed. I put in the earplugs (I never travel without them) and dreamed myself a guest at the "Castle in the Sky."

When I woke up in the middle of the night, I stepped out of the tent to the sound of the ocean and the sight of the stars.

Hearst Castle is CRAZY BUSY! Go first thing in the morning if you want to avoid the crowds. We left a busy but not too crowded visitor's center at 11 a.m. and returned to a mob at 1 p.m.

You can buy tickets in advance online at the Hearst Castle Web site. There are plenty of ticket windows at the Visitor's Center, but the lines get long QUICK and if you've purchased your tickets in advance, you'll have more time to enjoy your visit.

In addition to the campground, there are plenty of little hotels just down the road in Cambria. Reservations, even for camping, are recommended, though we were able to get a tent site upon arrival.

We spent about five hours, all told, up on the hill. That's the movie, the tour, some time at the Visitor's Center, and a coffee break on the patio. We're real dawdlers, though; you could probably get your money's worth in about 3 hours.

The Hearst Castle Evening Tour program begins a new season each September. Visitors to the Castle are able to experience evening reflections from the 1930s heyday era.
.
Read this entire feature FREE with photos at:
http://www.jetsettersmagazine.com/archive/jetezine/globe02/usa02/CA/hearst/hearst.html

By Pam, Jetsetters Magazine Correspondent at www.jetsettersmagazine.com

About the Author

By Pam, Jetsetters Magazine Correspondent. Join the Travel Writers Network in the logo at www.jetsettersmagazine.com

...