Summer Travel

Ohai blog! I've missed you! This summer has been crazy, in the best possible way. Summer is the traditional time for travel in academia, and I definitely kept with tradition. Two observing runs, one conference, and some personal travel as well. What does a knitter do when traveling? Find the LYSs, of course!

First trip was an observing run to Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile:

On my way out of the country, I had an eight hour layover in Santiago. One bus and one metro ride later, I arrived at Pueblito los Dominicos, a sort of artist co-op space where I snagged some lovely yarns:




I also picked up some more commercial Chilean yarn at a grocery store(!) in La Serena:


Next up, an observing run at Kitt Peak National Observatory in Arizona:


One of my sweet Ravelry friends, who is also an indie dyer, lives nearby and drove over to meet me, and brought along with her my very first purchase of Gherkin's Bucket yarn:


It's scrumptious!

After that, a trip to bella Italia for a meeting in Padua. I had to fly into Venice, so I snuck in a yarn store trip while I was there. The store, Lellabella, was fantastic. Small but packed with great Italian yarns!


Lastly, a family gathering in Pennsylvania to celebrate my granddad's life. I drove home with my mama and we stopped in Knoxville, TN, to visit a good friend and (of course!) hit up an LYS, where I got some Miss Babs, my first, which is dyed in (semi-)nearby Mountain City, TN:

The colorway is Gemini II, and I like to think that it's named after the NASA mission.

All in all an excellent, if exhausting, summer. Now I'm back home for awhile, settling back in, sleeping in my own bed, and not buying any more yarn because I'm set for awhile (ahahahahaha!). (In all fairness, I didn't keep all of the yarn--a lot of it was thank you yarn for rides to and from the airport, but still...)

How was your summer?