SPRINGTIME FIELD TRIP: Remember way back when, when the end of the school year, or at least the final few weeks, meant a field trip or two? The whole class piled onto a bus and rode out to a dairy farm or mill or ranch, the better to connect with history and the outdoors (as well as the many other gifts a field trip bestowed, not the least of which it felt kind of special to spend a school day having an adventure). The field trip still exists, in modern form, for both adults and kids, and its spirit will live on at Rush Ranch near Suisun City. The ranch is hosting a free family-sweet open house on Saturday, April 30 -- yep, this is not a school day but a weekend day, do note -- and several free activities will connect visitors to all sorts of wonders. You may see a bat or a bird of prey, live and in person, as well as a host of cows and sheep at the happening, which is presented by the Solano Land Trust. There shall be activities, too, of the science and learning sort. And games?
THERE WILL BE GAMES, and rides in horse-drawn wagons, and roping demonstrations, and the tossing of horseshoes, and, ohhhh yeah, wool spinning, an ancient art form that is beautiful unto itself. Vendors'll selling jewelry, crafts, and such, and some burgers and hot dogs'll be on the grill (those will be for sale, too). Will you breathe deeply, and enjoy some country-style air? You will. Will you ponder clouds and vistas and animals? If you give yourself a few minutes to relax, then definitely. Will you feel as though you revisited that ol' field trip scene, the one from thirty or forty years ago? You just might. The Rush Ranch Open House, by the by, is part of Take It Outside, California! If you know this initiative, you know it is all about getting Golden Staters under the sky and out into nature and public lands. That's certainly worth a high five, the kind of gesture you might have made when finding out your class was about to go on a neato field trip.
