John & Anne Wiley

2014/03/04

Out Of Palm

Last month as we climbed through the mountains coming out of Palm Springs toward home as sunset approached, we were thrilled by this view off to our left.

1757 Mountain Magic

1757 Mountain Magic

The air through the pass was moving fairly fast, as you can see from that wisp of cloud lilting over the mountain. Also as you’d expect from the fact that in the valley floor below us near here is one of California’s largest wind farms. Countless giant windmills are churning away any time power is needed for the grid. But even with our progress slowed by the air funneling through this valley, the air was almost smooth. So we had the time to breathe deeply into the mood of this view.

2014/03/03

Falling

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Nature,People,Random,SB Region — John @ 23:26

When it stopped raining and the clouds lifted yesterday we went “falling” (flying along the hills enjoying waterfalls). The air was hazy and light was low due to the still heavy clouds above, so the pix didn’t come out as I’d most like. But I did manage to catch some of the freshening falls with these pix.

2781 Private Wonder

2781 Private Wonder

This first one perhaps two miles from SBA is pretty amazing, but I’ve been told it’s on private property. The amount of water in it is far more than any of the others we saw yesterday, and it has at least three levels with pools. What a glorious place this would be on a summer day! Here’s an overhead view.

2793 Down Fall

2793 Down Fall

We saw several “slit” falls like this, with little water but fascinating rock work from millennia of water and rocks carving the groove as they passed this way toward the sea far below.

2803 Groovy Falls

2803 Groovy Falls

Here’s another with a similar yet quite different look, lower down the mountain where more rivulets have joined the stream that built it. So near the city, yet it seems likely that very few people have ever stood here in the song of splash and gazed out to the islands as a hawk circled in the rising air.

2806 Notch Falls

2806 Notch Falls

Many of these small falls have cut deeply into the rock, and some have little round pools like this probably carved by small boulders swirling in the current. How many people have enjoyed a serene bath in this tub?

2810 Tiny Tub

2810 Tiny Tub

Another tub is carved at the bottom of this steep ravine where more plants have managed to gain a foothold in the notch. I am here in this water garden, silently aware of life surrounding and within.

2814 Green Tub

2814 Green Tub

There were other falls we wanted to check on, but the clouds were too low. Some of them are larger collections of various tributary creeks and springs. But down in the foothills where we saw this last one, not many waterfalls were visible because they’d all collected into creeks covered by lush tree canopies. Even though this is but a trickle, the bare rock shows how much water flows here in heavy rains that carry boulders scouring away the soil and brush.

2813 Trickle

2813 Trickle

While our hearts take wing over the beauty of our planet, our feet yearn to hear and smell the living planet. So after we tied Tripp’s stout wings to the ground, we hiked up the San Antonio Creek Trail to move in wonder among the ancient oaks beside dancing waters where only days before we’d stood on dry sand.

3054 Wet Wonderland

3054 Wet Wonderland

2014/02/27

Island In Time

Today I revisited our flight with friends out to Santa Cruz Island, and was fascinated by this building I snapped as part of a scene near the southeast end. It’s an old church with cemetery, all but untouched by time.

1552 Island In Time

1552 Island In Time

Each of those grave markers represents a life story that ended here, so near the bustle and constant change of SoCA yet so very far. A time capsule from the previous millennium in some ways, of a very different lifestyle from our Hollywood freeway culture. Moving minutes backward in our own time to the climb West for the crossing, this long look to distant Point Conception carries my mind back even beyond the abandoned buildings by that lighthouse to the Chumash people who inhabited both places.

1513 Looking Back

1513 Looking Back

Though only a couple of minutes before that, our takeoff looking past UCSB to the island seems a lifetime ago.

1512 Further Back

1512 Further Back

The drought-ravaged wetland next to the airport hints at the marsh once there when a Chumash band lived on a hillock that was once an island.

Falls, Rides, Dots

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Nature,People,Random,SB Region — John @ 01:22

Swimming and wading in wilderness waterfalls is a major sport for SB hikers, many of whom probably know where this patient playground awaits the rain.

1413 Waiting Waterpark

1413 Waiting Waterpark

I uploaded a larger version you can see by clicking the image, and in that one you can more easily make out the one tiny pool still containing water. Not far away is this large and fancy horse ranch where many great rides await.

1433 Equestrian Acres

1433 Equestrian Acres

Not far from that on our way back to SBA are these hills dotted with orchards, with a large water tank and another swimming pool.

1444 Green Dot Patterns

1444 Green Dot Patterns

2014/02/26

Rock Bands

People sometimes discover totally new fascinations, and the subjects of these fascinations can change. For me flying isn’t a new fascination but as regular visitors to this blog well know, it has triggered several new fascinations. A big one is the rock bands in our mountains. Bands of rock that protrude from the scrub and rubble, revealing sculpted shapes.

1383 Three Splits

1383 Three Splits

Maybe this fascination is new because flying over these shapes provides an immediate 3D sense impossible from these photos, or from the ground. Another reason is probably that many of these sculptures are far from trails and thus invisible to all but the hardiest hikers. Or aviators. How is it the three massive boulders above are each somewhere in a process of splitting right down the middle?

1319 Texture Tales

1319 Texture Tales

The texture of this rock band peeking from the garnish of brush tells timeless tales of wind and water, begging to be touched even if only by the eye of a passing pilot. Then what about this fascinating dry waterfall? How many people even know it’s there, and fewer still have ever seen it much less found a way to explore it on foot. Maybe as time and technology continue making it easier to see and even stand in such places, there will be ever fewer unknown fascinations for people to discover.

1402 Fascinating Falls

1402 Fascinating Falls

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