John & Anne Wiley

2016/02/21

Interplay

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,People,Random,Relationships,SB Region — John @ 23:45

The interplay of air, land and water is so magnificent to me. Perhaps it’s a reflection of the relationships among people? Yesterday sitting mostly in awed silence shoulder to shoulder in Tripp we meandered down the coast to Carp and the Salt Marsh seemed to shimmer in that interplay.

0590 Carp Salt Marsh

0590 Carp Salt Marsh

A few breathtaking dreamscapes later we chanced to catch this surfer ripping a Rincon wave. The splash hung in a shining bubble, then transformed to a blast of misty spray and fell back into the boundless sea after a moment in the sun.

0615 Mingling Moment

0615 Mingling Moment

2016/02/15

We ♥ SB

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,People,Random,Relationships,SB Region — John @ 23:04

Santa Barbara was overflowing with couples on Valentine’s Day. But some were probably enjoying the President’s Day holiday, and others were just out relishing the crisp blue skies and incredibly warm weather. We toured the town having decided not to fly, then as evening approached the sweet song of a quietly passing plane caught our ear. The only decision was how short to make the flight, given that we had a movie date with friends. It ended up being 17 minutes in the heavenly air.

0005 Goleta Beach

0005 Goleta Beach

Every beach along our coast was alive with people at play. Though it’s impossible to tell from the quarter mile above where we fly, presumably many of them were couples celebrating their love in the ways they most enjoy together. We sure were! 🙂

0011 Couples?

0011 Couples?

Could those be two couples kissed by sea foam on a quiet stretch of beach beneath carved sandstone cliffs? We saw people at Ellings Park and the Wilcox (Douglas Family Preserve), and Hendry’s (Arroyo Burro) Beach. Whether on the ground, in the water, or best of all aloft in Tripp; We ♥ Santa Barbara!

0041 Hendry's

0041 Hendry’s

2016/01/05

Somewhere Over

Filed under: Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,Random,SB Region — John @ 03:13

One of our favorite songs is “Over The Rainbow” and there are two additional verses, including this stanza:

When all the clouds darken up the skyway
There’s a rainbow highway to be found
Leading from your window pane
To a place behind the sun
Just a step beyond the rain

Somehow that song fits into my flying dreams, such that aviation and rainbows mingle with Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now” song in my heart. With the El Niño rains predicted to begin here tomorrow, I was up on the roof checking and fixing stuff. Yet it was Anne working on the ground who first looked up and saw this apparition hovering over “our” mountains.

7128 First Rainbow

7128 First Rainbow

Our first rainbow of the year, and one of relatively few in recent years, had a bright left edge. Fading in and out across the arc, it ended in a diagonal cloud shadow that seemed to point toward the coming storms. The vibrant colors seem to foretell the return of green to our mountains. Yay! 🙂

2015/12/15

Always New

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,Random,SB Region — John @ 20:58

Every time we fly this area it’s new. Not just the different angles of light and qualities of air. Any slight dusting of rain like we had the day before these pix shifts the colors in vegetation, especially in surrounding wild country like our mountains.

5707 Hope Eternal

5707 Hope Eternal

Also different on this day was our route, since modest turbulence indicated by those puffy clouds kept many pilots waiting for our typical calm air. So we got this view over Hope Ranch into infinity with a clarity to Point Mugu and beyond that the camera didn’t capture.

5740 Familiar Fave

5740 Familiar Fave

A familiar favorite among our countless views of SB is this one past Shoreline Park and downtown to the sheltering mountains, now tinged with a subtly shifted green from that caress of light rain. Plants here are exquisitely responsive to moisture and tolerant of even exceptional droughts like we’ve been in. Another favorite view is this glance up State Street off Stearn’s Wharf and over the harbor and Mesa back toward distant Point Conception, again all but impossible to share with a camera but endlessly nourishing to our soaring hearts.

5757 Harbor to Conception

5757 Harbor to Conception

2015/12/10

River of Dust

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,Random,SB Region — John @ 09:46

The beautiful Santa Ynez River would have been nothing but dust this year, but for the three main dams. We were surprised to see pools like this along the stretch below Gibraltar Reservoir.

5400 Tiny Oases

5400 Tiny Oases

In case you didn’t notice them amid the vast expanse of brown, I’m talking about the string of pearls bringing the water of life to the lower middle-left of the above pic. As you know, I’m also a fan of rock formations, so it was nice to say hi to this one again as we passed. It was probably carved by eons of epic floods before the dams were built, until the edge stood alone.

5404 Stalwart Stone

5404 Stalwart Stone

Another rock I like is next to another deep pool that harbors some precious water at its base.

5414 Rock, Tree, River

5414 Rock, Tree, River

No doubt these pools have been replenished by occasional releases from the dam at Gibraltar Reservoir, and there’s a nice pool beneath the dam that you can just make out in this pic.

5423 Beneath Gibraltar

5423 Beneath Gibraltar

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