John & Anne Wiley

2012/12/16

SoCA Holidaze

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,People,Random,SB Region — John @ 22:44

This time of year is quite different here in SB, compared with other places we’ve lived. Rather than snow, our days are typically in the mid-70F range and people are enjoying time off from work like these folks were on the beach out near Point Conception.

1754 Brown Season

1754 Brown Season

This was snapped back in Brown Season on 11/24 before the rains came. Now it’s all lush and green, and in fact at the moment is under low clouds that are flirting with the misty hills as I look out the window typing this. On that flight, we noticed something new to us: lots of houses like these out past Gaviota where we thought there was just a working ranch.

1762 Lazy Coast

1762 Lazy Coast

I guess you don’t see them either, but in the original hi-res version of this pic I can make out at least a dozen homes. Here’s a closer view of the same area so you might be able to pick out at least three.

1758 Hidden Homes

1758 Hidden Homes

Driving to and from town takes maybe almost an hour from here, so it’s surprising some of these folks don’t have runways. Maybe they’re using helicopters. More likely though, they don’t commute. Maybe they mostly enjoy just Being there, going down to the beach for surfing and all the other benefits of not living in town. Reminds me of living in the Northwest woods one snowy Winter, 10 miles from the nearest paved road. Except for the weather. 🙂

2012/12/06

POV

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,People,Random,Relationships,SB Region — John @ 20:01

Point Of View is an interesting phenomenon. Two people experiencing the same situation often respond to it completely differently, each from their own POV. Both are of course, correct in their experience. Each may also believe their POV is superior. Yesterday we encountered that situation with friends, and it was intensely educational. Perhaps this is why, today looking through more pix from recent flights, I noticed POV in them. This scene is experienced quite differently from the sea, the cliffs, the shore, and here in the air.

1713 Sunnyside

1713 Sunnyside

This angle with the evening sun behind us, provides an uncommon POV. Not better than if we’d been in a kayak paddling furiously to stay safe in the surf. Or if we’d enjoyed the long hike to reach the cliff top and peer over the edge. Or feeling the brisk water in that calmer pool in the distance. How we each come to a moment has value, and sharing our POV with each other seems to me tied up with the Meaning of Life for our species.

Often, flying takes us beyond the realm of human experience going back even into a time we may have lived in tall trees. Looking down at this tall tower at the Garden Street Academy flips that POV of a high place, into an interesting shape far below.

1677 Flip

1677 Flip

Before flight became a frequent experience, I used to yearn for access to towers and other tall places. Now my POV is stretched so that such places are a passing curiosity. There are exciting moments during most flights, when a new discovery or POV brings smiles and thrills. But most often there is a deep calm that permeates our consciousness and endures after we’re back on the ground, savoring. A POV stretched beyond our species, that evokes calm pools of shared memory.

1728 Calm Pools

1728 Calm Pools

2012/12/04

Meditation

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,Random,SB Region — John @ 21:20

We’ve enjoyed some day and weekend meditation retreats. So nourishing for the soul, bringing that relaxed and serene spirit back to daily life. That’s how we felt yesterday after half an hour flying along the mountains above town. The recent rains have made it all lush, and myriad waterfalls are leaping with delight.

1896 Twin Falls

1896 Twin Falls

Quiet pools carved from the rocks are again bathed in soothing mist, and looking down at seldom visited places like this transports our souls there in an instant.

1893 Ion Pool

1893 Ion Pool

After these few healing minutes aloft, as we turned away from the mist-capped hills above Montecito to begin the quiet descent back to SBA I turned to Anne and said yet again, “I Love this!”

1925 Misty Moment

1925 Misty Moment

2012/12/03

Closer Look

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Nature,Random,SB Region — John @ 20:23

Speaking of stones, sometimes when I’m looking at pix from a flight something new will come to light. Like these folds in sandstone. I’m trying to figure out what would create something like this.

1633 Stone Skin

1633 Stone Skin

Grooves could be cut by wheels, as in the prior post about a sandstone outcrop. But what would account for a raised area with a groove down the middle, as at the top-right? At the bottom of this same large outcrop is another area with grooves.

 

1633 Groovy

1633 Groovy

So many places where a raised “fold” has a groove cut at the top. A raised area would seem to get more so as runoff was directed to the adjoining lower area. What could erode a channel right along the raised area?

From the air I didn’t notice any of this. Just a rock outcrop that somehow moved me to snap a pic.

1633 Glance

1633 Glance

Maybe this distant glance at the outcrop was interesting because of the unusual texture created by the sunset-angled light on those grooves.

2012/11/30

Stones Sunset Tour

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,Random,SB Region — John @ 22:13

No, I don’t have pix of the Rolling Stones on their geriatric world tour. This is about my fascination with the rock outcrops sprinkled along our majestic mountains. Flying the hills at sunset this time of year, the shadows etch features and textures complemented by splashes of glowing orange light.

1622 Weathered Face

1622 Weathered Face

Faces like this tell such a tale of the ages. All the story that went into creating the stone, accented by the carving of weather and other forces. The variety is visually pleasing to me in an artistic sense too, like this enormous impression of alligator skin.

1627 Tough Skin

1627 Tough Skin

Then there are the stones with signs of humans who passed long ago, like this area where local historian Neal Graffy pointed out ruts made by steel-rimmed wooden wheels.

1632 Slippery Slope

1632 Slippery Slope

If you click to see the larger version, on the left ridge you can make out he deepest parallel ruts. This dry scene somehow evokes an image of a stagecoach full of terrified passengers gasping at each lurch and bump as they imagine tumbling down into the ravine on a dark and rainy night with whip cracking at steaming horses straining up the hill. Scariest on such a night though, would be coming down as the brakes smoked and wheels slid while digging those ruts.

So many impressions come to me while taking a leisurely sunset stones tour…

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