John & Anne Wiley

2014/04/09

Mountain Memories

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Inner World,Nature,People,Random — John @ 05:50

I’ve lived in snowy mountainous areas, and hiked into the wild areas of Yosemite. But it’s been a long time. So seeing places like this gets me wondering who’s been there lately.

5195 Glacial Ground

5195 Glacial Ground

How many people had made the arduous climb to this smooth stone between the glacier’s retreat and the time of John Muir? How many since? Any this year yet? Are there any established trails? This zoom pic from high and far away makes the haze look far worse than it did in person, but I do hope to fly there some day when the air is crystal clear.

5207 Yosemite Valley

5207 Yosemite Valley

So many of our most magnificent parks suffer from smog, yet still offer such a healing place to Be. Far outside the park are places like this frozen meadow.

5192 Frozen Meadow

5192 Frozen Meadow

When the distant musical hum of our engine had passed, what sounds wafted across this theater among the trees? Are those human footprints I see that crunched in the snow fallen only a couple of days before, so high and far from the beaten track in the healing embrace of nature?

2014/04/05

Fly Over

Filed under: Aviation,Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,People,Random — John @ 18:48

We learned the difference between a fly-in and a fly-out: A fly-in is where people fly their assorted collection of people and airplanes to a destination. An example of a fly-out is where several airplane loads of people flew to the Sierra foothills for much merriment at Lynne and Ken’s unusual piece of paradise. Since we had Tripp parked at Oakland for our Whimsy at Mt. Tam. & SF, we flew over to join the gang. On the way I liked this scene of an open shelter in the rolling green hills. In such an overload of green hues, my eye shelters on that rusty red roof.

4798 Shelter In Green

4798 Shelter In Green

Then on to Pine Mountain Lake (E45), where people have built their dream homes with two “garages” each: one for their car(s) and one for their plane(s). Several of the roads double as taxiways residents use for driving to town or getting their airplanes to and from the runway. These are happy aviators, and we’re very happy to join them.

4823 Pine Mountain Airpark

4823 Pine Mountain Airpark

2014/03/31

Whimsy

Filed under: Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,People,Random — Anne @ 04:03

Sometimes in life, a whimsy invites the adventurous. Today we accepted the invitation, and a couple of hours ago we saw this.

3998 Old Gold

3998 Old Gold

With good weather today and rain hopes in the week ahead, we’re glad. Now settling for the nite and tomorrow…

 

 

2014/03/29

Temptation

Filed under: Aviation,Flying,Happiness,Has Photos,Inner World,Nature,People,Random,SB Region — John @ 22:36

This first pic shows a temptation pilots see often, and the last pic in this post shows something that adds to it in this particular spot just as other spots often have their own special cases.

1567 Teasing Tripp

1567 Teasing Tripp

It’s as if Tripp’s cousin here is saying, “I’m happy to be here, but you’re not invited.” But of course the plane’s not saying that. That message is spelled out in the little letter “R” at the top-left. That means despite looking so tempting this is a Restricted landing strip, only to be used by invitation or in emergencies. Flying over such spots, a few times friends have jokingly asked, “Doesn’t the engine sound a little rough to you?” But pilots respect the privacy of private airstrips, and have even dreamed of one day having one though with our meager funds that’s never going to happen. So instead I just take it all in from a respectful distance, and dream of living in a place like this just minutes by air from Santa Barbara.

1559 Airstrip Owner

1559 Airstrip Owner

The beautiful grass strip where Tripp’s cousin is parked, is just off the bottom-right end of this pic. There’s an old building that looks like a church and/or schoolhouse with a cemetery, so this was probably at one time a small town. It’s out on Santa Cruz Island, and across a ridge to the North is this smaller settlement that’s presumably related.

1561 North Shore Dock

1561 North Shore Dock

As I said, many private and Restricted airports have additional temptations nearby. In this case, not just the little communities and the many hiking trails. There are also many sea caves nearby on the South shore of the island where raging storms carve the shore and giant waves nibble at the feet of tall cliffs.

1577 South Shore Cave

1577 South Shore Cave

2014/03/28

Home Tourism

Filed under: Happiness,Has Photos,Nature,People,Random,Relationships,SB Region — John @ 23:09

We like it when visitors come, because it often gets us out doing the “tourist” things around town. It’s been a while since we visited the Harbor, for example.

140253 Rainy Harbor

140253 Rainy Harbor

So when dear friends from NYC were here on a stormy February day, we enjoyed the reflective views there again. We also discovered the viewing deck atop the Maritime Museum as clouds parted and a rainbow appeared offshore.

165252 Promise of Sun

165252 Promise of Sun

From there, the gull’s eye view out past the Harbor to the city and mountains beyond is more expansive.

165258 Good Gull View

165258 Good Gull View

Over at Stearn’s Wharf which we do seem to visit more often between visitors, we swapped photo ops with our friends. Much more fun than Selfies. 🙂

120243 Looking At Friends

120243 Looking At Friends

« Previous Page — Next Page »

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.