John & Anne Wiley

Well, it’s quite amazing to me that nothing new has appeared here since 2/28 (about our 3/29/2017 flight!) and here we are with the delightful 2018 SB Solstice Parade just days away! I guess it’s surprising that it’s amazing, since I’m mainly the one who’s been adding posts here. I’m beside myself. 😉

A few days after that island flight we enjoyed flying past some hillside poppies and lupine near Ventura. The slope had been scarred by fire, and little did we know then that it would burn again in the horrific Thomas Fire (more on that after more catch up posts).

8165 Poppies & Lupine

We walked the lovely beaches in this area, but seldom take pix then. Why then do we sometimes snap beaches from the air and enjoy “seeing ourselves” down there? Maybe because when a plane flies past us on the beach, we look up and drink in the music of flight recalling being there just as we snap the memories of strolling and wading down there?

8405 Up & Down Beach

It’s always a magical delight when we see whales. Scientists say our mirror neurons fire when we empathize with their parental nurturing.

8557 Swimming Lessons

The scalloped shoreline of Lake Cachuma is often interesting from above, especially when there’s green on the slopes.

8887 Cachuma Shores

Flower fields are another favorite.

8961 Color Harvest

We like to watch birds in flight, though we seldom see them while we’re flying because they see us far before we see them. Even other aircraft can easily escape our scan due to the distance between us. So it was fun to see this pilot stretching his wings near the edge of a beach bluff.

8975 Birdman

Speaking of beach bluffs, some of them tear into the sea in sheets. Pages of pre-history tilted up over eons until they tumble down into the waves they formed beneath, rose above, then dissolved back into.

9152 Over, Under, In

Sometimes picking up inexpensive fresh local colorful and nutritious organic produce at the State Street Farmer’s Market on Tuesday, we’ll glance up when a plane flies over. On the rare times we’re flying over it ourselves, we may snap a pic and zoom in later to notice that nobody down there looked up. We’re rare birds.

9500 Market Colors

Sometimes on a clear day while things are still green in late Spring, the hills and fields of Santa Paula just sparkle.

9661 Santa Paula Valley

Other times the geometry of life and human hands stands out, like the geometry of joy on this day they cleaned out the sandbox at Shoreline Park.

9686 Shape of Play

Sometimes the sea rises into the air and tries to devour the land, only to vanish in the sun.

9751 Land, Sea, Air

So in this very abbreviated collection, I’ve almost brought us up to a year ago. How long before I can make time to share more of the delights we’re so fortunate to enjoy?

Coming home from our 2017 mountain wildflower flight March 24th we saw Neverland. That former playground of Michael Jackson’s that had seemed drab when last we saw it, had burst into brilliant colors as if leaping from the shadows of memory.

7452 Train Time

I don’t know if the clock was accurate, but someone had clearly been working to keep it spiffy. Perhaps they were aided by the recent rain. Another floral name was also back in bloom, though seemingly less pampered out where colorful carnival rides had once cast their shadows and now is bare concrete.

7436 Missing Shadows

The petting zoo now appears an Old West ghost town.

7402 Fantasy Town

Mansions by the small lake while also quiet, seem especially well tended. Are they awaiting return of days gone by, or preparing for new dreamers?

7433 Leisure Life

Without pausing to ponder such questions we flew on past Nojoqui Falls, thrilled to see it gracefully spreading slender fingers of water again.

7475 Nojoqui Falls

Winging through Gaviota Pass we greeted the ocean again where it met the colorful hills of last Spring at Hollister Ranch.

2414 Hollister Ranch

One last reminder of that rainy aftermath was Lake Los Carneros as we prepared to land back at SBA. The marsh beneath the footbridge was still mostly dry, but the lake did look less parched and bedraggled than in the exceptional drought of a few months earlier. Swimming above so much green erased brown to bring us briefly beyond the shadow of a drought.

2417 Lake Los Carneros