Posted by Karen on 16-May-2010
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Ahh, time to leave Redwood Country and head back home to the valley. But before we leave, one more road-side attraction to see at Confusion Hill. It’s one of those mystery spots in the world, where gravity plays tricks on your eyes and how you know things should be. Spots where you stand and look at the height of your friend and they appear taller than they are and when you switch they are way shorter than they are; what causes this height change phenomena? Houses built on the slant to accommodate the weird gravity pull that lets you stand at an angle and on the walls. I kept an eye out for the elusive chipalope and finally spied him way up in the treetops as we were leaving. A rest stop provided the last pictures of the trip as we made our way through the overgrowth to find a geocache at a hidden little waterfall.
Posted by Karen on 08-May-2010
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Springtime in the valley. Tersha and I took her mom, Marie and niece, Brianna, to “Bring-a-Friend” day at Bonfante Gilroy Gardens. After a nice lunch in Gilroy, we went to the park and enjoyed all the beautiful flowers on this lovely spring day. We had a fun afternoon and a crazy hat show to boot. :D
Posted by Karen on 31-Jan-2010
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Lori and I went to Yosemite Valley to spend the weekend under the Full Wolf Moon, the biggest and brightest full moon of the year. From the Farmers’ Almanac:
Amid the cold and deep snows of midwinter, the wolf packs howled hungrily outside Indian villages. Thus, the name for January’s full Moon. Sometimes it was also referred to as the Old Moon, or the Moon After Yule. Some called it the Full Snow Moon, but most tribes applied that name to the next Moon.
On the way down Friday, we stopped at a vineyard and tried to capture the rows of bare grape vines and the precise line of trees behind it. We also stopped to look at a camping trailer I was interested in, so we didn’t arrive at Yosemite until slightly before sunset. We went up to Tunnel View to watch the sunset, which was fairly ordinary, but then the full moon started rising behind Half Dome and that was very extraordinary. For sleeping, we’d rented one of the Curry Village heated cabins and I must say, the heaters in those cabins are excellent.
Saturday morning, we walked over to the Happy Isles Bridge and photographed the Merced River and then we headed over to Yosemite Falls, Ahwahnee Meadow, Sentinel Bridge and just photographed away. We decided to spend sunset and moonrise on Sentinel Bridge, photographing Half Dome and the Merced River. We met a few other hardy souls out there with their cameras too and we all chatted and laughed away even though it was near freezing out there. We saw a little avalanche fall from Half Dome and I got a few pictures of it, which was kind of exciting. After the sun set, a huge cloud of fog settled over the horizon and even though it was the biggest and fullest moon of the year, we couldn’t see it rising, just the illumination of it behind the fog. Okay, time for pizza and warmth.
Sunday morning, we checked out the visitor center and the Indian Museum and met an old Indian woman weaving baskets in the traditional style. At Valley View, we met a couple of crows that were more than eager to pose for us, so of course we had to oblige them and take their photograph. As we headed for home, we stopped for one last waterfall on Cascade Creek, and then headed home after a really nice weekend.
Posted by Karen on 05-Jan-2010
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We have been socked in by fog for days and days now and everything is just a dreary gray. So, after going to Roseville to look at a trailer, I just kept driving right on out of town, just trying so desperately to get out of the fog for a bit. Finally, just past Auburn at 2,000 feet elevation… I’m out of the fog and free from the bleak gray for a few hours (hurray!). I explored a few side roads off the freeway and then found Yankee Jims Road, which is a nice 13 mile stretch of graded dirt road that takes you to Foresthill and that sounded like a nice way to spend some time out of the fog, so away I went. I only encountered a couple of other trucks, so it was just a nice pretty drive along the canyon and across the old 1930s Colfax-Foresthill suspension bridge. I stopped and enjoyed a waterfall along the way and then returned back to the grayness of the valley.
