nature

October 31, 2013

Unexpected Benefit of a Gator Quest

(The WP Weekly Photo Challenge asked to see a horizon.)

On my occasional trips to Florida to see family, I have been repeatedly disappointed in efforts to spot alligators out in the open (not planted at a zoo or theme park).

Please understand, I don’t have a death wish. It’s not like I traipse through the Everglades calling here gator gator. I simply search for remnants of gator culture in Florida suburbs, under the assumption that surviving gators will shun humans rather than eat them.

They certainly shun this human!

At the golf course where some of my family lives, signs like this one promise gator action near the pond:

An unfounded claim.

An unfounded claim.

I’ve never seen any gators at the pond, but one late afternoon, looking for gators did bring me to this wonderful reflection of the horizon:

Horizon-tal symmetry.

Horizon-tal symmetry.

Finally and at last, as we left for the airport to come home, I saw one! A little guy running away from us, toward the horizon:

littlegatorIMG_7016

We almost didn’t get the picture – took us many precious seconds to figure out that speeding up to see him before he got away made him run faster to get away.

October 27, 2013

Before The Day Gets Used

The WordPress Daily Prompt asks: “6:00AM: the best hour of the day, or too close to your 3:00AM bedtime?”

Neither. Both. Sometimes.

alarmclock-clock-broken_~u10900682

Don’t shoot the messenger.

My answer has changed over the years. It used to be that I was only up at dawn if I was still up from the night before. If I could set my own schedule, that would probably still be true.  Actually, what I would prefer is to sleep a few hours at night and the rest of my hours in the afternoon. Afternoons are useless. I like afternoons about as much as Camus’ Stranger likes Sundays. But I digress.  Somebody told me that 4 hrs night/4 hrs afternoon is a paleo sleep schedule: it’s how our distant ancestors slept. Alas, not sure when or if I can give it a try. My sleep schedule has rarely been up to me.  Jobs, schools, doctors, repair guys – they’re the ones in control.

Nowadays, half my body clock seems to be permanently broken. I can still stay up until all hours and most nights I must force myself to go to bed at a decent hour. But – after so many years as a night owl trapped in an early bird world – I cannot sleep in. Period.  So I am now quite familiar with 6 am.

Fortunately, 6a is a marvelous time of day, when all is fresh and full of potential.  In my household, I am the only dawn enthusiast, which makes 6a a “me” time of day. You will find me writing then. Or exercising at my outdoor bootcamp class. Or hiking.  Hiking into a sunrise requires a bit of planning – it all changes so remarkably quickly. The photos below were taken scant minutes apart. Every single day, the world starts in this beautiful way, whether we are there to witness it or not.

A couple minutes before 6a.

A couple minutes before 6a. Goodbye to night.

A couple minutes after 6a.
A couple minutes after 6a. Hello to day.

Clock photo from fotosearch.com. 

September 29, 2013

A Lurid End of Day and a Prizeless Contest

Every once in a while there is a dazzling treat of a sunset that makes me think the painter Maxfield Parrish was a realist.

For all you competitors out there, a contest: guess where this photo was taken and win the satisfaction of being right!

Hint to Dorothy: We’re not in Kansas.

Where was this photo taken?

Where was this photo taken?

(This Weekly Photo Challenge wants to see “saturated”.)

September 21, 2013

Rock Rorschach

If you read this blog much, you know I like to see stuff in other stuff.

Here is a rock that sits right in the surf on a Santa Barbara beach. It’s got a big hollow with ever-changing sand deposits.  Last time I was at this beach, the rock looked like a fossil shark tooth to me. What do you see?

What do you see?

What do you see?

Later that day, the surf developed the rock’s next persona:

Tide coming in.

Tide coming in.

(The Weekly Photo Challenge wants to see lines and patterns.)

September 10, 2013

Water Lines

When away from Oroville Dam in northern California, I can resent its intrusive existence and its destruction of the Feather River. Yet when I visit and walk across the dam, I see the beauty that remains. Currently, the reservoir is low on water, which exposes  patterns that disappear when submerged.

lowdam2photo

The current Weekly Photo Challenge wants photos from an unusual perspective.)

September 8, 2013

My Personal Space Telescope

On my recent walk across Oroville dam in northern California, clouds moved rapidly across the sun – all these photos were taken during just a few, rapidly evolving minutes – and created a spectacular scene that looked like star nebula photographed by the Hubble.

cloud7photo

cloud5photo

cloud4photo

cloud1photo

The current Weekly Photo Challenge wants photos from an unusual perspective.)

September 6, 2013

Repeating Landscapes

Reflections and shadows make the world more intriguing. This is true in people as well as terrains, but I don’t have photos that demonstrate this for personalities.

August’s full moon was so bright that it cast shadows on my car and produced enough light for me to take this photo:

That bright dot is the full moon, reflected in my car hood.

That bright dot is the full moon, reflected in my car hood.

An easy hike up Malibu Creek in southern California leads to duplicate images in this still and reflective pond.

Can you find the water line?

Can you find the water line?

Look in the pond and see the sky!:

Pond's-eye view of the sky.

Pond’s-eye view of the sky.

A tree’s reflection in the pond:

Another pond's-eye view

Another pond’s-eye view

The current Weekly Photo Challenge wants photos from an unusual perspective.)

September 5, 2013

I Had Better Get Busy

My “desert island” food is the blueberry. My “desert island” place is the ocean. Which proves convenient: I don’t have to bring my favorite place with me to the desert island, it will already surround me.

Desert island. Typing that phrase, I realize how comfortable I am using language when I don’t entirely know what it means. That must get me into trouble sometimes but apparently I don’t know when that happens.

Desert island. Somewhere remote and cut-off, I figure. Checking that infallible source of information, the internet, I learn that a desert island is an island that is not inhabited by humans.

(Sue’s first rule of blogging: start with a digression. Or four.)

Here’s the point: I love the ocean but I have only been to two of them.  Mostly the Pacific. Occasionally the Atlantic. Surely I need to see the others, and visit them from more than one location. Which means I had better get busy and travel faster.

Here is what the Atlantic Ocean looked like during my visit to a Florida beach:

The Atlantic Ocean from a beach in central Florida.

The Atlantic Ocean at sunset from a beach in central Florida.

At this beach it was not a good idea to walk while enjoying the view. There were dead jellyfish everywhere! I don’t know whether this was typical for this area. Perhaps I visited during a time of jellyfish affliction.

Dead jellyfish covered the beach like land mines.

It was a beach of dead jellyfish land mines.

(In response to this Weekly Photo Challenge.)

August 14, 2013

The Gull, the Rocks, and the Sea

I don’t like seagulls much, but this one did nothing offensive during the brief time we were together. Anyway there can’t always be pelicans.

Ocean with gull, in landscape mode.

Ocean with gull, in landscape mode.

Ocean with gull, in portrait mode.

Ocean with gull, in portrait mode.

These photos show a glimpse of beach at San Clemente, CA, where it is always this beautiful.

(This week’s Photo Challenge wants to see one image shot two ways.)