If all has gone well, I should be somewhere near the summit of Mt. Agassiz about now. If the conditions are good, I might try and bivy on top to catch sunrise over the Palisades. Might head up Goode tomorrow. Possibly a few more things during the week. Half tempted to head up to Mt. Shasta as well.
For perspective, I’m 1.83m (6 ft) tall. Redwoods are some big trees. Bad self portrait, I know…
I make most my panoramic photos using photomerge in Photoshop. Normally it works super good without any problems but sometimes I just have to sit there and scratch my head with what it outputs. This first photo for example: 3 vertical images with a Nikon 85mm tilt-shift lens. In other words, it should go together absolutely perfectly, without any distortion or misalignment anywhere. What happened in photomerge? A great mystery of life. All I can think of is that the clouds may have given it some problems. I just had to use the old fashioned way and combine it by hand. No problem.
Interesting results on this second photo as well. And again, it was simple enough to align and blend by hand for a perfect result.
After a night in the Mt. Shasta Area I headed west, through the winding mountain roads of the Trinity Alps and out towards the coast north of Eureka, almost to the Oregon border. This area is the home to Redwood national park and numerous smaller state parks. My favorite being Prairie Creek Redwoods state park, a mixture of thick redwood forests and beautiful beaches. This area is so from my home in southern California (it is a shorter drive from Seattle, Washington than from Santa Barbara) that I only first came through here a couple years ago in the summer and then again in the autumn of 2007.
There is this super cool campground at Gold Bluffs beach, set amongst coastal dunes with the endless crashing waves of the Northern Pacific ocean just a couple hundred feet away.
Roosevelt Elk lazily wander and graze throughout the tents and campsites. I would have liked to get a photo of them walking along the beach, but I never saw them there this time. More reason to go back again.
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Took a little road trip around California during the last week. Mostly to visit old places that I haven’t been to for a while, such as Mt. Shasta (above), which I climbed back in 2005, but haven’t seen since. Up every morning at 4:30, but the light was pretty dissapointing for the most part. Still nice scenery though, if not so good for photography. Still managed a few nice shots though. More in the next days…
Here’s a few more pics of the Jesusita fire from Wednesday afternoon while still at my brother’s house. We had been evacauated on Tuesday afternoon, but managed to get back in on Wednesday to try and keep an eye on things. By late afternoon, the fire was getting perilously close and most of the neighborhood had cleared out. From or estimates looking at aerial photos and from driving around today, we estimate the fire got within about 200 meters. The only traffic was from fire crews driving down Foothill road and police driving through the neighborhoods telling people to leave immediately. The Mandatory evacuation zone had been moved down to State street, so we were well behind the lines. The Temperature was somewhere near 100 degrees (37 C), as the “sundowner winds” were constantly changing directions, but mostly keeping the smoke just to the east of our location. At times the sky was as black as night.
First few photos are with a 14mm lens. It was that close…
First pic: Looking east.
Corner of Foothill and Calle Laureles, looking towards Mission Canyon
Fire crews driving east along Foothill towards Mission Canyon
California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (I think everyone knows who he is) came to Santa Barbara this morning to give a press conference in regards to the Jesusita fire, which he declared a “state of emergency” on Wednesday evening. The press conference was held at Earl Warren showgrounds, which is currently one of the main staging areas for firefighters who have come to the area to assist is the effort.
Things look a lot better this morning. Lots of helicopters flying around and a big fire-retardant dropping plane is also on the scene. A couple of the helicopter crews are using a field at one of the local schools to fill up with water via a hose and fire hydrant.
Been a busy afternoon. My brother’s house and neighborhood was put on mandatory evacuation around 4:30 this afternoon, so we were kept busy getting everything loaded into trucks and vans to move to a safer place. There is a small reservoir over the hill from his house where the fire fighting helicopters have been picking up water all afternoon, often circling low over his house. Still at 10:30 at night, 5-6 helicopters are still flying around in the sky. After it got dark I went to a view point a couple miles west and the wind was blasting and I could see huge flare ups in the fire every few minutes. Luckily the winds aren’t as bad as they could be though. Going to be a long night for a lot of people.
first photo: view from the Santa Barbara Courthouse around 4:30 this afternoon.
Seems all to early in the year for this to be happening already! A bit before 2pm fire was reported in the foothills above Santa Barbara in the Jeusita area, no roads but several hiking trails pass through the area.
Current temp is about 83˚ F (28˚ C) with winds about 20-25 mph (30-40 kmh).
2:15 pm
3:40 pm
Kungsleden Trail Hiking Guide