Stock Photos of Coronado, San Diego, California
Stock photos of Coronado, San Diego, California
My recent San Diego Magazine cover photo of the San Diego Coronado Bridge has generated some potential new clients for me over the past few days. I’ve assembled a gallery of Coronado Island photos for them to consider for related publishing projects. We’ll see if I make any sales! Thanks for looking.
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| San Diego Coronado Bridge, known locally as the Coronado Bridge, links San Diego with Coronado, California. The bridge was completed in 1969 and was a toll bridge until 2002. It is 2.1 miles long and reaches a height of 200 feet above San Diego Bay. Coronado Island is to the left, and downtown San Diego is to the right in this view looking north. Image ID: 22288 Location: San Diego, California, USA |
San Diego Magazine Cover Photo: Coronado Bay Bridge and Downtown
The February 2012 cover of San Diego Magazine is my aerial photo of the San Diego Coronado Bay Bridge, with the bay and downtown in the background. The boat wake shaped like a heart (”heart” = “reasons to love San Diego”, get it?) was the work of the cover illustrator. This photograph was shot on a fun flight I made with Alaska photographer Ron Niebrugge a few years ago. We had clear air and warm sunlight to make our photographs of San Diego. Thanks for looking!
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Leucadia Sunset
Sunset over the Ocean, Leucadia, California
This photo was made a few minutes after the sun went down, in Leucadia, California, an eclectic beach community in north San Diego county that is home to great surf, great taco shops and nouveau riche homes teetering on the edge of crumbling sea cliffs. I left the shutter open for 30 seconds to let the surf blur and allow the ocean to appear flat. I love living near the ocean!
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| Leucadia sunset, beautiful clouds and soft colors. Image ID: 27379 |
See more photos of San Diego.
Hotel Del Coronado with Christmas Lights, San Diego
Christmas Holiday Lights at the Hotel Del Coronado in San Diego, California.
During the holidays I joined my photographer friend Garry McCarthy at sunset to photograph the Hotel Del Coronado on beautiful Coronado Island in San Diego. During the holidays “The Del” puts on quite a holiday show, with a beachside ice skating rink and holiday lights. Garry and I waited until the “blue hour” kicked in and shot some nice images of this distinctive landmark San Diego hotel at dusk. If you like these, take a look at my gallery of San Diego photos. Thanks for looking!
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| Hotel del Coronado with holiday Christmas night lights, known affectionately as the Hotel Del. It was once the largest hotel in the world, and is one of the few remaining wooden Victorian beach resorts. It sits on the beach on Coronado Island, seen here with downtown San Diego in the distance. It is widely considered to be one of Americas most beautiful and classic hotels. Built in 1888, it was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1977. Image ID: 27396 Location: San Diego, California, USA |
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| Hotel del Coronado with holiday Christmas night lights. Image ID: 27405 Location: San Diego, California, USA |
Imperial Beach Pier
The Imperial Beach Pier is an old, charismatic wooden pier reaching out in the lovely Pacific from that funky and most-southerly city in California: Imperial Beach. The Imperial Beach Pier, of “I.B. Pier”, was most recently built in 1989. It is 1491′ long and 24′ wide and situated in water that is approximately 20′ deep. I like photographing the ocean and coastlines at dawn, and recently made a trip down to the Imperial Beach Pier to photograph it over the holidays. If you like these, see a few other Imperial Beach Pier photos. Thanks for looking!
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| Imperial Beach pier at sunrise,. Image ID: 27414 Location: Imperial Beach, California, USA |
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| Imperial Beach pier at sunrise,. Image ID: 27411 Location: Imperial Beach, California, USA |
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| Imperial Beach pier at sunrise,. Image ID: 27417 Location: Imperial Beach, California, USA |
See also my photos of the other four ocean piers in San Diego County:
Ocean Beach Pier photos
Scripps Institute of Oceanography Research Pier photos
Crystal Pier photos
Oceanside Pier photos
Pacific Harbor Seal, La Jolla, California
Cute Harbor Seal Photo, La Jolla, California.
This is the third of three images I had that were Highly Commended in this year’s Windland Smith Rice photography competition.*
This is one of the famous or, depending on your political position, notorious Pacific harbor seals (Phoca vitulina richardsi) the reside at the Children’s Pool in La Jolla, California. Some people really hate these seals and feel their presence on the beach has robbed people of the use of small cove and want to see the seals gone, forcefully or otherwise. Others love the seals and don’t want to see them bothered at all. I don’t really care either way, I just like to shoot photos of them. I’ve been photographing (and diving with) these seals since their colony first began forming in the ’90s. There are certain times of day when the light angles and water movement really work well here for photography. On this day, one of the more charismatic seals was moving about at the water’s edge and paused for a moment with its flippers raised, looking at me. I got off a series of photos and this was the most appealing of the group.
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| Pacific harbor seal, an sand at the edge of the sea. Image ID: 26315 Species: Pacific harbor seal, Phoca vitulina richardsi Location: La Jolla, California, USA |
* I was fortunate to have three of my photographs receive Highly Honored recognition in this years Windland Smith Rice photography competition sponsored by Nature’s Best Photography. The first was a photo of photographer Garry McCarthy working in the Virgin River Narrows in Zion National Park. The second was a composition of the Giants Marbles in Joshua Tree National Park. 21,000 images were entered in the competition, 500 made it to the final round of judging and 131 were winners or highly honored and appeared in the most recent issue of Nature’s Best Photography magazine. I am crossing my fingers that one of mine will also be featured as part of the competition’s six-month exhibition next year at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C.
Torrey Pines State Reserve Running Photos
It is for views like this that I run. I’ve been running for 35 years and will keep running until my body can’t do it anymore. I estimate that I have run at least 32,000 miles (1.25 times around the Earth!) and it is views like this that keep me fired up for more. I have probably run the trails in Torrey Pines State Reserve (north of La Jolla, California) 1500 times or more during my life. The other night during my run I enjoyed one of the finest sunsets I have ever seen there. Clearing storm, golden light, clouds, wet sand. I had my iPhone strapped to my arm but I had no “real camera”. There was no one else on the beach and it appeared I had two miles of spectacular low tide beach all to myself which in San Diego is a virtual impossibility. I spent the last 30 minutes of the day composing panoramas of the golden waning light shining on the cliffs and breaking storm clouds with my iPhone. That night I fed a stack of 45 individual iPhone images to Photoshop. Photoshop cranked away all night making a panorama and the following morning the first image below is the result. I’ve checked it at full resolution and the quality is really impressive. Thanks for looking and keep on running!
Click any of the images to see them larger. In their full resolution form, all of these panoramas are quite large, made from 20-45 individual iPhone photos that are stitched together in Photoshop. Sizes range up to 10,000 pixels in length and 3800 pixels in height. In the images that include waves, there are stitching errors in the waves which are largely unavoidable. However, in the images that face away from the ocean there are few if any stitching errors and in my estimation the images are clean enough to print up to 30″ or more in length .
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| Torrey Pines seacliffs viewed at sunset from Flat Rock, Torrey Pines State Reserve, La Jolla, California |
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| Torrey Pines seacliffs viewed at sunset from Flat Rock, Black’s Beach and La Jolla at far right, Torrey Pines State Reserve, La Jolla, California |
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| Torrey Pines seacliffs viewed at sunset from Flat Rock, Del Mar and Solana Beach at far left, Torrey Pines State Reserve, La Jolla, California |
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California Fall Color in the Eastern Sierra
View this blog entry in Google EarthLatitude: 37° 12' 42.94" N, Longitude: 118° 36' 40.39" W, Coord: 37.21193°, -118.61122°
Filed under: Sierra Nevada on 9/18/2011
In the next month I hope to once again make a brief trip to Bishop, California to enjoy the changing colors of the quaking aspens (Populus tremuloides). Below are the websites and photographers I follow to stay abreast of how conditions are changing as the autumn season progresses. I will be carrying several cameras with me this year so I don’t have to change lenses in the field. The lenses I find most useful are 16-35 or 15mm fisheye, 24-105, 70-200. I will also carry a small Lumix LX3 infrared-converted camera with which the below image was shot:
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| Aspen trees in fall, eastern Sierra fall colors, autumn. Image ID: 23320 Species: Aspen, Populus tremuloides Location: Bishop Creek Canyon, Sierra Nevada Mountains |
- G. Dan Mitchell’s Sierra Nevada photography is superb (especially his Yosemite images), and his blog is informative and well-written. Dan has written a super primer about fall color in the Eastern Sierra “Sierra Nevada fall color season – coming sooner than you think!” loaded with good information about what to expect and how to plan for autumn in the Sierra Nevada.
- Carol Leigh’s Calphoto.com. This is where many California photographers exchange detailed reports autumn foliage.
- Inge Fernau / MagicalGlow.com. I first noticed Inge Fernau’s photography as a result of her incredibly rich fall color reports on Calphoto. She gets out there to so many places, then fills us all in with exactly what the conditions are. Her blog is loaded with huge, beautiful images of the Eastern Sierra, and I’m hoping she publishes more of her fall color reports this year. Here is a two-part summary of her 2008 efforts, some spectacular images shown: 2008 Fall Color Summary Part 1 and 2008 Fall Color Summary Part 2.
- Greg Boyer and Cory Freeman / Sierra Impressions are two very talented photographers in Bishop, California who post timely info about conditions and their recent photographic works.
- Steven Bourelle / SierraVisionsStock.com. Steven Bourelle gave me advice prior to my first visit to Bishop for fall colors, and he was spot on with his recommendations. He has written an e-book guide about photography in the Eastern Sierra and Bishop Creek Canyon packed with good information along with a 2009 post “Eastern Sierra Nevada Fall Colors” about planning for a fall foliage shoot in the Eastern Sierra.
- Dave Henry’s reports and tips at the Sacramento Bee are really good.
- Michael Frye, one of the best photographers around who focuses on Yosemite and surrounding areas, has a blog post about Autumn in Yosemite. (Michael Frye has THE BOOK on photographing in Yosemite, I own a copy and have referred to it often.)
- Parcher’s Resort, near South Lake in Bishop Creek Canyon, maintains a fall color report in season.
- Eastern Sierra Fall Color Reports, a thread at NaturePhotographers.net started by Bishop photographer Cory Freeman / Sierra Impressions.
- Bishop weather forecast. (NWS)
- Pictures of Fall Color in Bishop Creek Canyon on Google Earth. If you have Google Earth installed, this provides a map with 18 of my favorite aspen images appearing superimposed where they were taken in Bishop Creek Canyon. You can zoom around and click any of the tiny thumbnails in Google Earth to see the image large along with captions. In a perfect world I would offer to actually walk around with your camera and shoot the photos for you, but in lieu of that this is the best I can do.
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| Aspen trees display Eastern Sierra fall colors, Lake Sabrina, Bishop Creek Canyon. Image ID: 17547 Species: Aspen, Populus tremuloides Location: Bishop Creek Canyon, Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, USA |
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| Aspen trees display Eastern Sierra fall colors, Lake Sabrina, Bishop Creek Canyon. Image ID: 17497 Species: Aspen, Populus tremuloides Location: Bishop Creek Canyon, Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, USA |
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| Aspen trees turn yellow and orange in early October, South Fork of Bishop Creek Canyon. Image ID: 17532 Species: Aspen, Populus tremuloides Location: Bishop Creek Canyon, Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, USA |
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| An explosion of yellow and orange color, aspen trees changing color in fall, autumn approaches. Image ID: 23325 Species: Aspen, Populus tremuloides Location: Bishop Creek Canyon, Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, USA |
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| White trunks of aspen trees, viewed upward toward the yellow and orange leaves of autumn and the blue sky beyond. Image ID: 23337 Species: Aspen, Populus tremuloides Location: Bishop Creek Canyon, Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, USA |
Shameless plug: I’ve got a nice collection of fall color photos. Check them out, they really are pretty good if I do say so myself. (Heck, when the colors are peaking its hard to take a bad photo of turning aspens.)
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Aspens in Autumn, Populus tremuloides - Images by Phillip Colla |
Keywords: eastern sierra fall color, aspen, report, foliage, photography, picture, bishop, photo, autumn, image, information, description.
Convict Lake Sunrise, Eastern Sierra Nevada, California
Convict Lake is a small lake at the foot of Laurel Mountain and Mount Morrison, in the Sherwin Range of the Sierra Nevada, California. Convict Lake is named for a group of convicts that escaped from Carson City, fled to and were apprehended after a shootout. Convict Lake is a popular fishing lake in the summer and is frequently stocked with trout. I happened to make two early morning stops at Convict Lake this summer, and these are the sunrises that I saw there:
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| Convict Lake sunrise reflection, Sierra Nevada mountains. Image ID: 26974 |
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| Sunrise and storm clouds over Convict Lake and Laurel Mountain, Eastern Sierra Nevada. Image ID: 26858 Location: California, USA |
Vernal Falls, Yosemite National Park
Photos of Vernal Falls and the Mist Trail in Yosemite National Park
Sarah and I recently made our somewhat-annual hike up the Mist Trail in Yosemite, enjoying the heights and sounds of Vernal Falls and Nevada Falls, as well as the Panorama Trail. It was not a serious photography outing since I was huffin’ and puffin’ just keeping up with Sarah who is a serious hiker and in better condition than I. We did make a stop just below Vernal Falls where we made the photo below. This is a place at which I always stop for a photo, and often there is a rainbow in the composition (see bottom of this post). On this day, however, breaking out the camera was especially difficult because of the enormous amounts of spray produced by near-record flow in the Merced River. I had about a second to get the shot before the lens would fog over with spray. I tried a dozen times and then gave up not wanting to damage the camera. I got this one keeper frame out of the attempts.
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| Vernal Falls and Merced River in spring, heavy flow due to snow melt in the high country above Yosemite Valley. Image ID: 26878 Location: Yosemite National Park, California, USA |
While we were hiking, we discussed the potential pitfalls of the hike, the short sections of the steps leading up to Vernal Fall which are most dangerous, where a simple slip can lead to a deadly fall down the steep and slippery rock apron and into the raging Merced. We also discussed the danger around the top of Vernal and Nevada falls, each of which has seductive and exceeding risky brinks. She got the message and I didn’t browbeat her too much, but quietly kept her within arms reach during some of those more nervous sections of the hike.
A few weeks later I had a somewhat unsettling experience. After enjoying a family reunion in Yellowstone during which I had the phone and email turned off for a week, I returned to my office to find that the most popular images on my website for the previous week were all images of Vernal Falls. Then, catching up on messages, I found two urgent calls from news organizations asking for images of the falls to run in breaking news stories. “Uh oh.” Indeed, with a quick search of recent headlines I learned that three young people had tragically died after slipping into the Merced above Vernal Falls and going over the edge. What a terrible event, for the three young hikers but also for all the others present on the brink of Vernal Falls at the time it happened. I felt sick in the gut, knowing Sarah and I had been there just a few days prior, walking those same steps and having one of the most enjoyable days together we have ever shared. With just a small misstep, the Mist Trail can turn deadly, and indeed it does almost every year. This year the Mist Trail has claimed at least four lives. Yet, it remains one of my favorite trails and I will continue to hike it with Tracy and the girls as long as they can tolerate my slowing pace and lame jokes.
About the Hike: Spring is the time to visit Vernal Falls and the famous Mist Trail in Yosemite National Park. Vernal Falls is at peak flow in late May and June, the weather is usually pleasant and the dogwoods are in bloom on the valley floor. We try to make a springtime visit to Yosemite each year to hike the Mist Trail with our daughters. We get soaked by the falls on the way up, soak in the sun and dry off at the top, enjoy a lunch of trail mix and Clif bars alongside other hikers, and leisurely make our way back down the trail later in the afternoon. If one times his visit to Vernal Falls at midday, a rainbow is often visible in front of the falls when viewed from the trail just 100 yards away.
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| Vernal Falls at peak flow in late spring, with a rainbow appearing in the spray of the falls, viewed from the Mist Trail. Image ID: 12634 Location: Vernal Falls, Yosemite National Park, California, USA |
Sky Rock Petroglyphs, Volcanic Tablelands, Bishop, California
Photograph of Sky Rock Petroglyphs, Bishop, California.
For some years I’ve wanted to see the Sky Rock Petroglyphs, a secluded and unusual set of petroglyphs located in the Volcanic Tablelands near Bishop, California. The Sky Rock Petroglyphs sit atop of an enormous volcanic block. The petroglyphs — dozens of them in many shapes and forms — face the sky, thus lending Sky Rock its name. My understanding is that Sky Rock’s orientation toward the heavens is unusual, but also curious is that this set of petroglyphs sits alone, isolated some 5+ miles from the rich Chalfant, Chidalgo and Red Rock petroglyph collections. Chipped into the rock, through the darker “desert varnish” that typically covers the exterior of such rocks, the Sky Rock Petroglyphs expose the lighter-colored rock underneath. The history of Sky Rock is not clear to me, although I have seen a number of published suggestions that the Sky Rock Petroglyphs were perhaps created by ancestors of what are today known as the Owens Valley Paiute (or Shoshone-Paiute) people.
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| Sky Rock petroglyphs near Bishop, California. Hidden atop an enormous boulder in the Volcanic Tablelands lies Sky Rock, a set of petroglyphs that face the sky. These superb examples of native American petroglyph artwork are thought to be Paiute in origin, but little is known about them. Image ID: 26979 Location: Bishop, California, USA |
Sky Rock is a special place, indeed. It was fascinating to see it firsthand and consider the artist who, probably many hundreds of years ago, composed the intricate petroglyph forms. While looking at it we realized very few, if any, of the shapes were recognizable. In the way that other famous artists in history have done, Sky Rock’s talented creator produced a work that captivates and intrigues and will outlive him for centuries - a distinction that most artists (and photographers) hope to achieve.
Thanks for looking! I have a few more Sky Rock Petroglyph photos. Also see my gallery of California photos and Sierra Nevada photos.
Mount Soledad Cross, La Jolla, California
View this blog entry in Google EarthLatitude: 32° 50' 23.35" N, Longitude: 117° 14' 40.77" W, Coord: 32.83982°, -117.24466°
Filed under: California, La Jolla on 5/10/2011
La Jolla’s Mount Soledad Cross is a 29-foot Latin cross made of concrete standing atop Mt. Soledad, overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The current Mt. Soledad Cross was built in 1954, but a previous cross stood on the spot since 1913. The Mount Soledad Cross has been the subject of much litigation. Supporters of the cross consider it an important war memorial, while opponents feel it violates the separation of church and state. Currently, the cross and the land on which it stands are owned by the nonprofit Mount Soledad Memorial Association. My hunch is that the cross will remain standing for years to come.
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| The Mount Soledad Cross, a landmark in La Jolla, California. The Mount Soledad Cross is a 29-foot-tall cross erected in 1954. Image ID: 26547 Location: La Jolla, California, USA |
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| The Mount Soledad Cross, a landmark in La Jolla, California. The Mount Soledad Cross is a 29-foot-tall cross erected in 1954. Image ID: 26553 Location: La Jolla, California, USA |
See more Mount Soledad Cross photos.
Pacific White-Sided Dolphin Photos
Pacific White-Sided Dolphin Photos
The first dolphins I ever photographed were Pacific white-sided dolphins (Lagenorhynchus obliquidens). This extremely fast moving species of dolphin often appears around San Diego in winter, but is normally found much further north ranging as far as Alaska and around to Japan. We would freedive in the open ocean and hope our presence interested the white-sided dolphins enough to swim by and investigate us. The first image I ever had that placed in a major photography competition (Nature’s Best, early 90s I think) was an image of a Pacific white-sided dolphin towing a piece of kelp. It would drop the kelp in front of me, wait for me swim toward it and then zoom by to take it again before I could reach it. Schooled by a dolphin … Psych! For those of you who have only used digital cameras: can you imagine trying to freeze the motion of a fast-swimming white-sided dolphin using ISO-64 in a relatively dimly lit underwater setting? That’s what we used to have to do. It was downright primitive.
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| Pacific white sided dolphin. Image ID: 00036 Species: Pacific white-sided dolphin, Lagenorhynchus obliquidens Location: San Diego, California, USA |
Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, San Diego
View this blog entry in Google EarthLatitude: 32° 41' 4.88" N, Longitude: 117° 14' 38.25" W, Coord: 32.68469°, -117.24396°
Filed under: San Diego on 3/30/2011
Photos of Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma, San Diego
When I went down to Point Loma to photograph downtown San Diego and Mount Laguna, I spent a while visiting beautiful and solemn Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. I was struck by the sheer number of tombstones covering the grassy rolling hills the overlook both San Diego Bay and the Pacific Ocean. I felt a renewed and deep appreciation for the many heros buried at Fort Rosecrans as well as our country’s many other National Cemeteries.
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| Tombstones at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, with downtown San Diego with snow-covered Mt. Laguna in the distance. Image ID: 26593 Location: San Diego, California, USA |
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| Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. Image ID: 26572 Location: San Diego, California, USA |
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| Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. Image ID: 26573 Location: San Diego, California, USA |
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| Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. Image ID: 26571 Location: San Diego, California, USA |
Downtown San Diego and Snow-Covered Mount Laguna
Mount Laguna, covered in snow, rises over the downtown San Diego City Skyline
In Southern California we have the ability to go skiing or sledding in the morning and surfing in the afternoon! A couple times when I was growing up I was able to ditch school and go mid-week skiing in the local mountains and get back home in time to make a run on the beach. A novelty, sure, but there are not too many places one can experience both in a single day.** In late February we had a cold wet storm come through that left quite a bit of snow on the mountains east of downtown San Diego. I decided to make a photograph contrasting downtown San Diego with a snow-covered Mount Laguna in the distance. This is a composition that occasionally appears on the front page of the local paper, the emphasis being on the novelty of the snow in this city known for its mild and pleasant weather. However, the U-T usually shows a harsh mid-morning or daytime image. I wanted something with warmer and softer light than that, so I photographed this after sunset. In the foreground is part of North Island Naval Air Station’s complex of tarmacs, runways and hangars. The bright plume of white seen in the middle of the image comes from an aircraft carrier docked in San Diego Bay. Originally I liked the streak of light from a passing plane, but being a modern unethical photographer I now think I should remove it in Photoshop. OK, that last part was a lie.
I was in shorts and a t-shirt when I took this photograph but I am sure the folks on Mount Laguna were bundled up.
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| Dusk settles on downtown San Diego with snow-covered Mt. Laguna in the distance. Image ID: 26716 Location: San Diego, California, USA |
**Another place I was able to play in the snow and swim in the ocean on the same day was at my aunt and uncles place on the Big Island. My uncle drove us from Kamuela on a dirt road to the top of Mauna Kea, where we ran around and got lightheaded from the altitude and slid down the snow-covered sides of the bowl alongside the astronomical observatories on top of the volcano. We drove back down and had pupus and an afternoon swim at the beach later that same day. Snow and surf.
Palm Canyon Brittlebush
This brittlebush photo, at dawn in Palm Canyon in Anza Borrego Desert State Park, was one of only a handful of desert wildflower photos I made last year. It is raining again, the second bout of rain the coast of Southern California has received this week. This is on the heels of much rain earlier in the winter. The pattern of precipitation that we have received this winter — lots of rain in early and mid-winter, followed by a few more lighter storms in Jan/Feb/Mar — oftens sets up a great desert wildflower bloom. It is no guarantee of course, just favorable conditions and increased odds. Importantly, unlike the front that came through earlier in the week, yesterday and last night’s system had enough push to get over the mountains and reach the desert. It could provide that last bit of moisture that the sprouting seeds and young plants need to reach maturity and spread out, which should really help the bloom this year. I’ve got my fingers crossed and am hoping to squeeze out a day or two to take a look for flowers soon and make a visit to my favorite desert wildflower spots.
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| Brittlebush at sunrise, dawn, springtime bloom, Palm Canyon, Anza Borrego Desert State Park. Image ID: 24301 Species: Brittlebush, Encelia farinosa Location: Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Anza Borrego, California, USA |
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| Cholla cactus, sunrise, dawn, Palm Canyon, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. Image ID: 24305 Species: Cholla cactus, Opuntia Location: Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Anza Borrego, California, USA |
Henderson Canyon Road Dune Evening Primrose
View this blog entry in Google EarthLatitude: 33° 20' 27.95" N, Longitude: 116° 21' 55.97" W, Coord: 33.3411°, -116.36555°
Filed under: Desert, Wildflowers on 2/16/2011
Its raining now. If the deserts to the east of us get some of this moisture, it should bode very well for the wildflower season. We received a lot of rain in November and December. When this occurs, typically all that is needed is another moderate rain or two in January or February to really make the desert wildflower bloom flourish. I’ve got my fingers crossed.
This is a cluster of dune evening primrose, my favorite desert wildflower. This was made along Henderson Canyon Road in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. It is quite possible that we will never see such displays on Henderson Canyon Road again, due to the recent spreading of invasive Saharan mustard that is unfortunately now carpeting much of the state park. Henderson Canyon Road used to be one of the “go to” places to see spectacular wildflower displays in Anza Borrego. I suspect those days are over.
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| Dune primrose blooms in spring following winter rains. Dune primrose is a common ephemeral wildflower on the Colorado Desert, growing on dunes. Its blooms open in the evening and last through midmorning. Anza Borrego Desert State Park. Image ID: 20467 Species: Dune primrose, Oenothera deltoides Location: Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, Anza Borrego, California, USA |
Photos of Scripps Pier, Scripps Institution of Oceanography
View this blog entry in Google EarthLatitude: 32° 51' 56.8" N, Longitude: 117° 15' 38.48" W, Coord: 32.86578°, -117.26069°
Filed under: California, La Jolla, San Diego on 2/7/2011
Photos of Scripps Pier, La Jolla
Below is the Scripps Institution of Oceanography Research Pier, the pier that supports the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California. The original wooden Scripps Pier was built in 1915 and was replaced by the modern cement pier in 1988. On the hill behind the pier can be seen many of the buildings that make up Scripps Institute of Oceanography. To the left (north) is the southern edge of Black’s Beach, while if one walked along the beach to the right (south) one would come to La Jolla Shores Beach in a few minutes. When I was in grad school I worked in the Norpax building on the far left above the sandstone bluff. Some of the greatest minds in all of science work on this hill, wearing flip-flops as their laser brains study climate change and deep ocean phenomena, and go surfing at the pier at lunch. It’s brutal living in Southern California.
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| SIO Pier. The Scripps Institution of Oceanography research pier is 1090 feet long and was built of reinforced concrete in 1988, replacing the original wooden pier built in 1915. The Scripps Pier is home to a variety of sensing equipment above and below water that collects various oceanographic data. The Scripps research diving facility is located at the foot of the pier. Fresh seawater is pumped from the pier to the many tanks and facilities of SIO, including the Birch Aquarium. The Scripps Pier is named in honor of Ellen Browning Scripps, the most significant donor and benefactor of the Institution. Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California, USA. Image: 22293 Location: Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California, USA |
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| Scripps Pier, predawn abstract study of pier pilings and moving water. Image ID: 26340 Location: Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California, USA |
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| Scripps Pier, sunrise. Image ID: 26456 Location: Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California, USA |
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| Research pier at Scripps Institution of Oceanography SIO, sunset. Image ID: 26531 Location: Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California, USA |
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| Scripps Pier, sunrise. Image ID: 26458 Location: Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California, USA |
See more San Diego photos and photos of Scripps Pier.
Earth Shadow Photographs
Earth Shadow is an atmospheric phenomenon most easily seen on a cloudless morning with a relatively clear horizon. But you have to get up early to see it, since it occurs before sunrise! Have you ever seen those layers of blue, purple and pink along the horizon just before sunrise or just after sunset? The darker sky, lowest on the horizon, is actually the shadow of the Earth cast upon the atmosphere, while the lighter sky above is the atmosphere as it is lit by the sun. As dawn nears, the shadowed portion of the sky is squeezed down on the horizon and disappears. The pink in the upper “layer” is the result of the sun passing at a highly oblique angle through the dust-filled atmosphere to the east (or west at sunset), colored by the particulate suspended in the air. I made a couple of photographs illustrating earth shadow recently while doing some early morning photography in La Jolla along with an older one from some years ago in Morro Bay:
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| La Jolla Cove and earth shadow at dawn. Just before sunrise the shadow of the Earth can seen as the darker sky below the pink sunrise. Image ID: 26523 Location: La Jolla, California, USA |
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| Earth Shadow lies over Point La Jolla at dawn. Image ID: 26444 Location: La Jolla, California, USA |
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| Earth shadow over Morro Rock and Morro Bay. Just before sunrise the shadow of the Earth can seen as the darker sky below the pink sunrise. Image ID: 22213 Location: Morro Bay, California, USA |
By the way, earth shadow occurs after sunset as well. But I’m usually slaving away at the grill or watching my daughters’ volleyball practices so I rarely photograph end-of-day earth shadow…
See more photos of La Jolla and Morro Bay photographs.
Cute Harbor Seal
View this blog entry in Google EarthLatitude: 32° 50' 51.61" N, Longitude: 117° 16' 42.56" W, Coord: 32.84767°, -117.27849°
Filed under: California, Harbor Seal, Wildlife on 1/27/2011
This harbor seal (Phoca vitulina) was quite animated. Most of the harbor seals lie on the sand throughout the day, resting between foraging sessions in the ocean, while younger/smaller seals seem to exhibit most of the activity. It is nearly February and just about time for newborn harbor seal pups to start appearing among the colony.
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| Pacific harbor seal, an sand at the edge of the sea. Image ID: 26315 Species: Pacific harbor seal, Phoca vitulina richardsi Location: La Jolla, California, USA |
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| Pacific harbor seal, an sand at the edge of the sea. Image ID: 26320 Species: Pacific harbor seal, Phoca vitulina richardsi Location: La Jolla, California, USA |
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Updated: February 3, 2012
