Among the Beautiful People
Green Flash, Morro Bay
Well, we’ve spent the last three days in Santa Barbara seeing what the real Southern California is like. We stayed with a Forest Service friend, Ken Heffner, whom Pete worked with in Dillon. As we were waiting at Kens house, he comes tooling up in his Mercedes convertible (top down) and I’m thinking, “This is not the same Forest Service down here.” Ken gave us the Grand Tour including wineries, bistros, beaches, tanned women, etc. We even got to see some of the forest (chaparral), although none of it was burning at the time. Many thanks to Ken for a great time.
We spent the previous few days up in San Simeon with the elephant seals and touring Hearst Castle. The seal viewing area is a little restrictive for photography, but I was able to find a more out-of-the-way beach with about 100 seals that I was able to get down and work with. They’re pretty tolerant and awful slow. I’m finding that shooting slow, legless animals is something I can just about manage. Hearst Castle was interesting, if only to see what Republicans did during a Depression.
The Big Sur coast was spectacular, but the campground we were counting on was closed for the winter so we’ll have to stop there for a couple extra days on the way back. Monterey was really nice and the aquarium was well worth the visit. Point Lobos and Moro Bay were a couple other stops that proved to be worthwhile.
We’ve headed over to the desert now. The California poppies haven’t come up yet (that’s where we are now) so we’ll head down to Joshua Tree tomorrow. This is the first night we’ve been more than a mile from the ocean since Jan. 10.
Moro Rock Green Flash, Moro Bay
Four Eyes
elephant seal
Harbor Seal
Curlew
Brandts Cormorant
Sand Dollar Beach
Beach near Santa Barbara
