Wind…

San Gorgonio Pass Wind Farms

the couch & the creek…

Normally, I would go to great lengths to exclude most human imprint from such a photo. The annoying couch next to the stream was close enough to an earth tone to include…barely

underfoot…

Desert Vignettes…

I noticed in one shot that I took awhile ago, while visiting the Joshua Tree National Park in California, there were multiple ‘vignettes’ of micro beauty. I took the one shot and zoomed into those locations on the shot to point this out. Our eyes glance over/past color, contrasts, structure. But, I don’t stop in the moment to break it down. The first image is the overall and the next seven images are the smaller vignettes captured in the overall.

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Whitaker Ponds

The Whitaker Ponds Nature Park is located in NE Portland and connects to the Columbia Slough. It looks to be an excellent area to explore for birds, native plants, wildlife amidst the black cottonwoods and ponds.

hazy day (Siberian Fire’s Smoke)

It seemed most of the days we traveled about the Joshua Tree/Salton Sea areas, there was a haze in the air. The crisp blue skies were sometimes missing. I then learned that the smoke from massive fires in Siberia was reportedly being carried across the Pacific Ocean into the Western U.S. A bit sobering considering Fukushima Daiichi? 

Below is the smoke filtering into the East Lake (Oregon) caldera from a nearby forest fire in 2006. It is not unusual during the Summer forest fire season in Oregon to have smoke drift into areas from the fires to the South/East.

Declaring War: Spanish Bluebells

Spanish Bluebells: Invasive, maniacal, beautiful….these pesky plants will take over in short order. I have declared war on this plant. I am not sure where it came from, but in three short years it is popping up everywhere. Beauty and color aside…their time is numbered (I think).