Point Lobos and Carmel Beach

Hello! I took some more photos of Point Lobos, but this time there's less splashing and more overcast skies. It was still nice and warm, but I had to actually wear a sweatshirt the entire time. I know, life sucks and then you die. I had to wear a sweatshirt in February. Poor me. :(

We also went to Carmel (before Point Lobos, but the pictures are after Point Lobos. They aren't chronological, sheesh, let up on me!) and spent some time on the beach. It's a very dog friendly beach, and it was great to see everyone out there with their animal friends too.

As you can tell, the trip started as a mushroom and disease hunt! Elisabeth and I sure are fun. We look for decay, rot, bacteria, and viruses everywhere we go.

Some disease kickin' this plant's ass.

This one was really neat because it appears to have holes burned through it.

Mycelia! We moved a fallen log expecting to find mycelia, and look, we found it! This is the part of fungus that you normally don't see. When it's ready to form spores, it typically forms a fruiting body (the mushroom / cap.) It does look like cobwebs, and it's probably in the ground underneath you everywhere you go. Mycelia will invade your body when you're dead. =^) Unless you're cremated...OH WAIT, It'll still eat you! 

Fruiting bodies of the above mycelia! It's like a beautiful flower that eats dead organic material instead of sunlight.
Mushrooms and fungus are so cool. Especially when they are this photogenic.

More mushrooms - these all popped up after the nice rain storms that we had recently.

This one was especially cool, in my opinion. It's a large dead mushroom that was once growing on a live tree. But, unfortunately, the mushroom seemed to have died...and is now being consumed by another type of mold! It appears to be an Aspergillus of some sort. (I don't have tools to identify this sort of stuff.)

Nifty little spider, seen here collecting dew. I wonder if spiders drink / eat the water off their webs? I've never thought about that before now.

Some sweet chromatic shells that we found on the beach. I might have nicked 'em after this photo. Maybe I didn't. You have no evidence!

Some living creatures on a rock at Point Lobos' "Hidden Beach". I am not sure what they are. There's a mussel in the middle, and they kind of look barnacle-ish, but I'm not convinced. #fuckifIknow
They're kinda creepy...and Lovecraftian...

Kuh-kaw, bitches! Try to splash me now!
There were lots of raptors out hunting.

Elisabeth under siege by the ocean spray and the wind. Hint: her hair lost the fight. :(

A California Poppy! My mom has this in Pocatello, they remind me of home. Odd that the California Poppy reminds me of Idaho.

Cute deer. What, I am not a writer, I can't come up with captions for everything...

You know how I feel about splash photos.
The sea was actually green here! We had to do some dangerous rock climbing to get in to this position - I slipped and almost took a rocky landing to the face.

"Excuse me sir, do you have a moment to hear the word of SPLISH SPLASH BEIATCH!"
What a tasteless caption. I'll leave it.

All these poor people being consumed by the mist. I can feel "Silent Hill: Carmel" rolling in off the ocean. Skinless dogs, I'm coming for you!

Sad girls por vida.
(She's not really sad, she's in wet toes ecstasy.)

Elisabeth cannot resist putting her feet in the ocean. Whenever we get near the water, she starts breathing heavily and her eyes dilate...she looks at me and slowly asks, "Can I..."
*heavy breathing*
"...put my feet..."
*heavy breathing intensifies*
"IN THE OCEAN?"

She never stops to consider how difficult it is to put on socks after your feet are soaked. Plus, sand on the feet. It's a miserable cycle; you try to wash off the sand in the water, but then more sand sticks to your feet as you move away from the water.
I just wear boots and make this face when she asks me to join her:

Photos from the city of Monterey, California. (December 2013 / January 2014)

I've been truly enjoying winter in California. I don't have to deal with snow, icy roads, or wet ankles. The best part about the winter here is that I can still see flowers blossoming everywhere. Of course, the leaves have fallen off some of the trees and there are some wintering plants, but for the most part, a lot of things are still green. Elisabeth and I went out over one weekend to Monterey, California to snap some photos and enjoy our weekend.

I hope you like the flowers!

Technically not a flower.
The duck has made a disturbance in the reflection.  Pray he does not disturb it further.
(Maybe also technically not a duck...)

Transparent red leaved plant. I don't know how best to describe this plant, but it grows tall and has a woody stem. The leaves at the end of the branch turns a very nice red color.

A shrub similar to the red one above, but it was purple. I'm going to work on finding out what kind of plants these were, and maybe I'll get back to you.

Roses are red,
Violets are blue;
But this rose is pink...
So how about...forget it.

Foxglove! It'll kill your ass dead!
(Or give you a mild case of nausea.)

Some variety of Fuchsia. They are such an exquisite flower. I like this picture because it's like some alien flower plant approaching to land. 

Some sort of Daisy. Probably Daisydaisy Adair variety. No, you don't think so? Ok, I tried. Whatever.

I'm not sure what this is. It looks similar to the purple flower below, but I thought they were both Fuchsias from a distance. When I come in closer for a photograph, it turns out that they are not.

Life and death, good and bad, living and dead...all of that cliche garbage in one photograph.

Purple flowers are a theme in Monterey, I guess. I've seen this one before in Idaho, but I don't recall the name of the plant. 

"Chomp"
This flower is often mistaken for the common koi fish. They seem to take a lot of water, so you don't want to let this one dry out if you bring one home.

Elisabeth's go-to awesomeface. D'aww!

Look at that fool with the hair! And the nose! Who has a nose like that?
What am I doing in this picture? Three options.
1:Fighting miniature ninjas in my hair.
2: Just ran in to a large invisible spider web.
3: No clue, it's just obvious that I have a problem.

A Breath of Yosemite National Park

Elisabeth and I have returned from our very first trip to Yosemite National Park. It's a very beautiful park, and I was happily surprised by the shuttle system in place. We were a little bummed to find that some of the roads were closed for the season (especially since they were closed due to snow despite the lack of snow...). On the bright side, we will have a chance to come back in the spring (June or so) and check out some wild flowers as well as some of the previously closed attractions. Climbing to the top of some of the longer hikes is more like what I want to do.

Upon entering the park, you are greeted by some awesome granite mountains. They're everywhere; that's the entire point of the park, I think. As always, pictures don't quite do them justice - you can stand at the base of one of these mountains and not be able to see the top because it's so high up there. It's ridiculous and exciting.

Please mind that all these pictures were taken on the 28th and 29th of December, 2013. There's very little snow here, but I expect that a regular year would have the valley floor covered in snowfall.

I separated the photos in to various sections just for a sort of organization. They're not necessarily in a date order, or progression order, or anything. If you don't like it, feel free to go start your own blog with blackjack and hookers.

Mountain Section

Mountain photographs. They move fast, so some of the pictures might be a little blurry. I'm sorry about that.

The first picture out of the camera. 

Look at that action! I'm lucky I caught this little bugger at 1/1250 shutter speed.

An early morning silhouette of a rock face.

The Yosemite Valley. This is up near the tunnel if you follow "Tunnel View" signs. We were initially disappointed by the amount of air planes flying over head, but they ended up making a cool path to the vanishing point on the horizon.

Click me for a bigger image!

You know you want to!

Trees Section

Yosemite National Park is also known for the Sequoias. Sequoias have the potential to be huge, and they are really a sight to behold. Take a gander at the pictures below...

I LOVE THIS TREE.

Feelin' up the tree. Hand added for scale. (And because she wouldn't stop feelin' up the tree...insert "Wood family" jokes here.)

I added a wife for a more proper scale. Look how large the plate armor on the tree is!

...and now I want you to know that these aren't even sequoias. These are just plain, boring, Ponderosa pine (Pinus benthamiana) trees. I mean, not that boring, but you know what I mean. They're huge! You walk beneath these trees most of the time in the valley, and you never realize how tall they are until you look around and realize that there are no tree branches near the ground. When you tilt your head up to see the tops, your brain turns off and you drool trying to comprehend how tall these trees have become. Then you realize that there are bigger trees south of the valley.

  Water Section

There's also a lot of springs, rivers, and ponds in the valley floor. From the lines on the rocks, we could tell that the water was low, but it was still flowing and there was very little ice.

That snow almost killed me - it's more dangerous than bears.

Mirror Lake.

Water rushes over top of the smaller rocks, whispering sweet nothings in it's ear as it passes.
"Splish, splash..."

Rocks in the wild. Often found resting in creek beds, where they have been known to lure in hikers and traveler using their deceptive stable demeanor. Then, as the hiker places his weight upon the rock, the rock slips out from underneath their sure footing and rolls away, likely guffawing at it's prank. The rock then consumes the fallen, moist, tasty hiker and waits for another victim.

Click me for a larger photo of this rock panorama!

(It's so worth it!)

Stars Section

My star photos didn't turn out as great as I would have liked them too, but they are still some of my favorite photos from the trip. We spent an hour or so out in the dark trying to take these pictures, so it was a little disappointing to see that they were all blurry. That, and we had some headlight douche up the street from us (he just had his headlights on the entire time) who proceeded to follow us for a little bit. Elisabeth was creeped out, and rightfully so, but I wasn't too worried. Nothing happened between us, other than he ruined a couple of photos. Fuck you and your blue headlights, douchy hatchback dude.

I just hate that you can't get this view from inside of a city.

It's like we're looking at a projection of the stars on a giant screen.

A speckled view of the universe outside of our planet. It's crazy to think that the light in the photo traveled for millions and millions of years just to collide with my camera lens, refracts a little bit, and lands on my camera sensor. Maybe there's a little energy loss as heat, and maybe it reflects back out some how and flies away...

Mushroom Section

I truly enjoy mushroom hunting and identification. While on a hike up to Mirror Lake, we encountered these lovely specimen. I haven't spent much time researching what they are, but I'll likely go on the hunt for an ID on these guys later. In case you don't know much about mushrooms, they are typically a sign of a healthy ecosystem. These mushrooms were growing on a fallen tree next to both moss and lichen, so everyone is receiving benefits from this dead log.

This mushroom and the picture underneath appear to be a Pleurotus genus mushroom, but I'm uncertain on species. The ostreatus species is most common in Yosemite from what I can tell.

The Pleurotus ostreatus is the oyster mushroom. If you eat mushrooms from the store regularly, you may have had one before. This picture doesn't look so much like the pictures I found for identification though, so I may be wrong.

A small haven for mushrooms and mycelia in a dead log branch. This one appeared to be a small polypore (Trametes spp.?), as indicated by the other polypores growing nearby.

Miscellaneous Section

Just some odds and ends that I wanted to share.

"I'm going to let you photograph me as long as you're using that telephoto lens from a good loooong distance away."

Trippin' balls.

"Don't quoth me on that." - Raven

"And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting

On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;

And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,

And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

     Shall be lifted - nevermore!"

This raven spent his morning on the top of our tent, probably warming up on our lost heat. I took this picture specifically to leave that poem chunk, by the way.

Closing Remarks!

I want to leave you with the same sight that Elisabeth and I had when we were leaving. It's a photograph of Half Dome with the sunset light casting it's orange hue upon the granite. As you should be able to tell, Yosemite National Park is a multi-faceted adventure that can be experienced in many ways, and most likely not in one trip.

XOXO
Gossip Josh.