I have written about my fascination with the very old and often very large trees that we saw on our weeklong spring walk in England’s Cotswolds. Many of the large trees stand apart, often in open areas or in rows between fields and pastures. This one, however, was close to a managed forest of smaller trees, which I presume are destined to become lumber when they grow larger.
Continue reading Old Tree and Cotswalds Woods
Mono Basin is a fine place to contemplate geology and immense spans of time. Mono Lake itself is an ancient body of water, and one that has not always looked like it does today. The lake is probably 3/4 of a million years old, and its ancestor lake was, at times, much deeper and larger than it is today. At times its waters rose high enough to overcome its current landlocked state and drain either north or south. (To really bend your mind, its waters may have drained to ancient Lake Manly in Death Valley.) Today, as large as the lake is, it is greatly diminished in size and depth by comparison.
Continue reading Early Light, Mono Craters
We passed this cemetery along a drive to the remote coastal village of Elgol on the southeast coast of the Isle of Skye. While parts of Skye are very busy and popular with tourists, there weren’t many people along this remote single-track road where there aren’t really any “tourist icon” sites. It was just lovely Scottish countryside —broad valleys, lakes, and some impressive mountains.
Continue reading Cill Chriosd Burial Ground
I was up and out of camp in the dark on this late-August morning. My plan was to work my way up Tioga Pass Road toward the pass, where I had a few subjects in mind along the way. After that I would head over the pass and out of the park to explore some areas just east of the Sierra crest. After going to the end of this valley to make a few photographs of alpine terrain, I headed back down this way, to pausing at a few places I had noted on the way up.
Continue reading Sierra Meadow and Peak