Day 323 - Don't Let the Cat out of the... Box!

Today marks the start of my three weeks of overtime hell, so I have a feeling my photos will suffer accordingly. Anyway, Elim loves boxes, but tonight he didn't want to cooperate and sit still in one while I took his picture. But this shot of him mid-jump, while not the clearest in the world, is pretty amusing.

Day 322 - A Tiny Piece of Yosemite

While we were in Yosemite, Nell picked up a tiny feather from one of the bluejays (?) at our campsite and I've been carrying it around ever since. This shot didn't come out that well because it was such an extreme close-up (the whole feather is about an inch long and this section is probably less than a centimeter). I just don't have the equipment to get a really clear shot at this level of magnification. But I like the lines and the vividness of the color. I've taken a few other shots like this, so I'm officially retiring feathers as a photo subject.

Day 321 - Backyard Safari

Today while I was cleaning up and decompressing from my trip, I heard a tiny bird rustling around in my backyard. I then proceeded to spend the next half hour trying to find it (it's one of those tiny birds that likes to hide in bushes) and photograph it without scaring it away. This photo isn't great and the bird isn't particularly attractive, but I'm proud of myself for taking the time to get the shot.

Day 320 - Road Trip, Day 6 - Red Rock Canyon

For my last day, Nell and Brian took me to see Red Rock Canyon, one of their favorite climbing spots. The name is definitely accurate—the first two photos show just how red the rocks are. The third and fourth photos are views from our hike into Pine Tree Canyon, which is believed to be a biotic remnant from the last ice age. Hiking in the desert at noon in July was probably not the wisest decision, but I'm glad I got to see a tiny bit of the place before my flights home.

Day 319 - Road Trip, Day 5 - Hetch Hetchy and Mono Lake

Perfect timing—it started raining just as we were breaking camp. This morning we checked out the Hetch Hetchy region and the O'Shaughnessy Dam, which flooded that entire valley in the mid-1910s in order to create a drinking water reservoir for San Francisco.

Even though we were only in Yosemite for about three and a half days, we visited all the different sections and worked in a lot of awesome stuff. I'm so glad I got to see it before leaving California.

On our drive to Vegas, we stopped at Mono Lake, which was unexpectedly fascinating. It's a lake without an outlet, so it's extremely salty and home to a lot of brine shrimp, which in turn makes is an important breeding/feeding ground for seagulls (it's freaking hell and gone from the ocean). And, once LA started diverting some of the water, the lake level dropped significantly, exposing these cool limestone tufas. I'm especially pleased with the clouds and moody lighting in the third shot.

Tonight we stayed in a hotel in Vegas and I got to take a shower for the first time on this trip. Yay!

Day 318 - Road Trip, Day 4 - Finally Playing the Tourist

For our last day in Yosemite, we went into the valley and did some of the popular stuff (there'd been relatively few people everywhere else, which was nice). The main event was a hike up the Mist Trail to Vernal Falls and then up a little further toward Nevada Falls via the John Muir Trail and then back down. The Mist Trail is ridiculously steep and the steps cut into the cliffside are sketchy as hell, but the waterfalls were beautiful. The first three shots are of Vernal Falls from several different angles, the fourth shot is of the Emerald Pool, and the fifth shot is of Nevada Falls.

We then checked out (but didn't bother hiking to) Lower Yosemite Falls (sixth photo) and Bridalveil Falls (last photo), which were both barely a trickle.

Day 317 - Road Trip, Day 3 - Tioga Pass Area

Today we checked out the Tioga Pass area, which is at quite a high altitude. First stop was Olmstead Point, which offered some pretty amazing views of Clouds Rest. Then we drove up to Tuolumne Meadows, from which we hiked to Budd Lake. This wasn't an official trail (it's used mostly by climbers), so we lost it a few times, but we passed only a few people and had the lake, once we found it, all to ourselves. The high altitude (about 9,500 feet) made this hike a bit challenging for me, but it was totally worth it. Getting to swim in an alpine lake was amazing. The third photo is a shot of Cathedral Peak from the lake.

Oh, and by this point I was using my point-and-shoot exclusively, because it was much easier to tote around and those damned spots were showing up again in my 14–45mm lens.