Pinnacles National park - a day trip

We went on a day trip to Pinnacles National park (Monument as it is called) with the cousins. The weather report said 85 F and we thought it would be nice weather to go on a 2+ mile hike and maybe another 2+ mile hike.

The park website promised interesting views, including a network of bat caves. 

 The first trail to Bear Gulch was great. The rock faces were really colorful..

 we got to descend into the caves through narrow crevices and the temperature drop was a palpable 30+ degrees. There is water running under those caves and it is really cool down there!

It was not easy to take pictures without a tripod but the bouncing lights off the water and rocks did make for some interesting pictures!

We were hit by 106 F heat as we exit the caves through a near vertical staircase carved into the side of the caves. It truly reminded me of the Batman movie when we looked up towards the exit!

Poor bats, no wonder they are blind. We were blinded for a few seconds when we went from nice cool darkness to scorching heat and bright sunlight! 

We went on to see a beautiful resevoir which was abuzz with all types of dragonflies!

and one type of butterfly in the 100's or thousands! This guy posed for me without realizing it. Caught him with a 400 mm Zoom (which is why the background is all Bokeh'ed out).

It was an enjoyable trip. Next time we shoud hit it earlier in the year when peak temperatures are closer to 70's or 80's. The park pamphlet promises views of great falls and rock formations, but guess those are longer hikes and will have to wait till the adults are in better shape. The kids seem to be doing fine with the trails. 

Even the little one managed to walk for 4 hours with a countable "daddy, please thooki(carry) me!" instances.

Will definitely recommend this place for  day trip. 

ps. Apparently the caves will be closed soon for bat baby season.. so check before you go.

pps. Take a flashlight. It is dark in those caves and another visitor in front of us said they saw snakes in the caves which is not surprising. We used one flashlight and one iPhone app to navigate the caves. Two or three flashlights would have been better.

Local trips to the rescue

FIL and BIL are visiting.. we spent a lot of time in the house, playing with a three month old baby that is delighted to find its own voice and in providing us with hours of amusement and happiness!

Jr. and the little one finally declared they wanted to go places. Their preference was indoor fun ... read "shopping" and we cleverly steered them outdoors.

We went to Christmas in the park for a little over an hour yesterday and the kids enjoyed it thoroughly!

Today the sun was not out but it stopped raining and the backyard was bright green. So off we went to a place that has been on our radar for a long time but we always drove past it.. 

Elkhorn Slough near Moss Landing on the way to Monterey. The drive was only an hour and the visitor center folks were great.  We went on a long hike for almost 2 1/2 hours and saw tons of birds and enjoyed the walk..

The photos are still a processing.. but here is a nice sample!

More tomorrow..

A weekend in Pictures

This weekend saw a lot of activity in spite of me being down Friday and Saturday. 

Everything that happened in and out of the house was a cheerful experience.

We did the Varalakshmi pooja dinner Friday and the whole house was full of people, standing room only at one point. It was great to see the smiling faces in huddled conversations and the kids running around gleefully (if there is such a word).

Then we attended a surprise birthday party for my friend who turned 40. Yes, this year is "no one escapes the big Four O" year for our batch. There are only 4 guys I know from our batch who are waiting to celebrate within the next few months. The cake.. Oh What a cake! We have seen a lot of unique cakes over the years but this cake takes the cake!

Came home for some rest and took my parents to Shoreline park so they could watch the geese, pelicans, etc. and get some sun. It was good to get some fresh air and sit on a park bench and get more grounded with the thought processes. Kind of like going into your hard drive and killing all those threads that are running in the background!

After a long time we skipped Yoga entirely on the weekend. The body needed a lot more water and rebalancing before being confident that there wont be any dizziness once in the room. Sometimes, got to give a break when a break is due!

This morning we went and attended a "Kalyana Utsavam" at a friends house. It is a function where they conduct a marriage ceremony for the god and goddess just like the real wedding ceremony for the bride and groom. It is kind of like the "wedding rehearsal" that people conduct in marriages here which gives a "what to expect when your kids get married" before the actual wedding. The priest did a good job of explaining what was being done in a step by step way, something that more priests need to do to set the context for today's generation so they appreciate the reasoning behind the customs.

My parents enjoyed it thoroughly because they don't get to attend outside functions during their visit here but in India they are going to some function or other on a weekly basis. For me, it was great attending a function after a long time where I was not the one doing the prayer! Sometimes it is good to be in the audience.

Then more rest after some heavy food and off we went to get haircuts, an activity that was postponed by the parents demand that it wait till all the functions were done..

Both the kids now sport short hair. A big help once school starts in a few weeks as we will be going crazy with the post swim class hair dry routine and the early morning "combing" ritual which will take an extra 5 minutes.

Now an eventful weekend comes to a close and we begin yet another busy week for everyone in the family!

Happy Monday, here we come!

Parks and more Parks

My parents have settled in comfortably to their new routine in the last 20 days. This is their old routine modified to constraints we impose on them here. They have been very sportive about it. The 9 year gap since their last trip, their brushes with death with severe medical conditions, living  a few years where other folks have to drive them around in India..... these have softened the impact of issues that were huge on their last trip.

We have been taking them with us to local grocery stores, costco, etc. and to the few birthday parties that we have been invited to in the last two weeks. Most of them have been in parks as the weather outside is great. My mother loves it although she cannot walk. She had triple knee surgery thanks to some really bad (read contaminated) operating theaters in India and if she walks for 30 minutes, she is done walking for the day.

Nevertheless, we are happy to see her walk from the parking lot to the picnic bench and back. Dad is just so happy to be able to walk in a park instead of our own backyard, which in his words is still a big improvement compared to the traffic and bustle in a major metro in India.

Took a few pictures in the park today. This is the first picture of them I am taking in a year.

Going back to shooting high key shots, something I love !

There is no photoshopping here, no background. Just flood the exposure on the background to white out everything and still get the face.. it is like a process optimization exercise in semiconductor world where you find a narrow process window between exposure, shutter speed and ISO to get this magic shot!

Time to wrap up the weekend and get back the busy routine!

ps. My apologies for messing up Blog readers. Still learning on Squarespace. There was a checkbox on top that changes the post from WYSIWYG to Raw HTML and I had the wrong setting.. 

Progressing further on waterfall hues

Two more pictures after making three copies of the same picture and focusing separately on water, rocks and trees and a final merge..

Another technique that came in handy was to focus separately on things in foreground and things in background (with tripod) and merge the photos together.

Tried it on the Golden Gate bridge the other day from Sausalito and it works.. Same goes for waterfalls. Got this tip from Jay Patel who happens to have a wonderful website where he tells us how he took the photograph! A big thanks to him for the pointers.

Think that pretty much covers the falls in the two mile hike radius from the parking lot!

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