Start with the clouds

It has been a good three months since the India trip. There has been a lot more traveling, all work related. Interesting places, experiences, people! A lot to write about.

However, work dicates I keep my travel locations confidential. It is a funny request given I meet so many familiar faces at various international airport waiting lounges. Also, there are only a handful of fab locations in the world one can go to these days, if you group it by country!

For now, the request has to be honored.. so let's start with the clouds!

This picture was taken somewhere at 33000 feet above an ocean, with the iPhone 5S

Think that is generic enough!

Now don't start asking me which ocean.. 

While I was going through iPhone pictures, came across another recent one taken at Big Sur where we went camping a few months ago. 

Both photos were sent through Photoshop for the same reasons. The first photo had way too many light spots from the plane window. So eliminated them on the middle of the picture. The second one had raindrops on the windshield which showed. Removed most of the drops that showed up on the road (you can still see the drops on the tree and sides). 

Here are two photos taken with the 5D Mark II the previous evening at Big Sur.

Have now found a new treasure trove of pictures on my iPhone. 

A friend who works at Adobe just got me a copy of the latest Lightroom! 

Apparently presets are a breeze with Lightroom. Will tell you how it goes soon.. 

A trip to Lassen Volcanic National Park

The long weekend that comes after a long long time every year came and went. We HAD to go somewhere on a long drive to relieve all that pent up stress of the routine between January to the end of May. 

We decided to visit Lassen National park after a six year gap with the cousin family. We had a ton of fun over the two day trip. 

The weather was perfect. There was lots of snow in the ground at 7000-8000+ feet altitudes. There was plenty of water gushing down the cascades and waterfalls. It was just perfect!

Ice had started melting and it created caves that had a nice bluish glow with the light reflecting from the other side!

Last time we visited this park, it was mostly snowed out and we could not go on any trails as they were all closed. We drove through the loop and came back. This time though, things were different. 

There were snowball fights, adventurous trekking, the kids all grown up and at an age where watching them interact and play is a joy in itself. Even the driving to and from the park was pleasant compared to the usual because we decided to put the younger kids in one vehicle and the older kids in the other vehicle!

We could clearly see the hot sulfur springs for a change!

and watch the sulfur meet the water which makes for some amazing hues..

We made one mistake, or rather the park authorities did. While trying to get to the Kings Creek falls, there was a trail that was closed. Given all the snow, we were off the trail walking in snow. Two families we crossed in the opposite direction told us "just follow the footsteps on the snow".. turns out we wandered off on a closed trail that was very dangerous. We made it in one piece to the falls and back where a rock slide had recently crossed the trail. It was quite and adventure with the kids. 

What were we thinking!

For some strange reason, I did not haul my tripod on the trip. So fancy falls pictures to show. Did get a few shots by placing camera on a rock tripod I built at the base of the falls.. 

Here are the only decent shots of the different falls I managed to get.. Did get a lot of pictures of the kids in action.. but they go on other Social Media!

That last shot almost cost me the camera! 

On day two we visited all the "vista points" and let the kids play in the snow some more. We also went on a beautiful trail around Manzanita lake and around the Lily pond. Thoroughly enjoyed it. Here are some pictures from those two hikes.

That we learned is Lichens.. not moss! It gave the giant trees a flourescent hue that was fantastic.

Lake Helen, although frozen provided other entertainment .. like me doing Triangle pose on snow/ice in front of the family! 

The beautiful Manzanita lake..

There were a lot of ripples.. but given my tripodlessness, opted to take the shot at a very high shutter speed to avoid the ripples.. this was taken with a 1/4000 or 1/8000 speed with ISO at 400. While driving back I realized that to get the entire reflection, a better idea would have been to use the full ND filter instead of the graduated ND filter and go a good 1/2 a second or 1 second at f22 with ISO 100. That experiment will be for the next trip or next reflection shot that comes our way!

The famous standing boulder at Bumpass hell..

Now for some pictures with the kids in action to add more beauty to the scenery..

and last but not least, the ghost cat.. 

and one of our best outdoor family portaits in recent memory (thanks to BB for the click)!

Strongly recommend Lassen as a weekend trip from the bay area, if.. IF it is not snowed out and you can get accomodation last minute at Red Bluff, which is 45 minutes away from park entrance. This is a lot less crowded than Yosemite and a lot more fun in our opinion!

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.

Adventures in tweenlandia

Jr., all of ten years old went to science camp last week!

She left on tuesday morning and came back friday afternoon. For the first time in her life, she spent close to three full days away from her beloved.....

iPad, iPhone, iMac.. We were not really worried about her missing her parents or her sister. The WiTHDRAWAL symptoms was what worried us. She managed fine, thanks to her wonderful teacher who acted as surrogate iPad and her friends who made up for the iPhone and the few creatures she encountered in the trails she hiked in Santa Cruz like a newt, banana slug etc. rounded off the entertainment.

After she came home she summarized the entire events of 3 plus days in one hour during our bedtime story telling and that got me to a few startling revelations.

They all got up at 6:30 AM because there was "flag".. "flag hoisting". It takes me 15 mintues to get her rear end out of bed starting at 7:30 AM on a normal day and twice that long on a weekend. So, I am planning to put a flag pole in my backyard and make her go do "flag" every morning.

No Flag? No breakfast! That should work..

Second, my darling now has an identity! As the narration was going on..

Jr. : We had these cabins which had like 10 people in each cabin and you know most of us desis were in one cabin and on and on and on..

Me : (did I just hear her call herself a DESI?!) Who were all in your cabin?

Jr.: Me, kid1, kid2, kid3,... and rattled off a list which included kids who had at least one Indian parent..

This is the first time I have heard her call herself a Desi !! So much for science camp. My daughter goes away for three days and comes back accepting her Indian-ness?

Last but not least, she took some really good pictures. Unfortunately she was not in a single one of the pictures. Guess she takes after dad for that one. We are waiting for her friends to share pictures of her.

Needless to say.. the first thing she did after coming into the house?

Look for the iPad!

Another wonder that happened? The little one admitted she did indeed miss her sister.. a little bit.. during afternoon playtime!

ps. San tells me that she looked for the iPad only after she had recited the one hour story after coming into the house.. we need more science camps!

A new year begins..

With more pictures..

from the day trip to Elkhorn Slough..

There was a good chance of rain so the entire camera gear did not make it to the hike. We will definitely visit this place again at sunset!

Bridge to nowhere!

We got some great clouds. It had just stopped raining..

This was funny if it wasn't dangerous. One minute, I am sitting down on the tracks taking photographs and suddenly there is a train horn and this commuter train goes through.. no gates, no restrictions! It was cool though..

We did catch some birds but they were more impressive on the binoculars than on the 200mm zoom through the lens. Why cant we just take digital pictures off of what we see with those awesome binoculars?! 

There were many other birds that either looked like versions of sparrows or egrets and a bunch of hummingbirds and the whole place was filled with bird sounds. 

Will strongly recommend a walk around the slough as a day trip.. weather permitting!