The hoodoos are formed when the “fins” or long ridges descending from the rim are subjected to erosion. Their red color is the result of the chemical iron oxide and water. Although very dry with only two streams in the park, small basins of water allow douglas fir to survive. The Claron Formation, providing the Continue Reading »
The Colorado Plateau is a region raised very slowly, thousands of feet, exposing sedimentary layers that created the color variations and whose erosion created incredible variety of canyons and rock formations. The Colorado Plateau is an immense area of land bordered on the south by the Sonoran and Painted Desert, on the west by the Continue Reading »
Our stay in Pasadena was extended for a week of tennis fun (daily play, lessons, and ball machines) followed by a week of recovery from tennis injury (Steven sprained his ankle BADLY). At last, we are on route to the land of the red rocks, with some great sites surprising us along the way: Continue Reading »
What do the Ivy League colleges have in common? Brick buildings, Autumn foliage, Ice Hockey Fanatics. One may don appropriate attire (note the fetching headware…that would be a foam hockey puck you see on my head) and root for the “Engineers”. Really. No “Wolverines”, “Tigers” or “Mustangs” for this crowd. I guess we win by Continue Reading »
I lived in Pasadena until I was 17. Visiting my mother here, gives us old and new venues to explore as she hosts us like visiting dignitaries. So many things here have gotten better over time (air quality, most of all) and some…well, not so much (like the traffic!). Some of the great old restaurants Continue Reading »
High up, above 11,000 feet in the arid White Mountains of California, just east of the Sierra Nevada Mountain range and north of Death Valley, it is known for for extreme weather. This area gets less than a foot of rain a year. The wind blows almost constantly, and the temperature can dip to well Continue Reading »
My first day of law school, my Constitutional Law professor boasted that he had taught both U.S. Supreme Court Justices William Rehnquist and Sandra Day O’Connor. Ironically, weeks later he candidly told us, about the time in his life when he failed in his role as a Constitutional scholar and as an American. He told Continue Reading »
If it hadn’t been 106 degrees in Death Valley (still, far better than 124 degrees on July 11th this year…), and if we hadn’t blown a tire due to heat damage, we would not have slept in one of the biggest truck stops in the US: Barstow, CA. Furthermore, we would not have been on Continue Reading »
Camping at Rock Lake, we are up at dawn to an ineffectively fly fish, when everyone else was catching strings of trout with spinner reels using powerbaits. All we caught was an art trout! So we had to console ourselves at “Pie in the Sky Cafe” at 9,800 feet. With only one oven they produce Continue Reading »
HOT ROCKS…EASTERN SIERRA VOLCANIC FORMATIONS Although we visited Mono Lake only two weeks ago, it feels like we have traveled months since then; maybe the ripeness of our unshowered bodies adds to this sensation! We saved this photo courtesy of USFS, as the Crater and Cone is massive enough we couldn’t get a good picture Continue Reading »