Sunday photoblogging: early morning ridge-walking in the high desert

i haven't been getting any exercise since i got back from argentina and it's been gnawing at me... most of the places i like to walk here, i have to drive to get to and that's just plain annoying... for sure, i don't like walking up and down suburban streets lined with houses that are all desperately trying NOT to look alike... i can head up to the high desert ridges that surround the neighborhood and i've done that quite a number of times, altho', on a still-summer weekend, unless you get out about the time the sun comes up, the heat and the omnipresent wind kind of take the fun out of it... what takes the fun out of it even more is the #%$^&*@#$ 4-wheelers and dirt bikers that zoom all over the place, tearing up the vegetation, throwing up clouds of dust, belching fumes, and generating ear-shattering engine noise...

this morning, however, i decided to get out early and, as i was enjoying the cool and the quiet, i realized that this was the first time i had done this walk in the summer... all the other times, it's been late fall, winter or early spring... anyway, it was a real pleasure, and i must be sure to do it again soon...

here's some photos to soak up on a late summer afternoon...



high desert vegetation, while plentiful, tends to be on the scrubby, understated side, and you have to get up close to appreciate just how lovely it is... the early morning light sets off these two quite nicely, don't you think...?



this is the 'burb where i live with my son his family when i'm in the u.s... yes, folks, it's definitely a suburb...



nevada and the great basin are full of dry lake beds... there's one not too far from the house that we have to drive by on our way to and from town... in the photo on the left, you can also see how the off-roaders tear up the trails and, when it rains, the water creates gullies... the photo on the right is a close-up from the photo on the left showing vehicles lined up on the bed of the dry lake, preparing, i would assume, for some sort of rally...



unfortunately, besides generating a lot of environmental destruction and noise pollution, the off-roaders are also very heedless about their trash... the collection of garbage in this photo just so happens to lie at the bottom of the winter sledding hill... sigh...



this is a nasty, spiny, prickly little plant that, when the cold weather comes, will dry out and become a tumbleweed... however, if you look close, you can see that it's completely covered with the tiniest little purple blossoms... just goes to show ya, huh...?

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Swan Lake Nature Area, Great Basin, high desert, late autumn

today, i decided it was high time to drag my arse out of the house and into the sunshine... i decided to explore the swan lake nature study area*, a marshland in the midst of the barren and rolling hills of the western great basin... it's a bit unusual, being fed by "gray water" from a local treatment plant, so it isn't exposed to quite the same extreme cycles of wet and dry as other great basin wetlands... it's on the migratory route of a number of species and is a top audubon society birding area... it's also one of the wintering areas for the tundra swan, the namesake species of the preserve which arrives in early november from the arctic circle and leaves in mid to late march... there are many shorebird and waterfowl species as well as a number of reptiles - mostly lizards - and several species of frogs and toads... bald eagles are year-round residents as are coyotes, badgers and jackrabbits...

.
Marsh cattails.......................................Cattails close-up

.
Dead sagebrush...................................Coots in the marsh pond

i walked quite a bit, probably on the order of 5 or 6 miles, all the way to the end of the trail and back... as i was resting before turning back, i happened to put my hand up to shield my eyes from the sun and was amazed by what i saw... when i was walking, i had felt numerous spider-web strands land across my arms, head and face, and, while i couldn't see them, i was constantly brushing them away... what i saw all around the perimeter of my hand, highlighted by the sun, were thousands and thousands of spider-web strands floating through the air on the breeze, glistening and just barely visible against the brilliance of the sunlight behind them... quite an amazing sight...

* Securing reclaimed water from the nearby Reno-Stead Sewage Treatment Plant, the marshland was saved from being developed as housing, which has allowed for the continued use of this area as a layover stop on the Pacific Flyway for over 130 different species of birds traveling between Canada and Central and South America.

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments

Summer to winter

when i left buenos aires in mid-april, it was hot, sticky and there was a mini-plague of mosquitoes... arriving back today, i am in the middle of a southern hemisphere winter, no leaves on the trees, a breeze that requires a fleece jacket, and a house that's taken most of the day to take the chill off... meanwhile, back in the high desert of the u.s. great basin, the temp spiked again today in the high 90s... my landlady is still in semi-shock over the first-in-90-years snowfall of a few weeks ago, and i guess i'm going to have to start eating starchier food to get my blood thickened up a bit... < sigh >

speaking of heat, my friends in the balkans are having to deal with some of what we were dealing with a few weeks ago - extremely high temps and wildfires... i couldn't believe the temp in skopje, macedonia*, on monday - 109F/48C... i've been there when the temp hit the low 100s, and, believe me, it was PLENTY hot...

on the bright side, i got my new wireless router up and running with no problem, except for the guy down the street who's using the same make and model... once we stopped trying to configure each other's router, things worked just fine...

*In Macedonia, one person died and 20 were evacuated from burning houses near Bitola, the country's second-largest city, as temperatures reached 42 C amid a declared national emergency.

Thousands of firefighters and local residents battled into Tuesday to contain the huge blaze, while President Branko Crvenkovski ordered army units mobilized to help with the effort. Firefighting airplanes and helicopters were expected to arrive Tuesday from Croatia, Turkey and Austria.

"We managed to defend the city and now have the fire under control. There is no threat to Bitola any more," Ivica Bocevski, a government spokesman, told The Associated Press.

it's such a small world... i happen to know ivica... he's a heckuva nice guy, so is his wife, and their 1 1/2 year-old baby girl is a sweetie...

Submit To Propeller
Tweet

[Permalink] 0 comments