Mountain Fire - Riverside County

The Chariot Fire (subject of my last post) was declared out on July 15th at 0600.

Less than 8 hours later, the Mountain Fire started about 50 miles away. As of this moment, the fire is almost five times larger than the Chariot Fire. Thankfully, there has been some rain the last two days (more on the way) and officials with (Cal Fire) believe they will have the fire out by Wednesday. Of course all this rain is a mixed blessing because now there is concern about mudslides and flash floods. Wild fires and mudslides! All we need now is an earthquake to complete the California trifecta. 

In my last post I showed you photos from the Chariot fire. It was south-east from where we were camped. In almost the exact opposite direction (north-west), this is what we saw the same day the Chariot Fire was extinguished.

This photo was taken from our campsite and is 40 to 50 miles away (as the crow flies). It was late in the afternoon and the smoke was almost due west of where I was standing, so I decided to stay there to see what sunset might do to this scene.

Right on cue, the wind died. Rather than spreading out downwind, the smoke just sat there building up into this massive and scary looking cloud. Don't get me wrong, I know the area where this fire was raging and it sickened me, but I still couldn't help feeling a little bit excited about what this monster might look like at sunset, if the wind stays calm. Does anybody else see an evil face in this thing?

Sunset...

The next evening at about the same time. Maybe it's the residual LSD from my formative years, but doesn't the smoke look like a large creature's bulbous head and face laying on it's side?

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More Desert Art From Anza-Borrego

Sorry that I haven't been posting much lately. Lots to post, just not a lot of time to do so.  We've spent so much time in our RV this year, that when we get home, there is too much stuff piled up for us to do. I just don't seem to get things posted.  I'm working on it though.  These sculptures are in the general area of the sea serpent I posted last week. Still, they are all in the middle of nowhere. In this case, nowhere is an awesome place to be.

Wasn't expecting to see this.

From later in the day. I liked how moody it looked.

Another old dinosaur. The mastodon, is pretty old also.

Lot's of steel plating in these things. Lot's of rust also.

All of the hair in their manes and tails is steel also.

A little different view of the one above.  As you can see, there isn't a lot out here.

Even steel babies gotta eat.

I totally forgot what these are. Something prehistoric.

This thing was HUGE! I thought I took another shot that better showed the scale.

Tapirs! This is for you Sheryl (and the Tapir Preservation Fund)

Wart hog, I'm thinking...

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Not Something You See Everyday

...but, in the desert, you should never be surprised at what you see! (which is why I love it so much)

feel free to embiggen any of these

How about a 400 foot long Sea Serpent in the middle of nowhere?

The metal work in this thing was amazing

My wife is standing by the head to give it some scale.  It's big!

I didn't know that Sea Serpents had rattle snake tails.

Wife not needed for scale, she's just photo bombing...

You can't touch this thing during the summer, when it gets up to about 115 degrees on a regular basis.

Just gotta love the textures and colors.

The artist created statues all over this section of the Anza-Borrego desert. They are near the little desert town of Borrego Springs. There is one stop light in town, but no others for about 50 miles. We're camped about 40 miles from here and regularly come down the mountain to explore. Most of the art in desert areas falls into the "folk art" category, but these are big time sculptures. The same artist has done many other pieces in the area, I'll post some of them in a future post.

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More New Year's Day Sunrise

I was running all over that mountain ridge, freezing in my PJ's at the break of dawn. It was eerie because of the many wolves I could hear howling.  I took a lot of pics, but will only burden you with these few...

So far, this is my favorite photo of the trip. Maybe one of my favorites ever. The little slice of reflection just below the far mountain range is the Salton Sea. It's over forty miles away. Many years ago the Colorado river burst it's banks, creating a 400 square mile lake. Because it has no outlet, it has become VERY salty over the years. It is the second largest salt water lake in the country, surpassed only by the Great Salt Lake in Utah. It is also one of the very lowest spots in the U.S. It is only 5 feet higher elevation than California's Death Valley.  Other than cropping, this photo has not been enhanced in any way.

This was the second photo I took on that day, and was less than a minute after the one I posted last week.

I got so excited running around because I was witnessing nature's "art" at it's best.

When I turned and looked to the west, I was happily surprised to see this amazing cloud formation lit up by the new day's sunlight.

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For reflections by other photographers go to Weekend Reflections by James.

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Weekend Reflections - Clouds

I took this photo last week. I'm so glad I noticed it.

For reflections by other photographers go to Weekend Reflections by James.

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Critters We Saw This Week

Ground squirrel. Not too popular because they undermine hillsides. Pretty darn cute though!

As the crow flies (or gull), we weren't that far from the ocean.

I don't know what he was. If you can spot him in this photo, maybe you know.

A shop in Julian had 5 hummingbird feeders out and all of them were being used.

A cottontail who didn't seem to mind me very much.

A crow riding the thermals. It may have been a raven, he was too high for me to really know.

A Horny Toad. They really aren't a "toad" at all, but a lizard. These guys are said to be able to squirt blood from their eyes (into yours) from five feet away. I don't know if that is fact or fable.

Red Headed Woodpeckers. These are guys who make thousands of holes in trees and then put acorns in the holes.

A covey of Quail at one of the camp sites.

Although my friend's dog is not a "wild" animal, he is one heck of a tether ball player. I've never seen a Boston Terrier jump as high as this guy can. Chuck (apocalypse now), this pic is for you! 

Those woodpeckers peck on everything. We were battling one who was trying to peck a whole in the roof of our RV!

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I also saw some deer and cottontails, but couldn't get a decent shot at them!

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Look Who Came for Dinner

We are up in the mountains again this week.  A few hours ago we were sitting at a picnic table eating dinner with a couple of friends.  Both ladies started pointing and shrieking excitingly saying things like "look at the size of that spider!" and "kill it!" This spider was walking towards us just like he was invited.

We took a few photos of it and my wife said, we need to put something by him so the photos can really show how big he was. She put a Pepsi can about 50 feet away close to it and when it strutted walked over to it, we took more pics.

Here's a photo of this guy next to a Pepsi can. Can you blame them for being excited?

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Last Week

Just a few photos of the area we were camped at last week.

A quick right turn and we could lose 5000 feet in a big hurry. That's not why I took the photo though. It was very hot and this line of clouds appeared out of nowhere, in an otherwise pure blue sky. About three hours later, there was a fairly large thunderstorm. That's the Anza-Borrego desert down the mountain.  It's an amazing place with miles and miles of FWD roads, but it was about 115 degrees down there on that day (so there was no way we were going)!

A look back up the road. Once again, the clouds were really nice.

My granddaughter forgot her camera and insisted that I take this photo for her.  Once I saw it enlarged, I was glad I did so, but I wish I'd gotten the whole shadow in the photo. It was about 5 feet long. My favorite time of day to take photos. If you enlarge it, you'll see what I mean.

As barren as the first two photos looked, this little seasonal lake is only about a quarter mile away. Plenty of fish in it.

What outdoors post would be complete without at least one photo of a critter?

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I have a few more posts coming from this trip. One from in and around the town of Julian, one from a side trip to the small town of Guatay, and one through part of the mountains of San Diego County that was devastated by fire a few years ago.

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