Steven's Creek had a lot of newts, including both local species. Especially exciting was a very large red-legged frog, my first ever and a goal for this year.
I took a self-portrait reflected from the frog's eye. Well, the camera and tripod are at least plainly visible.
When I got up to Black Mountain the sun was low and fog was moving in, which made for some nice generic atmospherics. There's something about the soft backlight, the harsh dark karst, glowing golden grass and fog that combine to make a nice mood. It was lovely up there.
I found a jay feather and played around with shooting it with the sun behind it. Of several hundred pictures this is probably my favorite. It took pretty much everything I know about my camera and its optics to make this work.
The Pacific Ocean is somwhere beneath that sea of clouds out there.
The fog crept in up valleys and ravines.
I don't like the combination of colors in this picture but I just love the perspective of sitting above the clouds and capturing their advance up and over ridges.
I took this last picture long after sunset, trying to get the light low enough that I could take a long exposure to soften the clouds and get some nice color. The fog was pouring between the trees at the top of the ridge as the it rolled in from the ocean.
Once again lots of thanks to Manda, who was stupendously generous to let me take this time away.
