Day 1 Part 2

Day 1 was relatively light, but the altitude required some heavy breathing. There were amazing wild flowers, but for some reason I only successfully photographed the orange ones....Check out the moon in the last photo! [Also I'm experimenting with a new method of putting the photos in the blog, which seems to take up less storage space, but makes them a bit larger! Excellent!]

Summer Mountains! Day 1

We now begin another trip series. I'll try to keep it short, since basically there are just a ton of mountain pictures (I tried to throw in a few flowers and people though...). In August, I went backpacking in the Southern part of Sequoia National Park around Mineral King. It was awesome, challenging, beautiful, everything you want in a backpacking trip. Some of the pictures were sort of disappointing and I have a new UV filter that was not working as well as I would like. Or more precisely, was causing more problems than I would like. (I still have no idea what the problem is/was...) Still, out of the 500+ photos I took, there are a few worth posting I'm sure :). I have very good intentions of getting out to take some fall pictures before it is too late as well, but we'll see if it happens. I may have already waited too long and I still have to write and apply for jobs before any such thing can happen! In the meantime, I'll dream of hiking in the mountains with no computer!

Winston!

 

Away with the travel photos, it's been too long since I've posted a cat picture!! Winston is enjoying freshly cleaned sheets as a result of a new washing machine. A very exciting event in the ongoing series of I'm inching depressingly closer to (gasp!) middle age.

So Long Aruba

 

This is our last evening of swimming. (Post-national park). [I didn't take this one, credit to Becky]. The very last day we had a lovely spa experience, but no pictures of that. There is nothing more bizarre, but also sort of satisfying, than having a full body "wrap" which invovles not only the mud/chocolate/aloe, but also actually being wrapped in plastic essentially. All in all, a wonderful trip.

Day 5 (still): Driving Back. Big Rocks.

 

 

 

 

 

That's right, it is still the same day, but we have now left the national park! We are stopping at some giant rock formations in the middle of the island. My understanding is their origins are hazy. I also really wanted to capture more of the local architecture and such things. I didn't get a great chance, since most of the time I was driving, but I did take a few pictures from atop the rocks. And one last lizard!

The 'Other' Side of the Island

 

 

 

 

The Southwest side of the island has wonderful protected beaches of the white sand sort already displayed. The Northeast coast is exposed to the waves from the Atlantic and instead has giant rock formations. Not too inviting, but they still look pretty cool.

Caves!!

 

 

There were some excellent caves. Including early 19th century graffiti. The pictures of that weren't so great though.