Nature

It's time once again for the monthly photo challenge by P.J.'s A lil' HooHaa. When I first saw this month's challenge, which is Nature, I thought to myself this one is going to be very easy. But then I didn't anticipate what was going to occupy most of my month and that definitely got in the way of me going out and taking a lot of photos. I still was able to get out and take some photos, just not in the quantity that I anticipated. You'll see what I mean as you scroll down through the text and photos.

1. Suburban rattlesnake
This one is a little bit of a cheat, but it relates to a story that happened in September, so I'm counting it.  I actually took this photo on August 25th and also blogged about it. But that's not the end of the story.  You see, I love snakes. I'd much rather encounter any kind of snake than what they eat, which is mostly rodents. Now, don't get me wrong, there are plenty of rodents that are very cute and fun to see in nature (squirrels and rabbits come to mind), but anything that will control the rat and mouse population in my mind is a very good thing.

This is where this story takes a different course, because a week later in the first week of September, I spotted this same snake, but it was 10 feet below me in a drainage canal.  This wasn't really a very good thing, because unless it was able to find some way out, the snake was going to probably die prematurely.  I thought the only way this snake was going to escape was for someone to throw a large branch that it could then crawl up on and get out of the drainage canal.  (First off, let non-California readers know that drainage canals here mean flood control.  They are normally dry except during the rainy months of December through March.) Dropping a branch into the canal wasn't going to be practical, so I resigned myself to the fact that the snake was probably going to die.

That is until about a week after that I was walking in the same area and noted a side drain that I knew led up into the spreading area below the dam that the main drainage canal serviced.  Cool.  That meant that the snake most probably got down there by that side drain which also meant that it could get back out of the canal the same way.  Nature finds a way.

2. Ouch
First thing I have to say is getting old sucks.  But it beats the alternative. Nature has dictated that aches and pains take longer to heal as you get older and you get mysterious maladies that for the life of you, you can't explain how it happened. I'd love to say I injured this while out hiking, like I fell getting to a great overlook and strained my knee. Perhaps I strained it while running a marathon, but those of you who know me well know that I don't run. I much prefer taking a much slower route everywhere when I'm on my feet.  Nope, as best as I can tell, this happened as I turned to get out of my computer chair and I strained the right knee as I twisted on it.  I've done the same maneuver countless number of times in the past and nothing has ever happened, yet this time, nature decided to tweek my knee, which in turn has really curtailed my outdoors walking for the past month.

The knee is getting better, but it's definitely not 100%. Last week was the first week since the injury that my FitBit has registered three days in a row of 10,000 steps or more, so I view this as a major accomplishment. I'm taking it easy because I don't want this to become a longtime problem.  I have things to do and places to go, one of them being Denver in the middle of next month and I want the knee to be good for that trip.

3. Sunset

The nice thing about nature, even though you may have limited mobility, it somehow comes to you. That's not the case with this next photo, but I think you get the gist of the statement. You don't have to be out in nature to appreciate a nice sunset. You could just step outside your front or back door and the sunset is right there.

This past weekend, I went on an overnight road trip to Paso Robles to view Bruce Munro's Field of Light at Sensorio.  The website describes the Sensorio as being comprised of "an array of over 58,800 stemmed spheres lit by fiber-optics, gently illuminating the landscape in subtle blooms of morphing color that describe the undulating landscape." My daughter and son-in-law went there earlier at my suggestion and they both loved it. I was planning on going earlier in the month, but my injury set me back a couple of weeks. My daughter suggested that I get there a little before sunset. The lights of the artwork aren't as readily apparent, but the sunset that nature provided helped set the stage for what I was going to see later on.

I've always been intrigued by temporary pieces of art like this, especially environmental art that attempts to blend the art into the landscape. I had just graduated high school when the artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude created their Running Fence project in Northern California. I didn't go see it though it was but a half day's drive from where I was living at the time and I regret not going to see it. When they created their Umbrella Project for Southern California and Japan, I made it a point to get out there and see it, at least the California edition of it. It was wonderful. And I also know that art is a form of beauty that is in the eye of the beholder. Some people will look at it and think, "really?"  For me, I love environmental art such as this, so Sensorio was right up my alley and I made it a point to getting up here to see it.

4. Saturn and Jupiter
Nature is not limited to what is on the earth, but also what's in the sky, even to things that we can't even see. While at Sensorio, the night sky was also on full display. Had I gotten there a little bit earlier, I might have gotten a quick glimpse of Venus and a small crescent moon, both of which were preceding the sun through the sky. Once the skies became really dark, as I walked through the field of Sensorio, I was also treated to Saturn and Jupiter.  For those of you non-astronomers, Saturn is the fainter white dot in the upper left, while Jupiter is the much brighter white dot to the right and downward from Saturn. Both planets can be seen very easily in the night sky right now and I felt the two planets viewed above the field of lights was just nature trying to enhance the human-made artwork.

I ended up walking through the fields on the paths for a little over two hours and these two photos are just the tip of the iceberg of the ones I took. I'm still going through all of my shots and processing them. I suspect that in the near future, I'll have an entire blog entry dedicated to the field of lights, so stay tuned.

5. Pelicans on a sea stack
As I made my way back home the next day from Paso Robles, I stopped along the way several times to take in the sights and to do a little geocaching. This particular spot was where there was an earth cache. Earth caches are virtual caches which don't have a physical container. You have to answer geology related questions after viewing the area and reading about the area on the earth cache page.

This particular earth cache dealt with some sea stacks that are just off the coast near Pismo Beach, California. The geology of how these are created is very interesting and I really enjoyed doing this particular earth cache. Once again, geocaching brought me to a place that I might not have visited were it not for this silly hobby that I so enjoy. Most likely, I would have barreled down the freeway at top speed, looked at the ocean as I drove by, but never really stop and appreciate how nature fashions the shoreline like it does. The topper of it all were all of the pelicans that use the stacks as a roosting area. As you can see, there were scores of the birds. The earth cache page also says you can see cormorants and California Gulls on the rocks. I did not see any cormorants, but there was at least one gull who had chosen to roost on the fence next to the bluff where this photo was taken. That gull must have been well fed by humans in the past, because it had no fear of me whatsoever. I believe that I could have pet it if I'd wanted to, but I resisted that urge. 

And there you have it.  These are my interpretations of the them for this month of Nature.  Please check out P.J.'s for his interpretation of the theme for this month.  At the bottom of that page, there will be links to others who have participated in this monthly challenge. As always, please leave a comment here.  I try to respond back in a timely fashion. I promise, I won't bite.