Pinnacles National Park

Sunday, 18 May 2025

Pinnacles National Park is a small national park in the Pacific Coast Ranges of central California. Originally set aside as a national monument to preserve the unique geology, it became a national park in 2013. Today it is mostly known as the location for release of California condors raised in captivity. The park has an east and a west entrance, but no road between the two. Today we visited the west side of the park in the hopes of glimpsing a condor. We had previously visited the east side in 2018.

The "Pinnacles" are eroded remains of ancient volcanic activity. The San Andreas Fault lies just off the east side of the park.

Unsurprisingly, we did not see condors, but we did see quite a few turkey vultures.

Southern California - Mostly

Wednesday, 15 May, through Saturday, 17 May, 2025

We always wanted to see the Mt. Palomar Observatory in person - even though (1) optical telescopes are nighttime creatures, (2) all the observing is done electronically, and (3) there's really not that much to see! But (1) optical observatories are usually in interesting mountaintop locations, and (2) it's still interesting to see these legendary scientific instruments up close.

First sight of the Palomar dome.

The classic entrance to the dome. Inside are another three floors of steps to climb to the observing floor.

The heart of the 200-inch Hale Telescope with primary mirror, camera, and associated electronics. In the background is the chamber used for resurfacing the mirror. Caltech maintains a web page giving all the details about the telescope.

After visiting Palomar, we continued on to Pasadena and Caltech. On Thursday, we had signed up for a tour of JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which Caltech runs with NASA).

The Clean Room at JPL where all the unmanned NASA satellites and space probes are assembled. For scale, a fully-suited manikin is in the foreground.

"The Center of the Universe" - the main control room at JPL.

We finished Thursday with a campus tour of Caltech.

The newest building on the Caltech campus - the Resnick Sustainability Center.

The atrium of the Resnick Sustainability Center.

Peacocks are fairly common around Pasadena and Arcadia.

Not exactly California, but Arizona. Sunset along I-40 in eastern Arizona.

Joshua Tree National Park

Tuesday, 13 May 2025

Joshua Tree National Park is in the southern California desert. It actually straddles two distinct desert regions: the Colorado Desert (a subregion of the Sonoran Desert) and the Mohave Desert.

Joshua Trees, a species of yucca (Yucca brevifolia, to be specific), are the signature flora of the Mohave Desert.

Joshua Trees lining Queen Valley Road.

The park has some interesting geological features. We think this is "Arch Rock", but I think it looks more like a humpback whale.

From a different angle it looks even more like a whale (although I could see an incomplete arch here).

The cholla cactus is a signature plant of the Colorado Desert.

The view from Keys View, overlooking the San Andreas fault, the Coachella Valley, and Palm Springs.

Petrified Forest National Park

Monday, 12 May, and Monday, 26 May 2025

Petrified Forest National Park lies along I-40 in Arizona. While not as impressive as the more well known parks, we found it well worth the detour off the Interstate. We arrived late in the day on Monday, 12 May, and didn't have enough time to see and do all that we wanted to do before the park closed for the day. So we returned on our way east to take a short hike through the badlands.

The park preserves a section of the Painted Desert where a large quantity of petrified wood has been exposed by erosion.

A jumble of petrified logs.

One of the larger logs.

A closer look at the log showing how petrification preserved the structure of the wood.

Petrified wood collects at the base of the cliffs where it has eroded from the softer sandstone and conglomerate.

One set of rocks is covered with Native American pictographs, giving the area the name "Newspaper Point".

A closer look at the "newspaper".

It's easy to think that Petrified Forest National Park could also be named "Painted Desert National Park", since it really showcases the Painted Desert. This is the view from Tiponi Point.

The triangular profile of these badland hills has given them the name "The Teepees".

The view from Blue Mesa in the center of the park.

Banded badlands at Blue Mesa.

On Monday, 26 May we returned to Petrified Forest National Park as we headed east on I-40. We really wanted to walk the short (1 mile) Blue Mesa hiking trail that lets you get down to the base of the mesa, about 120 feet below the top.

The hiker gives a sense of scale.

Blue Mesa.

Petrified logs that have washed to bottom of Blue Mesa.

Fireworks

Saturday, 10 May 2025

In May we took a 3-week road trip to California to attend Lon's 50th Reunion at Caltech. Basically, we drove I-40 for four days. One of our stops was to visit Lon's brother, Martin, at his home in Arkansas. Martin loves fireworks, so we had quite a show.

All these photos and videos were taken with an iPhone 16 Pro. I bought a camera, it happened to come with a cell phone.

Returning Home (from Finland)

Monday, 24 February, and Tuesday, 25 February 2025

We got home in the dark on Monday evening and were greeted by a good-sized tree that had fallen across the road. At first Lon thought he would have to walk up to the house to get the chain saw and cut up enough to clear the road. Then we realized that we could back up and take old logging roads to detour around the tree - much better than spending an hour or two cutting up a tree in the dark.

In the morning it was much easier to see the tree on the road.

It threw up a large rootball.

Ready for splitting into firewood.

In the Air

Friday, 6 December 2024

It was a brilliantly clear day as we were flying from Roanoke to Dulles Airport on our way to Vienna (Austria, not Virginia). Our flight took a western curve and we flew over very familiar territory.

As we ascended from Roanoke the Titan America cement plant and Tinker Cliffs on the Appalachian Trail were visible.

Next we flew by Covington. The WestRock paper mill was unmistakable.

In the distance was Clifton Forge, and our house was a dot on the image.

Ingalls Field in Bath County.

Lake Moomaw is in the foreground; the Homestead can be seen in the middle of the photo.

The Homestead is at left center, with the ski slope visible as the white streak in the center of the photo.

A wildfire was active in the St. Marys Wilderness in the Blue Ridge.

A view of the smoke plume from the St. Marys wildfire.