Rainy day

It's been raining all week here, reminding me of that last day sightseeing in Rio in the rain.

This is the view from Corcovado, the mountain with the statue of Christ the Redeemer. This panorama of the tiny boats and the city in the foreground, and the mountains fading away in the mist, was actually much more impressive than the actual statue we climbed the mountain to see.

The art of Drakes Beach

I thought this photo looked like a painting, so I helped it out with a little filter.

Sunday bird blogging

A pair of gulls hanging out on Drakes Beach.

Drakes Beach

I haven't taken many pictures in Berkeley, and haven't processed most of those I did take, but here are a few from our excursion to Point Reyes on Friday.

Drakes Beach is backed by steep sandstone cliffs, which the wind and water have sculpted into beautiful patterns. The winds were on display Friday, and I could only stand to walk on the beach for maybe twenty minutes, but it was worth being in the grindstone of the flung sand and water to be able to breathe in that fresh air.

Back to the Bay Area

I'm leaving tomorrow, for a brief stop in Reno and then on to Berkeley. So I want to post these pictures from last year's trip before I start collecting new ones: the view from Mount Tam and some nearby wildflowers, and the always amazing view from Cesar Chavez Park in Berkeley.

View from the mountains

That's the Pacific Ocean, seen from the terrace here.

I sprang for a transfer to the hotel and had a driver pick me up in San José because I didn't want to have to try to figure out how to get here on my own. And though we did drive along the coast briefly after leaving the Central Valley, we soon turned east towards the mountains and spent two hours on narrow winding two-lane roads going up, up, up. I wish I had been able to take some pictures along the way—there were fields full of white Brahmin cattle, river gorges so deep and thickly forested you couldn't see the actual rivers, and a string of towns that seemed to consist of only a church and a couple of houses.

It felt as though we had left the ocean far behind and below us, so this view was a surprise.

Saturday reflections

It's obviously a stretch to call this a reflection picture—a few faint clouds and two silhouettes in the water do not really qualify. But I'm in the middle of a take-home midterm this weekend and don't have time to look for something better.

These are the ruins of Sutro Baths, by Ocean Beach in San Francisco. The baths burned down in the Sixties, but I remember visiting when we were having special occasion meals at the Cliff House next door. There was a skating rink, and for some reason a mummy in a glass case, which I found both fascinating and terrifying. I never even realized there were actual baths there until after it had burned down and the ruins of the pools were exposed. We used to climb all over the ruins and the hills above when I was in high school; like so much else in San Francisco they've now been cleaned up and there are beautiful trails over the hills where we used to skid around on the bare rocks.

Next stop Ireland

Cape Spear, just outside of St. John's, is the easternmost point of North America, excluding Greenland and why wouldn't you?

L'Anse aux Meadows

Yesterday we hit the Viking trail. We're on the tip of the Great Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland now, and Labrador is a blue smudge on the horizon. Today we start making our way back south to Deer Lake, where we fly out Wednesday.

This is the view from L'Anse aux Meadows, the only Viking site in North America apart from Greenland. It was a beautiful day, as you can see in the picture. What you can't see are the very robust winds, which made me wonder why even a Viking thought this was an attractive place for a base camp.

Friday morning

I'm not sure if it's possible to have too many pictures of sunrises -- I may be testing that -- but I just love this bicyclist this morning.