Tuesday, May 3, 2005

I hope you like rainy day pictures. Last night I checked the 10-day weather report, and if it's correct I'll be working in either rain or snow until a week from Thursday (although snow in the valley is unlikely). Yikes. Inclement weather produces interesting pictures, so the challenges of working in it are generally worthwhile. But it's still a pain in the butt. You can quote me on that.

As a result, I didn't waste a moment of today's beautiful bright sunlight. It started with golden early morning rays backlighting the fresh green spring leaves of the trees along the Merced River just east of Swinging Bridge, as shown in our first picture today. (That's Upper Yosemite Falls in the background.)

Although all the waterfalls are full, Bridalveil seems especially so. Wind currents typically have a more profound effect on Bridalveil, and even with extra mega-gallons of water falling through space, the torrent gets whipped back and forth and even blown straight back up in a cloud of rising mist, as shown at the right.

This afternoon I hiked up to Mirror Lake, actually just a wide spot in the stream that runs across the foot of Half Dome's vertical slab. Photographers typically shoot facing east and mirror Mount Watkins in the water, but thanks to Nikon's super-wide 12-24mm zoom lens, I could create a view that includes Half Dome's face over its reflection, which reached almost to my feet at the edge of Mirror Lake.

As I walked back down from Mirror Lake, I saw a large group of hikers gathered ahead, obviously looking at some attraction (I assumed it was a herd of deer, which are plentiful and unafraid). But when I arrived there, I realized that the attraction was much more unusual and potentially dangerous. A young bear was foraging for grubs and whatever other edibles one finds in old logs, tearing them apart with his claws about 100 feet off the trail. He (or she) ignored the humans, however, and ambled away in search of other goodies after I'd captured the snapshot you see at the right. Whew.

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