A pair of red-eyes
Black-crested night heron
Zittel Farms
Here is another small local gem I’ve been overlooking for far too long. Zittel Farms in Folsom offers fresh produce, a pumpkin patch, educational tours for school children, and even Christmas trees in season. When I walk past the property early in the mornings there’s not much going on, but it still makes a very nice break from shopping centers and […]
A California king
All summer long as I hike along dirt trails surrounded by high weeds, I’m cautiously looking out for rattlesnakes. I’ve spotted them as early as March, both in 2014 and 2015; but this year I hadn’t seen one single snake of any type — until last Tuesday, when I was lucky enough to encounter this little guy at Negro Bar. When I tried to coax him off the trail (lest he be run over by somebody on a mountain bike), he coiled up and fiercely shook his tail at me before giving up and slithering off into the dry weeds.
Ugly duckling
Promenade
Scenes from Justin Herman Plaza
Memory Monday, Week 41
July 3, 1979 — Chemult, Oregon All the way north to Vancouver, B.C., and back we had overnighted at various KOA campgrounds; but along Highway 97 in the middle of Oregon there were no such places to be found. Instead, we stopped at Corral Springs Campground in the Fremont-Winema National Forest. The spot could best be described as primitive; there […]
On two legs and four
While in San Francisco last week I didn’t have time to visit the zoo or the natural history museum — and yet I seemed to notice animals almost everywhere I looked. Marina gull Justin Herman Plaza: I could be wrong, but when I looked at this building across the street from my hostel I saw three crabs: I didn’t even […]
Kindness of strangers
Thanks to this very nice man, who gave me a pair of his extra “eclipse glasses” so I could watch the special event for myself last Monday. This was the very first time in my life I had the chance to look directly at an eclipse — and it was awesome! Thank you, kind stranger. You made my day.