Today, besides more photos of details around Mission La Purisíma Concepción I’m sharing a couple of views from Mission San Diego de Alcalá (featured in last Wednesday’s post. I don’t have any old slide images from Mission San Juan Capistrano (featured in last Wednesday’s post), but wanted to note the virtual event happening today — a celebration of the St. Joseph’s Day and the annual return of the swallows.
It’s been nearly two years since I was able to visit Anderson Marsh at Clear Lake and walk the trails, and my visit last week offered a stark example of how even a slight change in weather patterns affects the plant and animal life in vital habitats like creeks and marshes. It looks like we may be heading back into another drought year — although I’m still remaining hopeful that our latest round of storms will help. On my previous visit, in May 2019, everything was fresh and green. The inlets of Cache Creek were full; I photographed turtles sunning themselves on logs and crawdads scurrying around underwater. This time, I found evidence of a recent prescribed burn and the inlets were parched and bare. I did see a good number of birds as I hiked along — including a pair of Valley Quail foraging along the sides of the dry creek bed.
Last Monday, I hinted that you would be seeing slides from the 1980s starting this week — but then I remembered I still had a couple of boxes of wedding photos to dig into. So I hope you’ll bear with me as I take you back now to my mom and dad’s wedding in the spring of 1948, as well […]
Here are some more of my mom’s slides from her California Mission projects in 1979-80. The top photo shows Mission San Miguel, featured in last Wednesday’s post. The remainder are part of the collection shot at Mission Purísima Concepión, along with her slide captions.
I’m working my way through several boxes of slides, trying to follow some rough chronological order. That means using hints like notes written or dates stamped on, and sometimes even the appearance of the slide frames themselves, i.e., some are plastic (1980s) and some are discolored white cardboard with red or blue around the edges (1950s and 1960s). Over the […]
More of my mom’s slides of the missions, shot in the early 1980s.
I’m not sure of this oak tree’s age is or how long it’s been lying sideways, but despite its unusual position the tree seems to be alive and well. The first time I recall noticing it was around 2004, and it’s still surviving. I hope that it remains in this spot for many more years to come, an old familiar […]
Huell visits these three Missions in this episode: San Gabriel de Arcangel San Fernando Rey de España San Buenaventura (Click on the linked image below to see the video.)
Summer 1973 — These photos are from a trip my parents took to Hearst Castle and Solvang on the Central California coast, leaving us kids home. But don’t worry! A few years later they returned and took me along with them. Sadly, I don’t recall too much about Hearst Castle except that it was beautiful and overwhelming; I’d love to […]