hanging on

Many people around the world feel that winter has taken them on a most unwanted roller coaster ride - whether the conditions include snow, ice, rain, flooding, more flooding, drought, wind, or a combination - the winter of extremes has hit hard.  And the hits keep coming.  It has left some hanging on for dear life, wondering what is coming next.

These trees reflect the extreme conditions in which they have existed for probably hundreds of years.  They hang on because that is in their nature.  It is the way of nature.

The first survivor in the group is a bristlecone pine in Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah.  The image was made using Kodachrome 25 slide/transparency film, one of my favorites, and scanned.

A digital image of a Ponderosa pine in El Malpais National Monument

Finally, another slide made with Fujichrome Velvia film, of a Monterey cypress near Carmel, California. 

until next Monday,

DB

a passion for the image

El Malpais, otra vez

A place is beguiling when it keeps popping up a person's mind at the oddest times and places.  Thus, El Malpais, otra vez.  Today's blog features more sandstone knobs, hoodoos, and arches in the making.  It is amazing how trees manage to plant themselves in such harsh but also opportune places.

In case you plan a trip here in the near future, the visitors' center is a wonderful source of information, as are the websites of both the National Park Service and the Bureau of Land Management.

until next Monday,

DB

a passion for the image

details by nature

First and foremost before I begin on this Memorial Day, my thanks to the military and police veterans and service members in our midst - Ann, Anita, Ben, Bogie, Burke, Chuck, Dalice, Dave K. and Dave O., Debra, Earle, two Fred Bs., JJ, Jim, Joel, John, Larry, Steve, and Tony, as well as those my little brain may have neglected to list - for your service.

We saw a great many veterans on their way to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Angel Fire during our recent road trip.  Some also stopped, as we did, at El Malpais National Monument near Grants, New Mexico, to give their bodies a rest before returning to their Harleys.

El Malpais is one of New Mexico's hidden jewels.  Rough and tumble in its character and history, it is a place where Mt. Taylor's volcanic energy laid wide swaths of lava over existing sandstone.  The details are fascinating.

Keep safe and enjoy this land.

until next Monday,

DB

a passion for the image