Matthew's web log

In another installment of my springtime ritual, I went to the East Coast to visit Grandma in New York and friends and family in Florida  Taking advantatage of a direct flight, I flew the red eye to New York for a few days in the Big Apple.  These were filled with enterntainment, good restaurants, and a stop to see Grandma and Aunt Karen.  We enjoyed the Natural History Museum which I think is one of the better museums to visit as a frequent visitor to the city.  It’s huge and to read even some of the signs, you could spend days there.  We also checked out the Lower East side for a trip to the past when it was an immigrant communtiy filled with members of the tribe.  Despite numerous trips to Manhattan this was my first time going up the Empire State Building which coincided with the best weather during our stay in NY. 

Florida was expectedly hot and humid although bearable for most of the time.  We went to the new location of Parrot Jungle which was fun.  I saw a couple friends that still live in Florida and celebrated Mom’s birthday with a couple good dinners.  The week went by quickly and then it was back home to California where I returned to work.

The photos are online   The album includes some pictures that were taken by others.

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/NewYorkandFlorida2008/

It’s been a few weeks since I posted photos.  Two weeks ago we went hiking at Huddart Park.  While the hike was beautiful through the redwoods, none of the photos were that great and since I’ve been busy, I didn’t bother making an album of them.  On last week’s short uphill park at El Sereno I just brought the pocket camera, but forgot the memory card at home (I did hike a different part of the park last summer).   That explains the lack of photos for the last couple weeks, but rest assured, we’ve still been busy.

This weekend the weather turned summer like with temperatures in the mid to upper 80s.  A nice change from the unseasonably cool weather earlier last week.  We took the opportunity to explore yet another park, Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve.  This park is off Skyline and has views of the ocean, redwoods, and wildflowers.  We’re even able to see part of our previous hike.  The photo highlights are here:

 http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/PurisimaApr2008/

(Note, the map links for each photo are working, but I haven’t had time to make the overall map of the hike, so that link is currently broken).

Following some storms Friday night and a few clouds on Saturday, the weather turned beautiful for Sunday.  It was perfect hiking weather.  We the rains earlier in the weekend, it seemed like a good idea to try and see some waterfalls now that they should be refilled.  After some web research, we found that San Pedro Valley County Park, had a waterfall that was over 100 feet.  Not being too long a drive made our decision easier to head over there.  Arriving at the ranger station we asked about which trail had the waterfall.  We were given directions, but the disappointing news that the waterfall was at most a trickle since they didn’t get much rain this weekend.  We pressed on anyway and had some good views of the Pacific and the town below.  The breeze was cool off the water, but in the sun without the wind it was t-shirt weather.  Here are the photos:

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/SanPedroMar2008

(As with the last hikes, there’s a link on the main index page for the map overview). 

With the mild California winter on the wane, I was able to get in a hike the last two weekends.  A couple weekends ago I returned to Almaden Quicksilver Park.  On a very clear day, we could see all three of the Bay Area’s biggest cities- San Jose, San Francisco, and Oakland.  This was a long hike for me (6 miles, according to the gps), but was still an enjoyable day outside.

Last weekend, the parents were visiting and it was in the low 70s- great for early March.  We went for a hike in Santa Teresa County Park.    After misreading the map, we took a steeper trail than I had wanted to.  We all survived and enjoyed the good views.

Note there is now a link to a map showing the entire hike (found on the index pages). I’m still fine tuning the website presentation for this, so comments are welcome.  There are still map links from each photo page.

Photos from the hikes are here:

Almaden Quicksilver:  

http://sanjoseabrams.com/photos/AlmadenQuicksilverMar2008/index.php

Santa Teresa:

http://ww.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/SantaTeresaMar2008/index.php

The rain finally stopped after what seemed like forever.  With beautiful weather, it was time to get some hiking in. 

Saturday it was off to the Long Ridge Open Space Preserve.   The preserve is off Skyline and it was a twisty road to get there- lots of fun to drive.  Getting there mid-afternoon and with a busy evening planned, we only had a couple hours to explore.  It was nearly deserted and we made a loop, including an intense uphill part.  The lighting was challenging for the photographs.  Lots of shadows and brights in the same picture and moving in and out of the shadows required constant fiddling with the camera.  Here are the photos:

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/LongRidgeFeb2008

Sunday L’ took me to one of her favorite hikes near Half Moon Bay.  It was windy at times, but the views were spectacular.  We saw a few elephant seals in the  ocean right off the beach.  The tide wasn’t low enough to walk the whole loop along the beach, but it was still quite pretty.  It reminded me of Point Reyes, only without a two hour car ride.  

A new experiment with the Half Moon Bay Hike was to try syncing the photos with the GPS tracking recorded by L”s GPS device.  This was fairly easy after a little web research.  I’m still working on the best way to display the map and photos together.  For now, there is a "See Map" link on each photo page (in the bottom right next to the photograph information) that will pull up a Google terrain map of where the photo was taken.   Here are the photos:

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/HalfMoonBayFeb2008

After recovering from Belize the first weekend of the month, it was time to explore some of the wonderful sites of the Bay Area.  Saturday it was off to the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains, a short fifteen minute drive or so.  Exploring the Sierra Azul trail, it was mostly shady and fairly steep.  Here are the highlights:

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/SierraAzul2008/ 

The following day it was up to San Francisco to visit the zoo.  I was hoping there would be an idiot feeding time like there was last month, but no luck.  Still, it was fun visiting my third zoo within a month.  It was one of the clearest days I've seen in SF.  We explored the northern end of the city after the zoo for some good views of the Golden Gate. Here are the highlights:

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/SFZoo2008/

I wanted to get one more photo shoot in of some animals in final preparations for my upcoming trip.  With only a little time to spare this weekend, I headed down to Happy Hollow Zoo.  It's just a short drive away and within an hour I covered the entire place. 

It's a challenge to get great animal photos even within the confines of a zoo.  The light changes as the animals move and the fast shutter speeds necessary to freeze motion are difficult with poor light.  Here are the highlights:

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/HappyHollow2007

 (Scroll down past the picture to leave a comment).

On a crisp but sunny late Fall day, I went over the hill to Natural Bridges State Beach in Santa Cruz.  This time of year the monarch butterflies are migrating and they congregate in the park.  I had heard about this a few years ago, but didn't make it during one of our rainier winters.  With a nice day and a good zoom lens, I was eager to try some wildlife photography.   Photographing moving animals requires a different skill from landscape photography and I want to practice a bit before my adventures later this month.

Photographically, I found that manual focus can be useful- provided you get the focus correct.  Depth of field is challenging at these focal lengths.  Digital is great since I don't care that most shots don't come out. 

Following the butterflies it was off to a more heart rate raising hike (at Forest of Nisene Marks State Park), but I didn't bring the camera for that part.  I did get to see the epicenter of the Loma Prieta earthquake which was a good follow on to last month's earthquake hike . 

Photos of the Monarchs.

I continued the annual tradition of going to South Florida for the week of Thanksgiving.  Although the weather in Northern California is excellent, by late November it's a bit cool and I look forward to some warm sunshine.  After some scurrying around to sort out Delta Airlines messing up my flights, I arrived early in the day on Saturday following the red eye flight.

The week was spent visiting with the family, playing with the dog, and seeing some long time friends.  While Florida doesn't have nearly the photographic opportunities of California, there was a nice Japanese garden (Morikami) where I took some shots.  The rest of the photos were of the family.  A link to the album is below:

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/Thanksgiving2007/

A hike was organized by Mid-Peninsula Open Space District at the Los Trancos preserve off of Page Mill Road.  The guided hike showed where the San Andreas fault lies and its impact on local geology.  After a rainy evening, the day was nice and sunny, although a bit breezy at times.  Here are the photos from the hike:

http://www.sanjoseabrams.com/photos/LosTrancosNov2007/