Monday, 21 November 2011

making a splash - now with added bobcats

The foothills of Sequoia are considerably less famous than the giant trees its named after, this is a shame as they are beautiful and packed with wildlife.


Hospital rock has a number of petroglyphs/pictographs (something old and with a p in it) on it


They were nice but difficult to decipher


The rivers in the park were very picturesque, a change from the natural but somewhat industrial looking gravel beds of the Canadian rockies and Alaska


Sunset on the dusk bear watching trip mentioned in the previous post


The local shop had the same poster we have in the water policy office at RSPB - I have never seen it anywhere else


Rock arch


On the Marble fork trail to visit the water fall


spiders web


I got too hot in my water proof trousers so walked in my boxers - luckily we only met one other person on the trail, he promptly fell off the path in surprise! (this really happened and isn't a joke)


California chestnut tree - although they look more like quinces



The waterfalls were amazing and incredibly varied, some were like white marble


Fi relaxes while I prat about


Although very cold the water looked amazing


The rocks were very cool too



The water looked far to inviting to resist and Ralph eventually cracked



Such grace, such beauty


It was cold but absolutely amazing - look at the colour of the water


king of the world


On the way back we saw a striped racer snake but it was too quick to capture on camera. Back at the trail head Fi's keen eye picked out a bobcat in the bushes, it was keeping watch for California ground squirrels


Inspired by our digi scoping in Yellowstone, Fi took this one through her binoculars - i think it worked quite well.  He had a fantastic moustache and chops.


When it eventually moved the bobcat skulked along very close to the ground, its a strange shape a bit like the Lynx and has a stump of a tail.

1 comment:

Kariboux said...

What, you saw a bobcat ? Damn, so jealous !! Yosemite in the snow seemed beautiful, too.. Cheers!