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photo by Donald Kinney
Veiled in mystic mist, my beloved Mount Tamalpais greeted me with this display early on Saturday morning. Quite beautiful, isn't it?
April 14, 2014
morning mystique of the mist -- Mt. Tam
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photo by Donald Kinney
Veiled in mystic mist, my beloved Mount Tamalpais greeted me with this display early on Saturday morning. Quite beautiful, isn't it?
April 13, 2014
McNear's Point -- two shades of sunrise
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photo by Donald Kinney
The first rule of photography is "just being there", and here in Marin County one of the best vantage points for viewing the sunrise is from the Loch Lomond boat harbor "spit", with what I think is a g-r-a-n-d view across San Pablo Bay towards the tiny East Bay town of Pinole.
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photo by Donald Kinney
Timewise, this snap with the reds preceded the first image. The reds quickly fade into yellow, and the day begins.
April 12, 2014
ripples, Alpine Lake, Mount Tamalpais
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photo by Donald Kinney
I've always been fascinated by ripples and reflections, and a good place to find them is on the surface of Alpine Dam on the shoulders of my beloved Mount Tamalpais. Temporary and fleeting--I truly think they are part of Nature's artwork.
April 11, 2014
below Alpine Dam -- Lagunitas Creek
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photo by Donald Kinney
Oh gosh, maybe I should keep it a secret, but you see, just to the west of my hometown of Fairfax is one of the most beautiful and scenic roads in all of California--with the relatively unimaginative name of "Fairfax to Bolinas Road". This road is popular with bicyclers and has a plethora of twisty turns, and ups and downs. And around every corner--another canyon and stream.
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photo by Donald Kinney
My favorite place to visit and photograph is several miles downstream, past Kent Lake and Peter's Dam, so I don't get to this wild fragment of the mighty Lagunitas Creek all that often, but I am always amazed and revitalized by the beauty I find here, especially in Spring when the creek is running full-blast.
April 10, 2014
Lagunitas Creek -- movement and color
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photo by Donald Kinney
click photo for full-size image
photo by Donald Kinney
April 09, 2014
our wildflowers -- better late than never
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photo by Donald Kinney
Due to a lack of rain our wildflowers got a late start this year,
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photo by Donald Kinney
but now they're popping up like gang-busters… These are Douglass Irises.
April 08, 2014
more Redwood Creek, San Geronimo, Marin County
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photo by Donald Kinney
click photo for full-size image
photo by Donald Kinney
April 07, 2014
Redwood Creek, San Geronimo, Marin County
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photo by Donald Kinney
I've been turning a lot of my images into black and whites recently--mostly landscapes where I can darken what would have been blue, and perhaps gain some contrast by lightening what would have been the reds, but what we have here are color images, and I think the brown earth tone is important.
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photo by Donald Kinney
I assume the name is Redwood Creek--neatly hidden within San Geronimo's Redwood Canyon. Not a place many people get to see, although we now have a newly opened preserved area, the Giacomini Wilderness, nearby.
April 06, 2014
a busy San Francisco Bay
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photo by Donald Kinney
Much of what was formerly part of San Francisco Bay has been turned into commercial land, roads and housing developments. The term "turned into" unfortunately means dumped with copious amounts of garbage and covered over by a few feet of soil and rip-rap.
In the 1960's three influential Berkeley women; Esther Gulick, Catherine Kerr, and Sylvia McLaughlin; environmentalists concerned about the shrinking size and polluted conditions of the Bay, were able to stem-the-tide of bay fill through legislation.
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photo by Donald Kinney
The fog comes roaring in like a freight train; or sometimes, as a thin veil.
April 05, 2014
afternoon light -- Bolinas and Point Bonita
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photo by Donald Kinney
The tiny town of Bolinas... Down there s-o-m-e-w-h-e-r-e in darkness--obscured and blotted out by the sun.
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photo by Donald Kinney
This image of Point Bonita (above) is from January 2012.
Well, I suppose they all weren't massive ships, but during the Gold Rush Years reportedly over 300 craft ended up on the rocks and/or sank while trying to find safe passage into the Golden Gate without navigational aids.
Point Bonita is on the north side of the entrance, and in the mid 1850's planners mistakenly located the first lighthouse too high--at 306 feet--and above the fog where it couldn't be seen by ships. In 1877 another was built near the tip of Point Bonita at 124' above sea-level and still operates today.
April 04, 2014
Cataract Creek -- flowing at full throttle
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photo by Donald Kinney
A raging torrent... Cataract Creek--capable of putting on quite a show.
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photo by Donald Kinney
My new wide-angle lens is allowing me to get in -- up close and personal. Perhaps you can spot one leg of my tripod, in the photo on the left.
April 03, 2014
Kinney Creek -- alive once again
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photo by Donald Kinney
Well we had some rain--a fairly good dousing--and Kinney Creek has come A-L-I-V-E again.
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photo by Donald Kinney
Kinney Creek is one of the larger creeks, among dozens, along the Fairfax to Bolinas Road which traverses my beloved Mount Tam-al-pie'-us, or as we locals simply call her; Mount Tam.
April 02, 2014
Sun cometh up -- at China Camp
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photo by Donald Kinney
Well, this was two days ago, and today's drama in the skies won't begin until mid-day or later. We have the PRETTIEST weather-person who just explained that the BIG BLOB of rain on her radar wasn't going anywhere soon.
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photo by Donald Kinney
Nice to have some rain, though...
April 01, 2014
Red Oak Victory -- at Richmond, California
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photo by Donald Kinney
Well, if I had known that I was going to end up at Rosie-the-Riveter memorial in Richmond last Saturday afternoon I would have gotten there a bit earlier so I could go aboard the Red Oak Victory and have enough time to do some spooking-around. I'll have to go back soon when I can spend more time.
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photo by Donald Kinney
At 62 feet wide by 455 feet in length a Victory ship isn't a big ship by today's standards, but 2710 of these utilitarian cargo and tanker vessels provided vital supplies of all sorts to our troops in the Pacific Theater during World War 2.
Technically, a Victory ship is a classification of a Liberty ship, and grouping them together; 18 American shipyards built 2,710 Libertys between 1941 and 1945, easily the largest number of ships produced to a single design.
The Red Oak Liberty was built here at Kaiser Shipyard in northwest Richmond, but across the bay in Sausalito there was another busy shipyard--Marinship--also turning out Liberty Ships at a fast pace. My grandfather worked at Marinship during WW2, and is probably the best explanation as to why I am a native of this area.
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