Wow long time since updating the web site for sure.
Well 2020 has come and gone and start of 2021 is not much better, the world is still dealing with Covid and so many other things. All said though, even though I have fallen way behind in the Sea Stories, I still have managed to get out and shoot photos whenever possible.
I did manage to get better at locating California Condors in the wild and even managed to get a few good picture of the magnificent birds in flight. I spent allot of time up at Bitter Creek Nation Wildlife Refuge overlooking the hills near the pen site and had some very good days and many not so good. All the time though I had my beloved Bluetick Coonhoud (Remi) with me and she enjoyed the time up at BC for she could get out and run in the grassland and smell new things and occasional staring session with some of the Coyotes we come across. Bitter Creek is very close to where I stay in my home away from home while working my project in California if is also close to another area me and Remi like to visit which is Carrizo Plains National Monument where we see Raptors allot and the occasional other bird such as woodpeckers and some songbirds., even blessed with the occasional sighting of a heard of Elk or a herd of Pronghorns.
Spent most of 2020 trying to capture Wildlife with the occasional landscapes, something I plan to concentrate more on this year. Though not as much landscapes as I would like, did manage to get some out at Alabama Hills as well as along the Central California Coast and the Pacific Coast Highway. I think part of the reason is that I planed to attend an Outsider Landscape conference in March 2020 in Kanab Utah and sadly it got canceled right before it was supposed to start. My wife Gerry even flew out from West Virginia with the plan that we would drive there and capture some other spot along the way. We were unable to that but did manage to take in Joshua Tree National Park for a couple of day which I think she really enjoyed. Speaking of Joshua, I did manage a few trips there and it always a great place to visit, even went once to see my nephew and his wife play a show at a local Joshua Tree CA location with the twosome Snake and Rabbit.
Since I work all over the world and currently working in Central California while the family is back home in Eastern Panhandle of WV, evening and weekends can get lonely and boring. That said photography has always help me keep my sanity and having my dog Remi with me pretty much 24/7 has been a Godsend also. The other great thing is I have managed to go back home a few time including for nearly a month in April when they shut down the project due to Covid. That shut down had me driving the Tundra from California to WV on run East with the dog and me and then turn around and came back West 3 weeks later. It was very nice though rushed to see our great country as I drove across, especially enjoyed Utah and Colorado on the way east and then taking the more southern route on the return, enjoyed Oklahoma, Texas, NM and AZ and even made a side trip to Oatman AZ on ole Hwy 66 and got to see the burros running through town.
Once back made few flights home and the wife came out in between the trips home. Back in August me and her did do some camping in my Roof Top Tent and got to enjoy the Redwoods NP as well as Larsen Volcano National Park, though at the time there was a lot of smoke in the air due to the great amount of fires burning all over California, still better than sitting in my 27’ Travel Trailer. Looking at my odometer on the Tundra, I see I have put nearly 80,000 miles on it since first coming to Californian in October 2018, most of it traveling ant taking photos.
So what the plans for 2021? Well the wife will be out here in April and I plan to take her out to Alabama Hill for a little bit of exploring and some camping. Then a few days after she leave I will head to Kanab UT to attend to the Outsider Landscape Conference that was postponed from last year. Later in the year the plan is to have the family (wife and two daughter to meet in Vegas where we will rent a vehicle and travel to Yellowstone and grand Tetons where I hope to get lots of wildlife and some great landscapes, but with the Covid restriction it hard to tell if that will come to fruition or not, fingers crossed and prayers that we are able to do so since Yellowstone is a bucket list item. In the near term, plan to work on my video edit skills (much needed for sure) and get my YouTube going.
Hopefully it will not be another year before the next Sea Story and hopefully the people that do read thin enjoy such along with the phots in my portfolio.