October Tam Cam

* * *

Tam Cam - October 2015 from John W. Wall on Vimeo.

Sculptured Beach

* * *

I never got around to either Palomarin Beach or Sculptured Beach during my recently finished year of photographing Point Reyes, but I finally checked out Palomarin over the summer, and with a significant low tide due on Monday the 26th of October, I took a day off work to check out Sculptured Beach, about an hour's walk south of Limantour. The fog was so thick when I left the southernmost parking lot that I memorized landmarks on the beach so I'd be able to find the trail through the dunes on my way back. Even with the fog pretty much burned off by the time I got back, it was still tricky to find the exact spot where the trail comes out.

Santa Maria Creek, not making it to the ocean.

Heermann's, mew and western gulls hung out to bathe in the freshwater creek.

The reef at Sculptured Beach had endlessly interesting forms, and I easily spent four hours exploring a fairly small area, leaving only when my belly insisted I head home for dinner.

* * *

Waiting for Rain

* * *

What sounded like rain in the woods was just the pitter-patter of fog 

dripping from the canopy onto a carpet of dry leaves.

Sometimes a Douglas fir's rat tails show loud and proud. 

Sticky patches of sap pool among the cone's scales.

Hardly a drop of water in this little arroyo seco off the Benstein Trail.

Spotted this crime scene at my feet as I knelt 

to explore a small pool of water in the ravine.

A California Giant Salamander, here a juvenile sporting about three inches 

of length, chills in the bottom of a pool.

An excited mob of acorn woodpeckers and steller's jays called out 

from the vicinity of this coast live oak bristling with nuts, 

stopping only when a cooper's hawk swooped in.

* * *

Fallen

* * *

All images made on Cataract Creek at Laurel Dell.

Trinkets

* * *

Drove up the mountain this morning to check on the game camera, 

and picked up a few trinkets presented by the sunrise, including "god beam" crepuscular rays, while I was at it.

Sunrise Timelapse

* * *