A Much Needed Day Outdoors - Saturday 9/30/2006

We ventured into the Alabama Hills again on Saturday. Hydra was busy with his metal detector, while I trundled up into one of the many spaces between rocks with my camera, notebook and a desert guidebook that was written in 1969. Some beautiful writing in the introduction, etc.



It was shady and cool between the rocks, and the loudest sound was my fountain pen gliding across the page.



This granite is so decomposed that you can actually crumble bits of the edges away with your bare fingertips.


We drove deeper into the hills in search of Gene Autry Rock. The road was quite narrow in some places. See how the side mirrors are folded back?



I hiked up a ways and did some rock-hopping. Love this boulder that dropped down and filled in the gap. I did get a bit of a feeling of not knowing where I was when I'd hit a few dead ends in a row, but it's easy to keep your bearings with the Eastern Sierras on one side.


Hydra played a song in the shadow of Gene Autry Rock. Sounded great out there!



Leap of faith... We just believed that the road was down there below the hood. And it turned out that it was.



Finished up the day at an event at the Manzanar National Historic Site. Took the photo below on our way into a panel discussion about the Owens Valley, partly in relationship to the Manzanar internment camp, which involved a panel of old-timers (some in their 80s and 90s) and audience responses to questions. It was an amazing evening partly in support of the publication of Voices From This Long Brown Valley by Jane Wehry.