Receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award from Bonaire

(Please also read the next post down the page for the International Scuba Diving Hall of Fame ceremonies on Grand Cayman on November 9th).

In an earlier post I described a wonderful week on the island of Bonaire in August, where I was given a humbling honor for my work in urging reef conservation forty years ago.

Those who know the story have heard that the actual award was in a piece of luggage the airline lost for the entire week. So, the actual statuette was presented at the Diving and Equipment Marketing Association trade show in Orlando in early November.

Here, Ms. Lara Chirino, Director of Tourism, is presenting the award, flanked by two young people dressed as a trademark flamingo and an iguana, animals found in profusion on Bonaire.

In the next shot, Ms. Chirino, the flamingo lady and the iguana fellow are joined by Leslie Leaney of the Historical Diving Society (second from left) and the famed marine artist Wyland (second from right).

My new friend the Flamingo Lady joins me in the picture. Note that I kept my cold hand off her bare skin for fear she would let out a squeal and get me in trouble!

 My thanks to the government and the people of Bonaire for extending this unique honor.

 It will always have a special place in my heart, bringing back those precious memories from 40 years ago  http://www.divexprt.com/index_pics/Bonaire/BonaireAchievementAward.html

International Scuba Diving Hall of Fame induction ceremonies

I have just returned from the Cayman Islands, where the weather was gorgeous. The visit was for the annual ceremonies of the International Scuba Diving Hall of Fame, on whose Board I serve.

We had gathered for the induction of a distinguished roster of those who helped diving become what we know today. About two hundred people attended the banquet, a gala sponsored and underwritten
by the Cayman Islands Department of Tourism. We gathered at the Grand Old House as the Sun was disappearing, and our inductees had their rendezvous with history.

 

Among our honorees was Andre Laban, one of Jacques Cousteau's very first employees, as he colorfully tells us here:

Another inductee was Clement Lee, who brought famed Sipadan Island off the coast of Borneo in Malaysia to the attention of the diving world.

I had a camera problem when my friend Allan Power, long-time guardian of the S.S. President Coolidge in Vanuatu (28,000 dives!!) was speaking, So, here is one of Tom Ingram's stills to show Allan as he made his remarks. My trip to Vanuatu in the early 1970s was one of the great adventures of my early career.

Howard and Michelle Hall, the makers of 100 films, most in recent years in IMax 3D, remembered their very first visit to the Caymans:

All in all, some extraordinarily accomplished contributors to our sport were honored by the Hall and the audience. Welcome to the new Hall of Famers! There will be much information and media more posted on the International Scuba Diving Hall of Fame web site soon  http://www.scubahalloffame.com/

Home from Great Basin National Park...

It is always great to get home from a successful adventure. The Great Basin formation inclides most of Nevada, and the national park is the jewel in the crown. In the Basin, water running off the mountains doesn't run to the ocean, but instead remains in the unique Basin ecosystem.

Sitting above the 10,000-foot level on Wheeler Peak is a delight, one I savored for four hard-working days.

Yes, a lot of jets go overhead! A main skyway from Vegas and L.A. must pass right over this landmark.

One pleasure in being home is that I can do computer processing I couldn't get to in the evenings in the motel. One picture I particularly wanted to have time to work out was the panoramas of Wheeler Peak with the Fall colors erupting on its flanks:

I got the color right at home, which I hadn't succeeded in doing in an earlier post of a quick 'motel-room' version.

The other wondrous scene that cried out for a panorama was what I thought of as the 'Color Corner,' a bend in the winding road where the Fall colors exploded over the four days:

I still haven't had time to process many of the Lehman Caves images, but I confess that it is a real challenge to shoot good images in the !#!$!%!^! dark with only small accent lights placed to illuminate the formations! Thank goodness for Photoshop...

It is satisfying when you get them to render so others can share how you experienced them. Just think of wandering in 50 degree darkness through a corridor, and then to turn a corner and see this::

And so, farewell to Great Basin!

Until the next adventure!!

Another perfect weather day...

The locals say that this is very unusual, and that a change is coming soon. So, I spent the day near the summit, reveling in the spreading color. I took a hike to Teresa Lake, one of the Alpine lakes here.
The good news is that I made it at that altitude, the bad news is that in the Fall the snowmelt water has mostly dried up:

This is a place in which to deeply relax, knowing that it is like this only a few days of the year:

It will take getting home and spending time, but I know already that the Lehman Caves pictures are the  antithesis and perfect counterpoint to the scenes at the sun-drenched surface. The narrow, serpentine tunnels connect chambers of astonishing complexity formed over millennia by rises and falls in water levels.

There are formations that look like popcorn, others that look like bacon strips, others like hanging drapes and even some shields that look like parachutes:

Did I mention the icicles?

Just kidding. Everything down here grew in silence and darkness for countless centuries. The stories of how Ab Lehman found the caves are doubtless embroidered in the century since he found them. No matter. It is a thrill and a privilege to see this shrine to Nature's infinite creativity.

On to more adventures!

An ultimate in contrasts

I made it through a long day, and I'm off again shortly.  Just to show the extremes from yesterday, here are the hillsides exploding with Fall colors which are spreading all over the flanks of the mountains.

And then, last evening, I enjoyed a tour through the amazing Lehman Caves, labyrinthine chambers and passageways decorated like this Gothic Palace:

No time to work on pictures now--I have to go out and get them!

Great Basin National Park

It was a long day and it's time to sleep but Great Basin is a small but beautiful park. The main attraction that towers over the landscape is Wheeler Peak, 13,000 feet high.

I was thrilled to discover that my estimate of when the Fall colors would begin was accurate. My guardian angels did it again. All during the day the colors seemed to be changing before my eyes,

This weather is supposed to hold for several days, and the colors, now above the 10,000 foot level, should spread across the high slopes.  It is gorgeous up there:

I'll be watching the colors spread and going into the Lehman Caverns tomorrow afternoon. Now, i'd better get some sleep! This day started at 3:00 A.M.!

The personalized Cavern trip will be late tomorrow, so I may not get online until Thursday...

Among the joys of being home...

While I obviously love being on the road shooting pictures, it is nice to get home to a big, powerful computer which handles my panoramas. Some scenes are simply too big for a single shot, no matter how wide the lens. Instead, I shoot several vertical shots which Photoshop then stitches together.

I also have time when at home to look at the videos I never have the time or energy to watch when traveling. This is the view from Dead Horse Point:

Last year when I went to Moab the mountains had their first snow. This year I went a month earlier, and the view was sublime. This is a horseshoe bend in the road that climbs the mountain group.

.
Then there were the immense vistas one sees from atop the Island in the Sky, the plateau that makes up the northern sector of Canyonlands. This is the view eastward from Grand View: toward the Manti-LaSal mountains:

And only a couple of miles away on the West side of Grand View is the Green River overlook:

Until the next adventure!...

Bidding a fond farewell to Moab

I have done a lot of traveling in Utah, and Moab seems to have the greatest concentration of different subjects to photograph.

And--that is not even to mention all the varied hardbodies one sees each day--river rafters, mountain bikers, rock climbers, hikers. Mix those with all the white-haired park visitors and it is a rich brew.

Alas, it's time to hit the road. Yesterday ended it with a another triumph of sunshine. First I went up in the mountains to take a last look out over Canyonlands:

A quick stop at Park Avenue in Arches was next, to see the tiny people in the vast scene:

Then a quick run up the road to visit Sandstone Arch, framing more tiny people:

On the way back to the motel, I had to take a quick drive out on Route 128, the route of the Colorado as it flows through the town:

Following the river to the East one revels in the long series deep canyons we also see from atop Grand View when we are in Canyonlands:

Let me leave you as I head for the highway with a calm moment from yesterday afternoon. A fitting finale to a superb week.

I'm outta here!

What a difference a day makes...

The old song had it just right. I try to schedule enough days on these trips to ride out a period of iffy weather, and it paid off yesterday!
The day began with beautiful skies, so I raced out to the
Red Canyon portion of the Colorado River.There are miles of scenes like these!:

Then it was on into Canyonlands and the overlook above the Schafer Trail. This road drops an initial 1,400 feet, then goes out to the river canyon and descends another 700 feet.

As I was taking still photos, a park worker pointed out that a car was coming up the trail, adding motion to the scene.

Out on the promontory overlooking the long trail, the view was heavenly in the sunshine:

I shot nearly 600 frames this day, so I can only give a slight taste of the wonder of the day. This is a high cliff at Dead Horse State Park overlooking the pans where they dry potash (fertilizer) in the sun, much like harvesting sea salt on Bonaire:

Today's sky shows promise, but I won't know til I get out there...

Desperately Seeking Sunshine...

Sunday was kind of ugly, what with the sky full of clouds and the roads full of Sunday Grannies who slowed me down as I frantically chased patches of sunshine. The big overlooks were a conspicuous casualty, look for example at the giant mud pie of a shadow as I looked South from Grand View (the tip of Island in the Sky) toward Junction Butte.

.There was a brief two-hour window where the Sun broke through in early afternoon. Arches had the best of it, since each of the interesting sites could fit into a moving patch of sunshine. I raced to Balanced Rock:

You don't want to be around when that thing falls. It will go from tourist attraction to projectile in an instant.

Near Balanced Rock is the Garden of Eden, a series of towers whose size was hard to portray until a nice couple with their baby walked right in front of the left-hand tower. Now, that gave a sense of scale to the formations!:

The Sun held in just long enough for the long walk to Broken Arch. That's it, far out near the end of that line of sandstone towers:

OK, OK. I take it back. Because it was Sunday, a nice group of tiny people were wandering around the arch to give it scale in the pictures:

One does get an interesting impression in national parks. Everyone seems to be from somewhere other than America. I listened to a polyglot of European, Japanese and other languages as I photographed various sites. Belgium, France, Germany, Spain and eastern Europe were especially well represented, and I had some pleasant conversations, since everyone has at least some English. My first thought was that we Americans seem to take our own wonders for granted. On the other hand, I'm reminded that I lived in San Francisco for 25 years and went to Muir Woods once. Somehow, a busy career doesn't leave time for touring in one's own country.

Speaking of careers, during the long walk back to the car I got through by cell phone to daughter Kira, who was recovering from a killer week as she tries to wrap up her latest movie. While I loudly scorn the prima donnas who parade on screen, she has given me new respect for the unsung heroes, the technicians who actually make films work.

May I have some sunshine today, please?...

The mornings have been sublime...

...but, as in most of life, the situation deteriorates as the day goes on. I see by the TV weather that the entire southwest seems to have thunderstorms rolling through. Sigh. Looks like more days of 'Cloud Dodge-em.'

Still, the mid-mornings have been clear. Here are the Three Gossips and Courthouse Towers in Arches National Park:

You get the idea. Look at that clear blue sky.  So, I raced up into the Manti-La Sals to get a high view of Cathedrall Valley:

The Priest and Nuns formations tower above the valley:

Back in Arches, the skyline is filled with spires of sandstone eroded into fanciful, even whimsical, shapes. These are part of the Devil's Garden, where several major arches are found:

Soon, however, the clouds came on in battalions and regiments. Every overlook I tried had big black cloud-shadows everywhere.

Moab is right at the foot of the Manti-La Sals where all that rain is falling, so I returned to the motel in a downpour.

Hoping for another clear morning!!