Hetch Hetchy Dam/Valley

I am amazed that not many people know about the Hetch Hetchy valley, it's like a sister valley to Yosemite but at lower grounds and not a valley anymore. The valley was converted into a dam and reservoir to provide water to the city of San Francisco. This valley has a lot of history and political story behind it which can readily be found on the net.

Hetch hetchy valley was the favorite of all in Yosemite to John Muir, he spent his last days in hope of conserving it but fate had some other plans. This was our first visit to the Hetch Hetchy valley and in one word it was beautiful. The reservoir was blue at its best neighbouring the towering granites and displaying the humongous Wapana waterfall which is undoubtedly looked the largest of all waterfalls in entire Yosemite valley.

Since Hetchy Hetchy is not very crowded like the Yosemite valley, parking was easy to find just at the dam entrance. Trail to Wapama falls is a 5 mile roundtrip walk with not much elevation gain.

The trail starts with a short tunnel at the other end of the dam, and it moves on the edges of the reservoir. The granite mountain on the right is Kolana Rock a large portion of which is submerged in the reservoir. If you have seen the X-Men II you might relate with me when I say, the reservoir looked mysterious.

Wapama waterfall is humongous, it's huge when compared to many other waterfalls in the Yosemite valley and still had water even in this serious drought. The last section of this trail is wooden bridge, which had washed away few years back owing to high water levels leading to casualties. So cross it with caution.

A mini rainbow at waterfall edge. Another note of caution would be to look out for rattlesnakes, we saw two on our way back.

The trail continues on to reach elevated levels, to the lake source for Wapama, but we left that for another day.

This valley is serene with no crowd, you can hear silence and enjoy it. Its nature at its best.

Adieu,
Divya

Yosemite Moonbow

Yosemite if not read or explored about can leave you unfamiliar to many natural wonders. We visited Yosemite in February to capture the Horsetail firefall but unfortunately the waterfall had dried up but it was still a good feeling to see how the sun plays with the sunset color.

More about Yosemite Firefall here,

The April visit was to see a new wonder in itself the Lunar Bow. First noticed by the legendary John Muir himself, yosemite moonbows need plenty of water in the lower yosemite falls, full moon on a clear night only certain days of the year when the moonlight is at a particular angle to the waterfall.

Don't forget to grab a night light to reach the lower falls, we made this mistake and had to spend 15-20 min to make our way to the bridge only to realize the large crowd had taken up all possible tripod space available.

The moonbow is not very colorful to the human eye as its unable to identify color range at night and rather looks like a silver arch over the waterfall. Only camera when set on long exposure capture the true colors of the bow. Due to less water the bow appeared quite low on the bridge and went flat in an hour or so.

I am definitely coming back to click this wonder again, but this time with a clear camera sensor, better skills to focus and better planned shots. No doubt the first timings have their own charm.

Adieu,
Divya

Yosemite Horsetail Fire Fall

Horsetail fall is a seasonal waterfall in Yosemite with little flow in winter and onset of Spring. Also popularly known as Firefall owing to a natural phenomenon which occurs around mid of February when the sun is in a certain position and waterfall has a decent flow. The last rays of sun just before sunset illuminates the firefall giving it look of flowing molten lava.

The fall is on the east side of El Capitan, some people confuse it with the man made firefall in yosemite few decades back but that was different.

The fall is best seen and photographed from a small clearing close to the picnic area on the north road leading out of Yosemite Valley east of El Capitan. Leaving you with more detailed links on photographing this phenomenon.

http://www.michaelfrye.com/landscape-photography-blog/2012/01/26/the-best-time-to-photograph-horsetail-fall-revised/

This february the weather was perfect with hint of clouds and prefect shade of red from setting sun, but sigh there was no flow in the fall.

Adieu,
Divya

California Almond Fields

California is leading producer of almonds in US, and you can visually get a confirmation for that while travelling in and around famous California route 99.

We saw flowering Almond fields while returning from Yosemite to San Francisco through Merced. From a distance these flowers look like cherry blossom, but are quite different when held close. California almond fields are a great opportunity for infinity pics.

Adieu,

Divya