CALIFORNIA

Anza Borrego from Storm Canyon, Mount Laguna

This blog has been existing for about 7 months now, but I don’t think I have made a post here about places in my own home turf, San Diego. I guess the reason to that is my other blog, San Diego Backroads. When I think of what to post in this blog, I think of outside San Diego. It is like I am making San Diego outside of California. For today, I decided to post something about San Diego’s backyard, Anza Borrego Desert State Park.

The picture of Anza Borrego Desert above was taken from the trail to Garnet Peak at Storm Canyon in Mount Laguna.

Mount Laguna

I find it amazing at how conditions changes at this place, right next to each other, but seem different worlds. If looking East is an arid land, looks devoid of vegetation from afar, yet, looking West at the same point where I took the first picture above is the oak and pine forest clad with snow.

Looking West from Storm Canyon

Anza Borrego Desert State Park is a rain shadow desert. When the storm coming from the ocean hit the mountains, the clouds are pushed skyward, and most moisture evaporates up the sky. Very little  or no rain would reach the desert. Rainshadow happens frequently across Southern California inland from the Pacific Ocean. Thus, allowing San Diegans to frolic in desert sun,

Anza Borrego Desert Wildflowers, Spring 08, San Diego County

get a dose of fun in the mountains,

Sledding on Mount Laguna, San Diego County, winter 09

and in the ocean.

Surfing in Windansea, San Diego, year round

Though Anza Borrego Desert may look brown and uninteresting from afar,

Anza Borrego from Afar

But don’t let its outright appearance deceive you. Behind this boring color are very interesting landscape,

Font’ s Point Overlook, See Person (if you can find him) for Scale

and as with all other deserts in the Southwest, it is very colorful in the spring time and early summer,

Brittlebushes, Anza Borrego, Spring 08

when many species of cacti, widlflowers, desert lilies, and bushes come into full bloom.

Desert Sunflower (Gold) and Sand Verbena ( Purple)

This year 2009, the prediction is another good bloom, since the park looks greener than last year. For current wildflower update, please visit the site: http://www.desertusa.com/wildflo/ca_abdsp.html

The Colored Earth at Artists Palette

A few miles North of Badwater Basin in Death Valley National Park is the Artists Palette. Artists Palette is on the face of Black Mountains

Moon Over Black Mountain, Death Valley

and is noted for having various colors of exposed earth, well, like that of an artist’s palette.

Colored Earth @ Artist’s Palette

The Artist’s Palette is on Artists Drive which is a 9 mile one way drive that starts at the east side of the Badwater Road.  The road passes through narrow canyons and various colored hills. Being in the desert always feel surreal to me, it always make me feel I am in another planet, yet I know I still am very much in planet Earth.

Looking West from Artists Palette

This is why I so love Earth, for there is just so much to see and do here. And it is my sincerest wish to have more awareness of green living helping mother Earth to preserve and conserve its natural resources. Earth is just so beautiful, a lot of times, Earth makes me cry from the wonders of its natural beauty. I have not wandered around the globe, a lot of times I just wander here in California for financial reasons (cheaper to travel close to home), yet Earth already has shown me its different faces, its different beauty. Growing up in the Philippines closer to tropical rainforest, and moving to the North East coast of US before California, at first, I did not appreciate the desert. It is devoid of the vegetation I was used to and I did not look deeper into its hidden beauty. But in time, in my constant visits to these places, I felt a connection with the desert, as much as my favorite place on Earth, which is the ocean. For me, all these wonders, the mountains, the desert and the oceans are equal in beauty, we just have our own preferences. Growing up near the ocean (and also the mountains) has made me choose the ocean to be my sanctuary, yet, I could not deny the profound beauty found in the desert. The desert is just something magical for me, it is so beautiful yet it is also not for everybody because of its extremes. The desert shows us how we can develop depth in character and beauty after all the fiercests tests in time. And just like here in Death Valley, and among its many wonders is the Artist’s Palette.

The Exposed Colored Earth @ Artists Palette

The natural colors at Artists Palette results from the oxidation of different metals. The iron salts provide the red, pink and yellow coloration. The green is from mica and the purple is from Manganese. It is the example of all the oxidation reaction that occurs in the metals. Much of the Artists Palette is from volcanic debris, about 5000 ft thick.Chemical weathering and hydrothermal alteration are also responsible for the the variety of colors in this area.