Got A Teakettle? Leave A Teakettle

Way out in the desert, along a bumpy and rutted dirt road on your way to the Racetrack in Death Valley National Park, is Teakettle Junction. No one really knows how the spot got its name or when but with the posting of the sign people started leaving actual teakettles with all kinds of decorations. As time goes on the park rangers will remove them so this spot is something of a changing art piece.

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Oven Bisect

In one of the older buildings near the Augereberry mining claim in Death Valley is an old, old stove.

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California Coast – Palos Verdes

Just another golden sunset on the California Coast

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The Long View Of Death Valley

From 6300' up on Aguereberry Point in Death Valley is a pretty great view looking South down the length of the park. Badwater Basin and more spreads far, far away.

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Life On The Road – End Of A Long Day

Long empty hallways are another repeating theme in my life. When I am out filming for work I often pick hotels that have free breakfast and that usually leads to hotels that look like this: functional, mostly safe, a bit drab, but good enough for a night’s sleep.

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Pagoda Buckwheat

Ever take pictures of things you don’t know and then forget to look them up? Sure you do! Agree with me to make me feel better! This is the Pagoda Buckwheat, native to California and the Mojave Desert. Spotted in Death Valley National Park on the rim of the Ubehebe Crater.

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Western Bluebird

I had a chance to go birding with the LA Birders today up in the San Gabriel Mountains, a location on the back side by Big Pines. It's not a location I would normally be drawn to, partially because it was 1.75 hours away. But getting up to 7000'+ made the temperatures on the moderate sized and the habitat meant a chance for different birds.

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What The Heck???

Not sure what you’re looking at here, huh? It took me a minute to remember what it was as well! And I was there. This is the Sundial Bridge in Redding, California. Sabrina and I stopped by on a West Coast Roadtrip because they had good birding in the area. Sure, we forgot binoculars, but Merlin helped us find quite a few birds. I also liked this angle of it. Or this.

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The Wreck Of The Peter Iredale

120 years ago the Peter Iredale ran aground and amazingly enough, you can still see parts of it today. Even more amazing, there is no (obvious) tagging or graffiti! You can find the wreck on the Northern Oregon Coast.

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More and More Layers

Long time viewers of this blog, now in its 21st year, know I love layers. Okay, maybe not even the long time readers know this, but I do, I really like layers. I keep a folder in Lightroom for any I come across and today is a chance to flush that folder, or part of it, because there are over 100 favorites in there.

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Western Sandpipers In The Shallows

Sandpipers are for me a difficult lot to identify. I rely on Merlin a lot. Both for the photos identification capabilities and for the audio identification. If not for Merlin, this would likely just be 'sandpipers' to me. Taken on the Oregon Coast near Astoria.

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Baby Orcas Are Cute Little Predators

Spotted up in Alaska this May while on assignment with Uncruise Adventures (so happy to have worked with them for 14 years!). After the sun went down, around 9:45pm, while most people went to sleep I stayed up chatting with the second mate while she was piloting our vessel toward Glacier Bay National Park. Off in the distance, coming our way were maybe a half dozen tails popping out of the water before ducking down again.

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Shifting Sands

The amount of images you can bring home from White Sands National Park changes daily with the shifting winds and sands.

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The Simply Folly Of Trying To See One Bird You Already Saw Before

A "Big Year" in birding terminology is trying to observe tons of different species of birds in a calendar year. It's a personal challenge some birders do and I decided to attempt a Big Year this year in order to dive deeper into birding. This lead me to walk around a man-made lake in Los Angeles in 96°F heat in the middle of the day to see a bird listed as "Provisional", meaning it was introduced and is currently not completely "Naturalized" and living on its own, breeding and surviving.

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Black-chinned Hummingbird

There here in LA for some breeding, meet the Black-chinned Hummingbird! #234 on my 2026 list and mission to observe 500 this year. I need to step it up a bit!

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Zion Rock Patterns

Not all the rock in Zion National Park is red sandstone.

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Zion Morning Sun

From the campground in Zion National Park. Pretty easy to enjoy this park without having to hike a hundred miles.

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Downtown Chicago On A Fine Day

The sun was shinning, the wind was blowing (not evident in the photo) and the sky was almost cloud free. A great day on the lake in Chicago.

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Beach Eagle

I imaging this Bald Eagle somehow rode all the way to the beach on their surf log. I might have been out in the sun too long today.

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Snowy Plovers And Persistence

I didn’t come to Oregon to find Snow Plovers, but once I was near them and knew they existed, I had to find them and add to my 2026 goal of finding 500 species. It’s not exactly ‘Snowy Plover Season’ in Astoria, Oregon, but the area where the Columbia River meets the Pacific Ocean is a breeding ground for these cute critters from March to October and eBird noted they had been seen recently.

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White-fronted Bee-eater

Sometimes the factual names of birds leaves something to be desired. Sure, now I know what this bird eats and what it looks like from the front, but it's so much more than that! I see six colors on this bird and a tail just about as big as the body. It can surely have a cooler name.

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Lake Manly Panorama

It's a bummer panoramas can't be properly appreciated on most of our screen, especially if you are reading this on a phone. But I still love taking them and working with them in the computer. Something about getting more out of the camera than its original format allows. I remember having a mask for my old Minolta film camera that would simulate a panorama.

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Patagonia Peak

Tracking back up in the fjords around Pia Glacier, I can't even remember which peak this is. The concerning thing for me is the hanging glacier or ice pack that looks like it is about to thunder down a mountain.

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I Don’t Know Why It’s Cool To Walk Behind A Waterfall

I don't know why it is fun to walk behind a waterfall, but I sure enjoy it especially when there is no one around. At Silver Falls State Park in Oregon there is a trail that leads you to ten waterfalls, including two you can walk behind.

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Circling The Icebergs

Fresh from Alaska, where the cold winds blow and the icebergs flow.

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Wilson’s Warbler

Soon all the birds with people's names in them will be changing, at least in the US. I'm wondering what the Wilson's Warbler will become? Bad-toupee Warbler?

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