Welcome to Mars

Click through for a larger version of this image - a stitched panorama looking out across the Arizona desert south of Page, over the (hidden) Colorado River to the red rocks of the Vermillion Cliffs. In the distance the Kaibab Plateau looms over the high desert plains.

No sign of J.G. Ballard's health farm.

Arizona
January 2008

Portraits of an Albatross

We spent yesterday at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, where I met this fine bird.





She's a Laysan Albatross, one of the North Pacific species. Sadly she's been injured so, can't fly.

Monterey Bay Aquarium
January 2008

Monday Sea Otter Blogging (part 1)

Bringing the cute one pixel at a time.

Sea otters at Monterey Bay Aquarium





I do like the 55-200 Sigma lens that marypcb gave me for Christmas.

Monday Sea Otter Blogging (part 2)

The first batch of otter pictures were captive otters. This batch is of otters in the wild.

One of the best places I've found to see wild sea otters up close is the harbour at Moss Landing. It's also one of the best places I've found to get decent fish and chips in California, in the restaurant at Phil's Fish Market. The harbour is in a lagoon behind a spit of sand near the sloughs at the mouth of the Salinas River, where the otters come in to ride out the rough winter seas in the calm of the sheltered harbour.

Sensible beasts.

Here are a couple of otters we saw there on Saturday afternoon.





I'm rather fond of the last of these pictures, where the otter is looking at its most cute. You can find more otter pictures in my Sea Otters photoset on Flickr.