Mid-March, in the final official days of winter, storms took shape and hit California as a whole. I was invited last minute by my buddy Leif to tag along for a quick trip up to Yosemite with the purpose of getting epic pictures. He rented a car with awd and we fortunately stayed inside the valley at the Majestic Yosemite hotel. This allowed us to drive around with heated seats and to different viewpoints and hiking trails. The park was probably as empty as it could ever be. 

Upper Yosemite Falls  

Sun rising somewhere behind half dome  

We hiked up to Mirror Lake

A lot of trails were closed and had too much snow so we roamed through the paths in the meadows

Saturday morning cleared up for a few hours and then more weather with snow passed though preventing us from getting any sunset photos. This is upper and lower Yosemite Falls from a meadow 

The somewhat famous church in the valley.  

some paw prints in the snow, I think we found the source. They were jumping in the air and landing nose first into the snow to find mice or something under the cold snow. 

Swinging Bridge 

Walking to the Vernall Falls trail. Another bridge with Yosemite Falls. First light and El Capitan plus Bridal Veil Falls. Hiking up to Mirror Lake. Center: Half Dome from Mirror Lake 

Comparing Saturday morning to Sunday morning from tunnel view  

I ordered a cheap polarizing filter coincidentally just before the trip. It helps my camera cut glare and pull in truer colors of sky. 

It was sunny for a few hours on Saturday which played a big part in melting the snow, I kept getting hit by ice and snow flaking off trees. Two views of the tunnel. The pulled-back view of the photographers Saturday morning. Mirror lake.  

Took a trip back around Palos Verdes and stopped at the lighthouse. It was a super clear day after rain and wind the day before and it was enough to see the Santa Barbara Channel Islands and San Nicolas island, way out there. From this spot a group of people track whale migration and we were fortunate enough to see some grey whales breach between us and Catalina Island. I’m 

There was a Holi celebration across the street from our boat at the Lagoon. I was actually waiting for this since last year because I wanted to get pictures of it. Got some! I saw a photography documentary series, Tales By Light, essentially a 2-season long Canon commercial, but one photographer was immersed in India for the holi celebrations and although I didn’t even enter the lagoon area I’m happy I got to get a better look at and photograph the activity. There’s hundreds of people covered in color powder who attend over 2 days and it’s a nice reminder of the local diversity and pride in culture. 

Went to a local park in Redondo that I previously never knew existed. We were going a little stir crazy in the boat so turned the opportunity into a picnic and then a little photography as we walked around the park. I was trying to demonstrate stuff with these pictures so I’ll leave them here. Bokeh, aperture, focal length and composition were on the lesson plan. 

Sunset in King Harbor  

Redondo Pier  

putting my tripod to good use with a long exposure shot

A lesser photographed pier in the South Bay - I think this one is getting torn down soon. 

I was really far away for this picture - across the boat launch basin and in a parking lot, but I think the composition and subject of this photo were great  

Always surprised by how many fishermen are out on the rocks all around the harbor. Spotted a really awesome classic landcruiser which deserves a spot on here somewhere.

On my walk around sunset trying to find some interesting pictures. It was really windy and I was glad to see a couple sailors going for it. 

We went up the street to a couple formal looking places like the local library and high school as a backdrop for Mia's new professional photo - which I’m really happy how it turned out. I got to use an old manual focus 55mm lens on my camera which was fun and created a nicely blurred background 

these fishermen are taking risks for their catch 

afternoon crowd at Naja’s 

Exploring slo in this car with James. I pretended I was a race car driver then I pretended I was photographing it for a magazine.  

Thankful for some amazing and thoughtful gifts: a tripod (not pictured but used for the night photo), a 70s film camera, a customized CNN vest, and beer plus soap made from beer! 

Shots from the Newport breakwall Sunday and the Redondo breakwall (I had to pumpout the boat) earlier.  

People usually don’t prefer their birthdays to be on a weekday but I saw an opportunity: use both of the weekends surrounding it to celebrate. 

Mia and I went up to San Luis Obispo the weekend before and her family made me an insanely good cake on Sunday, I got to drive a 911 turbo S as well as some scooters, and we hung out and watched the olympics.  

On my birthday, our friend Molly hosted a small dinner at her apartment and I was totally blown away by the generous and really awesome birthday presents. I felt really lucky to have spent the evening with such solid friends.  

And the following weekend, Presidents’ Day weekend, Mia and I went to Newport to hang out with Dante and Jenn who I’ve known since college and a new crew of friends I met for the first time. We cruised electric Pedego bikes around and then took a Duffy boat out during sunset. epic celebrations all around! 

Mia got me a tripod I picked out and I couldn’t wait to try it out - this was at 11pm on Saturday out in the cold.  

taken on my olympus at 60 seconds. The star trails are interesting combined with boat lifts they went speeding past on the water, and I think one plane on the horizon. The Tripp’s was on a garbage can and may have shaken a little. 

Nikon for probably its max shutter of 30 seconds, looking at the Redondo pier 

I got bored on this past Saturday night so around midnight I grabbed my mirrorless camera (olympus em10 Mark ii) as well as Mia’s DSLR (Nikon d3300) and my little tripod, I hopped on my bike and just went out In search of photos to test the differences. 

Olympus. Towards the harbor and manhattan beach from Redondo avenues.  

Nikon. At the pier  

Nikon. Trying to get the different lights shown in the sand. 

Nikon on the bike seat and of my olympus on the trash can. The stairs and tower were taken with the olympus. 

All Nikon

It was fun, I felt like I was in some stealth mission and my experience so far with these two cameras is that the Nikon feels better to carry, the grip is Bigger and feels sturdier, but at a cost of being large and taking up more space than my olympus. The olympus has more user friendly shooting modes and longer open shutter speed to gather more light, which is necessary because it is a smaller, weaker sensor size. The Nikon I think has stronger colors but can only stay open for 30 seconds which means it can’t gather as great of information in the sky, then again it’s a much larger camera sensor and stores larger files so the image is more clear if magnified. Theres also something satisfying about the cler-chunk sound of a SLR mirror flapping up and down that is missing from the shutter sound on the mirrorless camera. Luckily I can still take one or both around whether than have to choose. There’s Obviously a lot i need to learn but it’s fun to realize that picture taking doesn’t have to stop when it gets dark out, just have to be creative with the surroundings. 

Hiked down to the Dominator shipwreck in Palos Verdes after driving around the whole area searching for horse stables. I came here last year in the spring with my old film camera, but this time could take as many pictures as I wanted.  

A good winter swell was fading away but made this look like a rideable wave - it’s not.  

Palos Verdes surf check Saturday

January 24 & 25 was our second weekend in a row to be stuck home on the boat. It's been awhile between travelling and seeing family/friends that we have found ourselves with the opportunity to.... um, well... we didn't know what to do. I always have boat work but the weather was heating up and I didn't want my maintenance list to get in Mia's way (this time). I woke up and made coffee, "What do you want to do?" "I don't know, that thing that you wanted to do." sarcastically reply. A few minutes go by. "What should we do?"

This questioning bounces around between us for a couple hours until I'm restless and make us get up. We get coffee out, I check surf because last weekend (pre-back-injury) I bought a new longboard fin to try and it's been taunting me all week, Mia's equestrian side has been resurfacing and she's been looking at sensible places to board a horse. Palos Verdes has a few places so we decide to go up there, I know there's good views and trails so I bring my camera... the afternoon is finally planned. After some successful and unsuccessful visits to the horse stables, we hiked down to the shipwreck in PV.

Sunday was even warmer, mid-80's and dead calm. Mia went to the store for beer and snacks and I went and prepared the dinghy for us to cruise around on. I rowed us around the harbor, we got the usual comments from people about chivalry not being dead and how classic the dinghy looks. The tide was so low that people were beaching their skiffs in the middle of the channel and having a big hang out on the shoal. Although the wind was supposed to be strong and it was a small craft advisory, it was basically the most unexciting and safe, warm boating weather we could get here.

Other views from the same perch  

I couldn’t stop talking about how clear it was, almost never can see these mountains and from the top of PV we could see past Catalina and even San Nicolas Island.   

There was a rideable wave though and a handful of surfers gave it a go.  

hard to believe the conditions were this good this close to LA. 

the hike involves a steep and slippery dirt switchback down a cliff and then a few hundred yards of boulder-to-boulder stepping.  

Tried my hand at some long exposure night photography right up from the boat. Turned out pretty cool and I’m now trying to get creative for better shots. 

Long story short my back went out and the pain was significant enough that I gained another new appreciation to be able to walk without wobbling and sporadically losing strength in my legs. I took advantage of it by walking...slowly... with a limp... from the boat to the breakwall just in time for sunset and took these pictures.  

Mia’s cousin Sydney came up with a great idea to invite a group of good people to stay at an Airbnb in St Lucia. Who could say no? We went for 6 days and spent them in the house pool, at a couple different hotel / “public” beaches (the hotels make it very difficult to access the beaches on purpose) and we even chartered a 45’ catamaran and snorkel tour, then I rented a 16 foot Hobie from a resort. Overall it was a perfect balance of lazy relaxation and physical activities that were unique to the location.  

The view from the downstairs bungalow that the birhday girl, Sydney occupied.  

Kait, me and Mia, a patio view, a drone shot of Mia and I from Leif, the hobie sail departure taken by Leif, and Mia lounging in a hammock between the living room and backyard.  

The Airbnb was just outside of Soufriere which was a small town with a natural harbor which yachts were rotating through each day.  

We went to the Viceroy resort which was insanely expensive but offered a nice clean beach between the Piton peaks, and some impressive mega yachts in the bay.  

Trying night shots from the pool deck. The white light coming from the right of the first piton is actually lights from a 298’ yacht in front of the Viceroy resort (Sugar Beach)  

The catamaran charter was half snorkel tour and half booze cruise for just our group. The candid photos are Leif’s.  

The catamaran cruise ended at this beach down the hill from our house so we hung out on an abandoned dock for sunset.  

Playing with reflections from the pool.  

The house was very wide open to the Forrest surrounding it so every night lizards, frogs and other bugs made themselves at home.  

Leif, enjoying the sunset. He and I were technically add-ons to the trip after all the girls already booked and we couldn’t have been happier to be included.  

We went to Joshua Tree for New Years weekend. A big group of us stayed in an Airbnb that Mia found which had a huge backyard stretching into the desert. We drove over to an art installation during the day.  

the art installation was mostly a collection of garbage thrown together in a creative or weird way.  

a lot of toilets, plywood and loosened nails.  

Pretty sure that’s a catamaran standing straight up... a nice looking one too.  

I had my sandals on the roof and totally forgot, drove away at one point down bumpy dirt roads and they must’ve bounced right off

I didn’t actually go into Joshua Tree National Park, because that group outing took place around 6am the first day. But I’m determined to get back out there to see it in 2018, hopefully to camp too.  

This was all in the backyard of the rental, with a fire pit we all sat out by for New Year’s Eve.  

Great way to end a year  

Sophie and Andrew helping each other figure out a new toy  

The caption above applies to basically all the presents they opened. Matching pajamas were an awesome addition. 

By Christmas afternoon everyone was there

A hike on Christmas Eve when Mia was visiting, she got to see Sophie, Nicole and Scott. We hiked the Round Valley loop trail near Morgan Terrotoy which was full of cows and even a coyote 

Andy making sure the toys aren’t edible 

This marked the first Christmas both of the babies were here so there’s just a ton of pictures.  

Mia snapped this photo of me surfing in Shell Beach  

James and I went surfing because the weather was unseasonably warm plus some swell was in the water, we traded boards too so I was trying some nose rides (top right)