Shoulder Season

Our days for the past couple of months have been dictated by weather. If the wind was not blowing, and the skies were not crying, then we laced up our hiking boots and were out the door early to explore a new place in our backyard. This is the shoulder season – the time after Labor Day and before the snows of winter – when the tourists are gone, the streets are quiet, and it feels like the most sparsely populated county in California that it is.

This shoulder season was a long one. Despite some small storms in October that dusted the higher elevations, it wasn’t until last night that we received our first major snowfall. This is a great relief to the local economy, which depends greatly on the visitors that come and ski. It might be a White Christmas after all.

Here is a photo album of some of our favorite images from the last couple of months…

View looking east to June Lake Loop from the unoffically-named peak "Little Middle". Early season snow highlights the ski runs of the June Mountain Ski Area.







Vibrant autumn colors in Lee Vining Canyon, mid-October.







View of Mono Lake, looking east from the summit of Koip Peak.







A rare, graceful arch in the quartz monozonite of Yosemite, on the trail to North Dome.







Steelhead Lake, looking south towards Tioga Pass, on our way down from Shepard Crest.







Weathered stump in the pumice gravel of Glass Mountain.







Sculpted ice that was once a flowing stream emanating from Mildred Lake, Yosemite National Park.







Twisted roof pendant in Convict Canyon on December 5, just a couple of days before the big snow.







The view out our window this afternoon.