Styx Pass water works

[SSSdave]

Thanks kpeter, yeah those tidal images are incredibly colorful. A heads up is this coming Saturday and Sunday just after sunrise will have about the lowest tides this whole year, for example -1.6 feet at Carmel Bay. Thus worth a trip to the coast Saturday morning. Also Saturday forecast along the Moneterey coast is forecast to be foggy with very light breezes that will provide good diffuse light for such subjects.

balzaccom my camera daypack plus tripod not including extras like clothes, water, food are about 16#. And yes the whole carrying weight is a horribly crushing painful weight for little old me but about 10# less than just a decade ago when I was still lugging the 4x5 view camera.

Ok, so last couple days have made some headway on processing images and below have loaded up 3 token images since it looks like it may be quite some time before the trip gets up into my 2017 Trip Chronicles as I am simply going to be too busy in the field for quite some time thus processing will back up. Thinking of driving over Sonora Pass maybe Monday for several days including a visit to bristlecones in the White Mtns.

This basin of lake 7777 west of Mercur Peak is where I thought I would be camping at on day 3 and making reflection photos haha. (mouse select to expand rimg view)



And down on Cherry Creek my main target of all the effort, big water. Last night figured out a way to blend process with masking such images with such a combination of still elements I can focus stack and highly variable shot to shot whitewater elements that need to be from a single shot. Both the below are single frame 6000x4000 pixel images downsized below for web display at 16%.





David

[phoenix2000]

As to Stanislaus NF not opening the gate before the dam, that is something suspicious. Forest Service people are driving all the way to and parking at the Shingle Springs Trailhead. Those crews have been working their way up Kibble Ridge and Kibbie Lake trails sawing through lots of logs blocking trails. There is a nasty eroded area of the road between the Eleanor Trailhead parking and Shingle Springs, dump trucks were working on. So there is no reason at all for backpackers and fishermen to at least be allowed to drive to the Eleanor Trailhead that is 3.0 miles beyond the dam gate. Although Shingle Springs Trailhead (4.5 miles beyond dam gate) access may not open this summer, my suspicion is they may be waiting till Cherry Creek flows drop before allowing access to the Eleanor Trailhead, lest kayakers smash their bodies up against rock in the high flows.

I just called the Groveland ranger office and asked about the gate at Cherry Lake and they reported that they opened the gate last Friday (6/7/17). They added that you can only drive to the Eleanor Lake trailhead, the road to the Shingle Springs trailhead is still closed.

This works for me as my trip is going to start at the Eleanor Lake trailhead in August. Now I just have to worry about how hot it will be at Eleanor Lake at 5pm in August, crossing Frog Creek the 1st day and snow once I get above 8,500 feet.