Carmel & Big Sur
2013.06.27
Day One Hundred and Forty. And, Day 6 of the second annual Northern California road trip with my dear old dad. We continued to head south and landed in Carmel, home to some of the coolest houses in the region. With nearby Pebble Beach and Carmel Valley, there's a lot of money in the area and the houses along the aptly named Scenic Road display that fact quite nicely. We walked the length of the road and grabbed some lunch before continuing south into Big Sur. Our first stop there was Garrapata State Park, where we got out and hiked around, enjoying the immensity of the coastline and the waves breaking against the rocks. From there, we scooted on down to Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park, where the view of McWay Falls and protected cove never get old. Looping around to the backside of the hike, by the remains of Julia Pfeiffer Burns' house, we were treated to a rare view. There was a group of about 12 California Condors, just hanging about in the trees. I did the best I could to get a few nice images of them, but my poor little 28-300 just doesn't have the sharpness or reach to qualify as a proper birding lens. There was one crazy guy there with a 200-400mm lens who must have taken 1000+ pictures of the condors. For as much as I didn't enjoy having to pick through the 20 or so pictures I took, I can't imagine how long it took him so sift through that nonsense. Oh well ... to each their own, I suppose :)
