Fascinating and Ugly

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You may recall that there was some serious rain this winter in Three Rivers. I was fascinated by all the rushing water and posted a few times about it in March. March 11, March 12, and  March 13. (Probably posted in January and February too, but who wants to chase down all those links?)

One result of that enormous amount of water is that Kaweah Lake filled up very quickly. Now, the Army Corps of Engineers is letting water out as fast as possible to make room for the large amount of anticipated snowmelt. This means we can now walk down at the lake bottom again, and wow, is it ever fascinating and ugly.

Looking upstream from the Slick Rock parking area; Alta Peak is visible with snow on it and Blossom Peak has three points on the far right.

Normally when the lake is this low, this gate is open and we drive farther down. Not this time.

There’s a culvert beneath our feet here. It had to be roaring through to create this canyon.

The water is still flowing through the culvert; that is Highway 198 above.

Somebody was here when the mud was still squishy.

Driftwood galore.

So many layers of different types of dirt: silt, fine sand, coarse sand, all so thick.

It started getting a little squishy.

Look how deep this stuff is!

Too bad backhoes and trucks can’t come get this for fill on all the washed out roads, for future sandbags, and just to allow the lake to hold more water. But this is owned by the government, which isn’t exactly known for practical thinking or helpful practices.

Weirdly fascinating, definitely ugly. Life in Three Rivers can be so varied and interesting; if one must live in Tulare County, I vote for Three Rivers (although Exeter is an awfully nice town if you like town living, I dearly loved living in Lemon Cove, and Springville is quite beautiful in springtime.)

Tomorrow we will wash our eyes out with some wildflowers.

A post about walking on the lake bottom in March of 2020 is here. . . scroll down for the lake pictures.

More Yardening Photos

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This post about yardening is not about procrastination; it is about pure enjoyment of one of the most beautiful springs in recent memory. Is it just Three Rivers? 

Our cats have always loved feather grass. They try to kick the stuffing out of it when they are kittens, and then lie on top of it or try to hide in it when they grow up.

Basil was the only item that the fantastic plant nursery did not have; I found it at our local hardware store the next day.

Here is the studio to make this post a little bit about my art business.

It is a mystery as to why hollyhock keep volunteering when the deer bite them down to nothing.

In the past several years, I have weeded all around the baby poppies and ended up with a nice showing. This year I decided to skip that task, maybe because it rained almost every weekend. The result is tall weeds and almost no poppy plants.

Chances are there will be very few blossoms.

Had to end with a studio photo (and a bit of the painting workshop) to remind myself to get back to work.

 

Finding Information (Instead of Woo-woo Inspiration)

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I was procrastinating (and yardening) in order to think. Sometimes procrastination is simply waiting for inspiration. If you are a person of faith, that is a time of waiting for the Lord to show the way through some of life’s more puzzling situations.

One of my puzzling situations was how to paint the mountains accurately on a commissioned oil painting when I didn’t have the right photos. Sure, Part A is in Photo A, Part C is in Photo C, but then Photo B doesn’t match or fit because it was taken from a different location or there is a tree blocking what I need to see.

I can fake mountains and foothills pretty well, but this particular painting is calling for accuracy. Well, actually, Mr. Customer is calling for accuracy in the mountains, and I fully understand and endorse his desire. The point of the painting for him, besides recalling a moment in time, is to be able to see specifically which peak is where. 

I had a good start, but there were some significant difficulties, such as what happens between Castle Rocks and Sawtooth. I could make a few white dabs, but when Mr. Customer and I try to name peaks, our efforts would be stymied by misleading information. (Heaven forbid that we participate in dis and mis information!)

The answer came while having lunch on Rocky Hill.

Let’s crop and enhance it.

Nope, this isn’t the span of mountains I am seeking. It’s in this photo, but those beeves are in the way.

I cropped out the cattle, messed with the exposure so the mountains were very distinct against the sky, and VOILA! (That is French for THIS IS WHAT I WANT AND NEED! Maybe. I don’t speak French.)

Was I seeking inspiration?

Maybe. People who aren’t artists think there is some sort of woo-woo inspiration thing that causes artists to do our thing.

I am more practical. There is beauty everywhere, subjects that would make great paintings, but as a professional, I have to take into account what my customers (and potential customers) want.

So, more than inspiration, I was seeking information, but needed help to find it, and then, right on time, the Lord provided. (If you are not a person of faith, you might credit “the universe”. That’s too woo-woo for me.)

 

 

 

Lunch on Rocky Hill

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Rocky Hill is private land, in the hands of several people. One of those people is a friend, and she arranged for us to go to the very top. I had asked her if we could have permission to climb it with The Farmer and Hiking Buddy, and she said she has access to the top and can take people, and yes, she would love to take us up. Then Tulare County had a flood.

After things settled down from the flood, we learned of a tour to see the pictographs on Rocky Hill. Our friend was part of the tour, and she suggested that we go to the top for lunch after the tour. You betcha!

Get this: there is a paved road to the very top of this big rocky hill, and by “big” I mean 5 miles in circumference and 3 miles in diameter (not sure where that got measured). Friend has a key, of course, and we loaded up chairs, a table, lunch, and ourselves, and headed up. And up. And up some more. 2.4 miles, specifically.

Friend had laughed to herself when I asked if we could climb it. She later told me she wasn’t having any part of climbing but was happy to drive up with us. 

It was so very very perfect. Very very very perfect. A perfect way to spend the afternoon. Perfection.

Shut up, Central California Artist and show some photographs!

At the base—the hill sloping into the frame on the right is Rocky Hill.

That blue line is the Friant-Kern Canal. The wildflowers are mustard.

This is looking west.

And this is the unparalleled view of the Sierra. (Lots of people say “the sierras”, but it is the Sierra Nevada Mountains; thus “the Sierra” is the correct shortened term. You’re welcome. P.S. My dad taught me that.)

The tiny blue piece of water is actually called “Hamilton Lake”, and only appears in wet years.

The creek in the distance is Yokohl Creek, which did some real damage during the flood. People used to be able to remove sand from beneath the bridge, but some other people made them stop (for very petty reasons). Since then, the sand has piled deeper beneath the bridge and as a result, the creek flows very close to the underside of the bridge, which means debris builds up quickly during high water and then the water finds its way around the bridge, washing out the approach. Water always finds its way. (Ever heard of “unintended consequences”?) 

The cattle were curious, as cattle can be. (Remember this? – scroll down to see)

Friend provided an excellent picnic lunch, so very generous, oh so good.

Through this tree is a black cow fixin’ to deliver a calf soon.

This was the only larkspur we saw.

What a perfect day! Thank you, Friend, for sharing your beautiful piece of Exeter and your heritage with us (and lunch!)

 

Bonus: Spring Walk in Three Rivers

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This is an afternoon walk at Salt Creek earlier this week. No chit-chat, no April fooling, just photos.

Springtime Takes Precedence over Work

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Instead of showing you my current art projects or discussing the unending challenges and rewards of being a fulltime artist in Tulare County, today is another bonus peek at spring in Three Rivers.

These photos were taken on Friday morning.

Tomorrow I’ll show you my current odd job.

We Took a Stroll On Christmas Day

To the tune of “I Heard the Bells”

We took a stroll on Christmas Day,

So many things along the way,

Blue sky was strong,

But slightly wrong,

I thought this was a winter day.

We took a stroll on Christmas Day,

The same familiar route, our way,

The temps were sweet,

The sun a treat,

For rain and snow we all must pray.

We took a stroll on Christmas Day,

We walked an old familiar way,

But down the hill,

A foggy chill,

Three Rivers is above the gray.

We took a stroll on Christmas Day

We didn’t walk far, a shortish stray,

The grass was green,

The air so clean,

Then we strolled home again to stay.

 

BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE! (photos)

 

Happy Christmas, and if you are in the fog, please enjoy the Three Rivers sunshine vicariously. 

 

Thankfulness

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Round-up of Randoms

This post is a round-up of random thoughts that I’ve been gathering, thoughts that don’t fit any category, sprinkled with irrelevant and random photos.

  1. The last time Michael and I drove up the Mineral King Road together, a car with two young women caught up to us. Michael pulled into the next turnout, rolling slowly as he does, wishing the driver would get on it so he didn’t have to stop. Instead, the car stopped, the window went down, and the driver said, “You two are so adorable!” Excuse me? “Adorable” is what young people say to old people! I wasn’t even knitting at the time. (At least she didn’t say “adorbs”, a word that affects me like nails on a chalkboard.)
  2. The largest Catholic church in all of North America has been under construction in Visalia for two years. Visalia?? Central California, huge number of Catholic families, not a lot of priests available for multiple congregations (or however they refer to their separate churches).
  3. The bears are very active in Three Rivers this year, but not as many as in 2015 during and after the Rough Fire.
  4. Three Rivers population has dropped from 2200 to 1800, and there are only 80 children enrolled in the school. Seems like a good place to enroll your children if you want the teacher:student ratio of private school without the expense. WAIT! One week later, the population part of the sign was missing. What is happening??
  5. An old customer/friend called with an art emergency. This means that she needs some custom art and needs it fast. My prices haven’t changed in many years, but the smallest size I draw is now 9×12″ instead of 8×10″, and I tacked on a rush charge. I was a little embarrassed to tell her the price, feeling as if I was gouging her (but come on!), and her response was: “You don’t charge enough”. Oooph. Just oooph.
  6. I bid on a large mural project, and the waiting to hear if my design and prices were accepted, not knowing the competition, not knowing if it is even feasible to the (potential) customer is Not Fun. This is where faith comes in: “Okay, God, I trust you and your plan for me”. (If I say it enough, maybe eventually I will just relax about the uncertainty).

Mineral King After a Summer Storm

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Last week there was such a storm in Tulare County that the marina at Lake Kaweah experienced some real destruction: the docks slammed around, wrecked houseboats, the docks broke apart or sank or both, and five houseboats also sunk. Now they are just in these large jams and people can’t get to them. What a freak of nature storm.

I was down the hill; Trail Guy was up the hill. The evening after the storm, he took these photos in that beautiful glowing light called “the magic hour” by photographers everywhere.

A couple of days later he took these photos out on the trail. This first one is white flowers that I have never seen before. Maybe I saw them and thought, “White, meh”. But I don’t remember.