Photo Quiz Phriday--what are these two knobs called?!?

They live in Yosemite Valley, on the east end.

Photo is looking northward, generally...

Without looking it up,  can you name these?

Or, just one of 'em?

Alternatively, feel free to name them creatively,

 if you don't know their, um, traditionally used names.

We encourage wild guesses.

Fair warning: only PG answers will be posted. =)

And 100% accurate answers will be posted, but maybe a wee bit later than others...

Good luck, and Happy Halloween!!

xoxobb

How big is Half Dome? Well, can you see the people? =)

So, if you've never been to Yosemite, and wondered how big Half Dome was,

here's a hint.

Half Dome, photographed from Washburn Point

Same photo, cropped and enlarged to show the people at top

Same photo, cropped and enlarged again to show the people

Same photo, the for-sure people outlined

Tiny little bipeds: aren't they cute?

=)

Now go back to the top photo
and mentally picture the people (teeny, tiny specks) there.

So, there's your answer.

It's big.

xoxobb

from a distance...

Photo taken this October whilst flying from the Midwest back to California.

Dr. Penny Higgins (http://paleopix.com/blog/)
"Alluvial fans in the desert. And maybe a volcano or two on the right hand side…"

Dr. Penny would know; she's a "vertebrate paleontologist/isotope geochemist/geologist."

More geo-shots from that flight, w/Penny's interpretations,
are in the "earth from the air" set at  http://www.flickr.com/photos/biobabbler/.

Thus endeth the "From a distance" challenge for day 19

of the @just_go_do_it 30 day photo challenge.

11 to go; gonna be traveling during some of that,

so posts may become a wee bit spotty.

xoxobb

Why I prefer the window seat...

... even though I'm mighty tall: it's the planet ogling opportunities.

I can't imagine NOT wanting to sit w/face plastered to the window

when you can see such amazing things.

Heaven. =)

xoxobb

Moon over Big Bend National Park

A reward for getting our buns out of bed early,

on the day we drove out of Big Bend.

xobb

Single shot silent Saturday: Joshua Tree NP rocks

Yeah, yeah, it's all about you...

 

Trying to take a photograph of the section of granite wall
from which sprung the slide by Yosemite's Mirror Lake,
and who horns in?

Don't you think you get enough attention, Half Dome?

Jeepers.

Poor little slide....

=)

bb

New quiz, plus last hints 4 old aerial photo quiz...

 

This is the old quiz, and we have a few guesses:

Where is this? Name nearby town and state.

Hint # 1:

This is a photo I took moments before I took the above picture:

Hint #2:

It's not in Utah, Colorado, or the Dakotas...
And remember, I took it flying from Sacramento, CA
to Minneapolis, MN.

=) New quiz:

What is the cause of this pattern:

the land areas are different shades of brown,

connected by perfectly straight boundaries?

Mind you, the answer is something I've inferred,

but I bet it's right.

=)

xobb

okay, I figured out where 1 of the aerial shots I took was, so...

A QUIZ!! =)

Where da HECK is dis? (dat's my ND accent, doncha no)

Looks like a salamander, to me.

Just goofed off a bit on Google Earth, and found it.

I flew from Sacramento to Minneapolis.

And that's ALL I'm gonna tell ya.

=)

If, later, it looks like folks need a hint,

I've got one at the ready.

bb

uh, may I have a window seat, please?

 

=)

More to come.

xobb

kindaquiz answer + contextual pics

 

Well, the first guess, which was cracked brownies, is precisely why I like this picture. Because it is not clear, right away, what it is. That is a quality I adore in nature photos.

So, it IS a nature photo, and all of you next guessers were there. Funny, it's not dune or cliffs but it's rock (relatively flat) right NEXT to a cliff and just downhill from dunes. And yes, it was recently wet (since it's intertidal). How freaky is that? Again, y'all are a bunch of smarties!

Welcome to Montana de Oro State Park, California, home to AMAZING rocks. Oh, yeah, and there's an ocean, too. =)

 Here's where the trail starts descending toward the sea

 Nice dune shoulder

 

Dune resident

pink sand verbena

My guess re: the rock type was sandstone/mudstone, but I'm SO not a geologist, so found this re: Montana de Oro geology:

"The Monterey Formation is a widespread, thick body of silica-rich rock laid down in Miocene time, approximately 16 to 6 million years ago. It's easily recognized throughout the Coast Ranges by its rhythmic bedding and cherty nature, although parts of it are shaly and full of fossils."


If you were describing a person and said they had a "cherty nature," what would that mean?

This place has amazing rocks--freaky lumpy cracked rocky landscape. It's like the whole place is an experiment in clay and porcelain manufacturing techniques.

Are those the coolest rocky mounds, or what?

Biobabbler descends

to a very fancy, cracked porcelain floor

Beauty!

Root descending cliff

Check out the 50,000,000 rocks layered in that crazy cliff...

So there ya go, rockin' intertidal rocks.

More pics later, including one of my all time favorite shorebirds--sweet!

=)


biobabbler