Pinnacles in the clouds

[Wicked Dark]

We're doofuses (doofi??) - that's why they became monkey-butt.

Animals...well, the area is well known for its bat population - several caves were inaccessible because of newborn pups (as were many beaches in Big Sur up to Monetery - seal pups though, not bats). Pinnacles also has several species of raptor including the ultra-rare California Condor, although we didn't see those when we hiked, just hawks up in the thermals. They're nesting now and were vigilantly flying. We saw tons of song birds we couldn't identify - probably wrens and similar birds. Many hummingbirds - they were very attracted to my husband's red windbreaker. Quail are ubiquitous and we narrowly avoided running over several. Lots of scrub jays, too. Pinnacles has rabbits, coyotes, mountain lions, deer, badgers, gray foxes, bobcat & various rodents, too - but we only saw rabbits and ground squirrels. Lots of lizards (skinks mostly) and snakes, but we didn't see them either. We did see these little stink bugs. I call him Gary -



And here are a couple more shots, one is where it got a bit narrow and canyon-y and the other is up high - that bridge is jammed under the overhang and you have to crouch down and sort of duckwalk across. It's really tight in there and looking down over made me dizzy.





I think I'm done w/the Pinnacles photos for now and will move on to something else...probably the beach and some hilly stuff.

[Mad Aussie]

Mountain lions! See that always makes me wonder. This is a predator that would have no trouble bringing down a human ... and feeding off you. How safe is it to go hiking in country where there are Mountain Lions?

I like those shots. Very cool section of walking trail indeed.

Gary looks like a Ben to me.

[Wicked Dark]

eh, the thought that one would actually attack and eat me never crossed my mind. I've hiked in California wilderness before (Panamint mountains that make up one side of Death Valley) and never had a problem. I don't think we're high on their to do lists.

I just noticed on the bridge shot that you can see raindrops. Just after this was a very steep staircase...so steep it was a ladder, really, and that steel handrail got very slippery.

[JAS_Photo]

Very cool set! Love the color of that canyon.

[Wicked Dark]

Thanks. The rock has a really wide range of colors & it seemed that almost every time we came up a new switchback, there was a new shade.