Coming into Atlanta from the west, the interstate passes by a major amusement park just before it descends to cross the Chattahoochee River.

At night, the view of the city is…twinkly.

With this post, I report the end of the Rainbow Triangle Trip. Accomplished all goals, foremost among them seeing loved ones. Fun trip; and, simultaneously happy to be home.

This morning the fog was thick and the temp was such that the moisture attaching to the antenna as we zoomed down the highway froze!

Later, clearing was partial and we saw many wind mills; here’s an early one and many current models….

Genuine lone star llamas!

The oppressiveness I feel from all this packaging tells me it’s time to bring this Rainbow Tour to an end to escape all these cheerful protections….

For dozens of miles crossing the desert this morning, the air smelled to me vaguely like burning plastic, an odor backnote I found rather unpleasant. Miles.

The plants, however: unfazed. Unknown grey-green leaved low shrub with yellow fliers…

…and a towering yucca (I think).

Today’s title references one of my favorite books, Gary Paul Nabhan’s The Desert Smells Like Rain: A Naturalist in Papago Indian Country (1987). This desert perhaps should have smelled like rain today, as rain came through this area in the wee hours overnight. In fact, we think we’ve had rain at some point every day beginning on the 26th of December, for a run of 19 days so far. Tomorrow we may well not see rain, however.

Once again, we find SoCal murky. More rain systems pushing in from the Pacific. Not good for solar panel action….

Wearing my archaeo-hat, I would describe this as civic-ceremonial architecture on a flat-topped mound. You might say it’s a roadside chapel for some reason on a bulldozed hill.

Lettuce? Lots left in the field…I assume to be plowed into the ground as green manure….

Considerable irrigation required to make row-crops productive in the Imperial Valley….

Our Arizona desert encampment for the afternoon and early evening…

…even more beautiful with a rainbow, arc en ciel, aka arco iris.

And MJ and I took a power walk while Droney flew…such stupendous light…so wonderful catching up with long-time friends…until next time…. Lucky us….

Gulls/Terns and surfers under the marine layer. Here on this SoCal beach, lifeguards use red pickups.

Police? Surveyors? close one side of a bridge (out of frame, right)…fortunately for us, not our direction. (Yay!)

Random rooftop critters. Extra points if you noticed the pigeon before this mention.

Note: lawn bowling is not bocce or pétanque.

This sample suggests that redwoods are not an urban species, or just a NoCal species that does not like SoCal.

Dramatic green lighting on this SoCal Episcopal church. So Cali.

Apologies: too fried to do more than extended captions. Luvya.

I think this morning we drove under the last of the dense cloud layers that we’re likely to see in Cali. I enjoyed seeing the sun on the flanks of the hills…

…and ahead of us as we climbed into the visible humidity.

We even found at least two large herds of mechanical dragons.

Then, we crossed a pass, and, zip, no more clouds.

And into the city, the giant metro area. This species is the city flower. A showy choice as you’d expect for LA.

Here’s the City Hall tower; you’ve seen it in many movies and TV shows.

And, in the busy train station, a for-real shoeshine stand.

Here’s the busy corridor that crosses under the tracks, allowing access to each of the tracks above. Cops arrived in the golf cart; the fine is at least $1500 for going up to the tracks without a valid ticket, the sign said. We just didn’t get caught. Heh.

BTW, this city traffic, wow, exhausting. Sleepy-time for this blahger….

Isn’t that the cutest low-profile lighthouse? Cali-cute!

And there’s the Mar Pacifico—today not terribly pacifico. You can’t see the wind and blowing rain. Elegant, enduring seastacks….

Love the marching swells cut below by the long shallow sea-edge profile.

NoCal tourism touts the elk herds. Here’s one. Grazing and resting. Classic elk-life, when carnivores are not threatening.

Coastal NoCal also hosts trees—not only the giant redwoods pictured here.

During the rainy season, the trees and clouds may merge. This shot is from a high-elevation meadow called in these parts a prairie. [Note: this use of “prairie” is not a Boontling term.]

We took our walk in a section of the 🎶redwood forest🎶 we had not walked in before. I remember almost always seeing lone trees, or perhaps pairs. Here’s a circle of relative newbie trees. I did not find out if they are clones of the dead stump in the center, or if the rotting stump provided a hospitable microenvironment for whatever seeds were at its base to germinate.

For contrast: lichen growth on twists of redwood bark at a tree base.

Post title refers to a Cali term we kept encountering on road signs…which seemed to have been a pet term by some transportation engineers, rather than a road situation of great distinction for drivers. The first we encountered had a small curb between the two lanes that otherwise seemed like a regular two-lane road; another had merely a marked off paved area about a foot wide between the two directions—no elevation change whatsoever—and two lanes each way. Diversity in them thar divided roads….

We drove up-valley for quite a while—flat agricultural fields, some green, some brown. And in the sky above, many geese formations. This one was the largest.

Finally, we got to the upper valley, and the hills closed in on us. We speculated that on the east side of the pond, some of the shrubs on the slopes would be gorse; not here.

Climbing out of the valley, we saw gushing streams and the clouds that fed them. We drove through cloud, even. Lucky us!

Descending the Other Side, we found the tree-giants. Rain makes the trees happy, and low-light makes the camera work hard. Nice effect, however.

At some point, if you keep going west on this continent, you find the salt water of the Pacific, and perhaps a marina before dark. I heartily support the Spirit of America, with all minuscules or two inserted majuscules.

In the wee hours we heard serious wind; I was glad I was cozy indoors. When we ventured out on the road we found downed trees and many branches and so on. See the organic matter in our lane?

Farther along our trail, we found a rooftop water tower structure that lacked its tank. Absence is okay.

We picked a nearby place to eat, and whatta view! We watched the street become dark.

Best beet salad ever. All beets, no foliage.

And, as a timely capper, we reached the streetcar enclosure and started to figure out when the trolley would arrive, and presto the rain began. Lucky us, our stop was a mere 100 feet from the door to our hotel.

And now we are ensconced, warm and safe. Happy. Happy.

😀

When I walked this morning, I caught a good glimpse of the mountains, all lined up on the skyline beneath the clouds.

I also found a pair of kissing bugs. Yellow ones.