Friday, January 6, 2017

Pt Reyes


A Hike on Point Reyes, a pretty awesome place on the planet. Starting from Pierce Point Ranch.

Hog Island, with some strong memories from 3 years ago. 

There is a Tule Elk preserve on the north end of the peninsula. 

Didn't quite make it all the way to the end, but enough to get some good views.


Elk are impressive beasts, they do closely resemble red deer and caribou. 

Tamales Bay caused by San Andreas fault sliding up the coast, is the background.


Wednesday, January 4, 2017

USS Hornet

There are many good reasons to go see the USS_Hornet. From an engineering standpoint, it's amazing. It is pretty much it's own mobile city. It has a power station, water purification, an airport, communications, food entertainment. Docents lead tours in many facets of the ships features, with first hand stories of the experience of being in service on the vessel. 

There are 4 engines on the ship, here are the 11 oil burners to one of them. Essentially they heat seawater to steam.

The steam turns a turbine, which then through a transmission goes a propeller. The setup is repeated 4 times. Here is the control panel to control the furnace, the steam is also moved around the ship and used for heat and now distilled water. Bare in mind this is 1940's technology.

Up top in the bridge, there are control mechanisms, which you could mistakenly thing directly controlled the ship. The devices are more communication systems to the various devices that power and maneuver the ship.

Up in the bridge steering was not priority number one. Strategizing, commanding, communication

and navigation were more important most of the time.

The tower looks pretty small compared with the rest of the ship.

This F14 tomcat was used in top gun I believe.

The sense of scale is really incredible.

The navigation room is interesting too, before GPS LORAN was the primary.

Below deck is the "top gun" room where pilots were briefed among other stuff. The room has a completely different look than the rest of the ship. Which is sort of stainless steel and cream. All in all a fun interesting day out. 

The museum ship is moored in Alemada now, east across the bay from San Francisco.

Tuesday, January 3, 2017

Santa Cruz mountain redwoods

Another favorite walk - Henry Cowell Redwoods state park. So nice we went twice over Christmas.

One sunny, walk with views of the Monterey Bay.

The other deep in the virgin redwood grove.

Even Mum and Dad have been here multiple times.


We were lucky to catch the train, puffing through the forest, in the winter holidays it only runs once a day.


It's a spectacular sight watching it climb the mountain over the trestles, and it is a nice walk to boot.

Clam chowder bread bowls for Dinner on santa cruz wharf, overlooking steamer lane surf spot.