Sac Twenty de  Sequoia, acheté cet été 2009

Vous retrouverez tous les détails sur ce billet.

Porté épaule en cuir verni et textile

Dimensions : 37 x 24 x 10 cm.

3 grands compartiments intérieurs dont un entièrement zippé
A l’intérieur également : une poche téléphone portable et une petite poche zippée

Acheté pendant les soldes à -50% au lieu de 210 EUR, je le revends à 75 EUR FDP inclus.

Livré avec son dust bag

Prix de vente : 75 EUR FDP Colissimo suivi inclus
Contact : videdressing.catimini@gmail.com

Kings Canyon Roaring River Falls

Kings Canyon Scenic Byway (Highway 180) presents easy access to some of the wildest and most spectacular terrain in the Sierra Nevada mountain range. Gushing waterfalls, lush meadows and a road clinging to the side of a rock face make this a one of a kind drive.

Enjoy the grand vistas directly from the road, visit waterfalls via short 2-minute trails, go hiking at the end of the road or take a quick hike along Zumwalt Meadows. Some picnic grounds nearby the road are excellent places to rest, fill up and spend a moment to relax. Whatever you do, take your time and enjoy the narrow winding road at a leisurely pace to maximize your enjoyment.

How to get there

Kings Canyon Scenic Byway 180 Map

Take Highway 180 from Fresno into the park and turn left at the Sequoia intersection, it’s hard to miss.

Most tourists will “only” drive this Scenic Byway when visiting Kings Canyon National Park. Do not make the same mistake and take the time to visit one of the nearby locations (section below). The park deserves much more attention than it gets from most visitors, who tire of big trees after rushing through the important sights in Sequoia National Park, Kings Canyon’s sister. The beautiful hikes and mountain vistas of Kings Canyon are worth your time.

GPS position

N36 47.428 W118 40.212

How to photograph Kings Canyon Scenic Byway CA-180

Afternoon at the Kings River

The road is narrow and winding with very few pullouts. The road itself, clinging to the rocks, is a great photography subject. Only pullout if there is enough room and be prepared to stop for other drivers who are not as careful as they should be. A small stonewall protects you from going over the cliff, but the drop-off into the canyon is very steep and the wall may ultimately prove too low. Be careful and pay attention; I know how easily such landscapes can distract photographers.

Once in the canyon, the road winds along the Kings River. You will have many chances to pull out. Take advantage of it and climb down to the water. Using a tripod and slowing down your exposure, take some photographs of the cascades. The blue of the water contrasts favorably with the light of the afternoon sun on the surrounding mountains and the green of the trees at the river.

The High Dynamic Range that you face in this situation calls for the generation of an HDR image, one more reason to bring a tripod, which allows you to capture several exposures that stack well. Alternatively, you could meter off a sunlit area in the background and boost the shadows with fill light. You could even overexpose the bright areas slightly if you shoot RAW, since most cameras allow you to restore some of the highlights. This is not possible when you shoot JPG images, since the transformation to JPG will clip overexposed areas. How much you can recover depends on your camera.

Zumwalt Meadow

Once at Roaring River Falls, I got into position and just as I got ready to fire away, some person in a wetsuit jumped in to swim laps. At first, I was quite annoyed that he couldn’t wait a minute as he walked past me seeing what I did, but then I remembered that most passersby have no idea how wide my wide-angle lens really is. The problem was simply that he kept moving, which did not look good on the long exposure I used to blur the falls. Eventually the swimmer decided to do right by me and unknowingly became a part of my composition as he rested on a ledge. I quickly swapped lenses and used him as a scale for my waterfall shot. In the end I walked away happy that he was there. I did not get my wide-angle composition of the waterfall plunging into the turquoise-green pool, but instead I got an even more interesting and intimate picture.

I didn’t find Zumwalt Meadows or Grizzly Falls very photogenic during my late summer visit, but I can imagine that the snow melt and wildflowers that spring brings will change this significantly.

Kings Canyon Valley Vista

After climbing out of the valley at dusk, I stopped the car one last time to photograph the soft landscape after sunset. The high peaks of the Sierra Nevada that separate Owens Valley from the park imposingly loom over the valley, inspiring awe and the desire to conquer them at one point. For now I am going to be content photographing them with my long lens.

Best Time of the Day and Best Season

Mid afternoon to sunset is best. Keep in mind that direct sunlight will be gone about one hour prior to sunset due to the surrounding mountains. Any time of the year that the road is open will be good, but summers can be hot, since Cedar Grove lies at lower elevations. You probably cannot get here in winter and spring, due to pass closures.

I suspect that spring and fall will add a lot of color near the Kings River as the wildflowers are blooming or the fall adds color to the surrounding trees .

Time required

Four to five hours should be sufficient to photograph the sights along the byway.

Equipment

• Tripod
• Cable release
• Split ND filter
• Warming filter
• Wide-angle lens
• Medium lens
• Long lens (only if you plan to hike where you may encounter wildlife)
• Picnic (lock in a bear safe container when you go on a longer hike)
• Water
• Bug spray

Fees

The entrance fee to Kings Canyon National Park is $20, which also includes Sequoia National Park. It is valid for 7 days. The Interagency Park Pass will get you in too.

Close Locations

• Kings Canyon Mist Falls Trail
• Kings Canyon Grant Grove
• Buck Rock Fire Lookout
• Redwood Mountain Grove
• Hume Lake
• Sequoia Giant Forest
• Sequoia Lodgepole Area and Tokopah Falls hike
• Sequioa National Park Crystal Cave

Useful Resources

Kings Canyon National Park Page

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I think this may be the General Sherman tree, it’s been a long while.

Odessa Pop ei maga, järgmine kontsert on juba reedel Tallinnas, Mustpeade majas, kus esineb hoogsalt tunnustust koguv Hecuba.

Hecuba on Los Angelese linnas tegutsev duo, mis segab elektroonilist popmuusikat efektselt avangardi ja moodsa soul’iga. Tegu on popmuusika undergroundis hetkel ühe aktuaalsema uue tulijaga, mis on tänu kiitvatele plaadiarvustustele, headele laividele ja juba ka MTV-sse jõudnud kaunitele videotele jõudnud koguda tuntust ja tunnustust nii siin- kui sealpool Atlandit.

Õhtu ja öö jooksul esinevad veel performance’i ja muusikali-elementidega Sequoia (ansambli Stella liikmete uus projekt) ning lo-fi poppi mängiv Tallinna neiu Antonina uue kolmeliikmelise bändiga. Antonina esindab Eestit ka novembrikuises Music Alliance Pactis, mis blogidesse jõuab nagu ikka 15ndal kuupäeval.

Tantsuks ja kuulamiseks mängivad plaadimuusikat Tristan Priimägi ja Uims.

Mustpeade Maja uksed avanevad kl 22.

NB! Piletid on müügil Piletilevis ning baar-klubis “Juuksur” (Vaimu 1) hinnaga 100 krooni. Enne üritust ukselt ostes maksab pilet 150 krooni.

Üritus toimub kontserdisarja Odessa Pop ja MTÜ Rampade Org koostöös. Abi eest Hecuba Tallinnasse toomisel täname Ameerika Ühendriikide Suursaatkonda.

Lisainfo:

http://www.odessapop.ee
http://www.rampade.org
http://www.myspace.com/hecubahecuba
http://www.myspace.com/dantonina

Hecuba – Suffering

Bändidest pikemalt:

HECUBA

Los Angeles’e linnas tegutsevasse Hecuba’sse kuuluvad Isabelle Albuquerque (laul) ja Jon Beasley(laul, klahvpillid, löökriistad). Stiilipiire ületav Hecuba on tänu oma sel aastal ilmunud albumile “Paradise”kogunud alternatiivsema popmuusika vallas mainet kui üks põnevamaid uusi tulijaid. Plaadifirma Manimal Vinyl (Bat For Lashes jt) all ilmunud debüüti on juba jõutud iseloomustada sõnadega “fenomenaalne”, “kaunis”, “haarav” ja “ebamaiselt kummaline”.  Hecuba lood on tulvil vaimukaid käike ja andekat laulukirjutamist, nad võivad muutuda hetkega lõbusast südantlõhestavaks ja vastupidi. Duo uudselt kõlav muusika on täis üllatusi, avarust ja eksperimenteerimist, kuid mõjub samas enesekindla ja terviklikuna. Hecuba emotsionaalseid, kaootilisi ja sageli lummavaid laive on võrreldud futurustliku versiooniga Ike ja Tina Turnerist, kes võivad luua metsikuid helimaastikke, rabada tantsunumbritega või panna pillid käest, et jämmida põhjalikult a capella. Bänd on tuuritanud koos nimekate artistidega nagu Bat For Lashes,Devendra Banhart, Lucky Dragons ja Rainbow Arabia. Tallinnasse jõuab Hecuba oma ulatusliku Inglismaa ja mandri-Euroopa tuuri raames.

Hecuba kohta on öeldud:

“Hecuba on L.A .vastus sellistele New Yorgi bändidele nagu Excepter või Gang Gang Dance, kuid ta on seksikam, puhtam, vähem keeruline, sisaldab rohkem avarust ja vokaale, on hipisõbralikum, vähem mures oma plaadikollektsiooni pärast, eelistab pigem hip-hopi järgi tantsida, kui sellest rääkida, ei karda väikest glamuuri, eelistab täita pigem su kopsud kui ninasõõrmed, harrastab fotosessioone ja habemete piiramist.” /Paper Thin Walls/

“See kategoriseerimatu bänd kuulub võrdselt muuseumitesse, häppeningidele, klubidesse ja teatritesse. Nad on tuttavad nagu minevik, kuid viivad sind tulevikku.” /LA Weekly/

“Kui võtta Hecuba varasemad minimalistlikud elektroonika- ja klahvpilliseaded (2008.a. “Sir EP”), mis asetasid tihti esiplaanile mees- ja naisvokaali, on lihtne mõista, miks nendega seoses on tõmmatud paralleele Philip Glassiga. Uue albumi “Paradise” puhul rändab duo aga klassikalise popi radadel, mis on alguse saanud The Carpenters’i või The Cars’i juurest ning viivad läbi uuema R’NB kaasaegse tantsumuusika perifeeriasse, kus elavad Roisin Murphy taolised artistid” /Cyclic Defrost/

SEQUOIA

Eksootillise nime taga peidavad end ansambli Stella laulja Lotte ja rütmimasinist Kati. Stella on puhkusel ja tema rahutute liikmete loomepalavik otsib uusi väljundeid. Vastloodud Sequoia põikleb kõrvale kommentaaridest oma muusika laadi ja stiili kohta ning palub vaid rõhutada, et tegu on eelkõige visuaalse   performance’iga, mis võib omandada ka muusikali mõõtmed. Muusikaelamus ei ole garanteeritud, kuid võib saabuda ootamatult – ka neile endile. Plaanitava performance’i kohta avaldab duo, et see peaks sisaldama huumorit ja klišeesid, kurbust, rõõmu ja ilu, ning seda võib iseloomustada märksõnadega nagu “uni”, “alateadvus”, “autism”, “lo-fi” ja “peegel peeglis”. Laval toimuval saab olema süžee, kaasa löövad tantsijad ja erinevad lavakarakterid.

ANTONINA

Pulbitsevast Eesti põrandalausest popiskenest, mis väärib kindlasti rohkem avastamist, tuleb Tallinna neiuAntonina ehk Helene Vetik. Kõrvatorkavalt andekate meloodiatega lood on üles võetud kodus ja väheste vahenditega, kuid kõlavad omas elemendis efektselt ja kaasakiskuvalt. Antonina on kirjutanud lugusid juba 10 aastat, neid hooti elektroonilisete abivahenditega salvestanud ja harvem kitarri saatel esitanud. Mustpeade Majas astub ta esmakordselt üles koosseisus, mis võimaldab esitada neid lugusid sarnaselt tema myspace-i lehel kõlavaga. Kontserdil aitab Antoninat nime all Zanduro tegutsev kohalik synth-pop artist.

Redwood Mountain Grove Trail

Photograph the largest Sequoia grove in the world.

Only a few people visit the largest grove of giant sequoias in the world, despite its location in Kings Canyon, one of California’s most visited National Parks. The park service does not promote its location as it does nearby Grant Grove. The entrance is easy to miss and the unpaved dirt trail leading down the steep canyon road does not look inviting. No wonder most people drive past this grove, not even acknowledging its existence.

This is bear country. The warning signs at the grove parking lot and the behavioral advice for bear encounters discourage potential visitors to embark on extended hikes in the magnificent grove. Upon our arrival during a late afternoon the last visitors were about to leave, leaving us to fend for ourselves and our screams to echo from the trees unheard. Consequently, we chose a short hike instead of an extensive loop.

Even on the short hike, I was delighted with the photographic options and captured some nice images.

How to get there

Redwood Mountain Grove Map

The entrance to Redwood Mountain Grove lies 3.6 miles south of the intersection of Kings Canyon Scenic Byway (CA-180) and Generals Highway (CA-198) on CA-198. Across the street, you will see a large parking area (Quail Flat) with roads leading towards Hume Lake and Buck Rock.

Take the dirt road leading down into the canyon for about 2 miles to a parking area. In dry weather, the road is easily passable with normal passenger cars. The drive is spectacular, leading past several large sequoias.

GPS position

N36 42.448 W118 55.255

How to photograph Kings Canyon Redwood Mountain Grove

Giant Sequoia

The contrast between the dark foreground of the forest and the bright sky is too much for your camera to handle, especially during bright, sunny days. You could simply bracket your exposures and use software such as Photomatix to combine them into a single High Dynamic Range photograph. The photograph above is an example of this technique. It is very difficult, although not impossible, to align photographs that you shoot handheld. Use aperture priority mode for all your bracketed exposures to ensure equal sharpness throughout the image for all shots. The long exposures required for the overexposed photograph will demand the use of a tripod, which will also solve your alignment problem.

Although it is tempting to try to include the entire tree in your photographs, much stronger images result if you only hint at the size of a tree. The picture of the trail at the top of the article and the picture of the three trunks are examples of this technique. The simplicity of the subject makes these images more pleasing and less confusing.

Three Sequoia Trunks

Look for even lighting conditions. Sunshine penetrating the forest canopy will create bright patches that distract from the main subject. Our attention automatically goes toward brighter areas in images. Similarly, you can use spot lighting to highlight an interesting subject that will seemingly jump out of your frame.

The even lighting conditions do not require HDR handling and make the post-processing a snap.

Mossy Trees

I took the photograph above with a normal lens to bring the background closer thus creating a feeling of an even denser forest. The more you step back the farther you have to zoom into the picture and the closer the background will appear. This is a great technique to use in this forest, but you need to ensure that your images show more than randomly clustered leaves. The strong vertical lines in the image above and the clear split right down the middle help to make this image work.

Take a detour to Redwood Cabin, a naturally hollowed out tree made into a cabin. The remains of the cabin can be seen from one of the trails.

Bear Warning (click to enlarge)

Best Time of the Day and Best Season

The dense forest canopy will keep the light out for most parts of the day. Optimum shooting conditions exist from about 90 minutes after sunrise to 90 minutes before sunset. Darkness falls sooner in the canyon full of trees, so plan ahead before you leave on a long trail.

Time required

Spend between 30 minutes to 5 hours or more at the grove. You can hike as far as you wish or stay just 30 minutes to take in the sight of some magnificent trees.

Equipment

• Tripod
• Cable release or remote control
• Flash
• Wide-angle lens
• Normal zoom lens
• GPS

Fees

The entrance fee for Kings Canyon National Park is $20. This also includes Sequoia National Park and is valid for 7 days. If you plan to see other parks too, get the interagency pass for $80. It will get you into all National Parks, National Recreational Areas and National Monuments.

Close Locations

• Buck Rock Fire Lookout
• Kings Canyon Grant Grove
• Kings Canyon Scenic Byway
• Kings Canyon Mist Falls Trail
• Hume Lake
• Sequoia Giant Forest
• Sequoia Lodgepole Area and Tokopah Falls hike
• Sequioa National Park Crystal Cave

Useful Resources

Redwood Mountain Grove (Book Search Result)

Kings Canyon National Park Site

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According to The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, “Some 90 to 95% of old growth [redwood] forest has been felled since, and the remainder is now almost entirely in parks and reserves.” More at NPR.

Image: Michael Nichols/National Geographic

On the Net:

1. Coast redwoods information and photos
2. Coast redwoods for sale
3. Giant sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum) bonsai trees for sale
4. Giant sequoias outside their natural range
5. Help preserve redwoods: Sempervirens Fund

:: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: :: ::

The Sequoia trees are the largest in mass.  Some of them are 3,000 years old.
The cabin we stayed in.
General Grant tree (or was it General Sherman?? Col. Mustard?)
Playing Uno
Jelly Belly Factory tour.
Sleepy girls.
Alcatraz
Alcatraz school.
Nothing better than a soup bread bowl.
Lombard Street.
Enjoying Lombard Street
The VINVAN at the Golden Gate Bridge



Bad Badtz Maru
Gay Pride Bad Badtz

Halloween crafts at the Ramazetti’s.
Making Cookies


I want these guys in a wall in my house.

Joey and Sylvia relieving themselves on Interstate One.

Flashing my gang sign.



Solvang

Buck Rock Fire Lookout

Discover a secret place in between two of the most visited National Parks in California.

In my capacity as Photo Scout, I get to take many detours. Not many are as rewarding as Buck Rock Fire Lookout. Sitting on top of an unbelievably steep granite spire, Buck Rock is as vertiginous as it is beautiful.

Only a very limited number of people will make it to this beautiful place, despite its location in Sequoia National Forest, right between Sequoia and Kings Canyon Parks. With so little traffic and such high scenic value, Buck Rock Lookout was a pure delight to photograph. The hike up the stairs is easy, despite the high altitude of 8500 feet (almost 2600m). The view from the top is magnificent and the friendly fire lookout is always willing to explain the workings of the lookout and point out interesting places to visit. Visit Buck Rock when you are in the area and looking for something special!

The only down side was a number of people in camouflage who apparently take joy in killing innocent animals for pure joy, probably mistaking Buck Rock for a good place to spot bucks. As we found out upon leaving Kings Canyon, the hunting season had just started and an invasion of hunters had just begun. There seems to be something incredibly manly about shooting Bambi from a hidden position in the distance.

How to get there

Buck Rock Roads

Driving north on the Generals Highway between Sequoia National Park and Kings Canyon National Park, take the paved road toward Horse Camp on your right, shortly after the Lodge.

Follow it until you see the Buck Rock dirt road turnoff at GPS location N36 43.013 W118 50.941. Take the dirt road until you reach the parking lot. Then follow the signs to Buck Rock. At the end of your visit, you can either turn back or stay on the dirt road, which will get you to another paved road at GPS location N36 45.071 W118 50.904. Turn left (west) and follow the road until you get back to the Generals Highway at Quail Flat.

Buck Rock Map (click to enlarge)

The unpaved section of the road is sandy and a bit bumpy at times. I have seen people with passenger sedans at the parking lot. If you drive carefully you should be able to make it, but a high clearance vehicle is definitely a plus. You can download the trail log for the entire loop to Buck Rock Fire Lookout.

GPS position

N36 44.235 W118 51.642

How to photograph Buck Rock Fire Lookout

Another Perspective

Buck Rock is visible from certain parts of the dirt road and even from the paved road leading to Quail Flat. Keep your passenger scouting the area or drive slowly and occasionally check around. I took this picture from the paved Quail Flat road with a telephoto lens. I almost missed it if it was not for my attentive partner.

From the lookout parking lot, we spotted the radio facility and headed there first. There is not much to see here except another view of Buck Rock itself. The view of the surrounding mountain ranges is better from the fire lookout.

Once you are at the lookout, take some time to walk around and explore the views in each direction. I shot a couple of photographs with my telephoto lens. Hume Lake in the distance makes a good subject on a clear day and the mountains in the distance will look better in late afternoon with some more clouds to add color and drama.

View from Buck Rock

Buck Rock Ascend

On a clear day, you could take a few wide-angle photographs instead, including the lookout in the foreground. Those give a sense of space and let the viewer participate in the visit to the lookout. Shoot through the windows of the lookout with the landscape reflecting in them to tell a complete story, but make sure to ask the staff, who live here, if they mind. Consider this place the home of the guard who staffs the lookout 5 days in a row until the next person takes over.

Walking up the stairs, I found many excellent compositions including the stairs and the house or just the stairs. One of these is from the bottom of the last flight of stairs. Use the stairs to lead towards the house on top. Crouch down to get a different perspective and to include more of the stairs in the foreground.

Another excellent composition uses the rocks and the stairs to frame the forest and mountains in the background.

Best Time of the Day and Best Season

The lookout is open to the public between 9:30am and 6pm. It is only staffed during the fire season and probably closed from late fall to spring.

Time required

Between 90 minutes to 2 hours is sufficient for the loop from Generals Highway and back including the climb and time for photography.

Equipment

• You will need focal length from wide-angle to telephoto
• Circular Polarizer
• GPS

Fees

Although technically not in a national park, you have to pass through either Kings Canyon from the north or Sequoia from the south. The entrance fee for both parks together is $20. If you plan to see other parks as well, consider buying the park pass for $80 that will get you into all National Parks, National Recreational Areas and National Monuments. They usually accept credit card payment.

Maybe you can argue your way around the entrance fee if you only want to get to Buck Rock, since it is not Park Territory.

Close Locations

• Redwood Mountain Grove
• Kings Canyon Grant Grove
• Kings Canyon Scenic Byway
• Kings Canyon Mist Falls Trail
• Hume Lake
• Sequoia Giant Forest
• Sequoia Lodgepole Area and Tokopah Falls hike
• Sequioa National Park Crystal Cave

Useful Resources

Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park (get latest road information)

Buck Rock Foundation (seems outdated)

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In every place I’ve ever been outside of my country of birth I’ve heard one assertion about Americans espoused with enough frequency that it’s become something of a refrain to my ears.  “Americans,” I have been assured by people in more than half a dozen different countries “like big things.”  It seems that everyone acknowledges this as a universally accepted truth.  People are happy to grant that there are individual exceptions to this trend, but rest comfortably on a confidence that in the minds and eyes of the majority of people from the United States size provides some index of the inherent worth of any given thing.

I don’t think those that think this way are entirely wrong.  In American eyes bigger frequently is better.  The United States is a big place.  It’s not as large as many Americans seem to think it is, but it is a great deal more massive than many Europeans seem to realise.  For example, the straight-line, crow-flying distance from L.A. to New York is just over 2445 miles while that between London and Baghdad is slightly in excess of 2542 miles.  Yes, that latter pair of cities is further apart but only by a margin of around 100 miles.  People expect the UK and Iraqi capitals to be world’s apart socially and culturally as well as geographically.  The same doesn’t hold true for expectations of the two American cities.  They are, after all, in the same country.

Even though I grew up in the States I am struck by how large so many things are when I am there.  Cars are huge,  roads are massive.  Meals and waistlines are expansive.  Everything seems huge and its something people take pride in.  I know from my conversations with other American expatriates that they too notice the sheer size of so many things during their trips back home.  More frequently that I like to think about I also hear my fellow countrymen and women who are in England as tourists or exchange students  asserting what they see as the clear superiority of some American counterpart to an English place or product simply by braying about  its larger size.  My British friends have also teased me about this near worship of bigness by so many Americans.  Why, they want to know, do so many Americans see and assert a large size as a nearly universally praiseworthy trait in its own right?

Why indeed? In my musings on the subject I’ve come up with two factors that I suspect contribute to the equation of largeness with goodness.  The first lies in many parts of the natural landscape of the United States.  Speaking generally the sheer size of the landmass of the country means it contains a huge diversity of landscapes that in and of itself is pretty impressive.  Then there are more specific features.  When I was 13 years old I spent a week at the Grand Canyon.  Never once did my sense of wonder at what I was looking at leave me.  It’s immensity played a key part in my heightened sense of awe and it’s an aspect of the place I’ve never seen captured adequately in a photo or on film apart from an IMAX documentary I once watched.  Even that only captured part of the place’s grandeur through size.

If places like the Grand Canyon or the Sequoia and Redwood trees of the Pacific Coast achieve a majesty, drama and value in part through their size it is easy to see how and why some, perhaps many, European settlers and their descendants extrapolated a more universal relationship between size and value.  I don’t think that’s the whole story though.  Instead, to have any hope of really understanding the enduring American obsession with size we have to consider European ideas and concerns about the continent in the first few centuries after it’s European colonisation and the founding of the United States.

One of the most important lessons my doctoral research into the ideals and ideas that eventually coalesced into what’s now so carelessly referred to as the American Dream taught me was that, in many ways, America was defined in the minds of Europe before the Europeans arrived and after their arrival.  Some of those definitions were hopeful in the extreme and viewed the ‘new’ continent as a kind of new Eden for the regeneration of mankind.  Others were less sanguine.  Anxieties about degenerative and vitality-sapping influences were not uncommon, nor were they quickly silenced.

This was a hot topic of debate and in the late 18th century; it even prompted the Abbe Raynal to organise an essay

The Abbe Raynal

contest seeking answers to the question “Was the discovery of American useful or harmful to mankind?”  I don’t think it’s hard to work out how most American citizens and thinkers would have responded to such a question.  After all, wasn’t the United States founded precisely as a much needed alternative to the corrupt old practices of Europe and as a shining example to the rest of the world?

Whatever the true or complete answers to that last question may be it was the case that during its period as a series of colonies and in the aftermath of its  independence the United States wanted to make a good impression on Europe.  The newly created American citizens were in many cases eager to prove that their country and society was, if not superior, then certainly not inferior to the Old World from which it was born.

The anxiety on the part of the nation and its people to prove their worth took a number of forms examined and commented on by far better writers and thinkers than I.  Some of them still reverberate today.  For example many Americans can be touchy on the subject of what some consider to be the high arts or products of high culture in their home towns, states and nation.  Many of the same Americans, when visiting Europe, cram a huge amount rapacious museum viewing into short spaces of time with the main goal, as far as I can work out, of ticking off the largest number of items from a check-list of great works of art held in European collections.  At some level I suspect that part of the impetus for both these behaviours is a worry over being seen as less cultured, less experienced and less educated than the urbane and beautiful denizens of the Old World.

Immediately after Columbus stumbled into the Americas, continuing through their colonisation and extending beyond the establishment of an independent United States, one of the the most discussed theories about the United States centred on the concept of degeneration.  To make a rather long story short degeneration theory viewed the United States as a malign influence on its human inhabitants as well as its flaura and fauna.  Those who accepted the theory thoughtthat the offspring of European settlers in the New World would be diminished in comparison to their parents and  inferior to their European-born peers.  Not surprisingly the racist assumption of the inferiority of the indigenous peoples of North American was used as proof of the the continent’s degenerative influence.

This is where the whole question of size enters the frame.  European thinkers who accepted the existence of some eroding degenerative power at work in North America confidently asserted that American specimens of humans, plants and animals would in their inferiority to their European counterparts be smaller than those analogues.  As it turned out, however, the portion of the continent that would become the United States was a big place with some big things in it.  In their anxiety to refute conclusively European assertions of superiority finding examples of big things was an easy and attractive way for American thinkers to brush degeneration theory and its assumptions aside.  Even Thomas Jefferson spent some time collecting large specimens of American plants and animals to send to European proponents of degeneration.

What all this amounts to is that, at some level, it was European thinking in the form of degeneration that first suggested to many American minds that big is necessarily better.  Americans were disproving the assumptions and assertions of Old World superiority using some of the terms by which that world defined itself as superior.  In the fear of being seen as a retrograde step in the development of history and society Americans of European descent latched on to the idea of size as a marker of inherent value which could and should be loudly proclaimed and displayed.  This combined with some of the truly stunning and huge natural features of the landscape those same people and their descendants settled to allow the preoccupation with size to take strong root in the collective psyche of the United States.

Yes, many of the people with the United States do have something of an obsession with size for its own sake.  In fact I don’t think any of us who grew up there are entirely immune to it.  That being said, I do think that when Americans praise something for its large size on its own or in comparison to a non-American counterpart they are expressing the seeds of an anxiety sown long ago.  At some level people from the United States don’t cite size because they truly think it demonstrates American superiority.  Instead they do so because they are afraid of being the inferior residents of a degenerative provincial backwater sneered at by some of the people they most wish to impress.

That’s my theory anyway. . .

Dans l’ouest des Etats-Unis, sur le tronçon routier le plus saisissant de la Californie, une nature sauvage et préservée nous donne rendez-vous. Celle-là même qui a su inspirer, quelques années plus tôt, les grands écrivains de la Beat Generation comme Henry Miller et Jack Kerouac. Road-trip dans les pas des Beatniks, précurseurs du mouvement hippie.

SP, Tous droits réservés

Big Sur, jadis baptisé “El Sur Grande” par les premiers colons espagnols, est un bout de côte de 150 km situé entre San Francisco et Los Angeles, le long de la spectaculaire route panoramique fédérale n°1 (Highway One). Un passage obligé pour celui qui longe la côte. Après les villes de Monterey et Carmel, pendant plus de deux heures, la route défile en lacets interminables, longeant une côte très découpée et une falaise qui s’étire en hauteur et descend à pic sur plusieurs dizaines de mètres jusqu’à l’Océan Pacifique. Mieux vaut se cramponner fermement au volan: la route est rude, mais chaque virage est un ravissement. Ici, pas de ville ni même de village. 1500 habitants à peine. Les montagnes Santa Lucia sur la gauche et l’océan omniprésent sur la droite. La beauté toute particulière de Big Sur se contemple exclusivement depuis les aires de stationnement, tellement la route est sinueuse.

D’abord, on écarquille les yeux à Hurricane Point d’où l’on peut admirer le pont de Bixby Creek Bridge, un splendide ouvrage d’art en béton à une seule arche, achevé en 1932. L’une des plus longues structures du genre aux Etats-Unis. Il surplombe un profond canyon au fond duquel le “roi des Beatniks“, Jack Kerouac, écorché vif et en proie à la folie, s’est retiré pour rédiger son Big Sur, au début des années 60.

SP, Tous droits réservés

Passé le phare centenaire de Point Sur, qui s’élève seul face aux éléments, porté par un énorme rocher volcanique, vous pénètrez dans l’Andrew Molera State Park, le plus vaste des parcs d’Etat de la région. Un large sentier, qui traverse les prés fleuris, mène jusqu’à une charmante plage protégée du vent. Le coin est idéal pour surfer! Pour la rando, optez pour le “Headlands Trail”, un sympathique sentier qui mène à la pointe Molera (4.5 km aller/retour). Les fans d’équitation ne seront pas en reste puisque des excursions en forêt ou sur la plage, au coucher du soleil, sont proposées par l’entreprise Molera Horseback Tours.

Criques et collines boisées se succèdent le long de la Route 1. En quittant le parc, direction le sud, vous trouverez une majestueuse forêts de séquoias. Pour faire le plein ou poster quelques cartes postales, arrêtez-vous au hameau de Big Sur – le fameux spot indiqué sur les cartes! La nuitée dans cet éden se déroule dans un chalet en bois aménagé, en plein cœur d’une forêt de séquoias où coule une rivière… À quelques kilomètres, passage obligé par la terrasse du Nepenthe, un café-restaurant prisé des touristes européens qui, malgré la foule de certains jours, reste un endroit plutôt zen. Un verre de blanc à la main, face à l’une des plus belles vue de Big Sur, impossible de ne pas jubiler!

Chronic case of denial

Pentagon used psyops on US public from Raw Story

Musicians demand info on their music used for torture

AT&T staff told to complain about net neutrality to FCC

Oops: Sequoia reveals e-voting code from Tech Dirt

Rep. Polis narrowly avoids net neutrality disaster

Broadband stimulus has failed to date from App Rising

Rachel Maddow challenges Liz Cheney: be on my show

New public media models examined from Media Shift

Infinite Dial calls Absolute Radio UK ‘most innovative in the world’

First public white spaces broadband network trial launch in Virginia: 1 2

FBI can continue to gag recipient of National Security Letter

Propaganda now on sale at AT&T store from Public Knowledge

AT&T boss asks employees to fake it from Save the Internet

Over 200,000 calls to Congress in favor of health reform in 1 day

Google partners with iLike and Lala for new music service

Pentagon instructs officials to cancel nonexistent ACORN contracts

Adam Carolla podcast credited for new radio content trend

Denver Westword hiring marijuana critic is national news!

Medical marijuana applicants in Colorado increasing

Hemp: Legalize it and I will industrialize it from Huff Po

So why do we entrust it to companies that try to prevent scrutiny of their work? Ars Technica has a disturbing report on the code used by one company peddling computerized voting systems, Sequoia:

The Election Defense Alliance (EDA), an election integrity watchdog group, has launched a public review of the accidentally leaked source code that powers Sequoia electronic voting machines. Though still in its initial stages, the review has already uncovered evidence indicating that the voting machines are programmed in a manner that falls afoul of rules and guidelines established by the Federal Election Commission.

Sequoia generally goes to great lengths to block independent review of its technology. For example, the company used legal threats last year in an effort to prevent New Jersey election officials from conducting a machine audit. The source disclosure that has enabled the EDA to conduct its review was entirely accidental. The program code was exacted from an MS-SQL database that was provided to the EDA by the election officials of Riverside County, California in response to a public records request. Sequoia insisted on redacting the database before allowing the data to be reviewed, but they botched the redaction job.

They couldn’t even get the redaction job right, how am I supposed to believe that they’re counting votes right?

This is the public’s most sacred business — what University of Notre Dame president Theodore Hesburgh called a “civic sacrament.” It has to be reviewable by the public.

(der beitrag ist auch auf papierwahl.at zu lesen)

Das Projekt studysequoia, hinter dem die Election Defense Alliance steckt, hat jetzt erstmals Sequoias (proprietären) Sourcecode im Internet zugänglich gemacht. Der Code wurde dabei auf völlig legalem Weg beschafft.
Wie es dazu kam, wird auf der Seite erklärt:

The Election Defense Alliance filed a public records request under California law for a copy of the final election databases from recent elections in Riverside County California. Riverside coughed them up, after sending them first to Sequoia for “redaction of trade secrets” and forcing EDA to pay a substantial amount for this “service.”

As near as we can tell, instead of stripping out proprietary stuff of any sort, Sequoia simply committed vandalism [*]: they stripped the Microsoft SQL header data off the top, expecting that this would ruin access to the data under any possible database utility and making the contents unreadable.

While they succeeded in ruining the files as data, they didn’t realize what a Linux user could do with the “strings” command: strip out unreadable characters and leave everything left as readable plain text. This in turn revealed thousands of lines of Microsoft SQL code that appear to control the logical flow of the election.

[*] Auf der Seite wird derzeit nicht mehr von vandalism, sondern von “failed redaction” gesprochen.

Die 3 Hauptziele des Projekts lauten jetzt folgendermaßen:
Determine the security risks associated with editing this code in the field.
Determine what this code does, and if it does so honestly, effectively or in a legal fashion.
Determine if this code even legally exists or meets the legal definitions for a “voting system” at all under federal or state published guidelines.

Downloadmöglichkeiten gibt es hier.
Das 153MB große komplette Paket steht als sequoiacompletefile.zip und sequoiacompletefile.zip.torrent bereit.

[via The Brad Blog]

Das Projekt studysequoia, hinter dem die Election Defense Alliance steckt, hat jetzt erstmals Sequoias (proprietären) Sourcecode im Internet zugänglich gemacht. Der Code wurde dabei auf völlig legalem Weg beschafft.
Wie es dazu kam, wird auf der Seite erklärt:

The Election Defense Alliance filed a public records request under California law for a copy of the final election databases from recent elections in Riverside County California. Riverside coughed them up, after sending them first to Sequoia for “redaction of trade secrets” and forcing EDA to pay a substantial amount for this “service.”

As near as we can tell, instead of stripping out proprietary stuff of any sort, Sequoia simply committed vandalism [*]: they stripped the Microsoft SQL header data off the top, expecting that this would ruin access to the data under any possible database utility and making the contents unreadable.

While they succeeded in ruining the files as data, they didn’t realize what a Linux user could do with the “strings” command: strip out unreadable characters and leave everything left as readable plain text. This in turn revealed thousands of lines of Microsoft SQL code that appear to control the logical flow of the election.

[*] Auf der Seite wird derzeit nicht mehr von vandalism, sondern von “failed redaction” gesprochen.

Die 3 Hauptziele des Projekts lauten jetzt folgendermaßen:
Determine the security risks associated with editing this code in the field.
Determine what this code does, and if it does so honestly, effectively or in a legal fashion.
Determine if this code even legally exists or meets the legal definitions for a “voting system” at all under federal or state published guidelines.

Downloadmöglichkeiten gibt es hier.
Das 153MB große komplette Paket steht als sequoiacompletefile.zip und sequoiacompletefile.zip.torrent bereit.

[via The Brad Blog]

Sequoias of North Grove Loop with Hiker

Kings Canyon lures visitors with the largest living beings on the planet in pristine wilderness. Many trails in the park are mostly empty, despite the crowds rushing through Kings Canyon every day. Most tourists simply do not plan enough time to see the vast Sequoia and Kings Canyon Double Park, hurrying from sight to sight as the park map tells them. Fortunately, some of the best sights are not marked, leaving them empty and ready for your exploration.

One of these nearly empty places, North Grove Loop, hides next to the most-visited place in the park, General Grant Grove. No obvious signs lead here and most people are too busy following the map to pay attention. Kings Canyon is ready to reveal its secrets to you if you are willing to invest some time.

How to get there

Road Map

Conveniently located near Highway 180, Grant Grove is a primary destination for visitors to Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Parks. Enter the park from Highway 180, turn left at the intersection and follow the signs to Kings Canyon. The turnoff to General Grant Grove, on the left, is about 1.7 miles after the intersection, shortly after the Grant Grove Visitor Center.

Grant Grove Topo Map (click to enlarge)

Access the North Grove Loop trail from the General Grant Grove parking lot. Drive to the second parking lot a little further downhill, passed the bus parking. The trail starts at the bottom end.

The road to Panoramic Point starts across the main street (Highway 180 Kings Canyon Scenic Byway). Near the lodge, the road leads straight through a gate. The countless roads here can be a bit confusing. Don’t let the gate distract you.

GPS position

N36 44.661 W118 57.880

How to photograph Kings Canyon Grant Grove

General Grant Tree

The well-maintained walk around General Grant Grove is one of the most popular in the entire park. It is short, easily accessible and promises views of some famous trees. Crowds usually fill the short loop. The main attraction of the loop is obviously General Grant tree (vertical image), the best-known giant sequoia and the third largest tree by volume in the world. It is hard to comprehend the size of this giant, since the tree is fenced off and no smaller trees grow nearby. The trail leads past several other giants, like Oregon Tree, California Tree, or the fallen Vermont Log.

Vermont Log is a giant fallen Sequoia tree that is hollow inside. You can walk through the tree, and get a feeling for the immense size of these giants. Photography inside the large tree is difficult due to the large dynamic range. I metered off the outside foliage, used manual exposure, and lit up the inside of the tree with my little pop-out flash. I also told Dani to pose for me again, to give a better sense of scale for the tree. Normally the fence would be sufficient, but I like the human element of my lovely model in my compositions.

Vermont Log tunnel tree

Surprisingly the North Grove Loop that starts from the same parking lot is nearly empty. We didn’t meet a soul on the 1.9 mile hike. The trees are just as wonderful, as the picture at the start of this article proofs. Dani was kind enough to stand between the trees, demonstrating their size. The trees you can find along the loop are not fenced in. You can send your model close or get close yourself and photograph up for a unique perspective. The tranquil hike calms you down after facing the crowds at General Grant Loop.

Hume Lake from Panoramic Point

Drive across Highway 180 from Grant Grove to get to Panoramic Point, which offers the best views of Kings Canyon, Hume Lake and the distant peaks of the Sierra Nevada mountain range. From Panoramic Point, you can hike the Park Ridge Trail, eventually leading to a fire lookout with gorgeous views. Although tempting, I recommend visiting the Buck Rock Lookout instead, which offers even better views and which is more photogenic in itself.

Include some of the foreground shrubs in your photographs from Panorama Point to give the viewers a sense of the vast distances of this wilderness. Frame the picture as low as possible if the sky lacks clouds as it did during our visit.

Best Time of the Day and Best Season

You can explore Grant Grove whenever the park roads are open. The hikes through the forest are best during the day, as it gets dark quickly underneath the forest canopy. Panoramic Point is best in the morning or for sunset if clouds are present.

Time required

North Loop Trail: 1 hour

General Grant Loop: 30 minutes

Panoramic Point: 30 minutes

Park Ridge Trail: 2-3 hours

Equipment

• Tripod
• Wide-angle lens or fisheye lens
• Medium Zoom
• CP Filter
• Split ND Filter for sunsets (dark canyon, bright sky)

Fees

The entrance fee to Kings Canyon National Park is $20, which also includes Sequoia National Park. It is valid for 7 days. The Interagency Park pass will get you in, too.

Close Locations

• Buck Rock Fire Lookout
• Redwood Mountain Grove
• Kings Canyon Scenic Byway
• Kings Canyon Mist Falls Trail
• Hume Lake
• Sequoia Giant Forest
• Sequoia Lodgepole Area and Tokopah Falls hike
• Sequioa National Park Crystal Cave

Useful Resources

Kings Canyon National Park Page

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bon, tout comme avoir un jour un prince charmant, j’ai abandonné l’idée d’avoir ce sac-là (troooooo cher :s ) :

Par contre, heureusement pour nous, plein d’autres marques en font des trop chouettes et + accessibles. J’ai craqué pour le cube de Paquetage, en orange vermillon :

mais rassurez-vous, il existe aussi en gris souris ou en noir :p

Évidemment, je reste fidèle à Séquoïa, qui en fait un très joli aussi en orange, forme besace :

pas encore trop cher (77 euros) par rapport au Sequoïa Inside (trooooo boooo)  :

ou à la pochette violette :

ou encore celui-ci, moins cher et violet :p

ou encore au porte-feuilles alu

Bon, dans la catégorie + sage en prix et – exubérant mais quand même coloré, il y a le Pierre Balmain tout bleu (que j’ai trouvé sur cdiscount 45 euros !!!) :

sinon si vous souhaitez des sacs à main un peu plus originaux, de petits créateurs, cliquez maintenant sur www.sac-et-cabas.com, où vous trouverez également tout ce qui tourne autour des sacs, et pour y trouver/découvrir, entre autres :

- Julie Meuriss :

- les Cakes de Bertrand :

]]> http://creativegrowthoakland.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/eco-art-robots/ Thu, 15 Oct 2009 19:15:30 +0000 chiafrica http://creativegrowthoakland.wordpress.com/2009/10/15/eco-art-robots/

Our class is starting a new project: Robots. We’re using junk (stuff we’d normally throw away or recycle) and making new robots out of them. We’re using glue guns, junk parts, and a lot of creative energy. Check out our progress!  This is a picture of one of last year’s projects.  I’ll update with more info as we go along.  In the mean time, check out some of our work from last year.

Biggest and tallest
Our planet’s oldest trees live
In Sequoia Park

If your interest peaks when discovering things over a hundred years old…that are still growing…still impressive…still GREEN…then check out these three heritage trees on your travels in southern Oregon. These beauties have been creating oxygen and benefiting our planet for over 100 years…two of them for nearly 150 years!!!

The Lonesome Hickory – Mary Louise Black planted this Shagbark Hickory tree in 1866 from nuts she carried from Missouri along the Oregon trail. This is the only Shagbark Hickory in the area. 131 years old. 18 feet high. Located in Eagle Point, Oregon. Latitude: 42.585977 Longitude: -122.81687

Hanley Farms Willow – Martha Hanley planted this Weeping Willow to commemorate this birth of her son. This willow was delivered from a Willamette Valley nursery (on horseback) in a potato to keep the shoot from drying out! 148 years old. 30 feet high. Located in Jacksonville, Oregon.
Latitude: 42.335521 Longitude: -122.933139

Britt Sequoia – The famous Peter Britt, who is best known as the namesake of Jacksonville’s modern-day Britt Musical Festival, planted this giant tree in the spring of 1862 on the day of his son’s birth. The tree is now 135 years old and stands 205 feet high. Located in Jacksonville, Oregon. Latitude: 42.314703 Longitude: -122.971274

To discover more cool southern Oregon heritage trees, go to the new Oregon Heritage Map.

I have done two previous posts about Bodnant garden this year, in spring and summer. This post is mainly about the autumn colours so the pictures will do most of the talking.

There are still some colourful borders and some of the roses are still in bloom, but although today was a bright autumn day we’d had torrential rain (almost 2 inches) yesterday and the flowers had taken a battering.

An autumn border, 7 October 2009

Autumn roses, 7 October 2009

There is still a lot of greenery, but this serves to show up the beautiful yellows, oranges and reds.

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Autumn leaves, 7 October 2009

Autumn leaves and berries, 7 October 2009

Berries (Cornus kousa), 7 October2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Autumn colours around the lily pond, 7 October 2009

Autumn around the lily pond, 7 October 2009

Autumn sun glinting through an old Cedar, 7 October 2009

There are still a few water lilies, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

What are these strange things? 7 October 2009

Splashes of autumn colour, 7 October 2009

A splash of autumn colour, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

Autumn leaves, 7 October 2009

Shades of autumn, 7 October 2009

To round off this colourful walk around Bodnant garden here are some photos of the wonderful Sequoiadendron giganteun. These great trees are in the Dell and have grown to over 145 feet high.

A Sequoiandrendron giganteun, 7 October 2009

Sequoiadendron giganteun over 146 feet high. 7 October 2009

Bodnant garden is a wonderful place to visit at any time of the year, constantly changing but always a great day out.

More details about Bodnant garden can be found here: http://www.bodnantgarden.co.uk/

At Mutopo, many of the organizations we work with are early stage. They raise money to bring new things to market. So they need ways to reduce the chance of a launch #fail. And they need to reduce the cost of launch, since burning through their hard won cash will also lead to #fail.

But why:

1. do so many products fail when they launch?
2. does it still cost so much to launch a new product?

The social web seems to be offering some hope on 2, potentially joining search marketing in a formidably efficient pairing. However, perhaps the products can help too, by speaking for themselves?

Baking Products With Lower Failure Rates & Lower Launch Costs

Yep, turns out products are social, too.  In their new book, Baked In, John Winsor and Alex Bogusky share their thinking and recipes on how to build communication into products, so they can help get themselves to market.

One of the reasons we were excited about this book – we’d heard the idea before, from another very smart person.  Roelof Botha at Sequoia Capital, used the same words to describe what he helped to do with Paypal and Youtube – they “baked in” the marketing. They found ways to have people help them spread the products via email, ebay and social networks.

What do Sequoia and CP&B folks have in common? They really, really know how to get new products to market. So among other things, they have found ways to reduce the launch costs and reduce the risks of failure. So we’re listening and watching and with Baked In’s encouragement, stealing with our eyes and ears, where we can.

We like much of what they do and say, but we are interested in particular idea that is common to both of their strategies – the role of co-creators.  I dont know if the Baked In page 39 diagram hack (featured above ) is better, but I’d like to suggest it for a future Baked In version because I think this is what they mean. And the Baked In folks are making it as easy as possible to make these kinds of suggests on their Wiki Blog thingy (that may be how you found this post).

Why are the co-creators so important? Well they can do so much to help. Early on in the product development process, they can give critical feedback and ideas to help make products that they are more likely to use – i.e. products less likely to #fail. They can help teams prioritize by elevating the importance of issues they may have downplayed. They can give feedback on prototypes.

In the chart below, the bottom line, shows a traditional process. People are invited in selectively for research and then perhaps a soft launch. But in social product development, prospective customers are invited into more aspects of the development. They get to see more and influence more. And ultimately they help reduce the risk of failure at launch.

But they help with something else, too.  Not only do people co-create, they c0-own.  This may be best described by the ikea effect – the idea that people are willing to pay more for things they have had a hand in creating. i.e. they feel ownership. And this seems to mean they are more likely to help get the word out and buy. So they can also help reduce launch costs (economic costs, anyway).

So we really believe the co-creators are the key to reducing the chances of product #fail.

But how?

Learning by doing

At Mutopo we realized the best way to understand baking in and social product development, was to try it. We cant share some of our client projects yet, but we can talk about some of our own:

betacup - We’re all working on betacup to create a more sustainable coffee drinking experience
window boxen – Marcel is working with the Quirky community to get his Window Boxen window farming (initial concept rendering shown  above) ideas to market.
skin colaboratorie – Andrea is doing the Skin Colaboratorie to create new skincare productsto target specific ailments

Just like my experience with the Jovoto community, even at the concept stages, the feedback can be enormously valuable in shaping the product (unfortunately I didnt have the skill to do more with my Jovoto submission).

We’ll let you know, as we learn more. In the meanwhile, we’d love to know what you think so drop us a line or find me @shaunabe.

Pubblicate sul National Geographic le foto di uno degli alberi più alti al mondo e il risultato di un’esplorazione di un anno nelle foreste californiane di sequoia

Le foreste californiane di “redwood” – così gli americani chiamano la Sequoia sempervirens – custodiscono i veri giganti del regno vegetale. Si tratta in certi casi di piante che raggiungono la veneranda età di 2000 anni e l’altezza di 90 metri. Superfluo dire che lo sfruttamento intensivo  per la produzione di legno e i cambiamenti climatici hanno messo queste antichissime foreste in grave pericolo. Questo mese il National Geographic ha deciso di dare ampio spazio ai giganti verdi pubblicando l’immagine di uno dei più alti alberi mai fotografati (e la cui chioma è stata mappata con più accuratezza) e il risultato di un anno di esplorazione delle foreste californiane.

Mike Nichols è l’autore della fotografia (la trovate qui in versione completa) di un albero di più di 1500 anni alto circa 91 metri. La foto ha richiesto un anno di lavoro ed è il risultato di una composizione di 83 immagini. Nichols ha si è avvalso dell’apporto di tre macchine fotografiche, un team di scienziati, un dispositivo dolly robotico, un giroscopio e tanta pazienza. Oltre a Nichols, National Geographic, con la collaborazione della Wildlife Conservation Society e la Save the Redwoods League, ha incaricato Mike Fay, ecologo statunitense noto per la sua traversata dell’Africa a piedi a scopo naturalistico, di esplorare da sud a nord per circa 3.200 chilometri il tratto di costa californiana e dell’Oregon occupata dalle foreste di sequoia – da Big Sur al fiume Chetco. Il viaggio, in cui Fay era accompagnato da Lyndsey Holm, ha richiesto un anno consecutivo di cammino e il risultato è disponibile in questo sito.

Le sequoie sono state pesantemente protette nelle ultime decadi e il numero di esemplari sta lentamente crescendo. Il lavoro di mappatura di Fay e di altri naturalisti è uno degli strumenti fondamentali per la protezione di queste piante millenarie.