Cali Finale (27-29Nov2019)

The last few days on our California vacation was beautiful but bad for birds due to bad weather.  We did a ton of exploring and hiking but I came away with only a few shots.  We started our day on the 27th looking for some birds in the hills east of Pasadena but rain forced us to flee and in fact many of the canyons were closed due to landslide risk.  So we headed out of LA on the highway east over the San Gabriel Mountains and into Joshua Tree NP where the weather was threatening but not precipitating.  In fact the sun came out a few times.



Joshua Tree



A rainbow implying that Joshua Trees are as good as a pot of gold.

The next 3 days I spent tons of time trying to find Pinyon Jays and dipping hard.  The Black Rock Campground was supposed to be one of the better places in the park to find them so that is where we hiked.

White-crowned Sparrow

Gambel's Quail

Loggerhead Shrike

Gambel's

Cactus Wren

California Thrasher

Cool skull-like rock formations.

We visited a true desert oasis at the Coachella Valley Preserve and I dipped once more on my nemesis the Long-eared Owl.

Gambel's Quail

Phainopepla

Cooper's Hawk

We also visited the Big Morongo Preserve just north of Palm Springs.  Very nice spot but again weather was a factor with strong winds.

WC Sparrow

California Towhee

Our last day was spent hiking again but this time in snow.  The Black Rock Campground was covered in a couple inches of white stuff.

California Scrub-Jay

We had a red-eye out of LAX so we hightailed it back over the mountains expecting traffic but made it with time to spare so we went to Ballona Creek to watch the sunset and I bagged a couple more bird pics.



California Gull

Surf Scoter

I love Cali and can't wait to go back.  So much good food, great birds, hiking, surfing, the list goes on.