Tag Archives: river

Postcards: The Sundial Bridge

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My 2017/18 snowbirding vacation is officially over. Last week, Penny and hopped on a commercial flight home, took care of a bunch of chores my housesitter couldn’t do, and enjoyed the little of home luxuries like full-time electricity, a spacious shower, and a dishwasher. On Thursday morning, we climbed into my helicopter and made the first two of three legs of my annual migration to the Sacramento area for a frost control contract. The destination was Redding, CA, where the helicopter was stripped down for its annual inspection by the folks at Air Shasta.

While the helicopter was getting work done, I did some exploring. Friday found us at Turtle Bay, which is a park along the Sacramento River. There’s a kids museum there and access to miles of riverfront bike and walking trails. And the Sundial Bridge.

The Sundial Bridge is a neat little single-tower pedestrian suspension bridge over the Sacramento River. Cables from the tower, which looks like the vertical part of a sundial, collect to the bridge’s deck. It has translucent glass panels in the floor that offer a somewhat ghostly view to the river below; this walkway is set aglow at night by lighting under the bridge.

Sundial Bridge over the Sacramento River in Redding, CA.

The tower at the Sundial Bridge.

Deck of the Sundial Bridge.

Sundial Bridge deck at night.

Although I didn’t think it was a real sundial, this Wikipedia entry has informed me that it actually is; the Tower is oriented due north and there are places to read the time on the north side.

Penny and I spent about 2 hours in the area, walking on the trails and stopping for something to drink at the museum store there. The place was hopping, with plenty of pedestrians, bikers, and dog walkers. Later, when I realized we’d need a second night stay in the area, I checked into the Sheraton hotel there for a little hotel luxury; that’s when I was able to get the nighttime shot.

Snowbirding 2018 Postcards: Fireside at Camp

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Out in the desert, when the sun goes down, it’s like Mother Nature turned the heat off. It might have been in the 70s all day, but the temperature takes a plunge after sunset and a campfire is pretty much required if you want to hang out outdoors.

We spent about an hour gathering wood on Wednesday morning — mostly mesquite and salt cedar — and added that to the six aspen (or birch?) logs I’d brought south with me from a camp in Idaho back in October. While we were out boating in the afternoon, a friend stopped by looking for us. When he saw the large pieces of wood we’d gathered, he kindly used his chainsaw to cut them into manageable pieces. (Reminds me of a fairy tale where people put their damaged shoes out on the doorstep at night and elves repaired them. This elf’s name is Steve.)

As usual, my friend Janet got the fire going before it was dark and we sat around it to chat, eat dinner, and then chat some more.

It night was a great night for star gazing, too. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the area is very dark. With a meteor shower on the calendar, I took out my Nikon and set it up for night photography. We had a clear view of the horizon to the east and watched Orion rise. The meteors came soon afterward, averaging about one per minute as NASA had forecasted.

I tried (and failed) to get a photo of one, but I did make this photo of our campsite in the firelight, with Janet sitting by the fire. A car happened to drive by during the 30-second exposure, illuminating assorted bits and pieces of the scene. I have a darker shot, too, but I like this one better.

Fireside camp

Snowbirding 2018 Postcards: Backwaters Campsite

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I was a little disappointed that there was someone already occupying the campsite I wanted when I arrived at the Colorado River on Monday. Although the area was big enough for at least six campers, I didn’t like the look of the man, his female companion, or their junky pull trailer and truck. They looked like the typical loud, generator-dependent low-lives that are relatively common anywhere there’s free camping. One way to tell? They’d parked their trailer and set up chairs facing the open gravel camping area instead of the bucolic waterway only 30 feet in the opposite direction. Seriously?

After disconnecting my boat and leaving it parked there with the trailer locked — after all, that’s where the boat ramp was — I pulled into another spot I’d stayed in the past which was about a mile back up the road on the same backwater channel. It was a much smaller spot and a bit close to the road, but had better access to the water and better fishing.

The next day, after off-loading T2 (short for Turtleback 2, my second truck camper), and helping my friend Janet settle in with Short-Short (her very small pull trailer), we went back to launch my boat. Janet drove the truck back while I motored the boat to our site and parked it along the sandy bank. We then finished setting up our joint camp.

Here’s a drone photo of our camp shot this morning. The waterway on the left is the backwater channel; about a mile straight ahead is a narrow inlet that connects it to the Colorado River, which you can see on the right.

Drone photo of our campsite

It’s crazy quiet here, day and night, with the occasional disturbance of a vehicle driving by during the day. A good place to camp out and get some writing done.