Big Bear: Beautiful Along The Arctic Circle
You’d think that a place called “The Arctic Circle” would be austere and foreboding. Not so along the drive called “The Arctic Circle” near Big Bear where black oak speckle the forest with bright splotches of orange.
Seen in San Bernardino Mountains color correspondent Alena Nicholas’ photograph, Big Bear Lake peeks between the layered, sensuous curves of the San Bernardino Mountains, its blue waters beckoning travelers to the pleasures beyond.
This week’s storm shook about a third of the leaves remaining on black oaks at Big Bear Lake and clinging to the ridges, though those nestled in the canyons seen from The Arctic Circle are still dressed in fall finery. With sunny to partly cloudy days predicted, the fall color should hang for a while, though it will drizzle away, slowly but surely.
Nevertheless, with skis and snowboards now cutting groomed corduroy on the slopes of Bear Mountain and Snow Summit, what titian tones remain in the forest, is almost a distraction to why motorists are now traveling The Arctic Circle to Big Bear. And, with fall color ebbing in the mountains, we’ve assigned Alena to search the southland for where else it might be found.
Peak (75-100%) GO NOW! – The Arctic Circle and Big Bear Lake.
Berkeley: Where Bears Meet Beauty
Berkeley is perhaps California’s most misrepresented city.
It’s more than the Cal Bears and the great university for which they play.
It’s more than the student demonstrations for which the university became famous.
And it’s more than the “People’s Republic of Berkeley,” the oft-said slight to the liberal city and how it is managed.
Berkeley is a wonderful place to visit:
- for its beautiful residences, many of which are handsome examples of California Craftsman architecture;
- for its many fascinating shops, which often feature quality handcrafts and fine arts; and
- for its wealth of great restaurants, including Chez Panisse where kitchen artist Alice Waters conceived farm to fork cooking.
Though, it is in Berkeley’s gardens where bears meet beauty.
One of the state’s loveliest gardens is the UC Botanical Garden at Berkeley.
Though it will be closed on Thanksgiving Day, a truly “Berkeley” way to experience Black Friday, would be to protest the day’s in-your-face consumerism and make it an Orange Friday at the Botanical Garden.
Sandy Steinman, editor of Natural History Wanderings and a longtime friend and gifted observer of all things natural, sent these images taken in the Asian Section of the garden, showing it at peak.
The layered colors of crimson and gold are impressive, though it was the royal purple American beautyberry, genus callicarpa, that made us stop to look it up.
Clearly, we’re bearish on Berkeley’s beauty.
Peak (75-100%) GO NOW! – UC Botanical Garden at Berkeley
Saratoga Sugars Up
Three weeks ago, Silicon Valley color spotter Anson Davalos sent images of downtown Saratoga as it developed color.
This week it was at peak sugar with bright yellow ginkgo biloba, fluorescent red and orange Chinese pistache, ruby and gold hawthorne and maroon flowering pears heavy with leaves.
No doubt, today’s rain and wind sprinkled Saratoga streets with leafy confetti, as it did across Northern California.
Still, a lot of the color will likely remain through the coming weekend. If you’re heading to the South Bay at Thanksgiving, best bets include: Saratoga, Los Gatos, Pine St. San Jose, Campbell and Los Altos.
Peak (75-100%) GO NOW! – Saratoga
Going To Town in Los Angeles
Los Angeles color spotter “LA Leaf Peeper” (actual name withheld to prevent paparazzi from hounding this celebrity), reports that fall color is now “going to town” throughout the City of Angels.
LA Leaf Peeper has been the first anywhere in California to report fall color for the past two years and though this LA “star’s” reports are few, they include insights to the status of fall color in tinseltown.
We’re sure Extra, Inside Edition, the National Enquirer or TMZ will want to know that turned leaves are still hanging from the early-showing liquidambar that LA Leaf Peeper alerted us to in August. Though now, all LA’s deciduous trees are lit up brighter than the red carpet at the Dolby Theater on Oscar night.
Peak (75-100%) GO NOW! – Los Angeles
Orange Friday at Lake Gregory
Ansel Adams got so many great photographs of Yosemite, not just because he was a great artist, but because he lived there.
Color spotter Alena Nicholas has shared many beautiful images of Lake Gregory this autumn, because she lives there.
Nicholas writes,”They say home is where the heart is, and after this weekend, I thought to share, once more, the beauty of my little “home” lake. It may not be Yosemite, the Eastern Sierras, or Northern California, but Lake Gregory always puts its best foot forward and shares whatever beauty it has to the very end!”
That’s certainly true of what Alena showed us of Lake Gregory, this autumn. The sunsets there and from the nearby Rim of the World have been beautiful.
In the collection of photographs submitted by Alena, today, we see another aspect of fall in the San Bernardino Mountains… a forest full of deeply orange black oak at peak. Along shore, hints of yellow brighten the scene.
Alena traveled to Big Bear today where she likely saw scenes like this black oak, shot by Nancy Barron Booher and posted on our Facebook page.
With more snow predicted to arrive in the San Bernardinos on Wednesday and Thursday, Alena’s trip could be her last fall color outing this autumn.
Let’s hope this won’t be a Black Friday, but will still be orange.
Peak (75-100%) GO NOW! – Lake Gregory, Rim of the World and the San Bernardino Mountains
LA County Arboretum Nears Peak
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve mislabeled or just didn’t know what kind of tree appears in one of the photos posted on this site.
That’s why I enjoy visiting arboretums. At arboretums, trees are well-marked. The ones in nature don’t have a plaque at the base of their trunks with their common and latin names engraved on it. At an arboretum, they do.
I own several plant identification books, but visiting an arboretum shows me what the tree will really look like when it’s fully grown. “So, that’s what it means to be 70′ tall,” I’ve muttered to myself while looking at a tree I’d mistakenly thought would be right for my yard.
For anyone who loves trees, their great size, the beauty of their heavy, twisted branches, or how mature trees attract us to them, visiting an arboretum is endlessly fascinating.
This week is the week to visit California’s arboretums. Their associated botanic gardens are mostly dormant, but the arboretums are full of color.
Frank McDonough reports the Los Angeles County Arboretum & Botanic Garden in Arcadia is nearing peak and should be prime for the next two weeks.
Seen among his photographs are delicately stemmed crepe myrtle, a variety of colorful trees taken from Myberg Falls toward the San Gabriel Mountains, birch draping a garden path, a California fan palm beside full peak ash, and Chinese tallow (also known as the Florida aspen).
California has nearly 20 arboretums, in nearly every corner of the state. All are beautiful places to find solace and to learn more about the native and exotic trees growing throughout our state. CLICK HERE for a list of them.
Near Peak (50-75%) GO NOW! – Los Angeles County Arboretum & Botanic Garden
Napa Valley: Perfectly Paired for Thanksgiving Day
The Napa Valley is perfectly paired to provide beautiful fall color through Thanksgiving Day (conditions permitting). And, where do fall color photographers head on the weekend before Thanksgiving, when Tioga Pass is closed (and even if it weren’t, the color was gone from the Eastern Sierra weeks ago)? They head to wine country.
Darrell Sano did just that and sends back this collection of beautiful photographs taken this morning of the Napa Valley at peak. He got up early to catch the morning light warming the vines as balloons floated across the valley in the crisp and still November air. Then, he followed the color, finding brilliant yellows and reds in the vineyards.
Color spotter Santha Kumar V A was similarly satisfied after visiting Oakville, yesterday. He writes that it is “bursting golden.’ Santha tasted the golden color of a boulevard of ginkgo biloba trees beside rows of peaking yellow vines, in an image he calls, “Two Sides.”
During this season, indeed the Napa Valley has two sides: its full fall color and its full-flavored wines.
Color spotters Susan Taylor and Jas E Miner also found wine country to their taste, capturing vines and boulevards full of peak color in Napa and Sonoma counties.
All this makes wine country a best bet for fall color getaways over the Thanksgiving Day weekend.
Peak (75-100%) GO NOW! – Napa Valley
Postcard: Peak, Peak, Peak, Peak, Peak
With with the possible exceptions of The Deserts and Santa Catalina Island, it is now peaking at all California elevations below 2,000′.
Apple Hill in the Sierra foothills of El Dorado County are canopied with color, as spotters Vera Haranto Fuad and Sarah Showalter found when they visited this past week.
Historic photos taken by Linnea Wahamaki and Susan Taylor (posted to our Facebook site) show the beauty seen this month in Nevada City in the Gold Country and at McArthur-Burney Falls State Park in the Shasta Cascade.
Seen from 800′ in the Sierra foothills at El Dorado Hills, the Sacramento Valley is covered with broad spotches of red, orange and yellow fall color, like a Persian carpet that’s been cast across the valley floor.
Sarah Showalter’s photo of a red oak ablaze in Citrus Heights is typical of the color to be seen lined along boulevards in Folsom, Fair Oaks, Carmichael and Sacramento.
Today, Bonnie Nordby strolled through a magical forest of crimson, yellow, orange and golden Japanese maple at the Ironstone Vineyards in Murphys, and sent us this snap.
From the Santa Clara Valley (Silicon), Jennifer “JMel” Mellone contributed photos taken in Campbell
Wherever you go, California’s many urban forests are on fire. Color spotter Kathy Jonokuchi sent snaps of garden color in Agoura and Nancy Wright of Murietta send added some of Pepper trees in Murietta (both in Southern California), where exotic trees will continue to provide fall color (weather permitting) through the Thanksgiving Day weekend.
However, from Plumas County, color spotter Jeff Luke Titcomb is almost longing in expressing that the fall color there has descended to the river bottoms. His brooding image of smoke rising through a forest of pine and black oak whose last remaining leaves cling weakly to spindly branches, is a nostalgic reminder that 2015’s autumn show has only days remaining.
Fall Color for the Holidays
Folks heading home for the holidays should see lots of fall color in yards and urban forests, as this sampling taken by color spotters across California attests.
Jim Adams went out this week to capture glorious golden ginkgos and colossal claret-colored liquidambar along the boulevards of Sacramento’s Southside Park. Our state’s capital is a sight to behold in autumn when towering London Plane, Elm, Sycamore and trees of every imaginable variety, planted decades ago to shade the city from scorching summer heat, turn red-hot as Thanksgiving Day approaches.
In the Santa Clara Valley (AKA Silicon), Anson Davalos found Los Gatos streets arched with rufous arbors.
And, near Riverside, Nancy Wright drove through Murietta to find heavenly bamboo and liquidambar brightening the southland.
What makes California fall color so different from other areas on the continent is that our Mediterranean climate allows many varieties of exotic deciduous trees to flourish. That doesn’t happen elsewhere in North America. And, that means we get a flush of brilliant color in our gardens, arboretums and urban forests that is incomparable.
Peak (75-100%) GO NOW! – California’s Urban Forests
Sunsets, Another of Nature’s Fall Colors
Why do autumn sunsets seem more spectacular than at other times of year?
The Weather Channel reports that, because of its shorter wavelength, blue light is scattered easiest by nitrogen and oxygen air molecules, whereas “longer wavelengths — reds and oranges – are not scattered as much by air molecules.”
During sunrise and sunset, sunlight must pass through more of the atmosphere before we see it, TWC writes, “so it comes into contact with even more molecules in the air.” And, “As days grow shorter, the skies at sunset glow with the most spectacular hues, blooming with pinks, reds and oranges.”
Autumn weather patterns also bring drier, cleaner air from the north, allowing more colors of the spectrum to “make it through to our eyes without getting scattered by particles in the air, producing brilliant sunsets and sunrises that can look red, orange, yellow or even pink.”
Tonight, San Bernardino Mountains color spotter Alena Nicholas found the autumn sky lit with these colors as high clouds reflected nature’s fall colors.