Photos

Bixby Bridge is, for me, the end of Big Sur (or the start, if driving south from Monterey/Carmel). I had another picture looking down on the bridge from one of those little notches seen in other photos, but the portable hard drive to which I was saving my pictures died. It’s taken me a week to give up my efforts to recover the data. However, prphan just added the view I lost to this theme, so you won't be missing a thing; and his is clearly much better than mine would have been with its foggy magic.

Of the photos remaining, the one I liked best was looking away from the sun at this little house perched high above the surf. There was a birthday party going on the day we passed, and the driveway was decorated with balloons.

Bixby Bridge is popular photo spot. I think part of the attraction is the curves. This photo emphasizes the curves of the bridge.
In my prior post, I got lucky with a relatively clear day in the spring when California was exceptionally wet and getting a little more than its usual 15 minutes of green. I spent a lot of time working on a re-post; but I really hate to dump the critiques on which others have spent time on critiques. I might post the reworked version in the pano version of the old photo; I took the first one down based on the feedback. Big Sur is usually brown and/or foggy. Still it’s an awe-inspiring sight.

The source for the following text also has an usual picture looking through the bridge at the ocean. “Highway 1 and its five bridges were popular since their construction 1931-1937….. The Bixby Creek Bridge of Highway 1 is California's favorite coastal bridge. The bridge is …. socially purposeful and symbolically important to its travelers. Building the bridge and Highway 1 were important public works projects which brought relief to California's unemployed during the Great Depression…. This setting makes the projects' environmental concern and aesthetics important to avoid detracting from the natural beauty of the region….. This bridge not only connects travelers to their destination, but connects travelers with nature.”

“The first engineering concern was assessing how the highway would cross Bixby Canyon. The options were either a coastal bridge or a much smaller inland bridge and a 900 ft tunnel cutting though the Santa Lucia Mountain Range at the valley's origin. This tunnel would not allow for scenic views, and would align Highway 1 in a way that would cut directly though the Los Padres National Forest, which local environmentalists wished to preserve. A bridge was a worthy option in the eye of these environmentalists as it preserved one area of resource value and did not adversely impact on Bixby Canyon or Creek. In doing so it became a symbol of passing above the environment, and of accomplishing a practical objective while still allowing the environmental processes such as the creek to run their natural course.”

I tend to think of environmental concerns as a development that occurred in my lifetime; so I was impressed that, during the depression, environmental concerns played a major part in decision-making. This photo is listed as Monterey but the text locates south of Monterey and it very much has the look of the coastline in the Big Sur area. Ron Craig has a lovely foggy photo taken from Garrapata State Park. The park is just South of Point Reyes but from here to well north of Monterey, the state beach parks do not allow camping.