Super Moon Camping - 1st Backpacking Trip in 2013

It's been quite a long time since I last posted on this blog. Life has fallen back into a routine and time seems to fly faster than ever. I can't believe it's been a whole year since I came back from our trip around the world. A whole year in which I haven't been on a plane, nor left California at all - yet, a year of a lot of personal growth, keeping busy and feeling really happy and content with myself. Of course, not everything is perfect and satisfying, but the key is to weigh in all the positive aspects of your life vs the negative ones - and see how much more good than bad there is, overall. 

This blog post is about the first backpacking trip of the summer. I was invited by my friend Lynda to join her and some of her friends on an overnight backpacking trip in the Sand Ridge / 5 Lakes basin area in the Sierra-Tahoe National Forest. The hike is about 14 miles round-trip and I would label it as easy to moderate. There are lots of flat portions and the uphill parts are short. Overall, a relaxed hike, could be a good warmup for other, more strenuous hikes. The trail passes by several beautiful mountain lakes, and you really lose track of them. Every half an hour or so, there is a new lake in sight.  But I'll let the images do the talking: 

The second night of camping was the summer solstice night - which also happened to be the famous "supermoon" night. It was the perfect place to see it. The photo above is right before the moon peeked out from behind the ridge in the background. 

My Roomuseum

I finally finished my Roomuseum–an idea I had about halfway through our trip when I realized I had a growing collection of "artifacts" from the places we visited. 

Before I left on the trip, I didn't know what I was going to bring back with me. I thought I'd buy a pair of Argentinian leather boots or a leather jacket, and I wanted a variety of musical instruments from around the world. In the end, I didn't end up buying the boots or jacket, and the only instrument I bought was the sitar from India. Instead, I was always drawn to the textiles. Besides their inherent beauty, I'm fascinated by the patterns that often identify them with a particular tribe.

Best 43 Images of Animals We Encountered Around the World

I thought it would be a fun idea to compile some of the best images of animals we encountered during our trip, so Anne and I came up with this list. Some of them are quite hilarious. I tried to position them in chronological order, except for the first one, which is just a teaser to give you an idea of how amazing some of these encounters were...

Image 1: Anne leaning against a tiger at Tiger Kingdom in Chiang Mai, Thailand. 

2012 in Review and 2013 Resolutions

The other night I watched a National Geographic documentary on the first full ascent of the Everest made by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay in 1953. The most inspiring thing (which I didn’t know until now) was that after this moment, Hillary spent most of his life in Nepal, building schools and hospitals for the Sherpa people. As of now, he’s one of my new heroes in terms of making life choices and living a meaningful, fulfilled life. In this documentary, Hillary mentions a great quote that I’d like to share with you all: “Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature. Avoiding danger is not safer than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.” - Allan Keller.

2012 Overview

2012 was a good year... I would even go as far as to say that it’s been the best year of my life so far, at least in terms of adventure accomplishments. Considering I spent only 4 months out of 12 working, and the rest of the year traveling about and living frugally, I guess it was indeed the perfect recipe for a happy, fulfilled year. Long story short, here’s my 2012 in a nutshell: 

Indian Summer Days

Last weekend, my friend Jenni generously invited me along with some of her other friends to spend the weekend at a vacation house that her parents have rented up in Calistoga. The house was out of this world, an incredible 60 acre wine country estate with a pool, vineyards and apple trees. I brought my digital SLR (Nikon D90) with a 50mm lens and spent the weekend taking a lot of photos. It felt good and reinforced the conviction that photography is my one and true passion, as well as fueled the desire to shoot more.

All the photos below are straight from the camera, completely unedited. I changed the light temperature and color balance in the camera to obtain this green-yellowish color cast.