Does this mean that SierraVisions is no more? Not really. The site is still here and the most popular page, Sierra Nevada Web Cams, is still going strong. I have considered retiring the site, but there’s 10 years of my heart and soul put into this site, so retiring it is very hard for me to do.

For now, things will stay as they are and who knows what the future will bring.

For those of you who miss my photos, you can still view them on Flickr. I update Flickr quite a bit, so head on over to my photostream there by clicking on this link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sierravisions

You can also follow me on Face Book by clicking on the Face Book banner in the post below this one.
Or follow my fan page on Face Book at this link: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Steven-Bourelle-Digital-Arts/126403420729307

I want to thank everyone who’s supported and still continues to support SierraVisions. Like I said, who knows what the future holds.

I’m Ansel Adams. Imagine that. I knew it was going to say that half way through the quiz :D

Let us know who you are.

I just went downtown to get a bite of lunch, and on the way back I drove down Brockman Ln. It’s really ashame that the wind tore up the iris the way it did. There are more flowers out there this year then there has been in the last three years. But they’re all beat up. It really bums me out. This could have been a great wild iris year in Bishop. Maybe it will be up in the Bridgeport area.

I just finished a new article for CalNaturePhoto. It’s about copy protecting digital images and what could possibly be done to keep them from getting lifted from web sites. You can check it out here; **Copy Protection for Images, An Idea**

Last night I was flipping channels on the TV and as I came to RFD-TV I saw a familiar site, the corals at the Tri-County Fairgrounds. They were interviewing someone about mules. Imagine that, mules? in Bishop? Well I kept watching to see what the show was about. It was about training mules and donkeys. At the end of the show a commercial came on about how important it was to be in Bishop California over Memorial Day Weekend for Mule Days. Pretty cool.
I think it was two years ago that they filmed Mule Days for RFD-TV. I remember it being on last year.
I guess we can start the count down. In seven days the first events will take place. I bet that there are campers outside of the fairgrounds already. I think that the last few years they have let them into the fairgrounds on Sunday. I know that by Monday this town will start filling up with cowboys, cowgirls and mules!!
Well Shit Howdee, Welcome to Bishop!!

I was looking for my unidentified flower from the last post on there. I now know that the flower is a violet. So I chose plants-annuals/perennial for the type of photo and then chose viola for the scientific name and 544 images came up. I went through the first 12 pages or so and came up with two possibilities for the flower. I will go through the more picture later and see if anything else looks close.

Thanks to John Wall on the CalPhoto Group for pointing me to this site.

I did a lot of driving around the area. I like it. The forest in there is very nice. Lots of big Sugar Pines and Cedars. It’s always interesting walking beneath Sugar Pines. I worry that one of the huge cones will fall from two hundred feet up and knock me in the head. Those cones could do some major damage to your knoggin. :)

The only problem I see living in that area is fire. If a fire comes through there you are going to loose everything. There’s no way to save your home. The houses set in the middle of the forest and they will be toast if there’s a fire. It would be cool to live in the forest like that though. At least I’d like it.

Driving across Ebbetts Pass is fun. I’d say it’s the wildest of the major passes in the Sierra. Most of the road is very narrow. They don’t even bother with a center line, the road isn’t wide enough. It sure is pretty up there. There are some amazing Junipers growing near the pass. Old, gnarled warriors that stand up against the Sierra’s fiercest storms. I want to go back there this summer and get some pictures of them. It’s a good thing I had the road to myself yesterday. Because I was constantly distracted by the Junipers.

There’s still quite a bit of snow above 8000 feet. The two lakes you drive past still had ice on them.

All in all I had a pretty good day. Got some good pictures and most importantly I got away from the house and up into the mountains for the day.

I’m going to post a little more detailed post on CalNaturePhoto later on today. I will include some pictures from the trip too.

It was pretty awesome though. I couldn’t believe it when I saw all of those hits this morning. It brought a lot of new people to the site, and hopefully some of them will come back.

Just so you guys know, if you enjoy a post on CalNaturePhoto and you want to share it with the world, you can click on the **Share This** link and submit the story to many different sites. Also on the bottom of the side bar, under Blog Directories there is a link to FeedBurner. If you click on that link you cast a vote for CalNaturePhoto and it helps to bring more people in. If I get enough votes I get put on the front page of FeedBurner.

You may be wondering why I don’t have all of these new toys on SierraVisions. It’s because SierraVisions is very out of date and can’t handle these toys. The web has changes so much in the last few years that our little site has become an antique. I know, many of you like it that way. I do too. But, changes are in the wind. I’m currently working on the new version of SierraVisions that will bring it up to date. Now don’t worry, the look and feel will be as it’s been for years. There will be some layout changes, but mostly the site will stay as is.
The biggest changes will be invisible to the public. It’s the back end of the site that will change most. And that will help to draw more people into the site. As the site is now, Google doesn’t even scan the home page anymore. It’s in Google’s database, but they don’t stop by and see what’s new. That’s because of the old code that creates the site. So once the new version is up and running, Google will stop by again and bring more visitors with them.

I’m not sure when I’ll have everything ready. It’s not real high on my priority list at the moment. I’m working on it when I have spare time. It will most likely be in a month or two. I wasn’t going to tell you guys yet, but I figure now is as good a time as any. :)

And in other news. Ebbetts Pass is now open.

Talk to you guys later.
:D