Eastern Sierra, California

California offers so much more to a human eye than Nevada!

Even the Death Valley was prettier than Nevada desert. Despite its ugly title the Death Valley had a variety of shapes and sizes of hills and mountains, sand dunes, salt lakes… It was more entertaining than Nevada desert.

But what a variety of climatic conditions and living environments California offers!

After the Death Valley with its desert environment we visited Mammoth Lakes District. I instantly felt at home. Who could imagine that California offers Siberian scenery? I expected Canada to be very similar to Siberia, but California???
Rivers and lakes with rocky beds and crystal clear and icy cold water, rocky mountains with pine trees, cliffs and occasional sandy beaches, modest flowers among grass, squirrels on the trees – it is all so familiar from childhood. It is exactly what Mammoth Lakes are. The only pleasant difference is absence of mosquitoes. Whatever the reason is – there were no mosquitoes whatsoever, while in Siberia mosquito plague is one of the worst problems in summer. Apart from this, the picture is basically identical!

Also we saw Mono Lake, which happened to be the most surreal landscape, one of the most memorable I’ve seen so far (and definitely it will be always one of the most memorable images of America for me), despite quite a modest vegetation around it. It is a combination of snow white and crow black islands among gentle blue-purple-pink waters of the lake, banks, sky and mountains on the horizon.

And of course, we visited Yosemite Park, which is made of rocks and pine trees, but rocks of an incredible size and pines of an incredible size!!! It is another memorable impression of America. What a gigantic playground of Nature! It is a good place to learn how insignificant we are in comparison with the forces of Nature. When you see a huge mountain broken apart like a plastic toy you ought to reflect upon a few questions, feelings, sensations… What a depth, what a space! It is one of the most beautiful places on this planet which are the must to see…

We saw endless hills with dried yellow grass just like in Victoria; we saw fruit and corn plantations which are so huge in size that can be compared with Bundaberg sugar and macadamia plantations. I have not noticed along the way any petite farm like ours; everything is huge!

I saw here mountains visually quite similar to mountains in Switzerland and Kazakhstan.

And coastal line offers quite a tropical environment, as I remember from Los Angeles.

What else will I see in this colourful state?



http://picasaweb.google.com/Tatiana.I.Efremova/YosemiteParkCalifornia

http://picasaweb.google.com/Tatiana.I.Efremova/MammothLakesDistrictCalifornia

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