iris detail...

This is morning at Roy's Redwoods...   Beautiful, isn't it?

Streaming morning sun coming through the redwoods near the top of the hill at Roy's Redwoods, Marin County, California.

The sun and a bit of morning fog...

The watery abyss below the Golden Gate Bridge...

It doesn't get much fresher than this...

We missed it this year...   Maybe next year...

Direct from the end-of-the-canyon at Roy's Redwoods, Marin County, California:   "The Forest"

This is the roof of The Galeria, an upscale collection of shops in San Francisco.
CLICK for more pix of The Galeria on my San Francisco website

This is the James Johnson House, located in Half Moon Bay, about 20 miles south of San Francisco on the coast.
CLICK to see more photos of James Johnson House on my San Mateo coastline website

This giant redwood stands ready to greet visitors at the far-end of the meadow at Roy's Redwoods.

Redwood and foliage...

Some day I intend to learn the name of this wildflower (feel free to post a comment if you know), because besides being exceptionally beautiful, they have lasted all summer, while many of the others have faded and disappeared...

[ UPDATE:   Thanks to Ruthie for identifying this as a Mariposa Lily ]

This is the trail leading across the ridge to the top of the hill at Roy's Redwoods.   Officially, and also for very good reasons, it is named "Nature Trail"...

This grove of Madrones is the reward for huffing-and-puffing all the way to the top of the hill at Roy's Redwoods.

A little fly on a big yellow wildflower...

Getting across this giant fallen redwood is just one of the adventures you will find at Roy's Redwoods, near the San Geronimo Valley, Marin County, California.

This is the International Hotel, from Grant Street.   The International Hotel used to be known as the Swiss-American Hotel -- a low-cost hangout for writers and musicians back in the '50's and '60's.

A moody San Francisco morning of utilities, Coit Tower, & fog...

Building face...

This is San Francisco's Vaillancourt Fountain at Embarcadero Square, just "cattycorner" from the Ferry Building.   It had been perpetually closed for repairs, but now is restored and willing to demonstrate the wildly fun and insane ways water is able to interact with angular dimension and space...

"Cupid's Span" is a 60-foot-high jaw dropper.   Simply amazing and wildly funny...   This great public sculpture on an incredibly massive scale was designed by Dutch sculptors Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen.   It is located on the San Francisco Embarcadero, at the foot of Folsom Street.

Ranch pond, and beyond -- the forebay of Drakes Bay, from Mt. Vision, Point Reyes National Seashore.

The following is reprinted courtesy of:
http://www.sfsu.edu/~geog/bholzman/ptreyes/tripfire.htm
On the afternoon of October 3, 1995 the smoldering remains of an illegal campfire combined with 45 mph winds and the parched Chaparral landscape turned the peaceful Philip Burton Wilderness Area into an uncontrollable firestorm that lasted over 4 days. Sweeping the Mount Vision hillside, the fire engulfed and burned 12,354 acres of bishop pine forest, coastal scrub and grasses on state, federal and private lands. Although 94% of the fire burned within the park boundaries, the remaining 6% managed to completely destroy 45 homes in nearby Inverness Park. This area of the park had not experienced a fire in 50-100 years, which only increased its intensity. At the peak of the fire fighting efforts, over 2,100 personnel were directly involved in containing and suppressing the fire (Point Reyes National Seashore 1996; Point Reyes National Seashore 1996a).

Morning at Roy's Redwoods...

This is probably the most outrageous piece of public sculpture that I have ever run across...   When I first saw it my jaw dropped and it took some time to absorb it all.   After a while I realized that it was what it was -- a huge bow and arrow, stuck right into the ground...   Simply amazing...
CLICK to see more of the Embarcadero Arrow at:   http://www.photoarrow.com/sf/bowandarrow01loop.html

The City of San Francisco has always had a ban on burrying the dead within the city limits, so everybody gets "planted" in the little town of Colma, just to the south of The City.   The dead population of Colma outnumbers the living by about a thousand to one...
CLICK to visit more of Colma:   http://www.photoarrow.com/sf/colma01loop.html

Morning in the woods.   This is one of my favorite places -- near the top of the hill at Roy's Redwoods, Marin County, California.

I found this colorful water flowing in the Lagunitas Creek, Marin County, California.
CLICK to visit my website featuring the Lagunitas Creek

Early in the last century, loggers did thier damndest to topple every redwood tree in Marin County they could get the teeth of their saws into, but some areas were so difficult to reach that they survived destruction...   I found these survivors on Mount Tamalpais.

For non-native life on the west-coast, the 1860's is considered pretty much "ancient history", but that was when the Roy family established their ranch amongst the mighty redwoods, about 25 miles north of San Francisco.