HOPE VALLEY FALL COLORS October 2, 2016

Again up at a good hour, about 8 a.m., I had read on a fall color website that Hope Valley was about at peak. Somewhat of an early fall. This would be easy to check out. I like to post information so that anybody viewing my website or my Facebook presence can look at it. Some may think, it was old video left over from another year, or go on to attribute dishonesty and other bad character, as apparently overheard in the long ago peak section and chapter. I have little or no incentive to produce fakes, or to misrepresent.

Driving south on U.S. 395, I got gas at 2.339 in Carson City. I had seen distant stands of color on the eastern escarpment of the Carson Range, a big part of the Sierra Nevada. I had a hike at Taylor Creek in mind, but decided against it. Onto CA 88, I set my camera to record. The late morning light didn’t favor me shooting my video, but I have to take what I get.

As I was figuring to post to Facebook and my Thousand Peaks Club page, I’d speed up the video, so it would be condensed in time. Facebook allows for only a 2 minute clip, at maximum. There are other sites, though, and then wherever it goes, I hope for quality.

Going up the grade before the resort, I hoped that the video would be a nice opportunity for some to spare the driving. I had slow video of other road trips, driving, as I lived in Sacramento. The computer company had upgraded the application some time ago, and it’s nice to be pleased, not angry.

Indeed, the colors were about peak for some groves. I drove to a viewpoint of my favorite grove, near the U.S. 89/88 junction. With several photos with my best camera and lens, I captured the scene. These would be the only stills that I had taken.

Motoring on, many cars had pulled over with photographers wandering about, enjoying the outdoors. It was windy and a bit cold for me, so I didn’t get out of my car much. Getting to the Red Lake side road, I did a U. A new clip for the drive headed eastward. The sun was about overhead, so one should be able to discern the scene and colors well. My car is old, so I’ll probably refrain from driving as far south as I did, last year. June Lake was nice, but a longer drive.

I’d have normally stopped, but that would cause a break in the video that I was shooting. So, I drove down to the rustic lodge that so many people like. Shutting off the camera, the colors there were prime, as they often are in the fall peak. I didn’t need a restroom break, so motored on. I’d head home, to my computer and all, to spend the rest of the day working on my downloads and movies.

I had forgotten to plug in the dash cam power cord at Red Lake, so no capture from there on my eastbound driving. I remembered to plug the cable into my cigarette lighter, about the time that I was coming back to Minden. I had my water bottle to take sips from, but didn’t need any rest break, all the way home.

I did some grocery shopping, then came home to get to my computer. I had large downloads from my 64 GB card, as well as with my dash cam videos. It’s a blessing to live in the Eastern Sierra, with no longer drives back to California. My car is quite ancient now, and I would rather skip road trips to places where I had already been. If some outdoor lover happened by my website offers and contacted me, I’d negotiate for what to do and sharing expenses. The Rockies may soon be past peak, but there’s the groves down about to Bishop, CA.

Perhaps in my former days, I might have gotten up at a ungodly hour, then made a full day of it. There’s a few peaks worthy for climbing down by Yosemite, but most of those I had already summited, some multiple times. I’ve got little left on my bucket list, but if a younger person came to me, liking peak bagging, I’d probably share. I captured mostly movie clips, then submitted them to You Tube. Logging into Google, what I thought would be uploaded somehow turned to be an unedited clip. I deleted this right away, and got a message about Flash Player. I had already installed the newest version, but I could not edit the clips. Beyond me, I went to Facebook, but the quality was so low, I also deleted what I had uploaded. Figuring to do as I have done, to post them on my own website, I had to re-learn what to do. New software had to be learned as well. Computer work has been getting more and more confusing.

Well, the next morning, I managed to upload my videos to You Tube, at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRqcCDNPjvAkzcle627zCdQ I have a channel there, but little used. It makes my videos available without the plug-in or having to have a iOS device. It took some doing, as I wasn't very familiar with how to upload or edit. Practice makes perfect, sorry.

As I am unaware of how to update my website, given that I had heavily used the computer company’s viewing software, with all my movies formatted in a system for which they are dropping support, many people won’t be viewing any of this. I had asked people and done searches, but no one will either describe the steps that I need to take, or tell me that a huge amount of video conversions have to be done, as is my fear. As I can understand, that won’t be easy.

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