Bodie on a perfectly cloudy day!
Huell Howser once told critic Robert Lloyd that the intent of his show was to encourage viewers to “begin personal adventures into the circumstances of their place as if to turn each neighborhood joint or roadside attraction into the equivalent of the Mississippi River and to set out rafting with Huckleberry and Jim.”
My Photographer’s Assistant and I have been playing Huell’s Huckleberry and Jim for the last few years. It has been a lot of fun. If we are driving up the coast, we look for places he went to on his show. Like the Moreton Bay Fig Tree in Santa Barbara, at 80 feet tall and 576 feet wide, he wasn’t kidding when he said it was a “big” tree. Another time we searched for and found the Mission Purisima Mission in Lompoc. It is the only place left in California where you can walk on an original dirt section of the El Camino Real that the Spanish and the Missionaries used hundreds of years ago.
The last couple of months, with the drought going on, we have been channeling in on his shows on the Owens River and the Eastern Sierra. He visited an amazing number of locations. (Admit it, you heard his voice when you read amazing didn’t you.) They include:
· Bodie
· Bristle Cones
· Conness Glacier
· Devils Post Pile
· Hot Creek
· Manzanar
· Mono Lake (multiple times)
· Owens River (multiple times)
· Owens Dry Lake
· Rock Creek
· Yosemite (multiple times)
The above list doesn’t even include the multiple locations in Death Valley he visited or the Western Sierra!
I have “kind of” been to all the above locations. I say kind of because I have been in 20 Lakes Basin but not on the Conness Glacier trail itself.
This last month I have been focused on getting to specific spots along the Owens River. I wanted to find the headwaters of the lower Owens River, the start of the LA Aqueduct, and Billy Lake. It has been a lot of fun looking and along the way, I have discovered a few new spots I love.
The images in this post are from the locations Huell visited. Some of the images are from years back and my photography has improved since then. I hope you enjoy them.
Probably the most photographed tree in the Bristle Cone groves!
Twenty Lakes basin near the start of the Connes Glacier trail head.
The top of Devil’s Postpile
Hot Creek on an exceptionally lovely day!
Manzanar
Mono Lake sunset spectacular
Headwaters of the Lower Owens River and Los Angeles Aqueduct. Those three inlets on the left and the water under the bridge are the start of the Lower Owens River.
Lower Owens River
Billy’s Lake on the Owens River
Bartlett Plant - Owens Dry Lake
Lower Rock Creek
Half Dome w Clouds
Did I miss any of the shows Huell did in the Eastern Sierra/Owens Valley? The trout stocking show was in the western Sierra. Evidently, there are two Duck lakes in the Sierra.
I hope you enjoyed channeling Huell in our part of California. It just proves this part of California provides its share of California’s Gold.
If you want to watch some of the actual shows you can find a lot of them on the internet. Just google Huell Howser and the location. Or you can search the on-line archives at Chapman University