Here in Bakersfield we had a tantalizing glimpse of fall, only to morph into a dust storm and temps heading back into the mid-80s (or worse). It’s what we expect, those of us who call this dry, dusty place home. But every year we hope anew that we’ll get cooler early, have a real fall, and see more of the wet stuff called rain.
I thought it would be fun to put up a gallery of fall pictures so we could pretend. These are photos I’ve taken while traveling, not in search of fall. Some day I’ll go looking for fall to take some dramatic shots. But these will tide me over.
We think of fall colors as a riotous display, but we can also enjoy a single leaf imprinted in the sidewalk. This isn’t just any sidewalk – it’s outside the Houses of Parliament in London. I should be there right now, again, but the recession got in the way.
This beautifully-shaped tree was in Kensington Park. If my grandkids had been with me, they would have been sitting on that branch.
We also went to Canada last October. Here’s a little bit of what we found in Vancouver.
Stanley Park had some beautiful foliage. It was also a bit rainy but we are so thrilled to see rain that we don’t even mind it when traveling.
These beautiful colors were near Grouse Mountain in Vancouver.
You know how it’s important to look not just straight ahead but up, down, and all around? I liked this puddle in Stanley Park with one green leaf just starting to turn. And I also liked the next leaf.
I found the best, eye-popping color in Italy. Again, we just planned a trip when we could and never expected the surprise of fall colors.
Vineyards in fall outside Orvieto – wow!
Orange and red are striking, but yellows can be beautiful also.
Everyone starting to feel like there’s hope? That we really will be able to put on a jacket some time this year?
I don’t particularly like the composition of this photo, but the trees just wouldn’t move for me. It does show the variety of color in Italy. The next photo was taken looking down from Assisi.
Finally for today, a look at the Tuscan countryside in fall. This is one of my favorite photos.
You can see more photos from Italy and more fall colors here. Also, you can read more about Italy and London if you are interested in the travel journal pages.
And there are some really fancy, slick, dramatic fall photos from petapixel who linked to the Boston.com for these.
I’m putting a link on the side panel to Michael Zhang’s site Petapixel, a really cool photography page that tends toward the technical. Take a look - I love it.
TOMORROW: more autumn from Colorado.
