Eagle Creek

Posted on July 22, 2009 by Mike

Just some pictures from a recent hike up Eagle Creek with Jules.

Dispatches from Borneo

Posted on May 23, 2009 by Mike

Renan Ozturk does dispatches from his expeditions. He describes them as “Episodic & on the fly creative content cut in the field and sent with satellite technology.” They’re pretty amazing. Here’s a series from a trip to Borneo.

Snowshoeing

Posted on March 26, 2009 by Jules

Who’s that weirdo on the end???

Happy Snowshoers?

Oh yeah, that was me.

For some reason, I couldn’t get the rest of them to display much enthusiasm. Though my P.I. did raise his hand.

Mother of Thousands

Posted on November 25, 2008 by Jules

So I acquired a baby plantelet from Kalenchoe (Mother of Thousands) from one of my classmates several months ago. It’s a cool plant that they often use for tumor research. I used to have one in undergrad. It’s currently growing on the window sill right next to my desk in lab. It is now producing little plantelets along the leaf margins. Soon they will ring each leaf, with little dangling roots. These will soon drop off into the soil to sprout up into new Kalenchoe clones. Woot. It’s pretty nifty.

Japanese Maple in Autumn

Posted on October 29, 2008 by Mike

Japanese Maple in Autumn

Originally uploaded by ** Krissy **

I miss visiting Portland with Jules. Maybe we should take a trip soon.

Huckleberry Preserve

Posted on August 10, 2008 by Mike

Jules and I went on a hike up in the hills yesterday. I brought my video camera and shot random things during the trip. Here they are:

Huckleberry Botanic Regional Preserve from Mike Horn on Vimeo.

The Great Outdoors

Posted on July 26, 2008 by Mike

Cho siblings at the entrance

Went with the Cho siblings today to Muir Woods and Stinson Beach. The redwoods were as grand as ever, except one which fell recently. It was a big one too. It fell over one of the trails near the entrance so I wonder what they’re going to do with it.

Jules in a redwood

We were pretty touristy and took lots of pictures of the hollowed out redwoods that you can stand in. After the redwoods we traveled north to the Hog Island Oyster Farm where we picked up 50 fresh oysters of various sizes. With seafood in tow we traveled back down to Stinson Beach and spent the rest of the afternoon scarfing down grilled oysters, corn, veggies, potatoes and cheesecake.

We made a mess

After the eats we bore witness to the most people I’ve ever seen on Stinson Beach. But… lame-o me didn’t take a picture of the masses. So this crazy Cho picture will have to suffice.

Crazy Chos

After all of that we drove back to Oakland, freshened up, and then went out to Mangia Bene out in Martinez for some delicious eats. Now I think it’s time for a nap.

The Beaver State

Posted on June 28, 2008 by Mike

Jules and I are in Oregon this week for a wedding. I just thought I’d drop a note and mention that it’s really pretty up here. Not too many flowers blooming right now, but the grasses are all very big and green (much to Jules’ dismay) and the weather has been pretty nice.

The other day we went for a local hike with Jules’ parents and family friends and once we we past the treeline it was like we were in another world. The trees and foliage were dense for most of the hikes, but some parts thinned out and you could see a hundred yards or so of foresty goodness.

Jules and I took the featured picture after the hike when we were waiting for everyone to catch up. More pictures soon perhaps!

Yosemite With the Lindow Lab

Posted on June 2, 2008 by Mike

Jules invited me to go with her lab to Yosemite again over the weekend. I have mixed feelings about Yosemite. On one hand it is such a touristy place full of people, cars, pavement and garbage that you don’t feel like you’re really enjoying nature. On the other hand Yosemite Valley is such an amazing, awe-inspiring place that you can overlook the hordes of people.

The more popular trails to destinations like Yosemite Falls and Half Dome are lined with people, but on this trip Professor Lindow took us to Taft Point and Sentinel Dome which had very few people. For those of you who don’t like to hike very far, both trails are only 1.1 miles from the parking lot. The picture with this post is of Taft Point. From the edge there is a wonderful view the valley including Yosemite Falls and El Capitan. Apparently there’s a pretty good view if you look straight down too, but I didn’t get that close enough to the edge to look over. It made me queasy just seeing other people do it. It pretty much drops off to the valley floor.

Hiking around Yosemite made me want to take an extended backpacking trip. I’ve pretty much decided on going back to Desolation Wilderness. I went there for a trip once as a Boy Scout and I think about due for another one. I’m thinking late July or August. I can get Jules ready by then right?