Boron mine, Boron California
Deep Springs Lake. Home of Deep Springs College, California's most unusual 2-year education program. Notice the fault running through the image (base of mountains).
Badwater, Death Valley
Mammoth Mountain ski area (summertime)
Horseshoe Lake, Mammoth. The large area of dead and dying trees surrounding the parking lot is caused by extremely high levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the soil. The USGS continues to study this area as part of the Geological Hazards Program (Long Valley Caldera).
Intersection of the Garlock and San Andreas faults (can you find them?)
Annotated image (fault locations approximate)
Runway at Edwards Air Force Base, on the west side of Rogers Dry Lake (visible in right third of image). The 15,000-foot runway at Edwards (with an optional 9,000 foot extension into the dry lake bed) is a back-up landing location for the Space Shuttle.
Golf course in the desert near Palm Springs.
Santa Cruz Island. A large fault divides the island (can you find it?).
Annotated image of Santa Cruz Island (fault location approximate).
Isthmus Harbor, Catalina Island - in addition to Avalon, this is the other major port 'o call at Catalina.
Avalon Harbor, Catalina Island. The large round structure at the north end of the harbor is Catalina Casino. Built in 1929, it's been a decades-long focal point for visitors. Not for gambling, though - the word "casino" is Italian and means gathering place. The Catalina Casino is famous for it's large ballroom and movie theater.
New cars, Port of Long Beach. The "white" cars are not actually all white - they are covered with peel-off plastic to protect the paint from the ocean crossing.
Rose Bowl, Pasadena. "Michigan" is emblazoned on the north end zone and USC is on the south, which suggests that this photo was taken shortly before the 2007 Rose Bowl (although it could have been the 2004, 1990, 1979, 1977, 1970 or 1948 Rose Bowl).
Oil refinery storage tanks. The odd shadows on top of some of the tanks are caused by the floating covers. The cover rises and falls with fluid level in the tank.
Closed landfill, Los Angeles
Disneyland!! Main Street, USA and Space Mountain are visible in this image
The Queen Mary; permanently docked in Long Beach
Portuguese Bend Landslide, Palos Verdes Peninsula. Note the patches to the road - a continual maintenance headache.
Annotated image of the Portuguese Bend Landslide.
Planes at LAX (image rotated 90 degrees)
Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, San Diego
Shallow reef, La Jolla
SeaWorld, San Diego
All American Canal (black stripe) crossing under Interstate 8
Coronado Bay Bridge, San Diego.
Salton Sea, Imperial County. Agriculture extends both northwest and southeast of the Salton Sea. Most of the rest of the surrounding area is desert. The Salton Sea was formed accidentally in 1905 when a water diversion project went awry. The entire volume of the Colorado River flooded into the Salton Sea basin for almost two years before the breach was sealed. The 1905 flood, though accidental, duplicated previous natural floods which have occurred for tens of thousands of years when sediment build-up at the mouth of the Colorado River forced the river away from the Gulf of California and into the Salton Trough.
Algodones Dunes, Imperial County
Agriculture on the U.S. - Mexico Border (south of the Salton Sea). The border is clearly evident, based solely on the agricultural practices on both side of the border.
This blog has no relationship to Google. It's just an interesting collection of Google Earth images from California.
Golden Gate Bridge South Tower
Financial District, San Francisco. View is rotated and low-angle. The Transamerica Pyramid can be seen in the upper middle of the image.
Giants Ballpark, San Francisco. Big hitters can reach McCovey cove
Salt Evaporation Ponds, South San Francisco Bay
Angel Island, San Francisco Bay
Point Reyes National Seashore, Marin County. The San Andreas Fault cuts through this image (can you find it?)
Annotated image (fault location approximate)
Vineyards near the Napa Valley
Waves entering Crescent City Harbor. A tsunami struck here in 1964 (from an Alaskan earthquake) and took 10 lives.
Areas clear-cut for lumber
.......more clearcuts
......and still more clearcuts
Circular irrigation, Butte Valley
Yuba Goldfields; 8 miles of outwash from Gold-Rush era hydraulic mining.
Pelican Bay State Prison
Powerlines crossing a field
Cal-Neva Lodge, Lake Tahoe
Agricultural fields, Sacramento Valley
New home construction, Tracy
Shasta Dam
Sutter Buttes, near Marysville
Top-down view of Half Dome, Yosemite National Park. The shadow of Half Dome is projected toward the valley floor.
Switchback trail up to the top of Yosemite Falls
Thousand Island and Garnet Lakes, Ansel Adams Wilderness
