Tunnel View, Yosemite National Park, California

Bound for Yosemite on the 5 freeway. The picture doesn't show it, but I'm going downhill fast.

The mountaneous terrain north of LA give way to the flat valley.

And then you're back up in the hills again as you leave Fresno on highway 41.

The vegetation shifts from desert brush to trees as you near Yosmeite.

By trees, I mean giant Sequoias.

They stand like giants among the other trees in Yosemite.

This is how big they are.

All streams in Yosemite are fed by snowmelt from the mountains. Since I'm visiting in September, when the spring floods are over and there hasn't come any more snow, the streams are near empty.

The "tunnel view" of the Yosemite Valley. It is called "tunnel view" since it is right at the mouth of a tunnel that you drive through to enter the valley from the south. From this point you can see El Capitan (the steep bare rock face to the left), Half-Dome (the almost white peak curving up in the background in the middle of the picture) and Bridal Veil Falls (just to the left of the top of the right foreground pine trees - you only see a small vertical white line).

Bridal Veil Falls. There is more water flowing through here in spring.

Closeup of the fall.

El Capitan. A favorite among climbers and base jumpers.