San Francisco:

I made my pilgrimage to City Lights Books in San Francisco to purchase a copy of 'Howl' and 'A Coney Island of the Mind' . . . .  I was last at City Lights in 1969!

The alley next to City Lights Books is a kind of "walk of the poets" . . . . .

Yes.

The famous Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco is actually a wharf!

I had the opportunity to visit my birthplace, Monterey, California on a beautiful day.

I spotted this fuzzy bud in Monterey.

Oregon:  Oregon is my favorite place on the planet for natural beauty . . . just barely beating out New Zealand.

It was a very cold December in Western Oregon but that did not stop my friend Jeff Milligan and I from our search for magical textures, patterns, and landscapes.

This old fence and aging wall makes an even better photo without me. Willamette Valley, Oregon.

On our drive around the country roads outside of Woodburn, Oregon we happened across an old railroad trestle . . . well . . . that had photogenic nuts.

Trestle nut.

The entire railroad structure was bolted together.

Railway bolts.

Weathered, corroded, rusted.

The Willamette Valley of Oregon is a wet and damp place most of the year and moss grows on any south surface.

Nature making art of bolts.

A winter sunset in the foothills of the Oregon Cascades near Silver Creek Falls.

Sunset snow and cloud on Oregon field furrows.

We ended our Oregon stay with a GREAT New Years' party at the Hilton Hotel in Portland.

A few more pics from last Christmas' wonderful trip to the American West Coast.

The San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge shrouded in fog.

My wonderful wife, Yoo, and I not shrouded in fog on the San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge.

Another in the Oregon Trestle Nuts Series.  This one is "Nut J."