Long Hot Summer in El Portal

Hi folks,
it has been a very hot summer up here in El Portal and as I head into my last month working in Yosemite, I wish to show off some of my photography of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The first group of images is of the canyon I live in, which has the Merced River flowing away from the Yosemite Valley heading west towards the coast. It is very hot here all summer long with some weeks hitting over 110- 117 degrees and averages of over 100-110 degrees.

El Portal lies in the middle of the canyon and has the mass population of 630 people.

The Pine Bark Beetle has wrecked havoc on the pine trees here and over 65% of them are now either dead and red like this one or infected and soon to be deceased.

 I captured Saturn and the full moon 06/18/2016with my 80.0 400.0 mm f4/5- 5/6  lens on my Nikon 810 Body. Believe it or not the sun is so bright on the moon and even Saturn that I have to underexpose the shot and then brighten it up in Photoshop. For Saturn this was an extreme issue but I did manage to salvage a cool shot of the distant planet.

I also captured the full moon this night.

Moonrise on 08/17/2016

The stars are mostly out all the night with very little turbulence making for crystal clear photographs.

Seeking a good fishing hole or two along the Merced River is not always an easy hike sometimes, I have to get around big rock like this. 

 And squeeze through small openings like this.

Or over tough obstacles like these

 And then I can always swim around but then I scare the fish.

Looking east along the Merced River.

             One of the many rock walls that line the narrow canyon.