I thought a ride to the Tule Elk Reserve would be a great thing to do on a sunny day. I took my compact 7x-15x binoculars, as suggested by the website. I left the real camera, taking only the cell phone so that I didn't have so much to carry.
I took off westerly on a paved road but shortly turned southward on a packed dirt road. I have a pretty decent sense of direction, and the sun was out, so I just kept taking roads that took me in the direction I wanted to travel.
I took a few photos as I pedaled along. The first as I pedaled along on the paved road.
I soon had to turn south, and the road was packed dirt.
I was riding the fixie with 25c tires, hardly an off road machine, but had no trouble despite what the roads looked like.
Before long I left the barley and alfalfa fields and was riding between almond and olive orchards. I stopped to take a photo, hoping to post something here about "almonds to the left of me, olives to my right, here I am, back in the middle again",but alas, my phone repeated the same symptoms it had a couple of days ago. Black screen. I took out the battery and restarted multiple times to no avail.
I finally gave up and pedaled along, hoping it would work when I got to the Tule Elk Reserve.
I got there to find that I had the place to myself. I scanned the expanse and found a herd of 5 branch antlered bulls. They are much smaller than the Roosevelt and Rocky Mtn Elk found in Oregon, but I was very impressed by their antlers. 6+ points on all of them (on each side for those not familiar with antler terminology) and many more than that on most of them. Alas, my phone was not going to cooperate. I watched the elk for quite some time. The eventually moved to the left, nearer a service road. I pedaled over there and had a front row seat. The elk didn't seem to care that I was there. Sure wish I would have brought my camera.
Signage in the area said that Tule Elk were nearly extinct by the late 1700's. There were evidently only two elk left in the San Joaquin Valley, and very few left in the entire world when in 1874 a rancher set about trying to help them. In 1932 the State of California stepped up and set up this reserve area for them.
Since I didn't get any photos of the elk, I'll give you this video by the Tule Elk Natural Reserve.
They reproduced successfully until they outgrew the carrying capacity of the reserve. The have now been transplanted to other areas that they historically occupied.
These elk are certainly different than Oregon elk. These guys were out in the open on a 90 degree day, when their Oregon relatives would be relaxing in the deep shade of a north facing slope. ...not that they have any deep shade anywhere near here! Their light colored coats probably help keep them cooler.
I had stayed around long enough, and started to make my way back. I stayed farther east on the return. There are a lot of these dirt roads laid out in rectangles around the various orchards and fields. Big pumps whirred as they poured water onto the land for flood irrigation, and into ditches that fed other systems. On the return I was riding by alfalfa, barley, and fallow land.
It was a good ride. I couldn't ask for better weather. I even had a big old floppy eared Jack Rabbit strike a pose on the road in front of me. And of course, the phone worked again when the ride was over. :-(
............Road Bike........Rollers.............MTB..........Lifecycle......Total
Today ...........19................0....................0........................0...........19
Jan..............304...............15...................0......................31..........350
Feb................0..................0....................0.......................0..............0
March..........18.................0....................0........................0............18
April...........113.................0....................0........................0...........113
May..............101................0....................0........................0............101
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