To celebrate our 50th anniversary, we spent four days at a friend's cabin in Big Sur. The weather was perfect and everything was beautiful. One day we drove south and stopped at a couple of spots to take in the views. This painting shows what we saw at one of them.
On our last evening in Big Sur, we went out to dinner in Carmel Valley at a Japanese restaurant. On the drive back to the cabin, we stopped at Monastery Beach to see the sun just going down in a beautiful sunset. I tried to capture it in this painting.
On our first full day in Big Sur we went for a hike in Point Lobos State Park. We had avoided the place for years because it was always crowded and they don't allow dogs, but we thought we should give it another try. We parked on highway 1 and headed north to Whaler's Cove, then followed the North Shore Trail. The trail is pretty rough, but it was so beautiful with the rugged granite headlands, deep blue ocean, pine and cypress forest and lots of wildflowers. I used one of my photos with a bit of artistic license and it turned out pretty good.
From the Point Lobos park entrance, we walked through forest which opened to this view of Whaler's Cove just ahead. It was such a nice scene that I snapped a photo before we arrived at the beach. I chose it for this painting because I liked the trees and the expectation of a nice view just ahead.
One day in Big Sur we hiked the short trail out onto Soberanes Point in Garrapata State Park. Just as at Point Lobos, the weather was nice and the seashore was beautiful. I liked a photo that I took of a wave hitting a big rock and used it for this painting. The red coloring above the rocky shore is from ice plant which seasonally turns red. It is an invasive alien plant that is found just about everywhere on the California coast.
Near the end of June, we went to a three-day clinic in Novato for Maureen and Zim to work with cattle. I took many photos and I wanted to paint something from them. I chose one of Chris riding Shiner and separating a steer from the herd in a rodear. Riders make a wide circle around the herd to keep them bunched together while one rider cuts one out and tries to keep it out of the herd. To start it off, Chris demonstrated how to do it with Shiner, who is an excellent cutting horse.
