TimeOut

Up the Sweetwater River

Sep 15, 2022,21:04 PM

We have walked in this part of town before, but never "Up" the River, only West from this point to the Bay. We were there 18 months ago or so at Paradise Marsh and once again since then, on A Navy Gray Day.

Anyway, it's not wilderness today, but a patterns of water, concrete, and blue sky.

The San Diego Trolley runs across the river, as well as the freeway which is the reason for all the pillars. And this complicated tensioning device to keep the trolley electrical wires from flapping around (I presume).

The bike path on which we are walking goes underneath all these roads and rails. The tide is about in its middle or slack stage.

A convenient Trolley came by just at the right time. Most of their cars are wrapped with advertisements, like this one.

View of the tensioners from the other side.

We saw a whole flock of pigeons looking down on the world,

from their high-rise condominium / freeway overpass.

While I had my eye in the sky, my wife was looking close to the ground, and she pointed out a couple lizards who obligingly posed for us.

I'd say 8/10 lizards run, but the 20% who freeze are always fun to see when the photos are "developed" back home on the big screen.

I found five birds each standing on its own footing. A great photo opportunity; a chance to see unspoiled wild life close to the big city.

if carefully cropped to reduce the grafitti...

We took a quick step back as some cyclists powered through. It doesn't matter what side of the bike path you are on, they come through singly, in pairs, in packs, or head down, hammering the pedals.

I returned my camera to the pelicans as I have rarely seen one with his mouth open like this.

Here's a better angle on this group of five birds. How can that pelican twist his head and neck to clean out his ~~arm~~ wingpit.

And the pelicans again.

The tiny bird. Relatively speaking.

A cormorant must have felt lonely as he was about 100 yards away from the others.

He was drying out his wings after some underwater fishing. You can see Mexico -- the hills in the background.

The Batman sign!

We turned our attention to our feet again and found some tiny beautiful flowers.

While I am trying to focus on the macro flower shot, my wife finds some fish. I'm looking for one jumping; about "yay-long" as any fisherman would. She says "No, down here silly" and I take the photo.

On the north side of the path we can see Paradise Marsh.

Two cyclists speed by and we have just about had enough of this.

We found a spot here between the two inside lanes of the highway -- I literally could climb over that small wall and be in the fast lanes. Yeow!

I like it a bit better down here.

and you can see on the right side of the picture below there's really nothing stopping you walking on the shoulder of the highway. The next exit on the northbound lanes is "The National City Mile of Cars"

A weary man with two backpacks dropped onto a rock in the shade, just before these five cyclists came through. We all stayed out of each other's way and exchanged "Howdy", "Yo", "Good Morning (my wife), etc.