— Chapter XIII of XIII · Final —

California

Home. After twelve chapters of away, the Pacific Coast where I keep returning to from all of the others. A garden in Laguna Niguel, Malibu at first light and again at sunset, the sky above the ocean making weather, and the city below the Hollywood Hills at the end of every day. The gallery closes where it started.

Laguna Niguel · Malibu · Mulholland · 5 Photographs
Suiho En — a Japanese stroll garden in Van Nuys, with moss-covered boulders, a clear stream, and a stone-and-timber bridge in the middle distance
No. 01 · Chapter XIII · California

The Garden

Suiho En · The Japanese Garden · Van Nuys · 13:45

Suiho En — "Garden of Water and Fragrance" — designed by Dr. Koichi Kawana, opened in 1984 in Van Nuys. The unlikely detail: it sits on top of the Donald C. Tillman Water Reclamation Plant, and every drop of water you see in this photograph — the stream under the bridge, the koi ponds, the tea pavilion — is treated wastewater from the San Fernando Valley, recycled, oxygenated, and sent through the garden before being released. The stream is technically the city of Los Angeles cleaning itself. The bridge over it is hand-cut cedar. You cannot tell the difference. That, more than anything else, is the city.— Photographer's Note

"California is like an island on the land."

— Wallace Stegner · Where the Bluebird Sings to the Lemonade Springs · 1992

Sun 27 Oct 2019 · 13:45  ·  Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max  ·  Main Camera  ·  4.25mm  ·  f/1.8  ·  1/1412s  ·  ISO 32

Suiho En · 6100 Woodley Ave · Van Nuys 34.1797° N · 118.4773° W
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A small cove at Thousand Steps Beach in South Laguna — sandstone bluff with a sea cave on the left, gentle Pacific waves on the sand, footprints in the foreground
No. 02 · Chapter XIII · California

The Sea Cave

Thousand Steps Beach · South Laguna · golden hour

Thousand Steps is the unofficial name for a small public beach in South Laguna, hidden between a residential bluff and the Pacific. The "thousand steps" are actually two hundred and eighteen, down a concrete staircase wedged into the canyon wall — the only way in or out. The sea cave at the south end was carved into Topanga sandstone by the same Pacific that is still working on it. The footprints in the foreground are someone's. The cave has been there for ten thousand years and waits to see who comes next.— Photographer's Note

"The cure for anything is salt water — sweat, tears, or the sea."

— Isak Dinesen · Karen Blixen · Seven Gothic Tales · 1934

Thousand Steps Beach · South Laguna  ·  Late afternoon  ·  Pacific Ocean

Thousand Steps Beach · South Laguna · Orange County 33.4906° N · 117.7415° W
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A close-up looking up at the layered sandstone cliff face of a Malibu bluff against a deep blue sky with light cloud
No. 03 · Chapter XIII · California

The Bluff

Malibu · dawn · 6:41 in the morning

Quarter to seven in the morning, looking up. The Malibu bluffs are part of the Santa Monica Mountains — sandstone, mudstone, and shale, deposited as ocean floor between 16 and 5 million years ago, then lifted by the same tectonic compression that built the Transverse Ranges and is still active. You can read the layers like the rings of a tree. Each pale band is a season the sea was quiet. Each dark band is a winter it was not.— Photographer's Note

"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe."

— John Muir · My First Summer in the Sierra · 1911

Wed 13 Jun 2012 · 06:41  ·  Canon EOS 5D Mark II  ·  35mm  ·  f/4  ·  1/1250s  ·  ISO 200

Malibu bluffs · Santa Monica Mountains 34.0353° N · 118.8728° W
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Crepuscular rays of sunlight breaking through a low cloud bank over the Pacific Ocean off Malibu — silver water, a rocky promontory on the right
No. 04 · Chapter XIII · California

God Rays

The Pacific from Malibu · winter light

The technical name for these is crepuscular rays. They happen when sunlight breaks through gaps in a cloud bank and the air below is full enough of moisture, salt, and dust to scatter the beams visibly. Sailors used to call them "the sun drawing water" — they thought the sun was lifting moisture into the cloud. They had the direction wrong but the cause exactly right. Off Malibu, in winter, this can happen for forty seconds, twice an hour, and you can lose an entire day watching for it.— Photographer's Note

"Los Angeles weather is the weather of catastrophe, of apocalypse."

— Joan Didion · Slouching Towards Bethlehem · 1968

Malibu coast · Pacific Ocean  ·  Winter afternoon  ·  Crepuscular light

Pacific from Malibu · California 34.0353° N · 118.8728° W
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The sun setting behind the silhouetted ridge of the Santa Monica Mountains from a turnout on Mulholland Drive — deep orange sky fading to red, dark tree silhouettes in the foreground
No. 05 · Chapter XIII · California · Final Frame

Mulholland

Mulholland Drive · the Santa Monica Mountains · sundown · home

William Mulholland was the Irish-born engineer who built the aqueduct that brought the Owens Valley water to Los Angeles in 1913 and made everything below this ridge possible. The road named after him runs twenty-one miles along the crest of the Santa Monica Mountains, separating the city below from the valley behind. From any one of its turnouts, at sunset, you can watch the sun do the thing it does — drop behind the ridge, throw the red over LA, and end the day on the entire eight-and-a-half million people underneath it. After twelve chapters of away, this is the place I come back to. The gallery closes here.— Photographer's Note

"We tell ourselves stories in order to live."

— Joan Didion · The White Album · 1979 · opening line

Mulholland Drive · Santa Monica Mountains  ·  Sundown  ·  Looking west over Los Angeles

Mulholland Drive · Santa Monica Mountains 34.1265° N · 118.4072° W
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