Rapt attention

I had to make at least one more trip out to the Torrey Pines Reserve. Two reasons. For one thing, who knows how long the four juvenile peregrine falcons will actually stick around? Bets are a week or two at most, before they fly off to a future of unknown cliffs and eyries. Might as well grab a few more snapshots before they fly away.

Secondly I had been on the phone with a credit card company for the better part of two days and was about to explode and I needed to go somewhere to chill.

What better place than on the bluff overlooking La Jolla, watching the hang gliders sailing the thermals in the distance on a typical day of June gloom?

Del Mar beckoned from the north through a small stand of opuntia cactus and yucca.

I picked up my pal Ronnie, recently returned from a vacation in the Big Island and drove out to Torrey Pines.

I guess the big cavalcade of large lens laden photographers who have been chronicling the fledge every day for the last two weeks had just left. Good. Didn't have to go through the whole lens envy thing again. Felt like I was back in the locker room in junior high.

We didn't have to wait too long before the supersonic raptors started sailing by. Didn't see a lot of acrobatics or food exchanges but enjoyed the display we did receive and got fairly close a time or two.

The peregrine falcon is the fastest member of the animal kingdom, its dive has been clocked at 242 miles per hour. Its sheer speed and nimbleness makes it a challenge to photograph at times.

People often ask me why I am so darn obsessed with raptors. I don't quite know what to say. You don't see it, you don't get it, no problem. We all got our thing.

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