Devil's Postpile National monument...a geological wonder lurked in the scenic wilderness of Sierras...adjacent Ansel Adam's wilderness..traversed by Jon Muir trail.....
When we visited in early October...it was a rainy, cloudy, snowy day......
The conifer woods-fringed path leading to the monument...
The popular ski area en route........it was closed anyway...
It appeared so dreamy, I had to pose before it...despite wind, chill and the imminent snow....
The city center...the huge mammoth statue.......
The weather was so precarious, even the ranger at the Visitor Center warned us....the high altitude narrow road often gets blanketed with snow on such blustery days...we went anyway.
Fog has draped the surroundings...it was surreal for we sunny San Diegans..
Some aspens in their autumnal look appeared like beacons......
After a quarter mile hike from the parking lot, we reached to the monument...a stunning geological feature made of columnar basalts.....
While a lot of them were standing erect, over the years, many have crumbled and piled up at the base..
The individual columns were gigantic..some ferns and wax currants grew among them...with yellow foliage in autumn...
The structure is an outcome of lava heating and cooling time...one side of the dome is collapsed...
A trails leads up to the top of the monument.....the view was amazing from there...the rain, clouds and fresh snow of the year on the Sierra peaks had created a magical landscape...
The top of the dome...a mosaic of with hexagonal or pentagonal column tops...to me it looked like a giant penny ball.....
Time will tell how long the columns can hold together, considering the massive pines are growing from them....the granite wall in front of it reminded me of Sequoia and Yosemite...after all, all of them share same geological origin....and are part of the Sierra...
A meadow near-by and a creek flowing through it......
Giant spruce trees in the woods....
