This past weekend I took a quick trip over to Chewacla State Park just outside Auburn. Springtime is just about gone since this week has reached into the high 90′s and everything now looks bleached out and crisp (no rain tends to do that too). I have been trying to test out some new photo gear for sharpness and contrast etc, so why not choose scenes that are impossible to capture correctly. High sun with fast water (bleach white) on black rocks doesn’t make for easy metering, but it was still nice to get out and shoot something different. The waterfall is at the very end of the park, and is a nice short but hefty hike. The dam from Lake Chewacla feeds into this small-ish waterfall which sends a good bit of water downstream. There is always something different to shoot out at Chewacla, this day it was the waterfall. The EXIF data can be found over on my Flickr site if interested.
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The Photo of the Day today is a very small red and yellow wildflower found in the southeast, usually in the spring to early summer in the shade, called an Indian Pink or Maryland pinkroot, and woodland pinkroot. Better known by its Latin sir name Spigelia marilandica this little guy was blooming over at Chewacla State Park all over the place once we took a look around. Shot with a D7000 and a Nikkor 35mm 1.8 (EXIF details can be found over here) if you are like me and so inclined to read that sort of stuff. I have some shots of the waterfalls but haven’t gotten around to post-processing on those yet. This has already been a crazy busy week and it’s only going to increase as the week goes on unfortunately. It’s not really unfortunate, it’s just the way the week is this week.
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Last night we went out to Chewacla State Park for a very quick trial run to test out the Dagger Axis 10.5 Kayak. This boat is much smaller than our previous kayaks but is very stable, easy to maneuver, and tracks quite well. We got to Chewacla too late to give it a real good testing but it was nice to get out on the water for a short time and to see the sunset together. It was a beautiful “fall” sunset, full of mosquitoes and 95*F weather, but as you can see from the photos it was well worth the trouble.
There doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of review information about the Dagger Axis around the blogosphere but from a first impression it certainly gives a lot of bang for the buck and is one of the only kayaks that can seem to adequately cover both white water and recreational or touring flat water. From past experience you really can’t get a good feel for how a kayak handles until you have sat in one all day and paddled for hours (or miles), much like riding a street bike for the better part of 40-50 miles at a time. Hopefully the weather will cool off soon and we can do a little paddling during the day without having heat stroke. For now, here are a few pics from the launch (I’m the one with no hair), and one from the lake.
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This was an extremely busy week again but today is finally Friday and time for Friday Feet. Today we drove out to Chewacla State Park to ride our bikes on the trails (paved that is). Is you live near Auburn this is a great gem right out of town, has a nice river, waterfall, and fishing lake. Along with a very nice route around the river, there is a bike trail just at the entrance of the park which is a popular running and biking spot. It was nice to get some exercise outside now that we are deep into winter, but it ended up being about 70* today and made for a nice bike ride.
We stopped at the lake to sit on the swing, which made for my Friday feet post today. I was able to work a little panning technique into the shoot today with Deb on the swing. I love the effect of motion but it isn’t all that easy to pull off and make it look half way decent. You can do this in a number of different situations, I just forget to give it a try sometimes.
No body else has jumped on the Friday Feet bandwagon yet, but I have found that it has forced me to look at different ways to do this weekly (short) shoot. It isn’t that each Friday has to be something spectacular, it just keeps me thinking about how to keep creating original ideas. It helps to have a nice mild day in winter.
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I have over the years learned to really appreciate the wildlife photographers that specialize in photographing birds. It is no easy task when they are usually so skidish of any movement. This guy was shot from a small floating boat in the swamp, he must be use to crazy photographers.
Wakulla Springs State Park in Florida has an unbelievable number of species to be able to photograph, and you don’t have to have a real high dollar setup to get some good shots here. This photo is a Limpkin (Aramus guarauna), which are somewhat related to the cranes.
They are a pretty good sized bird, this one is protecting his nest as we go quietly by in our non-motorized boat, although he doesn’t look all that happy about our presence.
Image Specifics
- Body – Nikon n90s
- Lens – Nikon 75-300mm @ 300mm
- Film – Kodak 100S
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This is the famous Delicate Arch from Arches National Park. We visited there around 1998 and again in 2002 when I was able to take some of these images. The park is an incredible place. It is hard to even get a perspective of the park from an image like this. The arch here is so high, standing underneath it, you look like an ant.
We hiked out here at sunset, and although it looks like we are all by ourselves out here there was a fairly large crowd just on the other side of my camera, all taking the famed image you see above. And today, it is the image of the day. It you are anywhere near the park in Utah, take the time to stop by and hike out to the arch. The hike is a little long but is not hard at all, even in weather not quite as good as it looks in the photo here. Be prepared to spend your sunset evening with many new friends who also had the same idea and go early so you can just sit and relax and watch the incredible beauty of this rugged land.
Image Specifics
Body – Nikon n90s
Lens – Nikon 24-120mm @ 24mm
Film – Fuji Velvia 50
Other Blog Reading on Arches NP
I found some very good blog posts written about their experience in the park. Each is unique and interesting. Some that caught my eye were:
- Arches National Park by Looky
- Visiting Delicate Arch – Moab, Utah, by Lakaw
- Arches, by Two in a Tent
- Arches National Park, Utah, by Drew: Around the World
- Birds, Delicate Arch Trail & Another Visit, by RV-Dreams Journal
- The Other Side of Delicate Arch, by Andrew Morrill Photography
There are many others of course but these just jumped out at me. Great job above.
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I love Sundays here at the park. All the weekend campers head out for home and the wildlife returns for another week of calm living. The day was just beautiful today. We took the motorboat down the Pamlico river to the maina where our sailboat is and then returned. All the crabpot bouys that are normally dotting the surface of the water were gone and the seagulls have taken their place. The nights here are turning cooler, mid 50′s, and the days are glorious.
I will be leaving on November 1 for the Houston Quilt Festival where we are vendors. Hopefully I can find some purse frames for my new knitted bags and perhaps a few more patterns, threads, and beads. Tonight I am starting on the Sister Dahlia pattern that I charted after having spent all of last night and part of today loading the beads on the thread. If the count is wrong I am not sure what to do.
The Purple Crocheted Lariat is now complete and looks great. It is my first attempt at crochet ropes and I really like how it turned out. The picture of the finished Lariat is below.
I used #30 weight crochet thread and 60 grams of Black Opal beads (80204-30) from Wal-mart. The thread I used was white and if I had to do this one again I would use a dark color.
