My wife and I in days past were quite active paddlers. We spent about 5 or so years kayaking all around the country in between conventions (our work), and because we were always traveling we were able to kayak in some really neat places. Just to name a few, we went out to the caves in Lake Superior near the Apostle Islands, the slot canyons at Lake Powell in Arizona, coastal surf in the North Carolina Outer Banks, rivers and lakes from Ohio to New York, and out to the great Columbia river in Oregon. Only problem, for me, was I never did like my particular kayak (the Dagger Cortez 16.5), for various reasons, but I never could get comfortable on a long paddle.
Since then we have tried to find different outdoor activities that we could both enjoy together, but never really found anything we both equally liked (other than sailing, which we might do again some day), so we decided to go back to kayaking, but with shorter, lighter, smaller, less expensive, kayaks we can just throw in the back of the truck and take to the nearest body of water (like Chewacla which is only a few miles away). Anyway, below are some of our previous paddling trips, wish we had time to go back to some of these great places.
These below were all shot with film so they are a little grainy, HDR high res images are in order soon.
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This image of the day comes from a National Forest trail that is so green during the summer it looks like a rain forest. This is from about a mile or so down Ivy Creek Trail in Colorado, one of many hundreds of images I came out with on this particular day.
Walking the Ivy Creek Trail
If you have never walked a trail in a secluded spot you don’t know what you are missing. The peace that I tried to convey in this image is only the tip of the ice burg so to speak. You take a road out of Creede Colorado to a national forest road (dirt road), where you have road signs and a view of houses.
The farther into the woods you travel, the smaller the road gets, the more nature takes over. Once you are back into the trail you hear absolutely no man made noise. No street noise, no cars, no chatter, just the creek and some birds.
It is like you have traveled into a sound booth at a recording studio and it is miles and miles across. This photo was taken only about a quarter mile into the trail, which you can take for about 20-30 miles, or loop all the way back into the city of Creede.
This image below is one of my all time favorite shots I have taken as a photographer. I would encourage you to look at the larger size to see the details in the trees. Only can nature produce so many variants of green. In person, it is the most lush and fertile area you can imagine, almost untouched by society.
Image Specifics
- Body – Nikon D2X
- Film – Digital RAW 12.1mp
- Lens – Nikon 17-35mm [f/2.8] shot @ 17mm – f/13
- Exposure – 6 seconds @ ISO-100
