Art, buildings, Places to Shoot, Travel

Buildings along the Way…

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Buildings. I love them. I love their form, their function, their stories, and their history. This was one of the tougher edits as far as choosing what to share. Architecture in the south and east is so very different than what we have out west, especially in New Orleans. I couldn’t get enough.

But first! a quick word about keywords. I changed one of my main themes from architecture to buildings and here’s why: buildings, in my mind, is a broader subject. It includes, for me, all things built by humans. It could be a pool, a bridge, homes, skyscrapers, windows, doors, door knobs, gates, fences, and the like. Those are actually some of my keywords under buildings. Here are all nine of them: doors, windows, interior, brick, church, gate, historic, stone, and house. I’m not sure I’m married to this list and it will change as my subject choices change, but that’s what I have at this point in time.

Beyond the main theme, you could honestly just keep going with subsets. For example, one could pull up all church images, change the preset to churches and continue to add keywords like steeple, stained, glass, pews, altar, religious, etc.

Our first stop on our adventure was with some old, dear friends in Portal, AZ. We stayed in our camper, and they slept in the yurt. We ate and lounged in the yurt as well. We cooked and used the bathroom in the tiny house on the right, which is hooked up to a cistern and a septic tank.

Portal is an unincorporated community in Cochise County,  in southeastern Arizona. We got off I-10 and drove 25 miles south-southeast of San Simon on the east side of the Chiricahua Mountains. This area is often called the Yosemite of Arizona. The community is also a popular location for birding. 

One of our Harlingen, TX days was spent in South Padre Island. To get there we had to drive through Port Isabel, part of the Brownsville–Harlingen–Raymondville – Matamoros metropolitan areas. Established as a town after the Mexican War of Independence, Port Isabel became an important cotton-exporting port before the American Civil War. The harbor, town, and lighthouse all were fought over and exchanged hands during the Civil War.

This is the pool at our funky RV park in Walasco. It was heaven. We mostly had it to ourselves as most park inhabitants had already fled the heat and gone back to Canada.

This is Ellen’s childhood home. The owners were SO lovely and let us come in a poke around. Ellen shared childhood stories she could recall and it was fun to listen to how the house USED to be when she was a kid.

This is cousin David’s home in Houston. He does a lecture series at Rice University when he is in town, exercising the mind you know, and we joined him. I could have done a whole blog alone on the architecture of Rice University.

On our way to Galveston, we couldn’t pass up the Johnson Space Center. We did a tour of the grounds and drove by this building that still contains a Saturn V rocket. It was really long.

On to Galveston. The above image had three main theme hits, animals, art, and buildings. I chose to share it in buildings. I believe this was part of a restaurant.

We found an oil rig museum that was quite interesting.

There were a lot of beautiful buildings in Galveston. Some had plaques on them that announced that they had survived the big hurricane of 1900.

Following south Texas, we headed to Fountainbleau State Park on the north shore of Lake Ponchatrain in Louisiana. It was beautiful and we really wished we had our bikes there. There was an alligator in the pond, Spanish moss hanging from the trees and we were about 40 minutes from NOLA across the causeway.

We spent two days in New Orleans, one just walking around and taking it all in, the other we met my cousin Dave, from Houston, and watched the French Quarter Music Festival parade for the first time in two years (due to Covid). I’ll explore more of that with Music.

The interesting buildings in NOLA were endless.

Peeling paint, color, style, NOLA had it all.

This is a view of the main house of the Whitney Plantation. Such beautiful grounds but such devastating human stories.

We then found ourselves in Houston, Mississippi, another of Ellen’s old stomping grounds. She lived here for 18 months around her freshman year in high school (1969). This lunch counter at Parson’s Drugstore no doubt saw some sit-ins at some point.

Here is a picture of City Hall and Ellen’s old house.

The Hillsborough, Chapel Hill, and Raleigh areas of North Carolina had amazing architecture as well. I learned that Duke and the University of North Carolina, arch college basketball rivals, are across town from each other. Both have BEAUTIFUL campuses.

These images are from the Duke University chapel. Below are the catacombs where a few past university presidents are buried.

On to Cincinnati! We found this set of steps on a trail in the middle of the city.

The skyline of Cincinnati and the Purple People Bridge that connects Ohio and Kentucky.

Following Ohio we headed to Nebraska with a stop near Iowa City. We learned of the Amana Colonies so we went there to walk around and have lunch before driving to St. Paul, NE.

The Amana Colonies are a set of seven villages located near Iowa City.  The villages were built and settled by German Radical Pietists, who were persecuted in their homeland. Calling themselves the True Inspiration Congregations, they first settled in New York near Buffalo in what is now the town of West Seneca. However, seeking more isolated surroundings, they moved to Iowa in 1856. They lived a communal life until 1932.

For eighty years, the Amana Colony maintained an almost completely self-sufficient local economy, importing very little from the industrializing American economy. The Amanians were able to achieve this independence and lifestyle by adhering to the specialized crafting and farming occupations that they had brought with them from Europe. Craftsmen passed their skills and techniques on from one generation to the next. They used hand, horse, wind, and water power, and made their own furniture, clothes, and other goods. The community voted to form a for-profit organization during the Great Depression.

Today, the Seven Villages of Amana are a tourist attraction known for their restaurants and craft shops. The colony was listed as a National Historic Landmark in 1965.

That evening we landed at the farm in St. Paul, NE, following a harrowing thunder/dust storm that prompted tornado warnings as it moved northeast at 65 mph. That is not a typo…65 mph.

On the farm property is a one hundred-plus-year-old farm, the oldest barn in the county. These milk jugs and lanterns were found in this barn.

Our final stop was Denver to visit our daughter, Chelsea, my brother Jonathan and his family, and our good friends the Prows.

We parked a street off of the Santa Fe Arts District and found these windows in the church we parked in front of. I loved them.

That’s it on the buildings keyword. There was so much more to share but in the tradition of keeping this blog short and to the point this is what I have.

Next week is another of my favorite subjects…transportation!

Happy shooting!

 

Art, keywording, Photography, Places to Shoot, Travel, Urban Art

Art along the Way

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There will be a minimum of nine posts in this series. Why nine? Because Lightroom allows me nine keywords that I have put in my “main themes” preset. Last week’s blog is the tenth as it was my introductory post on my keywording system, AND an introduction that we have returned and to expect the stories of the images. So, here we go.

As previously stated I currently have the following keywords in my “main themes” preset: art, buildings, food, music, nature, people, signs, transportation, and urban. Today’s theme is art.

In my first edit, I do a couple of things. I mark poor quality photos with an X to later delete, a P which flags “wow” images for future editing, and assign groups of images with at least one, sometimes more than one,  keyword, usually from my main themes list, for future keywording. In this case, I then pulled up all of the art images to further assign keywords. I typed art into the keyword set box and nine more words came up to make it easy to further identify photos. Those keywords are folk, glass, graffiti, metal, murals, painting, patterns, statues,  and stickers. I’m in the early stages of setting up these presets and as I discover better words to use I adjust the preset.

Another thing I’d like to point out is that I only had three cameras with me, an iPhone 8, a Canon Powershot S120 point and shoot, and a Lumix DX8 micro 4/3 body with my “travel” lens, a 28-300 equivalent. I’ll identify each image with the camera used.

That being said, let’s check out the art!

iPhone 8

When we got blown off the beach at Padre Island National Seashore and headed to Harlingen we had to find a way to fill our three additional days. On our first extra day, we went to South Padre Island, driving through Port Isabelle on the way. SPI as the locals refer to it is the polar opposite of the National Seashore. It is developed and very touristy. Think south Florida. On our way over we stopped to walk around Port Isabelle and found this dolphin sculpture. It turns out they are everywhere. This is Port Isabelle’s public art animal.

As a side note, these two art pieces were also assigned the main themes keyword of animals.

iPhone 8

On SPI you have to walk under this great big turtle to get into a store that sells all things beach.

iPhone 8

We also discovered that, in Walasco, we were about six miles from Progresso, Sonora. Yay! Mexico for a day! This wall, however, was at a restaurant we ate at in Harlingen upon our return.

Canon S120 Powershot

In Houston with my cousin Dave and his spouse Bong, while wandering around downtown, we came upon this musician.

Lumix

We only gave Galveston one day and really enjoyed ourselves wandering around and looking at the old buildings and seaport life. This sculpture was out at the end of a dock near the oil well museum.

Lumix

Oh yes, now we’re in New Orleans. Lots of art here. This cane belongs to our Voodoo Museum tour guide.

Lumix

We were in NOLA for the first French Quarter Music Festival since Covid and there were a lot of art vendors for our enjoyment.

Lumix

We were in Lousiana for three days, on the second day we went out to the Whitney Plantation Museum. It was a sobering experience and is the only plantation in Louisiana that focuses on the lives of the slaves more than the plantation owners. These two statues were outside of a slave house.

Lumix

We found this art exhibit in Dollywood. For me, it was the highlight. As much as we LOVE Dolly Parton we did not love her theme park. Maybe I’m just over theme parks and their fakeness. Oh well, the umbrellas were cool.

We rescued Dollywood day by leaving and heading to Gatlinburg. Evonne had told us that Gatlinburg is a popular place for the folks in Cincinnati to vacation. We began at the visitor center and found a Skyride that takes you to the top of a mountain where you can walk across suspension bridges and take in the views. More on that later. What you get here in the art blog is a sticker on the window of the restaurant we ate at from Hopi Radio!!

iPhone 8

Lumix

We didn’t spend enough time in the Asheville, NC area but I DID manage to find this very cute statue in a neighbor’s yard. I could do a whole post on just art in Asheville.

iPhone 8

in the Hillsborough, NC area these are the two art items that made the cut. The above dog is leaning up against my cousin’s house and below is one of a hundred mosaics, part of a public art project where folks can create a mosaic with the theme of I Love Hillsborough.

iPhone 8

iPhone 8

A shark-headed girl, sitting on a bench, in the lobby of an art museum, in Cincinnati. I loved it.

Lumix

This is a May Pole blowing in the wind in the Amana Colonies of Iowa. We were turned on to this adventure by a friend we were texting with who used to live in Iowa. It’s so great to be able to add last-minute adventures while traveling.

iPhone 8

Now we’re in Denver, our last stop before heading home. The above blanket made of old ski sweaters was found in a thrift store in Iron Springs located in the mountains outside of Denver. They have lovely hot springs there and Colorado Style pizza. More on that later.

iPhone 8

One afternoon we drove down to the Santa Fe Arts District in Denver to wander around and see what art was on display. This is what we found.

iPhone 8

iPhone 8

iPhone 8

iPhone 8

I hope you enjoyed the brief art exhibit of our seven-week journey. Until next week!

Happy shooting!

Adventure, Outdoors, Spring, Travel

Coyote Hawk’s Grand Adventure…and keywording

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We’re BACK! After nearly three months of nearly constant travel Ellen and I have found ourselves at home for a whole month and, I think I’m finally ready to settle down and weed through the images of two major trips. I’ll start with our first one, the seven-week epic tour of the southeast – midwest -and then home to Flagstaff.

I say three months because we left home in our rig on April 1 and returned on May 20, 50 days later. Then, on June 8th we flew to Washington D.C., trained up to New York City, and flew home on June 28th. Now we’re home for a month before heading off to California and Washington State. I’m going to go through the driving trip first.

With nearly 3,500 images to sort through and what seems like as many experiences, I’ve decided to break it down for you via keywords. For those of you who don’t know, keywording is a system photographers use to locate needed images in the future. For example,  in this first set, I’ve assigned the keyword “Coyote Hawk” to each of the images. Then, when I need images of our rig for this trip to write about, I go to the metadata search area in Lightroom, click on April and May, go to the next column, click on Coyote Hawk, and presto! images assigned with these words appear. From that, I can choose the ones to export and upload to the blog!

I recently learned a new trick in Lightroom that has been life-changing. They have keyword PRESETS!! Wait, WHAT?!? You mean I don’t have to type the words in EVERY. SINGLE. TIME?? Excellent, I’m IN!

I created a preset called AA-Main Themes. The AA is just so it shows up at the top, in alphabetical order. It allows me to easily access, at a click,  nine words to assign to images to begin the process of keywording. Here are my nine main themes: buildings, art, food, transportation, urban, signs, nature, people, and music. Most images will get one if not two of these words assigned and I don’t have to take the time to type the words repeatedly, it’s a simple click of the mouse.

That was my aha moment in working with these pics so now let’s move on to the stories of this trip.

As I stated earlier, this first set of images will be about our camper and what became our home away from home, literally. We had taken Coyote Hawk out for about a dozen nights between November 30th when we picked her up and April 1 when we left for Portal, Arizona. We were still working Tuesdays-Fridays so our camps were only two to three nights at a time, every few weeks; hardly enough time to get into a real rhythm.

What happened on this trip in regards to our relationship to our home on wheels is nothing either of us expected. We figured we’d be SO ready to be home after seven solid weeks on the road, but we weren’t. Coyote Hawk came to provide us with such feelings of safety and comfort that we actually preferred staying in her rather than moving into the comforts of the homes of friends and family we visited.

What’s funny is that people, bless their hearts, thought they were doing us a favor by offering for us to stay in their homes. What happened on this trip is that our camper BECAME our home. The bed was comfortable, our stuff all had a place, and we created systems and rhythms with each other to make our little space a literal home on wheels.

Our first three nights were spent in Portal, AZ. It’s a little community located in southeastern Arizona not far from the Mexican border. Our good friends have a lovely piece of land there just east of Chiricahua National Monument. It was a great place to land on our first big driving day in Coyote Hawk. Heading out from Flagstaff was mostly downhill so we got crazy good gas mileage; 22 mpg to be exact.

At camp, we generally need two things: a shower and a toilet to go #2 in. We have a small, nighttime toilet we use to pee in and an outdoor shower if we need it. Luckily these guys let us use their toilet.

After three nights and two days with our beautiful friends, we headed to Texas. We crossed New Mexico on Highway 9, drove through El Paso, and ended up in Junction, Texas, and South Llano River State Park.

We LOVED this park. We wished we had brought our bicycles, as there was some riding to be had. This is also where we got to interact with armadillos for the first time. That will be in a later post.

By April 6th we were heading to Padre Island National Seashore.

It turns out that in Texas one can just drive on any beach and camp. Pretty cool. As you can see we were quite a distance from any other camp. But as you can also see, the winds had picked up the afternoon before, blew hard all night, and blew sand all over our mat. It blew so hard that we moved our truck, in the middle of the night, to face the wind and try to reduce some of the rocking from the gusts. Needless to say, with fine sand blowing everywhere and no relief in sight, we called it after one night and headed to Harlingen.

We were supposed to be in Harlingen for two nights, and one day and that one day was to be spent seeking out Ellen’s childhood home and neighborhood. We instead added our Padre Island time and ended up being there for five nights, four days. We were actually in Walasco, TX staying at Magic Valley Park. It was billed as an RV park but this is what we got, a slab of concrete in some grass, surrounded by mobile homes, 95% of whose residents had just left to go back to Canada. It turned out to be a really nice, safe place to camp. We had laundry facilities, a pool, a hot tub, and a shower and bathroom at our disposal.

Coyote Hawk was also our daily drive. Luckily she was easy to maneuver on city streets. Here she is parked on Ellen’s childhood street.

One of the upgrades we decided our rig needed was to tint the truck’s windows. Wow, what a difference it made with the sun and heat.

From Harlingen, we headed to Houston to stay with cousin Dave and his husband Bong. We easily could have camped in the driveway but were invited into an upstairs room and private bath. It was here that I think we began to realize that staying in the camper is easier and just as, if not more, comfortable for us.

Following Houston, we headed south to spend two nights at a KOA on Galveston Island. It was a KOA Holiday property and had a very country club/resort feel. Not exactly our style. But it worked, was close to the beach, and had laundry, shower, and bathroom facilities, so we were good.

Again we were happy to have a smaller RV as we parked on city streets and meandered through cemeteries in Galveston.

After only two nights and a day to explore Galveston, we headed to Lousiana and Fontainebleau State Park. It. Was. Beautiful. We LOVED it there and again, wished we had bicycles. We spent four nights there, and three days.

On all three days we drove the 25-mile-long causeway over Lake Ponchatrain twice into New Orleans, and once to visit the Whitney Plantation.

From NOLA we headed north into Mississippi to see another of Ellen’s childhood homes in Houston, MS We camped at Davis Lake Campground 20 minutes from Houston. We parked at the town square and wandered around a place where Ellen and her family lived in the late 1960s for 18 months.

The next stop was Henry Horton State Park just south of Nashville, TN. This was another park we loved and wished we had bikes to explore with. We didn’t bring the bikes as we didn’t want them hanging off the back, ripe for theft, as we visited the cities on our trip. Stay tuned and you’ll see what we came up with.

We stayed here for two nights and a day. We’ve decided that, when possible, a layover day is a must. It’d be a shame to pull into such a beautiful park in the afternoon only to have to pull up stakes and head out first thing in the morning.

THIS two-night, one-day experience was all about Dollywood! We stayed at The Ridge Resort in Sevierville, Dolly Pardon’s hometown. The RV park had a LOT of concrete, very manicured lawns, twice-daily trash pick-up (I’m serious), and giant bus-sized RVs surrounding us. We felt like we used to after canoe camping at Lake Powell and paddling over to the restaurant for a meal and mixing with all the clean houseboaters. We were a bit out of our league.

Following Tennessee, we headed to our friend’s house in Weaverville, NC, just outside of Asheville, NC. No pics were taken of this camp as we parked in an out-of-town neighbor’s driveway and stayed in our friend’s house. It was a lovely time hanging out with Trish, Paul, and the pooches.

Here we are in Hillsborough, NC at my cousin Wendy’s home. This is her barn and that window on the second floor? that’s our little one-bedroom apartment. It was a lovely private space and we SO appreciated being offered to stay there, which we did, but, as I stated earlier when we visit again, we’ll just stay in the Hawk.

From North Carolina, we went through five states to get to Cincinnati, OH, and visit our beautiful family of Evonne, Rob, and Akacia. We camped 20 minutes away in Winton Woods Campground. It was a wonderful five days, six nights with family.

From Cincinnati, we traveled to Sugar Bottom Campground just outside of Iowa City, IA. We met the most lovely people there but oh my God it was hot and humid. That was a two-night, one-day layover on our way to Nebraska.

In Nebraska, we stayed at the  Puncochar Family Farm. It has been in the same family for over 100 years. Yes, we parked next to a dumpster, but it’s full of building supplies as the house out of sight to the right of the truck is being renovated. We drove to the farm on Thursday, May 12th, stayed Friday, Saturday and  headed to Denver on Sunday.

In Denver, we stayed in the basement of my brother’s home. There was no other option. The above picture reinforces for us how well we chose the size of our rig. We were able to park in downtown Denver without a problem.

This post kicks off the blog series that will tell the stories of all those images posted to Facebook in April and May of our epic spring adventure. Thanks for tuning in and I hope you enjoy revisiting the adventure!

Adventure, Family, Places to Shoot, pop-up camping, Travel

Coyote Hawk’s Big Adventure

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April 2nd is one week away. That’s when Coyote Hawk takes us on our epic journey South to Portal, AZ to visit good friends then East on Interstate 10 all the way to New Orleans, visiting friends and family along the way. From there we’ll head North to Cincinnati before jumping on Interstate 80 and heading back home, again, visiting friends and family along the way. Keep on the lookout as I will post on this blog our adventures and discoveries along the way.

Let’s begin with a camper tour:

In the above image, you see the driver’s side of the camper. The bench my feet are on as well as the one I’m sitting on provides us with a lot of storage. This is good as we’ll need to bring clothing for 85 degrees and humidity in south texas as well as potential late spring blizzards along I-80.

The counter has a two-burner stove, a sink, and a small counter space. The drawer on the left holds our utensils and the cabinet below that is for our pots, pans, and dishes. Below that are the batteries and the other cabinet doors are the water pump and fuses.

On this side is the refrigerator with stickers on it. Above that is a shallow space for personal items. To the right of that is our pantry. Below that is a double-door cabinet for ellen’s clothes and below that is a similar cabinet for our shoes. The bed pulls out over the table to make it King-Size. We have to push it back each morning to access the table.

We’ve now spent 12 nights in her. Ellen has been it her 16 nights as she took her camping while I was in Florida on a photo workshop.

We’ve had her off-grid at White Tank Mountain Park, Lake Pleasant Regional Park, and McDowell Mountain Regional Park, all in the Maricopa county park system in the Phoenix area. We fill up the 20-gallon fresh water tank, run the hot water heater that holds six gallons and get our electricity from our solar panels.

We hooked her up to shore power once, at Patagonia Lake State Park in Southern Arizona, over Christmas last year. We also experimented with city water, bypassing the 20-gallon tank. Both systems worked great. Sadly, though, we did not blow out the outdoor shower well enough and ended up with a leak in the brass faucet system. Four-Wheel Camper sent us a replacement and it was just installed.

The other item we recently fixed, with the help of our brilliant friend Rod Horn, was the after-market backup camera. Ours disappeared when we took off the tailgate. Rod machined a bracket that goes over the license plate and he was able to attach the backup camera to it.  Works like a charm.

Coyote Hawk will get her first oil change on March 30th. Other than that, we should be ready to roll on April 2nd. For this trip, we decided to leave behind bikes and paddleboards as we will be spending a lot of time with friends, family and in cities,  visiting museums. We have menus ready to go and will spend the day or two before we leave grocery shopping and packing any last-minute items. We have lists and lists of lists.

Our mail is taken care of, our neighbors are watching the place and watering our plants. We don’t have any pets. I think we’re set!

I’m not sure what this Epic Adventure Blog is going to look like exactly so be patient and let’s see how it turns out together, shall we?

Thanks for reading!

 

AHPS, Animals, Animals, Arizona Highways PhotoScapes, Nature, Outdoors, Photo Workshops, Photography, Places to Shoot, Travel, Water

Birds of South Florida with Arizona Highways PhotoScapes

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The workshop, Birds of South Florida with photographer Beth Ruggiero-York and Arizona Highways PhotoScapes, was nothing short of amazing. It ran from February 6-12, 2022, and began in Fort Meyers, Florida on the Gulf Coast. We made our way south, through Everglades National Park,  ending on the Atlantic Coast at Boynton Beach. Here are the images from that epic journey.

This is a rough itinerary of our photographic locations should you ever find yourself in South  Florida with a camera. Speaking of cameras, all images were shot with a Lumix DX-8 and most with my 100-400 mm lens.

My adventure began with trying to GET to Florida. I was supposed to leave Flagstaff on Friday, February 4th, and arrive in Florida that evening. However, recent winter storms provided me with an alternate plan. Between cancelations, delays, hotel stays, and changing airlines  I eventually left Flagstaff Friday evening and arrived in Fort Meyers Sunday around 10:00. The workshop was scheduled to begin at 3:00 that day so I had time to Uber it to the hotel, grab a quick nap, and meet our participants right on time!

The adventure continued when we left the hotel lobby on Sunday afternoon for our first shoot at Naples Pier. We were scheduled for a 30-seat minibus to take us around for the week but walked out to a full-size motor coach that was FAR too large to access some of the parking lots on the schedule. We took it to the pier for lack of a better option. However, following that first shoot we dropped our people off, had the bus driver take us back to the airport where Ron York, Beth’s husband, the other photo guide, had secured us three premium SUVs. Beth, Ron, and I became the bus drivers for the week. Whew! Crisis averted.

Naples pier was a nice way to begin the workshop and just get out and warm up the old camera. On Sundays, however, the powers that be do not allow fishing, Wait, WHAT?!? No fishing means way fewer birds. Hmmm. We wandered around the end of the pier when someone spotted a few egrets on the roof of the building. YAY! Birds! Again, crisis averted. I only took my 100-400 mm lens out on the pier. We all lined up, aimed our canons, and photographed these characters.

This Ruddy Turnstone was wandering the pier. I hadn’t noticed he had lost a foot until I downloaded the image.

More Ruddy Turnstones squawking out below the railings along the pier.

The first official day Beth had us up early and driving out to Cape Coral to photograph the neighborhood Burrowing Owls. They had set up shop between the fences to a set of baseball fields and a street. The houses on that street face the owls. So there we were, lined up and waiting for the little guys to wake up and come out and say hi. 

They blend in remarkably well. The owls throw themselves a festival every year. Apparently, they have been living here for quite a few years.

I found this Loggerhead Shrike hanging out on a post.

After leaving the Burrowing Owl neighborhood we headed to Sanibel island stopping at Pond Apple Park, a set of ponds that attract birds, on the way to Ding Darling Wildlife Refuge. We parked in the Matzaluna Italian Restaurant parking lot. The trail entrance is out by the road. The park is about 40 acres and is a place to definitely spend some time.

This Wood Stork was showing off her new pedicure.

If you can look past the birds there are some pretty cool plants in Florida as well.

The White Ibis. As common in Florida as pigeons.

Next, we went to the Ding Darling Wildlife Refuge which is part of the largest undeveloped mangrove ecosystem in the United States.  It is world-famous for spectacular migratory bird populations.

The refuge was created to safeguard and enhance the pristine wildlife habitat of Sanibel Island, protect endangered and threatened species, and provide feeding, nesting, and roosting areas for migratory birds. Today, the refuge provides important habitat to over 245 species of birds.

We took the four-mile Wildlife Drive, stopping along the way to photograph birds. These were all shot with my long lens.

Florida Pigeion (White Ibis)

Roseate Spoonbill, a crowd favorite.

A fishing Tri-Colored Heron.

Monday was one of our longes days because next, we head south to Everglades City for lunch at a food truck and a photography boat tour out among the mangroves.

Everglades City is at the mouth of the Barron River, on Chokoloskee Bay. The Bay is approximately ten miles long and 2 miles wide. It is separated from the Gulf of Mexico by the northern end of the Ten Thousand Islands.

This was our lunch spot. See the green umbrellas behind the building? We ate at those tables. At this point, I believe we were either in or at least at the edge of Everglades National Park.

We then divided into three groups, loaded three different boats, and headed out in three different directions so as to not be in each other’s way for pictures.

A couple of baby mangroves taking root.

Our captain showed us an Osprey nest, a Bald Eagle nest, a shell island built by Native People over hundreds of years, and a spit of land that housed these White Pelicans. They were chillin’ on the beach until we floated a little too close. They then got into formation, except for the one guy, and tried to march but had nowhere to go. We motored back away from them and everyone mellowed out.

We toured an area full of islands like this. We had a regular prop boat, not an airboat like they use in the thick of the Everglades. All three boats met up at sundown at one particular island where many birds go to roost for the evening. It was quite a sight.

Tuesday morning we started off at Big Cypress Boardwalk. This was in Everglades National Park. Boardwalks are a common way to have trails in the park due to the massive amounts of water. I was also glad to be above any potential reptile run-ins. This was a short walk through a very dense, watery jungle that ended at a more open pond.

The pond had a few smaller birds (as seen above) as well as several Heron and a Wood Stork.

AND! An alligator.

Woody Woodpecker made an appearance on our way back to the vehicles. We heard him for most of the trek in so when he finally made himself seen everyone was quite excited.

Our final stop of the day before heading to our new hotel in Homestead, FL was an area of the park called Shark Valley.

Shark Valley is a geological depression at the head of the Shark River Slough located along the Tamiami Trail (US 41).  Shark Valley empties into Shark River in the Ten Thousand Islands of Monroe County. The Valley characteristically includes sawgrass prairie that floods during the rainy season, hence the name “river of grass”—Pa-Hay-Okee, from the Mikasuki language—for such marshes in the Everglades. We will walk the Pa-Hay-Okee trail tomorrow .

Wildlife seen in Shark Valley includes alligators, ibis, wood storks, roseate spoonbills, raccoons, white-tailed deer, and various amphibians. Here’s some of what I saw:

This guy landed on the railing right near us. He looked like he was on a serious mission. The trail we were on was paved and followed a ten-foot-wide “canal” on one side that continued into a deep jungle on the other side of the canal. The opposite side of the path was dense jungle. The sun was out and this was by far the warmest and most humid day we would encounter. coming from the cold winter at 7,000 feet in Flagstaff? I loved it.

These little guys attracted a crowd. They were literally at our feet in the weeds. Just across the way was mama. She never seemed too concerned, luckily.

 

A goofy-looking Anhinga.

Two different types of turtles, one on the stick and one just below it in the water.

This Anhinga was swimming underwater like a snake. He’d come up for air and usually had a little fish in its bill. It was such a great place to shoot because you could follow his path on the footpath. The canal was narrow enough that the animals were never too far away.

I walked with just a sling and my 100-400 mm lens which made it easy and maneuverable.

What a difference 24 hours makes. We went from the sunniest day to the rainiest day in that amount of time. Wednesday morning found us at Pa-Hay-Okee Trail. A boardwalk through the everglades. Though it was beautiful, this was not my favorite place to shoot but only because I really don’t consider myself to be a landscape photographer. So I focussed on other things.

Sunrise was beautiful.

The most difficult thing to get used to in Florida is the flatness. There are no landmarks to help keep your sense of direction intact and on really cloudy days you don’t even know where the sun is.

The boardwalks were super cool. Even if I wasn’t super inspired to shoot I was really glad just to be there and enjoy the magic that is the Everglades.

Following this trail, we headed back to town for breakfast. It was really wet so as a way to see something cool but not necessarily stand in the rain with our camera gear we went to the Robert is Here Fruit Stand and Farm.

Robert Is Here is a family-owned and operated fruit stand in Homestead, Florida. They specialize in rare & exotic fruits and vegetables, mostly grown right there on the farm.  The location started off as a literal side of the road Fruit Stand and has grown into a complete tourist destination equipped with an animal farm, play area, and picnic tables. It was a pretty cool way to spend an hour and let the rain dry up if only a little.

You could also purchase chocolate or gummy alligators.

Read the sign to the left of the coconut carvings to see what they actually are.

They also had quite the collection of old tractors.

From there we were off to  Anhinga Trail

There weren’t as many birds here as in other locations. We chalked that up to the rain.

This Purple Gallinule has some BIG feet! He uses them to run across the tops of the lilypads. In sunlight, he is VERY iridescent. But seriously, those FEET!

Hanging out in the rain.

From here we headed to Flamingo, FL. This was one of my favorite places to shoot. There was so much going on here. Between the raindrops, we saw a crocodile (not an alligator ), a nesting osprey, and manatees. We also grabbed lunch here at another food truck. Restaurants in the Everglades are hard to come by.

There was a marina here in Flamingo. Also, an old pier.

The manatees were drinking drips coming off the floating dock.

Our final stop of the day was Mahogany Hammock Trail, another boardwalk. A Hammock is hard to explain but I’ll try.

A hardwood hammock is a dense stand of broad-leafed trees that grow on a natural rise of only a few inches in elevation. Hammocks can be found nestled in most all other Everglades ecosystems. In the deeper sloughs and marshes, the seasonal flow of water helps give these hammocks a distinct aerial teardrop shape. 

On Thursday morning we drove from Homestead to Boynton Beach, FL. Our afternoon shoot was at the  Wakodahatchee Wetlands. The Wetlands are constructed on 50 acres of wastewater utility property.  Wakodahatchee features a three-quarter mile boardwalk that crosses between open water pond areas and islands with shrubs and snags to foster nesting and roosting. This site is part of the South section of the Great Florida Birding Trail. Over 178 bird species have been identified there, along with turtles, alligators, rabbits, fish, frogs, and raccoons.
Each day, the Southern Region Water Reclamation Facility pumps approximately two million gallons of highly treated wastewater into the Wakodahatchee Wetlands, which in turn acts as a percolation pond, returning billions of gallons of freshwater back into the water table.

We photographed this area for about three hours each Thursday evening and Friday morning. It was so great to experience the difference between evening bird activity and morning bird activity. Watching

Apparently the week before, these guys were falling out of trees it was so cold.

There was a LOT of nesting and courtship activity.

Baby Great Blue Herons!! They are definitely ugly cute. They were the only babies I saw. The rest were in preparation.

We ended the workshop at Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. What a beautiful place. I can’t wait to go back with my bike and bike some of the trails. They also have a canoe trail I’d love to explore.

There is a trail behind the visitor center, a boardwalk trail, that goes through a deep, dark cypress grove.

Once we left there we headed out to the end of the road and found this:

This dock saw plenty of action. Just to the left of it is the Great Blue Heron. Somewhere below is the alligator waiting for the fisherman to catch something he can steal. And in the distance flew flocks of birds heading across the setting sun to their roosting place.

I chatted with a lady who had been out kayaking. She and her friend took the wrong channel and ended up out where they should not have been. The channel closed up and when she got out to move her boat along she realized she was a foot or two from an alligator. Yikes! Glad they made it back safely!

Wow, that was a long post. It was a spectacular trip. Keep p in mind that these pictures are only the tip of the iceberg. I came home with over 4,000 images. I have since edited them down to just over 1,000 but still, these only tell part of the story.

I highly recommend this workshop and I think it will be offered again in 2023 so look for it on the Arizona Highways PhotoScapes website.

I hope you enjoyed my trip to Florida, thanks for looking.

Happy Shooting!

 

 

 

AHPS, Animals, Animals, Arizona Highways PhotoScapes, Nature, Photo Workshops, Places to Shoot, Shooting Close to Home

Shoot at the Zoo with AZ Highways PhotoScapes

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On March 5th this year I joined photographer Amy Horn and Arizona Highways PhotoScapes for a day of shooting at the Wildlife World Zoo in Litchfield, a town just west of Phoenix. It’s a spectacular way to wander around a relatively small zoo and practice your photographic skills. I brought with me only one camera body and lens. I shot with my Lumix DX-8 and Olympus 100-400 mm zoom lens, which equates to a 200-800. At times this was a little too much lens but 98% of the time it was perfect.

One of the skills we learned was how to shoot through a fence and make that fencing disappear. If not entirely, then at least mostly. The following images are my attempts to create such magic.

The fence in this image is so blurred it almost appears as part of the background.

This lioness was watching the day go by behind a chainlink fence.

All the animals were quite active on that day. We’re assuming due to a cool front moving through the state.

“Pumba, you ARE a pig”. The warthogs were also behind a fence. Again, the fence is so blurred it’s barely noticeable.

The following set of pictures, by contrast, were of animals NOT behind any sort of fence. Wait, let me clarify, they were behind enclosures, but I could photograph them without shooting through a fence of any kind.

This crane image was captured on the safari tram through Africa. I was able to use Lightroom to grab the background, take down the exposure to make it appear as shade, and highlight her (his?) beauty.

This little guy was on a monkey island across some water. He was going to town on a piece of tree. His little old man expressions were super cute.

Again from the Safari Tram ride, we saw this gazelle.

Zombie Flamingo Appocolypse?

Heading into Dragon World we passed the slow-moving tortoises to see some, well, dragons.

You can see the fence that this ostrich was behind. He (she?) was pretty close. Apparently, the ostrich is not the sharpest tool in the shed. They do, however, provide for some great facial expressions.

Moving on to the duck pond where there was a LOT of activity.

Egyptian Geese.

A pair of wood ducks with her in full mating regalia. I caught them just before they, well, YOU know, they tried making baby ducks. I hope they were successful.

A beautiful  Red-Crested Pochard looking for a mate.

A very colorful Mandarin Duck strutting his stuff.

There were even a couple of majestic black swans.

…and a turtle.

We were treated to a private animal showing where we could shoot first and ask questions later.

This character, a red-legged seriema, took this fake snake in its mouth, stood up as tall as he could go, and slammed the snake to the ground. So there.

We were presented with a Kookaburra bird and were able to practice the camera settings for flight.

Macaws close up are always nifty.

We then moved on to other animals. Turns out we were helping the next couple of mammals out with their “sessions”. Which apparently, means getting them ready to come out in public and not be terrified.

This little guy was a character. He’d come out, then run back. He did this quite a bit. Then one of the handlers figured out how to bring him out farther. He’s trained to do circles around their feet for a treat. So, she’d take a step as the little guy was rounding the back of her foot, and slowly, he made it out beyond the stage.

This one always makes me nervous. But he (she?) performed wonderfully. He came out in front of the stage and was quite well behaved, keeping all parts of himself…TO himself.

Following the show, we wandered off to Australia for a walk-about. We encountered a mama kangaroo whose little one had just crawled back inside the pouch. A couple of the participants had more patience than I did and waited for the baby to come back out. I can’t wait to see THOSE images!

It was cool watching them jump and use their tales for balance. They are VERY strong animals.

All-in-all it was a great day of photography and instruction. The temperatures were perfect if not a little cool at times but that meant the animals were active, which makes it more fun when you have a camera. I encourage you to join PhotoScapes next year for this workshop or if you need inspiration just get out to your local zoo and see what you can find.

Happy Shooting!

Architecture, Family, Gear, People, Places to Shoot, Travel, Urban Art

A Smart Phone Works…

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Let me say right up front that I am a minimalist in life, meaning I live by the “Less is More” motto, and am a photojournalist at heart. It was my major in college which fit as I began documenting my life, in pictures, at an early age.

With that in mind, I’ve heard it said that the best camera you own is the one you have with you or the one you actually use. For example, if I own a heavy full-frame camera with equally heavy lenses but do most of my shooting with my smartphone because of the weight, then, in my opinion, my best camera is the phone camera. This theory brought me to minimalism in photography. I reduced my gear down from the Canon line to the mirrorless Lumix brand. It serves me well and more often than not I take a lens attached to a camera body attached to a sling and go out shooting for the day. In my pockets, I have an extra battery and a lens cleaning cloth. No pack full of extra lenses, and all the gear that might distract me. I also have just quit bringing a tripod as it always seemed to be an exercise in futility, I NEVER used it.

You now know enough for me to get to the actual subject of this blog…photographing San Francisco with an iPhone 8.

Last summer, August 2021 to be exact, we finally made it to Northern California to see the family after a two-year Covid hiatus. The family lives in Marin County, north of the Golden Gate Bridge. One day a group of us decided to take the ferry to the City then spend the day hopping on and off cable cars. I was torn as to whether I would capture this adventure in a “real” camera or “live it” and just go with grab shots with the iPhone. I chose to live it. Here are some of my images:

This is the crew we went with: my mom, step-dad, sister-in-law, and her two kids, granddaughter, nephew, and my cousin’s kid. It was a formidable team.

We spent most of the day in Chinatown where I found some amazing murals.

My wife, Ellen, and I with our granddaughter. It was her first trip to see the family in eight years.

I love wondering unfamiliar cities and finding treasures like this parking garage entrance.

We HAD to stop by the fortune cookie factory!

We grabbed lunch inside this giant mall and did some quick shopping.

Our two youngest team members were SUCH troopers.

After lunch, we boarded the trolly and headed to Fisherman’s Wharf where we ended the day. From there we walked back to the Ferry Building and headed home.  

Our crew hanging off the trolly as we pass one going in the opposite direction. You can see the Bay in the distance.

I wasn’t preoccupied with photo gear and was able to be present and spend a glorious day with my family while still documenting the day. And it was a single-lens iPhone 8! Not even the fancy three-lens 13 (or whatever generation they are on to).

Have a great time on your next family adventure and remember, it’s okay to live it. 😉

Happy Shooting!

Adventure, pop-up camping, Travel

Introducing…Coyote Hawk

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We finally did it! My wife, Ellen, and I took the plunge back in March and ordered a truck and camper. We ordered a Ford F150, 5L Coyote engine, 4×4, extended cab on the same day we ordered a Four Wheel Camper Hawk front dinette model. The new rig has hot water, a furnace, a king-size bed, solar, a fridge, and what seems to be plenty of room for our kitchen and clothing needs. In the cab, we store items not necessarily needed in the camper like binoculars, bike bags, a tire pump, paddleboards, a slackline, guitar, etc. We’ll have a swing-away bike rack on the back.  The truck can hold 2,300 pounds in the bed and the Hawk only weighs 1,300 pounds coming out of the dealer with our add-ons.

We drove to Rancho Cucamonga in southern California on November 29th, spent the night, and got her installed the next day. We drove home immediately afterward and went to sleep. All of this, coming off the heels of a six-day round trip drive to Cinncinati, then thanksgiving with family, then a day of rest before hauling off to California…we were exhausted.

We both had Wednesday off and spent the day getting her ready for our first overnight. In the driveway. With heat. Did I mention it has a furnace? Seriously, a game-changer. As is the ability to get out of the elements and stand up! Or sit at the little table.

Driving with the ability to reduce our profile was important to us. As well as having a small, compact rig that is relatively easy to maneuver in parking lots, gas stations and on forest service roads. Here she is, basking in the palms of Barstow on the way home,  in travel mode.

Our only goal on Wednesday was to get her ready to sleep, then wake up in the morning and be able to have tea and coffee. Ellen filled the two ten-gallon propane tanks, we made the bed and made sure the heat and stove worked, and slept in the driveway. Here’s an interior image of me sitting with the dinette area turned into a couch. The bed slides out over the table to become a king. We plugged into shore power, turned on the heat, went to sleep, and woke up in the morning after a night of neighborhood catfights. Not quite as soothing as coyotes howling in the distance.

We then turned on our hotpot that was plugged into the outlet (only on shore power) and heated our water.

The interior, popped up, has plenty of headroom. So far our tallest friends fit!

So there, you’ve now been introduced to Coyote Hawk. We hope to see you on the road and if not, at least you can follow her adventures, and OURS, in this blog.

Cheers! Happy Trails! and Happy Shooting! No, not guns…cameras!! Lol.

Animals, Animals, Collections, Gear, Nature, Outdoors, Shooting at Home, Spring

New Birding Lens

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I recently purchased a new lens for my Lumix GX-8 micro 4/3 camera body. It’s an Olympus 100-400 mm zoom which translates to a 200-800 mm given the crop sensor on my camera. It. Is. Amazing.

The images are sharp, it’s not too heavy to lug around for 2-3 hours and it hangs nicely on my sling so my hands don’t cramp holding it while not in use.

Here are some recent images from my first outing with it. These were all shot at a local wetland near where I live south of Flagstaff, AZ.

I can now officially consider myself a Bird Nerd! It is SO MUCH FUN collecting images then going home and identifying them with the app Seek. I pull up the app and point my phone camera at the image on my computer and it does a great job of identifying the birds. It works with animals, plants, and insects as well.

I wasn’t sure what this little guy was so I posted it on FaceBook and asked the birding community to identify. They were quick! It’s a vesper sparrow.

Catching them in flight is challenging. I set the camera at 400-800 ISO, in full sunlight which gives me a shutter speed between 2,000 and 6,000.

Perched birds are easier but you still have to be quick. They don’t always hang out for a photo! This is a red-winged blackbird.

Coming in for a landing!!

I’ve seen as many as four ospreys hunting the ponds of these wetlands.

This looks like a shorebird to me. It’s a killdeer. On another day I caught one with a worm in its mouth!

They are so dramatic when they sing!

The first goslings of the season!

This one was tough to capture. It didn’t hang out for long so I had to be quick. Luckily, with the length of the lens, I don’t have to get too close and the birds tend to not skitter away quite as quickly as when I tried to capture images of them with my 28-300 mm lens.

Turns out it’s also a reptile lens!

Set your camera to burst mode, hold down the shutter, and expect to trash a LOT of images. In my first two-hour outing I think I took over 800 images. I tossed probably 700 of them.

Every time I’ve been to the wetlands I see a new bird or capture a bird in a different way. Also, as I get better, I find myself giving permission to toss previous images of the same bird. Don’t forget, pixels are free. Load up those memory cards and only keep the exceptional ones. The first ones may not be exceptional but with practice, they will come!

Happy Shooting!

Adventure, AHPS, Arizona Highways PhotoScapes, Outdoors, People, Photo Workshops, Photography, Places to Shoot, Travel, Water

Surfing, Central Coast, California

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I was on an Arizona Highways PhotoScapes Women’s Retreat in mid-April and had an amazing time shooting along the Central Coast of California. We were based out of Morro Bay.

There were so many great photo opportunities that I decided to break down the trip into sections. The first one is one of my favorite things to photograph…surfing. What a difficult sport. Like anything, it takes such dedication to be any good at it.

Let’s begin with something I’ve never seen before…remote control SURFING!!

His board was probably a foot long and the controller was standing in the surf, just off the pier, having him surf the smaller waves. I must say, he was pretty good!

Now, on to the dedication part. The temps were in the high 40’s each morning. These guys were decked in full, hooded wetsuits WITH booties. No thank you. Too cold for this lover of oceans.

Even in Cayucos, near the pier, in the afternoon temps of mid-60’s, full wetsuits, booties and hoods were the norm.

We ended up in Cayucos, north of Morro Bay, for our afternoon/sunset shooting location. Photographing surfers from the pier was great fun. I shot all of these images with my Lumix GX-8 and 14-150 mm (28-300 mm with a crop sensor) setu-up.

High shutter speed is a must. Photographing the wipe-outs was just as fun as a good run!

There was a lone stand up paddle board surfer.

It seemed to me that catching waves was easier for him as he was already up on the board and used his paddle to drop in.

Once there he just had to balance and not let go of his paddle.

Paddleing out seemed to have its challenges though. He had the paddle to occupy one hand and a board to occupy the other as he crashed through the waves to get out for another set. It all looked very exhausting.

Most of the surfers were on longboards and these two guys were all about walking out to the end of their boards and “Hanging Ten”.

There were a couple of young guys out on their short boards working the waves.

These two joined the mix late in the afternoon. They seriously looked like synchronized swimmers heading out on their boards with pointed toes at the ends of legs that were moving up and down in a rhythmic kicking motion timed to their arm strokes. The boys became less focussed once these two showed up. 😉

At the end of a session, walking out of the surf on a lonely beach shows the potential solitude of surfing.

This was new to me. Covering a board before loading it up after a morning in the water.

Back in Cayucos, the sun setting and a lone surfer calling it a day.

I decided to put these end of the day, sunset images into black and white. I really like how they turned out.

Check out the Arizona Highways PhotoScapes site for information on our upcoming Women’s Retreats and co-ed workshops. It’s shaping up to be a busy workshop year! AHPS.org 

Happy Shooting!

Life's Adventures…