Looking down...

We were on the road at 4:45 this morning, heading north to Snohomish County for a day of exploring and hiking and geocaching. We walked along the slough trails on Spencer Island and saw a family of river otters, and chatted with a man and his dog who were out for a morning walk. The man had a tripod and a huge wildlife lens on a Nikon camera, but hadn't seen anything more exciting that a lone heron.

We spent the rest of the day driving deeper and deeper into the mountains above Darrington, rewarded from time to time with a creek or river crossing, the occasional deer, and even more infrequent car or truck.

There was a cache near a bridge over a narrow granite canyon, and looking over the edge at a pair of waterfalls, I was looking straight down at the top of a fir tree that grew on a rocky ledge far below.  Without leaning way out over the railing and holding on tight, I never would have known that this was a single tree, and it was the top I was seeing, not just some branches.

Not the usual sort of lone tree I look for, and a good reminder to never take any view for granted, to always look closer.

Walk in the woods...

Finding the unexpected in the woods... one of the reasons I love hiking. Nature is spectacular, no matter the weather, or time of year, sun or rain.

In this beautiful wooded hillside, someone thought Mother Nature needed some bling...

Bug in the woods...

For quite a while now, I've wanted to explore the Danville-Georgetown open space park, and pick up the many geocaches there. It's a few hundred acres, named for one of the coal mining towns that used to be there (Georgetown), and the railroad that serviced the area. It's a popular place for horseback riding, which is evident by the parking "lot:" a quarter-mile long extra-wide strip along the road, perfect for horse trailer parking. Today there were nine trailers there. As I headed off down the trail, I wasn't thinking about caching... I was thinking that if I still had horses, I'd be hauling out here to ride these trails.

In spite of all the horse trailers, I had the trail to myself. I found my cache, and also a rusty red VW beetle in the woods... and I wanted to walk further than I had time for.

It seems to happen way too often. And I say "next time" way too often. I'll have to work on that.

Chaos...

This morning it hailed, twice. It got thicker and thicker, until it looked like a river of ice falling from the sky. I scooped up Madison and took her to the window to see; it's probably her first hailstorm. I went outside for a closer look (leaving Madison inside), and turning 360 degrees I could see a band of blue sky all around the horizon. The thick clouds made a bowl above our heads most of the day.

Only one thing to do... go take a walk on the Lake Youngs trail. We made it a fast walk; it's turned cold and threatens to rain again.

While Dave roamed the woods looking for a geocache, I just stood and looked at the woods. There's something so wonderfully chaotic about woods in the Northwest. It can be tough to find a point of interest, so sometimes I just like to aim and shoot and capture all the amazing variety of it all.

Secrets shared...

My current favorite local park has become my new favorite place to go wander with my camera. It's an open space that surrounds a small lake, and it's a great place to stretch my legs. The park is full of native trees... towering firs and hemlocks, massive cedars, maples and alders, vine maples, and spiky hawthorns.

Because I live nearby, and drove past this acreage for years before the city started buying the land, I know where the farmhouses and barns once stood. So I understand the reason why there are so many pockets of non-native trees: the oaks, the fruit trees, the camellias and other ornamental shrubs that once surrounded farmhouses and barns.

The knowledge is like a secret I share with the land. I like that.

Open space...

One thing I love about geocaching... the search for caches has taken me to a lot of really cool places. A couple of weeks ago, we discovered a new county open space park near our house. We went back again today for another cache; there are eight of them here. This wooded open space lies near a couple of beautiful lakes, on land that was once riddled with coal mines. I'm looking forward to better weather, so we can go hiking here.

Morning glow...

The ground in this corner of the park is carpeted with oak leaves that finally fell off the trees. I scuffed my way through piles of uninspiring light brown leaves, and this one leaf glowed in the pale sunlight.

Nursery tree...

Sometimes I pull out my camera and pretend to be taking pictures, to hide that we're actually looking for a geocache. Today as we walked off the trail down toward the Cedar River, my camera came out with no conscious thought at all. The huge multi-trunked maple tree had colonies of ferns all over it, growing from the horizontal places, and from mossy patches on the trunks. The ferns absolutely glowed in the late afternoon light.

Red...

Up early to make a pot of tea, then went downstairs with my book to spend time with Murphy. Once the rest of the house was up and packing and making plans, we took my bright red MX-5 for an emissions test. It doesn't usually get to go out in the rain, but in spite of that, we still managed to make most of the drive with the top down.

Once we were out, we didn't want to go back home. Dave suggested lunch, and we considered The Mint, but decided to take the back roads to Maple Valley, and have a late lunch at Testy Chef instead.

When we got home, the kids were engrossed in a movie. I finished my book, then took my camera out to look for fall foliage. The dark rainy day did wonders for the bright red and gold leaves.

When I was good and chilled, I came in for warm clothes, then curled up with the laptop to search for free typefaces that look like handwriting. I'm looking for something that mimics my own writing, to use for my E|J logo on photos. I haven't found the perfect one yet, but have found a lot of fun typefaces to try out.

Homeward...

Today, we head for home... really! We retraced our steps to check out the much-anticipated antique shop, but it was closed. I suspect the owner was the man out on the John Deere tractor, sweeping freshly cut hay into rows.

I wrote in  my journal as we drove, wincing a bit with my sliced index finger. I suspect there's still a bit of blackberry thorn deep in the cut. There are lists to make... things to do and look up, books to reserve at the library, photographs to edit. Thinking of all the beautiful places we've seen, and days to write about. And photography skills to work on, like sunsets. How to get more color from the sky, more true-to-life color. And reflections. I hope there are places near home where I can get near the water's edge without wading (or swimming). And I'll look for more vantage points for sunrises and sunsets; ours always seem to be the best during the winter months.

My focus the past month hasn't been on E|J or even reading friends' blogs, so I read some of my favorites as we drove, and thought about changes to make to E|J for 2016. I wonder if I can do a daily post next year?

Chasing Aspens...

We headed out early this morning with one goal: search out the best fall colors we can find. When we went to Telluride a few days ago, the aspens were starting to turn from yellow to orange, so decided to head in that direction again. When we turned west out of Ridgway, the morning light was just reaching the top of the San Juan mountains, ready to spill light down the valleys. We couldn't have had better timing.

We joined a bunch of other photographers at a wide pullout, each ready with tripod and some with huge telephoto lenses. I'd have preferred a wide angle landscape lens; maybe when I get home I'll invest in one. But my 18-250mm Sigma lens plus polarizer is great for this kind of light and bright landscape.

We stumbled upon Last Dollar Road by accident; it was a good parking spot to photograph a hillside with a rustic wood fence in the foreground. When we decided to drive up the road just a ways, to see what was back there, we struck photographic gold.

It's miles and miles of dirt road through broad parkland with creeks and grazing cattle, old homesteads, and the occasional cluster of ranch buildings. We forded creeks more times than I can count, and the road got steep and rutted and a bit dicey in places. It's not for the faint of heart, or those without four-wheel drive. I was glad to be in the Tundra.

We leap-frogged with a group out for a photo tour, and when they stopped to walk through this old and twisty stand of aspens, we joined them. These trees were huge... for scale, check out DW on the hillside taking a picture.

The more we drove, the more beautiful the mountains and rivers of aspen trees, flowing down the ravines. And as we climbed, the colors deepened from gold to orange, copper to burgundy.

I could have spent all day here. As it was, we were out on the back roads more than six hours, just chasing aspens.

There are more aspen photographs to come.

Barred, or Spotted?

We hiked through Cedar Creek Park again today, and this beauty flew across the trail in front of us, and landed on a nearby tree.

I don't know my owls, and aren't sure whether this one is a Barred owl, or the more uncommon Spotted owl. I do know that he (she?) was very curious about us, especially when I started hooting at him. Each time I tried to imitate his call, he'd swivel his head around and stare at me.

It was dark in the woods, and I had trouble getting pictures in focus. These turned out the best.

Smoke

The boys headed for Alaska this morning for a few days of salmon fishing. I headed east, to visit friends who just moved to Lake Wenatchee. It was a fun, relaxing weekend with good friends and lots of good food and wine.

Early Saturday morning, the smoke rolled over the ridge and into the valley. It's a grim reminder of the many forest and range fires that are burning across the state. By Monday morning, the rising sun turned red as it rose through the pall of smoke.

As I drove home over Blewett Pass, I never drove out of the smoke. The layer hung against the hills, clinging to the landscape. I finally drove above it when I reached the 3000 ft. summit of Snoqualmie Pass.

I always stop to photograph Ingalls Creek, especially when the leaves begin to turn color in the autumn. With the hot, dry summer we've had this year, the mountains are showing fall colors already.

Spring comes...

The high country is the last to see the brilliant spring greens of the deciduous trees, so a detour home from the east side was definitely a must. Yakima canyon to White Pass, then over Chinook Pass toward Mount Rainier. The mountain was playing hard to get today, buried in clouds and invisible from just above Tipsoo Lake. But the Naches River was picture perfect, and we even saw a big spring salmon.

Surrounded by trees...

The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness

- John Muir

From the archives, November 2011 | The northern slope of Tiger Mountain above the tiny mill town of Preston, the morning after (and during) the first snowfall of the season. Cottonwood and alder and maple merge into the evergreens like a green and gold crazy quilt, and where the trees disappear into the clouds, it's snowing.

Photographing trees

I'm on a mission, now that the leaves have fallen and branches are bare. A mission to find those perfect specimen trees to photograph.

There's one in my neighborhood, just a couple of miles from home. A towering maple tree, which stands straight and full in a corner of the pasture, protecting an ancient wooden barn. It's gorgeous in the autumn in yellow and orange, and in spring wearing bright green. But I've never photographed it in winter.

The best stretch of trees I know is in the wide greenbelt of I-90, between North Bend and Snoqualmie Pass. The trees are spectacular here, all kinds from maples to Douglas fir to alders and vine maples. I never pass this way without wanting to stop and pull out my camera. Unfortunately, the roadway and traffic would be in every shot.

These lone specimen trees aren't all that easy to find, at least not trees that are good candidates for photography. I think the search would be a good project for winter.

Aspens on Blue Mesa

On the road again Day 7 | Blue Mesa

We left Dee at home to watch football, and headed back up to Blue Mesa. The weather has turned damp and cold, and I'm so glad I packed my down jacket. Today we're going to retrace yesterday's route south to the reservoir, then take a scenic drive that goes along the north rim of the Black Canyon, with overlooks where we can walk out to the edge, hold our breath and look down... way, way down to the river.

We've seen a lot of aspen groves on our trip so far, like brush strokes of green and yellow, orange and red across a canvas of grey rock and evergreen. As the days go by, the colors change and intensify and grow more beautiful.

After leaving the canyon, the road goes for miles through remote ranch land and high meadows, heading north then west. We drove for miles without seeing another car. We came through a couple of small towns, Maher and Crawford and Hotchkiss. There weren't any antique shops or wineries open today. Bummer... we saw a couple of intriguing ones.

Bare branches

Have you ever noticed a tree standing naked against the sky, 

How beautiful it is?  

All its branches are outlined, and in its nakedness 

There is a poem, there is a song.  

Every leaf is gone and it is waiting for the spring.  

When the spring comes, it again fills the tree with 

The music of many leaves, 

Which in due season fall and are blown away. 

And this is the way of life.

- Krishnamurti 

Waiting to pounce

Temperatures falling.

Leaves falling.

The locust and birch

fall in gentle drifts,

yellow and green, still soft.

The maple leaves hang on

until crisp and dry

Then fall straight down

with a rustle.

Overnight, summer has receded

leaving the feeling 

that winter is peeking

over my shoulder...

Waiting to pounce.

Searching for aspens

A few years ago we went mountain biking in Moab with a group of friends. We rented a house in town big enough for all of us to have separate bedrooms. Our room had a beautiful wide-angle photograph of aspen trunks. I've been looking for my own grove of aspens ever since.

Today, as we climbed the series of passes through the mountains between Bryce Canyon and Moab, we saw so many beautiful groves of aspen trees. But there was a blizzard raging outside the car, and the views were as much in our imagination as reality, so once again, I couldn't capture the aspen photos I wanted. Very disappointed.

This is a photo that Dave took in 2004, on our first trip to southern Utah. He cropped it to a similar size, but we never found a grove of consistent trees to make the picture we really wanted.