Vancouver Island and Vancouver

Back in October, Nancy & I had the good fortune to visit Vancouver Island, from Naniamo to Port Alberni to Uclulet and Tofino and then back to Vancouver.  Our travels across the island was a brief five days.  We could have easily spent double that and covered less ground.  Our arrival on the east side of the island was in tandem with several severe storms that were battering the west coast of the island.  As a result we witnessed the temperate rain forest in its glory - cold, damp and slippery.  Even after nearly breaking her foot, Nancy was keen on walking these trails.  There was something mystic about being in these ancient old growth forests.  Along rivers, bears were frequent visitors as they knocked over rocks in their search for tasty morsels.  Our visit took place as the salmon started to run up their birth rivers.  The eagles were happy.  Back in Vancouver, the city scenes of Gastown and Stanley Park were slightly familiar to us as we'd been there a mere 29 years ago.  The lights of Vancouver over the harbour are a dream for any shutterbug.  My images of sealife are from one of two aquariums, both of which were mesmerizing.  Vancouver is a great place, partly because of the traditions of the aboriginal people.

St Thomas's Future Elevated Park

A couple of weeks ago, the promoters of this park let a dozen or so interested people visit this bridge over the Kettle Creek valley.  The bridge is about a hundred feet above the ground.  When we were let through the access point, we were looking eye to eye with Turkey Vultures that were riding thermals.  So cool.  Speaking of cool, the winds were blowing and the sky was grey.  The visit lasted about an hour and by the end of it, my hands were frozen but not too frozen to capture just a few more shots.

Remembrance Day Service 2015

Until today I'd never been to a Remembrance Sunday service.  The service in Shedden Ontario was nice that the service wasn't fit into the hour before lunch on a work day.  The extended family of a WWII hero was in attendance as his exploits were highlighted.  Young cadets escorted aged veterans thoughout the service.  Everyone looked to the sky for three fly-by's of Harvards.

Cottage Closing Weekend

No sense driving up north on Friday due to rain, we left home in the rain Saturday morning.  The weather soon dried up but as we were pulling off the highway to the cottage road, the skies opened up again.  What to do?  Chill a couple of hours.  The rain stopped and the wind dried everything quickly.  This morning the sky was clear and the sun was warm.  Beautiful day like this made it difficult to close the cottage for the season.

Abandoned in Muskoka

A couple of weeks ago, while driving home from Muskoka, I pulled over several times to capture a few images of abandoned places.

Startrails

Last night while listening to several different performers at the Fred Eaglesmith Charity Picnic most people with a camera were pointing them at the stage.  Not me.  Mine was aimed straight up for 50 minutes.  Six hundred frames later I had a 25 second time lapse video.  The following image is a frame capture of that video.

Perseid Metoer Shower

With all the hype this week of the great Perseid Meteor shower that 2015 was to deliver I didn't want to miss out.  I headed out to the beach near Lake Erie after dark (about 10:30 pm), pointed my camera south then north.

First shot is over Lake Erie with the Port Bruce beacon flashing.  I was using an app for my camera to record a time lapse of the movement of stars.  The process took about 20 minutes taking about 100 separate images.  I didn't like the outcome so I grabbed a single image merge and worked with it.

The second shot was a little simpler; point the camera in the general direction of the milky way, focus (not easy in pitch black) and expose for 25 seconds.

Port Bruce

Last weekend the weather was extremely dramatic so I took a drive down to Pt Bruce expecting a nice sunset. On the way hay bales coaxed me out of the car early.  Later while I was shooting along the shore two young women asked I could take some shots of one of them with her own camera.   After doing so, I asked if I could take a few shots of her with my camera.  Walaa said sure.  Then the light did what I had hoped for and lit up the sky amazingly.  The wind was pushing water up onto the pier and the reflections were an unexpected bonus.

Early Morning Garden

Today we had the chance to revisit Charlie's garden.  When you walk through the pathways you wonder just how much time Charlie must spend keeping everything so tidy and fresh.  All I know is I would never be able to do it.

Tall trees line his property's eastern boundary.  The sun this morning was strong and the trees caused the light to enter the back yard in streams.