Western Swing Photo Adventure 2011 - Memories and Moments in Time

Well, folks, its been nearly 3 years since I was last on an extended photo adventure...this time, this adventure is back to Colorado to do some shooting with an old friend, Weldon Lee of www.rockymountainphotoadventure.com and then on to some National Parks and Monuments that I have never been to.

This adventure started out much like my last outing with Weldon back in 08 to photograph Maine Moose, in that I was invited to accompany him and his good friend and partner Lori Huff to shoot the White Mountain goats up on Mt. Evans near Idaho Springs, Co. Once again when I checked air fare and car rental for a nice short shooting vacation I was overwhelmed at the cost... and, as in my last adventure with Weldon, my thoughts quickly turned to fact that I could drive and camp out and extend my time from 19 days to 2 months for about the same money. Well...I'm not sure of that last statement is all that true, as it turned out to be a lot more expensive that I had anticipated.

My initial thoughts to save some money on this trip were to buy a small pop-up tent that would fit in the bed of my new pickup truck for sleeping. Since some of the places that I had anticipated to go to would involve back woods camping...and during the time of year that the black bears are seriously eating their hearts out getting ready to hibernate for the winter, my thoughts of being a soft taco for a hungry bear had me re-thinking this tent-in-the-truck deal. The second obstacle was that this tent-in-truck thing would not work out since one of my favorite camping locations when on the road going from point ”A” to point “B” is the Wal-Mart Residence Inns. The store managers would have frowned upon my setting up a tent in the back of my truck to camp out in their parking lot... I do believe.

So now my thoughts were to just take my 26ft camper/trailer...but this is a really long trip. Yeah, there is great solace in the added comfort of a home on wheels so to speak, but then I thought about the gas mileage...or lack there of. This would make the fuel cost factor a Woser!. So I said to myself...Self?, how about looking for a fiberglass camper shell to fit the truck. That would solve the bear, the Wal-Mart and gas problems...all in three. What a genius I thought. Well, I couldn't find a used camper topper for sale that would fit my truck. So I ended up buying a new one. That in of itself would have more than offset the additional fuel cost of pulling my camper, but then hauling that camper back into the wilderness places I went would have never worked...as it turned out. Besides, I make sudden U-turns frequently when I spot something of photographic interest.

Well having added up all the gas receipts and food costs over and above the original trip just to photograph white goats, I nearly fainted. I'm sure my blood pressure went up a couple of points, but... let me say this about that...it was one hell-of-a trip.

I went to places in southern Colorado. and saw absolutely beautiful scenery that I didn't get to see when I lived out there back in 2000. Places like the Colorado National Monument, the Black Canyons of Gunnison National Park, the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve were absolutely outstanding. I also spent a few days camping in the Rocky Mountain National Park, but this time I was appalled at the high fences that were put up in some of the best landscape areas of this park to keep the elk out of their favorite feeding grounds. Many of my favorite places, as well as a few hundred thousand other photographer's, for beautiful fall landscapes are now no more. I'm sure the residences of Estes Park are real thrilled as well, because these elk are now probably eating aunt Martha's favorite garden plants, not to mention uncle Fred's lawn.

Another site that really took me back a bit was the great huge numbers of pine trees that were cut down and stacked ready to burn as a result of the pine boring beetle. This little bugger, no pun intended, is attacking pine trees all across the northern reaches of the continental US. Our National Parks are very hard hit by this little bugger...there I go again. The parent beetle attacks the pine trees just under the outer bark area and deposits the eggs, where then the larva eat their way into the center of the tree from top to bottom. At this point I'm not really sure just how well our boys of botany can come up with a permanent cure for this outbreak. The parks service current mindset is to only cut the dead and dying trees that immediately adjoin public hiking trails within the boundaries of the parks. The remainder effective areas will be left up to Mother Nature. In some fairness to the park service personnel there is a somewhat limited herbicide being applied to trees that are once again adjacent to public roadways and hiking trails. These efforts might be a bit too late in the areas of heavy infestation and perhaps these same efforts might have been somewhat more effective had they been put into action when the pine boring beetles were first noticed.

Back to the substance of my photo adventure...The Colorado National Monument was very much like I had remembered how eastern Utah looked back when I was there in 2002, and had much the same geological formations and sand coloration. What really blew me away was the Black Canyons of Gunnison National Park. That was really some deep hole carved out by a stream of water, much like the Grand Canyon further west. Its mind boggling to think that water can do that...but of course it only took a couple of billion years or so to accomplish what we see today. Of course it’s now a raging river, but it is also controlled by a damn at Mesa Lake. In some of the rim locations you could stack a couple of Empire State buildings on top of one another with room to spare and not reach the top of the rim of many of these canyons.

I was standing, behind the metal railing thank you, peering over the edge straight down into the bottom of the canyon observing some rapids in the Gunnison River and thinking...if you fell over, no one would ever find you, only the pile of crap you left on the ground as you exited mother earth. If the Grand Canyons can really top this...then I should go. The Black Canyons of Gunnison are so numerous, overlaying one another, twisting and turning such that you only need to move, in some cases, a matter of a few feet and you have a complete different view.

I should back up to mention something about the main reason for this photo adventure... remember my mentioning those white goats?

Now that was exciting...not the goats so much as the drive up to where they hung out. There were 11...count them, I did many times up and down day by day...11 one hundred and eighty degree switch back turns to get to the top of the goat’s world at over 14,000 ft. Actually this is the highest location in the continental US that you can drive your car...14,272 ft.+ This is a rather narrow road with quite a bit or roadway giving way to gravity. Those stupid rubber orange cones out at the edge of no-whereville don't mean very much to the guy on the inside of the driving lane, but the poor schmuck on the outside lane?????...what can I say. But, the goats where there and in good numbers at times, as were some ewe mountain sheep and lots of Yellow Bellied Marmots and those cute little guy’s, the Picas.

A few Ptarmigans to round out the mountain wildlife...other than that poor dude that couldn't manage to make the curve on his mountain bike...never did hear if he made it or not. This is a road that you really need to pay great attention to where not only your driving but also the other guy…no place for rubber necking…but I did…otherwise you would miss finding the smaller animals. As for the goats, well they stand out quite well, especially when you negotiate one of those 180-degree switch back turns and they are standing in the middle of the road right in front of you…hard to miss...but you have to because it’s a long way down to the next road.

One place that was very high on my bucket list was the old mill of ghost town of Crystal on the Crystal River. Its been told that just about every well know photographer has made his image of this mill. If this is true, then the guy with the old falling apart jeep in the nearby town of Marble, CO. has got to be a millionaire by now, as he runs a wilderness tour in that area. This mill is not only a longgggggggggggg way back and well off the beaten track, but its real difficult to get to...I know all too well. It seems as though my GPS unit decided to take me to what would have been a near suicide mission. It seems another well know Flickr photographer went the wrong way as well. It was a good thing that a truck was coming out and the driver told me to definitely not go that way. He said he would show me where to turn off. So I turned around in a small rocky-river bed and followed him out to the correct turn.

The return trip back was not as hair raising as the ride in, as there was a deep/steep (not many adjectives could adequately describe this) drop off on the passenger side of my truck. Visibility was very low on this seemingly too narrow of a road, if one could call that a road... hell, its mountain rubble. Then there was this muddy area about 10 feet long from the recent rains, which was still very wet. I had already put the truck in 4WD high just in case, and with the left side of the vehicle riding up the side of the mountain I reluctantly negotiated the mud hole. Well, when the rear tires entered the mud hole the rear of the truck suddenly slid sideways and dangerously very close to the edge of the “DROP-OFF” (which BTW I could not see). Having had extensive experience driving 4WD off-road in the Florida swamps, I stepped hard on the gas, letting the front tires pull the truck back on-to the road.

We got to the "Y" in the road where I should have turned in the first place, but rather watching my GPS. I thanked the 3 men and made the turn. Now it’s getting very dark thirty. As I passed a couple of mutant dwellings, for a lack of a better term, there were these guys staring at me as I drove by. They looked as if they had stepped out of the 1800’s. I went quite a ways down this road, trying to put a little distance between these people and myself. It was now very dark and going any further was not a good option. I decided to back into a slot or side road if you would like to call it that...I wouldn't. I got into the back of the truck, locked it up real good and loaded my nine mil and tried as I could to not remember what I had seen driving in. All I would have needed to hear that night was dueling banjos...and I was outta there.

The next morning I made another attempt at reaching this old mill site but the road...hell, it was the side of a mountain not a friggin road by any means. I was in 4WD Low just to keep the vehicle slowed down to get up and over the rock rubble, some of which was quite large. I finally gave up after about a mile and after several times of hitting the undercarriage of the truck. I still had no idea how much further the old mill was located and so I turned around...only to see this old guy in an old 4WD jeep heading my way. He said ya given up?...I said I'm-frade-so. He said it was about another 4 or 5 miles back to that old mill site and that this was the good part of the road. That's pretty much all I needed to hear at that point. Scratch that mill off the list. I don't know what that tour guide in his old jeep charges to take people back to that old mill but I would have giving him twice that amount if he came by.You'll notice that there are no images made trying to get to this old mill.

Jumping ahead again...after the Black Canyons of Gunnison and a few one day side trips, I headed southeast towards my next destination, The Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve located in the SE corner of Colorado. This was OK, but not what I had expected. I couldn't hike the soft sand and there was really not that much to drive, that is unless you wanted to 4 wheel up the side of a mountain in a $34,000 truck...not me, not again...I stayed pretty much on level ground.

But you always wonder what would be in store going up there....nawwww not this time. The weather was turning crappy and cold. I did another side trip to a waterfall that really was not all that great. On my last morning there, I was making morning coffee on the tailgate of my truck…that was my table top for cooking and eating, the clouds looked very ominous and as I looked out I could see small flakes of snow falling down. I downed my normal 2 cups of coffee and my fried sausage and egg biscuit…packed up and headed to Taos, New Mexico.

Taos, NM turned out to be another bust, as I just could not find any of the real old colorful adobe houses. Everything I found was adobe look alike or mocked the old houses. I drove up and down as many of the back roads as I could find staying away from the main parts of town, which are nothing more than tourist traps selling dust collectors. I have enough of them already from past adventures out west.

I did another waterfall in the rain, shot a little of this and that along the way and headed southeast towards another destination, The White Sand Dunes National Monument in New Mexico. I looked at my computer mapping system and saw that my next destination was taking me past Bosque del Apache NWR. I was there in 2001, but that was in the winter when the bird migration was in full swing. This was summer… it was very hot and the place was bone dry, not even a roadrunner could be found. Anther day and night shot to hell. The next morning and most of that day found me arriving at the White Sands proving grounds and The White Sand Dunes National Monument.

Now that place could be interesting but I found it very difficult to shoot. The sand dune were very cluttered and I found it hard to come up with pleasing landscape compositions, but I found shooting much smaller detail studies, as I call them, I could somewhat tame the beast. ...Waiting until the sun was much lower casting very long shadows was when the larger scale landscapes became more interesting.

I was contemplating going back for the morning but actually thought that everything would be much the same thing, but with a different lighting direction, so I began a 2 day long drive to Rockport, TX. to meet up with my cousin for some salt-water fly-fishing at his "fish shack”, he calls it, condo on the water. I hadn’t been there in over 13 years and it was a much-needed break before heading the 1300-mile trek back home in Florida.
Rockport is always windy and this 4-day stay was no exception. The winds shifted direction and created fishing situations much difficult than the week before when my cousin and his wife caught 11 Redfish in 4 hours of fishing. But we managed to catch a few fish to take back to Florida.

All in all I would have to say that this photo adventure, which was nearly 8 weeks long and well over 7500 miles long was another “Great Photo Adventure” with many “Memories and Moments in Time” to share with family and friends.

All Day Photography Seminar

Folks,I have been kicking around the idea of presentating an "All Day Photography Seminar" for some time now...and NOW is the Time.

This seminar would be at a location of your choosing,generally your home town location. I would need a local host club and or person to work with, of which I would be doing about 90% of the work required myself. This lessens the burden for others and makes the process much easier on you.

As an additional feature for the participants, I will stay over the following day an do a "Hands on in the Field" Photography Workshop.

For more information and a complete itinerary of the days proceedings,please contact me at: JMWNaturesImages@comcast.net

Digital Audio/Visual Slide Presentations

Folks, just one of the many aspects that I enjoy doing is sharing my digital images with others...camera clubs and or special interest groups. I also enjoy teaching other photographer the knowledge that I have be fortunate enough to acquire over these many years of perfecting my love for the "Visual Image".

One way I have accomplished this is by assembling my digital images into themes and accompanying these images with what I consider the best Nature Music I have ever heard.

These Digital Slide Presentations,as I call them, flow seamlessly into the audience attention and enjoyment.

If you, or you perhaps may know of some camera clubs or special interest groups that would like to have me come to your location and not only present my Audio/Visual Presentations,but to also speak in general about them and answer questiona by the audience, then please contact me at:JMWNaturesImages@comcast.net

What to write about in my first blog post

Well, being a bit late in getting a blog started, I sat here for quite a long time trying to figure out what in the hell to write about. I don't have any special interest groups to promote or demote. I don't have any particular step in marching to whatever drummer there might be at my door these days. So, in thinking back to what has happened in my life in the last year or so that would be worthy in writing about, only one event came to mind.

Some of you may have already read it on Flickr or my web site but this event was certainly worthy of a first post here. I'm a bit long winded, so bare with it and at least enjoy the images and my weird sense of humor.

Michael

Some events in the life of a Nature Photographer

This adventure story is something more of a personal tragedy than some of my more humorous adventures, but nonetheless I felt compelled to write the event as it was an adventure that I shall remember forever.

This past fall photography trip of 2008 was to meet up with a good friend of mine from Colorado, Weldon Lee, http://www.rockymountainphotoadventures.com/. Weldon does photo workshops and speaking engagements all over the world and had invited me to go to Haines, Alaska to photograph eagles in the snowy winter conditionsof November. This would be very hard to do here in south Florida. Upon checking airfares to Anchorage, I found them to be very expensive and basically out of reach. So I looked over some of Weldon's other workshops and found fall "Moose in Maine". That sounded equally as good of a trip to me as winter eagles, although that trip is still on my list.

I was born and raised in south Florida and have photographed eagles here, but as much as I have stomped these backwoods in the last 55 years, I have never come across the first moose. Now perhaps they were here all along and I just never saw one... like our elusive panther...or maybe they just never liked our hot humid weather and migrated north. I just don't believe there are many of these critters here in Florida. So I called Weldon to see if there was any space available for the moose trip, and there was. I once again checked the airline flights to Bangor, Maine where everyone was to meet up with Weldon.I found the same similar high airfares, and in fact I would have needed to rent a car for the week once I arrived Bangor. The car added to the airfare was a lot more than what I bargained for just to be able to spend only 6 days in the North woods in quest for Bullwinkel. I checked the mileage, added up the gas cost and decided that I could drive to Maine, spend the week with Weldon and his group of people and then be able to visit other place on the way up and then back to Florida... sounded like a great plan to me as I had all the time needed for such a trip

Now I have a 26 ft travel trailer and truck that I could have taken but the not so great gas mileage, probably less than 8 mpg was not going to make this trip work. So I removed the 4 bucket seats from the back of my van and said to myself...self, I could put my air mattress down the middle and still have lots of room for everything I really needed. I sat down and planned the routes north, with a few side trips here and there and did the same for the return trip. These various points of interest were plotted up on my laptop and highway-mapping program as lat and long's. I just plugged the POI's into my new GPS unit and felt fairly confident in being able to find and go just about anywhere.

I belong to a website site for photographers called Flickr and have met a lot of very nice people there. Mike Jones of http://www.mikejonesphoto.com/was one of them. Mike's photo stream of Acadia National Park on the coast of Maine had some really great images, and I wanted to go there and see this place for myself...major stop number two on my long list of places to visit. That side trip to Acadia NP was well worth it and I plan to go back, only next time I will spend the extra money in gas and take my travel trailer...ya just gotta love those creature comforts of indoor cooking and not having to crawl on my hands and knees to get into bed, not to mention being able to stand up and get dressed in the morning... with the lights on!!!!

My first stop on this trip was actually in northern Georgia,(Cleveland) where my cousin lives. I found some really nice areas there on this trip and did some shooting of old barns, log cabins and grist's mills before heading north. I planned for more shooting in Georgia when I returned.

One of the many locations that Mike Jones suggested was Mt. Washington in New Hampshire aswell as the very scenic highway called Kancamagus Hwy. As my luck goes, I arrived at the town of North Woodstock, which was the western entrance to Kancamagus Hwy. on a Saturday. Crowded driving conditions does not begin to describe what I ran into, and that mountain top that Mike said would be the greatest...well as I rounded a curve the full view of Mt. Washington covered in snow was what I saw. The cars were lined up for over a quarter of a mile trying to get in. I just knew that my spending $20.00 to go up that mountain was not going to get me to the top. I was fairly sure that the sudden snow caught the road cleaning crews a bit off guard. I just proceeded east to meet up with Weldon in Bangor.

So after chasing bullwinkle around in the north woods of Baxter State Park, Maine for a week and getting some great images of Bullwinkle and his friends, I then drove to the coast of Maine to spend time at Acadia National Park. After a great week in Acadia, my southern return routes took me through the back woods of upstate New York and south to the scenic drive through the Shenandoah National Park. I always stop in at the visitor’s centers to see what's available to photograph. I love waterfalls and I checked a few out and found Dark Hallow Falls to be a minimal hike, on paper. Well that hike was a lot more than I had planned on, and with a weak right knee, lets just say that was not the best decision I made that day. The knee held up but was swelling up like a tick on an old hound dog after I made it back to the car.

I headed south to the entrance to the Blue Ridge Parkway National Park scenic drive late that afternoon and checked the GPS for the closest Wal-Mart Residence Inn's... yes!, I camp out in their parking lots along with many other campers...can't beat the nightly rates and 24 hour shopping, and most even have gas stations. Well before daylight the next morning I headed south on the Blue Ridge Parkway. After photographing a reconstructed late 1800's farmstead most of that morning, I checked the map for my priority location number three of this trip, and that was Mabry Mill. This famous mill was on my list for years and now it was finally within reach, or so I thought. It was still a long ways away and I decided to just make no stops and try to make it before the late afternoon sunlight was gone. Traveling at near light speed, I finally made it... just after the sun went over the mountains, but still in time to get off a few nice frames. I decided once again to seek the location of the nearest Wal-Mart Residence Inn so that I could return the next morning. I wanted to shoot this thing... every which-way from Sunday.... in fact it was Sunday.

After photographing the mill, old log cabin and blacksmith shop, it was decision time once again. Checking the maps against and my planned route back into northern Georgia, I found that I was still nearly 400 miles south to Cherokee, NC. and another 200 miles looping west to my cousins in northern Georgia. This would have been another 5 to 7 days minimum, as the photographer flies with all the planned stops along the way. I decided I was tired, the knee was swelling up again... decision time once again. I decided to make those other locations of water falls, log cabins and grist’s mills and lord only knows what else, for another time. I headed directly by the quickest route south to Cleveland and my cousins place. He wasn’t expecting me for at least another week. I pulled in his driveway, called him on my cell phone as I went up to the door and was talking for a few minutes, and then knocked on his door. The dogs went berserk and he said I have to go see who is at the door. When he opened the door, I heard some muttered word that sounded like “sombeech”... I just love doing that to people.

A couple of light days looking for old barns and whatever with... NO hiking, I decided that I would top off this trip with a nice colorful sunset with all the layers of the Blue Smoky Mountain tops. I chose the highest elevation point in Georgia, Brasstown Ball mountain overlook. Having never been there I dragged my cousin along with me.

There was a tram that took people up to the observation point and back but it stopped running up at 4:45 PM and it was now after 5. We started out walking past this nice paved roadway that the tram takes and I thought why not walk up this nice paved road instead of the hiking trail, but I reluctantly chose the hiking trail...the one with the large sign indicating that this was a strenuous steep hiking trail. As it turned out, that was not the best decision I made that day. The trail lived up to that stupid sign...it was strenuous all right. For someone with a weak knee, carrying a heavy tripod and two cameras, I began to wonder about this mind driven sunset photo that I was after. I had to stop and rest the knee and body several times... Hell, I'm a flat lander and not used to hiking steep trails in high elevations.

The hiking trail eventually ended at that same paved roadway the trams take about 40 feet or so from the summit. I love that term, “summit”, as we don't have many of those in Florida. Straight ahead across the paved road were some earthen stairs that continue to the summit. I had given great deal of thought about going around them but NO!!!… I decided to take the stairs... not the second best decisions I made that day and one I now regret with the utmost of passion. The first couple of steps were alright, but the next to the last step...its always that one... was a bit higher and so I mistakenly took it with the weak knee ahead of the good one and attempted to push up... “Holy Sheep Shit”. The heavenly gates opened up and angels spoke to me in a way I will remember for the rest of my natural born days here on earth. The light then went dark... little birds were flying all around me... which was very hard to see through the tears streaming down my cheeks. Then it hit me..."PAIN"!!!... like no other I had felt before in my life. I spun around and sat down all in one swift motion, grabbing the handrail as if it were my last hope of not going over some cliff. I must have sat there for quite some time. My cousin came back and said,"We're almost there" and also indicated that time was running out... funny... I was thinking the same thing, but in a much different way. I faintly remember saying "That's IT !... I can't go any further". I can only hope that was all that I may have blurted out. I guess my cousin didn't appreciate me dragging him to the top of this mountain only to hear me say that. Only when he noticed the tears streaming down my face did he realized something wrong had happened.

After what had seemed like an eternity, I finally managed to get up. I had to use my tripod and the handrail, as I could not put any weight on that knee. I finally managed to get back down to the last step and hard pavement...not sure if I floated down or just how I did it, as my cousin never did tell me. Now normally I hate tripods, but in this rare case, I loved that damn tripod. I gave my two cameras to my cousin and tried to hobble down that tram roadway using the tripod to hang onto. After making some slow progress in my downhill adventure, I came to a curve in the road, and there... before me was my sunset shot. Not the one I had envisioned, but at least it resembled such. I got one of my cameras back and somehow managed to fire off one frame of the now infamous “Sunset from Hell”. This was my last parting image on this trip and one that I'll remember for many mango seasons to come.

The hiking trail that normally only takes about 20 minutes or so to get to the top and the overlook, took me over an hour and a half to get back down that damn mountain to the parking lot. I told my cousin to take my cameras and go on down and move the car closer to the gate and if I wasen't back in an hour...send the troops. It was pitch dark now...can't see your hand in front of your face. Every large rock looked like a black bear. Obviouslly I made it but that was damn hike is one I'll remember for a long damn time.

After a couple of days at my cousins house of alternating between frozen bags of peas and whatever else was in his freezer, placing them on the knee trying to get the swelling down, I managed enough energy to endure the ten hour drive south to Florida... good thing for cruise control. This was not the happy ending that I planned for, which was initially a pretty good 35 day photography trip.

Soon after arriving back home and seeing my orthopedic surgeon, my worst fears were brought to light... the knee was a goner and was never again going to be my right hand man. A new total knee replacement was the next major chapter in my life. My surgeon assured me that 95% of these surgeries go without any complications. That was somewhat reassuring, but I was wondering about that other damn 5%. I didn't what to know at this point, but I was soon going to find out first hand.

The surgery went very well and in fact the epidural was working overtime. I felt great...no pain...up and walking. The first two days went uneventful... everything was going well. I was walking the halls when the physical therapist noticed swelling in the right calf. Of course this was the day before I was to be released to go home right?"…Yeah Right". They brought in the Ultra Sound machine and you guessed it... "Blood Clot". No, I don't have a black cloud over my head.... its a damn force five hurricane.

It’s been a little over four months since the surgery and I am getting around OK, but not where I had planned to be. I am sitting in a campground writing this sort of adventure story, which is unlike the other adventure stories that I have written and posted to my web site in the past. I try to find some humor in all of this, I really do...but it’s hard. This 08-photography trip of "Mainely Moose and More" has given me some very nice images and another couple of 30-minute digital slide programs to present. So I have to be thankful of that.

The prognosis after nearly a year now is still uncertain. Most mortals are generally back at their normal routine by this time, but I am still hampered by an unwilling right knee to return to normalcy. A friend of mine from Miami had a great saying for his business: "As good as some ... Better than most". I like to think that this still applies to me.

Michael