Photography and Outdoor Activities

My wife and I are currently on vacation in Franklin North Carolina - a central hub for hiking in the Nantahala National Forest, and many other wild and wonderful places in the mountains of this beautiful state.  The march of spring is more advanced here than in our little corner of New York State, but the interesting thing is the large difference between the progression that can be observed in the lower valleys as opposed to the  higher elevations.  I had hoped to observe some spring flowers, as well as a bit more water in the various streams, rivers, and waterfalls compared to what we saw when visiting this area last fall.

Our first partial day in the area took us on a hike to Glen Falls in the Highlands area - we were very tired from our drive, and this 2.8 mile round trip was about all we could muster on Friday last week.  The falls and succequent cascades were beautiful, as were the forget-me-nots at the base of the falls.

Glen Falls, Nantahala National Forest

The neat thing about the Nantahala is that unlike in the Smoky Mountain National Park (also close by), dogs are allowed on just about all of the trails in the National Forest.  The unfortunate thing, though is that the dogs have a tendency to get bored when we are not hiking, and just taking pictures.  Here is one bored sniffler, my dog Worf.  Our other dog, Kaylar was also nearby.  My wife had to control her own dog, though.

Worf, patiently waiting for his papa to get done taking pictures

That was about all we could do on the first day.  We did bite a bit more off on day two, hiking from the Wayah gap up Wayah Bald along a portion of the Apalachian trail.  The weather has been pretty much off an on during our stay here so far, with some rain every day.  This day started out very gray, but we decided we needed some exercise anyhow.

Along the hike up Wayah Bald we encountered three guys who were attempting to through hike the Appalachian trail.  The first two gentlemen passed us like we were standing still - with full packs on.  The third gentleman was a bit less fortunate, and appeared to be struggling quite a bit by the time we passed him about half way to our destination.  He appeared to really need to push up on his hiking poles to get up some steps just prior to crossing a road.  Boy, we really wished him luck - he was on his way to Cold Spring shelter, the next closest shelter along the trail with his 68 pound pack.  The shelter was about 1.5 times farther than we expected to go, and it was already almost 5PM!  It took us about 2.5 hours to hike to the top of the Bald and see the following view:

View from Wayah Bald in Nantahala National Forest

We stayed at the top for a little while, but were a little worried about making it down the mountain before it got dark.  We did make better time on the way down, but ended up back at the car at about 7:30 PM.  Not so surprising, as we had gotten a late start.

On the following day we took a trip to the Southern Nanatahala Wilderness and hiked a portion of the Beech Gap Creek trail.  The wildflowers on this trail are amazing.  Dogwoods, two types of trilliums and many other types of flowers were in bloom.  It was interesting to see two types of trilliums in one area.  We do have trilliums in our area of New York State, but I have never seen so many trilliums in one place as I did on this trail.  Here’s a peek:

Pink Trillium on Beech Gap Trail (trail 378) in Southern Nantahala

On the Beech Gap Trail there were also canopies of Rhododendrons that would have been amazing tunnels of plush pink beauty in a week or two, but these were not quite ready to bloom on May 3rd when we took this hike.  With any luck, I should get an opportunity to post some more images from a hike showing Azaleas in bloom in the next few days.  I hope you enjoy these images until then!

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More and more flowers are beginning to bloom, some nice spring flowers, and others not so nice.  During a photo class with my students on the Family Foundation School property I took some images using my D300 and 105 f/2.8 D micro Nikkor lens.  The first is an image of a tulip up close.

Up Close Tulip, Nikon D300, 105 AF-D Micro Nikkor

Unfortunately, some flowers are not quite so pleasant, especially if we are trying to keep a nice lawn.  Perhaps we can better appreciate the lowly dandelion when viewing it from a somewhat less standard point of view.

Dandelion Close up, Nikon D300, 105 AF-D Micro Nikkor

I’m not sure I will get another chance to make another Signs of Spring post from NY’s Delaware Valley as the season is rapidly progressing, leaves are greening and the wonderful pastel colors that signify the reaffirmation of life are intensifying into the darker and less subtle colors of approaching summer.  I am currentlly on vacation in North Carolina and anticipate at least one post of images from the Nantahala National Forest area of North Carolina.  Check back again soon!

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At this point in time the crocuses have come and gone, the tulips are out, and the daffodils are in full bloom.  Narcissas are just beginning to bud and early leaves are visible on some shrubs and trees.  Ducks are an everyday sight now on our wonderful backyard pond.  My binoculars spotted mallards, common mergansars, and even a pair of wood ducks early this morning.  Wood ducks, although not uncommon, are only infrequent visitors in our little backyard paradise.

This week did not bring much time for photography, however, a friend of mine just received a new camera last week, and wanted to give it a try.  We went out early this evening and spent some time observing the evening light, budding trees and early leaves.

The image below shows a local farmhouse and barn with early leaves on a willow tree, one of the first trees to leaf out in early spring.  I just love the pastel colors in early spring, like this yellow-green.  I previously had much  difficulty capturing spring accurately with film, and have to say that the modern DSLRs capture colors with significantly better accuracy.

This image was captured with a Nikon D300 and an 80-400 Nikon VR lens at f/11.  The camera’s ISO was set at ISO 200 and the image was photographed with the lens set to a focal length of 280 mm.  The camera / lens combination was on a tripod and VR was set to Off. Who said you can’t use a telephoto lens for landscape photographs? The level of detail produced by this set of conditions would be more than sufficient for the maximum print size I can print at home (17 in x 25 in).

Early Spring on John Milk Road

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Review of 50 mm f/1.8 AF-D lens posted.  Second cheapest auto focus Nikon lens currently available.  Is this the best bargain going?  Find out by following the link.

50 AF-D f/1.8 Nikkor review

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Posted new review of 18-70 mm AF-S DX G Nikkor lens, my favorite compact “normal zoom” for Nikon.

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Spring continued to march forward this week, as more ducks and geese landed on our pond, red wing blackbirds and robins frequented our yard, and our first crocus came into bloom.  Even bald eagles have been fishing our beaver pond again!

Here is an image a robin from yesterday afternoon.  He looked a bit disheveled, but was happily searching for worms in the still brownish grass.  Picture taken with a Nikon D300 and a 80-400 VR Nikkor lens.

There had already been signs of our flower bulbs sprouting last week, but here’s an image of an early pollinator visiting our first crocus.  A surprisingly large number of bees were buzzing about our compost pile, about our chicken feed (see my wife’s blog  Wild About Chickens for more on our chickens), and around this lone flower.  Boy, that bee’s really got it’s head in there!  This image was captured with a Nikon D300 and a 105 AF-D Micro Nikkor lens.

First Crocus

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The migratory birds are starting to return to our little corner of the Delaware River Valley.  Yesterday I went out on a morning run on our local dirt roads, ran through mud, snow, and ice.  As I returned, I saw a flock of birds sitting in one of the apple trees along the road I was running on.  On closers inspection, I saw that they were Robins!  Robins are a sure sign of spring in our neck of the woods.

On our walk earlier today, my wife and I saw more Robins, and quite a few common mergansers and geese on our pond.  We sometimes get wood ducks and mallards, as well as black ducks.

We live at the edge of a beaver pond that tends to attract all types of wild life, including beavers, of course, but also all types of different birds.  We sometimes see bald eagles, blue herons, and early in spring several species of ducks migrate through.  Even with the ice still on the pond, this is another sure sign that spring has finally come to upstate New York!

The image of a common merganswer pair was taken earlier this afternoon in rather poor light.  It was actually snow flurrying a bit, and was cold and windy.  Our pond is still partly iced over, and the duck’s movements were restricted by the ice cover.  The image was taken with a Nikon D300 at ISO 1600 using a 80-400 VR Nikkor lens set at f/11.  For a review of this lens, check the reviews section on this site.  This image is a rather heavy crop of the original capture.

Common Mergansers and Pond Ice

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A brief review of the 105 AF-D Micro Nikkor lens has been added to “Reviews”.

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Added a post on snow shoeing up Balsam Mountain to “Places”.

Balsam Mountain

View From Balsam Mountain Fire Tower

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