If you’ve been around for more than a year you’ve probably read about or even participated in a Walktober. It’s someting that began when Robin over at Breezes at Dawn went for a walk, took a few pictures and shared it all with us while inviting us to go out and share our own walks.
These images were taken at Kensington last week.
It evolved into an annual event with people from all over the country, and even the world, doing their walk sometime in October, taking pictures and posting about it while linking to Robin’s Walktober post.
Showing off
Then sometime at the end of the month, or the beginning of November Robin would do a post featuring everybody’s adventures.
Fall is definitely on the way.
What fun to see different places in the world! And to know that people all over are out doing their Walktobers at the same time!
Autumn light.
This year Robin needs just a little help to get Walktober organized, so I’ll be doing it for her. As it gets closer to October I’ll probably remind you once more, and then sometime in early October I’ll post the ‘official’ Walktober post that you can link to once you do your own walks.
Little orange flowers with morning dew.
Near the beginning of November I’ll collect all of your posts and do a final review of everybody’s Walktober.
Joe Pye nears the end of it’s summer work.
BUT! Least you worry that you don’t like to walk, let me reassure you it doesn’t have to be a walk. It could be a drive, or a boat ride, a kayak trip down a stream through fields filled with cows.
Caught in light.
It could be a pogo stick hop through your neighborhood, or a tour of your own backyard. It could be rural, in a forest, along a beach, or a city experience through a busy midtown.
The beginning of the leaf drop.
You can skip or ride your bike or do the tango on your walk. You can ski or snowmobile if you have enough snow. How about roller skating? Now that would be a Walktober!
It’s your Walktober to do whatever moves your heart.
Subtle.
I don’t know where I will take you this year, but here’s where I went last year.
We have a couple weeks to figure it out this year, right? RIGHT! So put your Walktober caps on, and watch for the official Walktober post. I can’t wait to see where to take us all!
In case you’re wondering what people do when they’re camping but not hiking up and down mountain ravines, let me show you!
We had a fire nearly every night. Here Beth is taking a picture of the engineering of the fire pit.
You might decide that you’d like to take a stab at a camping weekend somewhere beautiful near you. We’d love to be the inspiration if you decide to make the leap.
This is your typical bundle of firewood purchased from the park. $7.00
Or you might already be a camping sort of person and just want a new place to visit. If that’s the case, we’re your girls!
We roasted the obligitory marshmellows.
Personally, I like campgrounds where there’s some space between sites. Preferably some trees and shurbs that give you some illusion of privacy. Because let’s be real, when you’re camping you just don’t have much privacy at all.
We even ate one each.
I’m OK with that. I have no problem sitting in my chair next to my fire reading a book as people walk by with their dogs, waving hello.
We took some goofy pictures too.
My experience has been that most people that camp are really nice.
Our next door neighbor. 4 kids and two parents.
And there’s always something close by to explore. Just get in your car and drive and see what you find.
What’s in here?
We were camping at this park in the hopes it had a dark sky at night so that I could try to do a little photography. We ended up with one cloudless night, and we headed out to the park’s disc golf course to see what we could find.
Comfy on a chair, working on the settings to catch the stars.
There wasn’t much in the way of a foreground there, so I mostly focused on the stars and didn’t worry about it.
Even with the light polution you can see the Milky Way.
But then I thought maybe I should at least try to put the truck in the shot.
The adventure truck beneath the Milky Way.
I think I need more work on that sort of image, but it was fun. A cool night, but not cold. No bugs to speak of. No scary noises, nobody else around to worry about.
And we were back in our tents shortly after midnight!
Back to bed for a good night’s sleep.
Can’t go wrong when you get to sit out under the stars!
I still have to show you what we found when we went out exploring. Guess there’s one more post in this series of photos!
Way back in August, before the US Labor Day holiday when campgrounds across our country are filled to capacity, I met my sister at a Georgia State Park to camp for four nights. It took me two days to drive there from my home in Michigan and along the way there were, of course, barns.
I had two beautiful days to drive.
It was a last minute decision where to camp when we realized we didn’t have time to drive all the way to South Dakota like we had planned. For her, driving two days to my house and then two days to SD just didn’t work.
We are determined to do a better job of planning next summer.
The main view from Cloudland Canyon State Park.
Anyway, she found this state park in northern Georgia, right at the Tennessee state line. In fact we weren’t far from Chattanooga. But you wouldn’t know it when you were in Cloudland Canyon State Park.
We had a great campsite, big enough for two tents, with a whole other space housing the firepit. We had a fire almost every night, toasting the obligitory marshmellow and enjoying the warmth as the evenings were just a little cool.
Home away from home.
This park sits on the top of Stone Mountain, a high ridge, part of the Appalachian Mountains, with a wide valley that overlooked part of Tennessee. And there were plenty of hiking trails with overlooks.
People way over there on a trail looking at us way over here.
The ranger at the park store where we checked in told us to do the yellow trail. It was a four mile loop that, he said, we could pick up right from our campsite. He said it had the best views of any of the trails and we’d see the two waterfalls that everyone comes to visit when they’re in the park.
Going for a little walk in the woods.
Well. The first evening, though both of us had driven all day, we headed right out on the yellow trail. We figured we’d see at least one of the waterfalls and have a nice walk.
Following the yellow trail.
Turns out the trail was full of tree roots and we never saw any part of a river though sometimes we could hear it. After awhile it was getting dark and we decided to turn around and figure it out tomorrow.
We’ll try again tomorrow.
In the morning we drove to the ‘main overlook’ which was technically closed due to hurricane damage. But we could still see the amazing view, for which the park was named. And at one end of the parking lot was a sign for the falls. So off we went.
So many stairs.
The trail moved down, down, down into the canyon. It wasn’t smooth, there were roots and rocks and holes and some railings that had seen better days.
This rock is holding up the stairs we climbed.
There were lots of stairways, curling around and around and down and further down too. We saw lots of pretty things, and as we finally got down close to the bottom of the canyone we could hear the waterfall.
An interesting place to rest.
The waterfall was beautiful and we stayed there quite a long time. It was well worth the walk down. (And in the back of our mind we were already contemplating the walk back up!)
A beautiful place to sit and contemplate.
Then we walked back along the path to where it joined with another trail to go to the second waterfall. Nothing easy about that walk either!
Sometimes it was a rocky climb.
We met several people along the way down into the canyon and everyone said the same thing: “Nobody told us this trail was this strenous!” We looked at the trail map and on the back was a small paragraph that waid it was a difficult trail. But seriously this was a really difficult trail! We were glad we brought water!
Never ending stairs.
Anyway, down more steps, along more cliffs, and we finally got to a deck overlooking waterfall #2. Also beautiful.
Waterfall #2.
And it had a bench to sit on while we enjoyed the peaceful spot. I even ate half of the now smushed banana I had in my pocket.
So peaceful.
After we sat there for a good long time we faced the fact that the only way to go was up. And so we started.
Beginning the long climb back to the top.
My quad muscles were already sore from all the stairs down. And it turns out my calf muscles were too. Going up was slow, with lots of breaks to examine interesting things in the rock walls.
Getting the shot from the best angle.
Or just to sit on a landing and talk to people going down. Everyone was so encouraging. Some people had their dogs with them. I never would have asked Penny to walk down all those stairs, which were made out of grating. I think they said there were over 600 steps.
Trying to hold up the rock.
Just think how uncomfortable that would be on their feet. And if they decided they weren’t going to go back up, then what? Are you going to carry your dog up 600 steps?
Watch where you put your feet.
There was a couple with a very young girl too, on their way up when we were going down. She was already whining and they were negotiating how far she’d have to climb up before they’d carry her for awhile.
There was so much beauty.
Nope, I would not advise bringing any aged children down into that canyon. No dogs, no kids, there should have been a sign at the top!
Do you see the whale?
Anyway, we slowly climbed back up to the top, resting when we wanted to, stopping for interesting things, even stopping for uninteresting things. Just stopping.
Even split rocks help hold up the wall.
And it turned out it wasn’t as bad as I’d feared, though I was really glad to finish. At the top was a young couple, she clearly very pregnant, just starting down. We showed her pictures of the rock strewn trail, the seemingly endless miles of stairs. She smiled and said she thought she could do it even though she was 7 or 8 months along.
Slow and steady on the way up.
We told her the first waterfall was prettier than the 2nd and if she didn’t go to the second she wouldn’t be missing much. We told her it would be ok to decide to turn around, the trail was beautiful and she’d still have fun.
Looking up makes you a little dizzy.
I bet they went all the way to the first fall, but I hope she turned around there. It was already afternoon and I sure wouldn’t want to do that trail with fading light.
Luckily we didn’t see any falling rocks.
We were glad we did it, but neither of us suggested doing any more trail hiking the next two days!
There were lots of rhododendron, this would be beautiful in the spring.
We did do a little exploring in the surrounding area the next few days but those pictures will have to wait for another post.
Every summer we are lucky enough to have orioles visit our feeder. They never stay long enough, many adults leave sometime in mid to late August which seems too early.
This lady serves gormet grape jelly!
The juveniles stick around a couple more weeks, eating the jelly as fast as they can.
What do you mean I have to feed myself?
Even though the youngsters are pretty, I always miss the adults.
You’d think the lady would put a roof over our lunch!
But last year and this year, after quite a long break without seeing any adults, I’ve had adult males and on occassion an adult female stop by the feeder in late August!
You shut up! No YOU shut up!
I’m always excited when, long after I think they’re gone, they show up for a few more days.
I need to grab a snack before those two come back!
I guess they’re fueling up for their trip south to Florida, or Central America. That seems like such a long flight I can’t imagine.
I thought I’d check out the finch food. Not as good as jelly.
And it seems even harder to imagine the youngsters being successful at the trip on their own. I wonder if families reunite once everybody is down there or if once they leave they’re leaving their family forever.
You’re not my mom!
I know they’re gearing up to leave me. But I bought a big jar of jelly this week, hoping they’re around long enough to finish it all.
Lately, not often, but once in awhile, I notice something in my periphery vision that looks like a person standing off in the distance. Down the road, across the lawn, far away. It’s just a moment, mostly a dark grey shadow, and when I look directly there’s nothing there. Once in awhile there’s a small tree or a mailbox but lots of times there’s nothing there at all.
I brought it up with my nurse practicioner at my annual physical and she asked me if I had told my ophthalmologist. I hadn’t but I had an appointment coming up, so I said I would. Today I sat in the chair with my eyes dialated and told him the story.
He started smiling and said he usually sees this in 90 year old people. And that it’s just my brain that sees something and fills in the rest to create, for a moment, something that makes sense. I had thought that was what was going on myself, so was relieved when he looked in my eyes and didn’t see anything to worry about.
But the whole experience reminded me of something that happened when I was processing photos from my night under the stars with a friend and her daughter. I processed one photo where the daughter’s phone was shining down near the bottom of the frame. I had been shooting the stars above her, but sometimes she ended up in the image.
On this particular photo, one of the first I worked on, I thought it was just her phone that was glowing. I used the ‘remove’ button in Lightroom to get rid of that glowing shape. I had never used that function before. I edited the rest of the image, knowing the whole bottom 1/3 of the picture was dark beach.
Turns out it was her face that was lit up, and when I erased her face I left the rest of her body intact. That is, if you read the instructions on how to use this button, a problem.
Witout knowing any of this I thought maybe I’d lighten up the dark beach just a touch and see how that looked beneath the Milky Way. And I got this:
Turns out I had only disappeared her face, and Lightroom, with it’s infinite AI wisdom knew there couldn’t be a person with no face, so it created one for me. If you look carefully you’ll see a guy sitting in a chair. The chair that was right there with us all night.
I actually thought for a couple minutes that some guy had joined us for the night of star gazing, even though I knew there was no guy there. And then I shared the new image with my friend and her daughter and they freaked out too.
No, no guy quietly came and sat in our chair. It’s just that AI completed the person I had left in the image. Just like my brain completes the image it thinks it sees out of the side of my eye.
No wonder it’s hard to know what the truth is anymore.
Almost a week ago now we had clear skies, no moon, and moderate temperatures. It was all perfect for a Milky Way photo shoot. So a photographer friend and I along with her daughter took a run up to the thumb of Michigan to find somewhere to spend the night under the stars.
Best to know where you are.
There’s a special barn up there, and I’ve always thought it might make a good Milky Way foreground.
This barn is “in” the town of Pigion.
We checked it out, both sides. The owner of the barn must have a sense of humor.
Open to interpretation.
But physically it wasn’t really faced in the correct direction for a Milky Way shoot that night. Maybe earlier in the season when the Milky Way will be further to the east. I’m keeping it in mind So we headed up toward Port Austin, near the point of Michigan’s thumb. We found a little roadside park with a small sandy beach.
The last light illuminates the log resting on the beach.
We decided to watch the sunset from there and then decide what to do. While we were watching the sun a small flock of cedar waxwings showed up, sitting in the dead tree near us and then flying out to catch bugs. The light was low and they moved so fast it was hard to get a good image.
A cedar waxwing keeps watch for a tasty bug.
But they sure made me smile.
There seemed to be an unlimited source of very thin rocks, perfect for stone skipping. So my friend and her daughter skipped stones and I took pictures.
So fun!
It was so much fun.
Meanwhile the sun began to set. And, though we didn’t get a great sunset it was pretty enough for us.
A quiet sunset.
We went back to the car to get our real cameras and when we came out to the beach hundeds of lightening bugs rose from the beach grass. I tried so hard to get a picture of them, but it was hard.
See the yellow fireflies? Now multiply that by 100s.
Just imagine standing there with all these glowing lights flitting around you. It was magical.
And then it began to get dark and my friend told me there was an aurora alert and we should take a test shot to the north and see if anything was happening. And guess what.
A pink dome, supported by a green base with a couple pillars in for good measure.
There was!
So we spent a lot of time shooting the aurora. It wasn’t a spectacular show, but there was plenty of pink and green and light pillars.
Crazy beautiful.
Then we turned our cameras south to see if the dark horse was leaving the protection of the trees yet.
Hiding behind the trees.
It was still, unfortunately, partially behind the hill. We weren’t in a prime location for Milky Way, looking to the south it was behind the trees for much of the night. But the aurora made the site worthwhile.
The aurora was moving out further into the bay.
Across the way you can see retangles of golden light. I think, after studying a map, that must be Tawas, a large town on the other side of Saginaw Bay. I also wondered if there’s a bank of foggy mist out there.
We looked back to the south. The dark horse in the Milky Way was moving further out from behind the trees.
The dark horse is headed west.
So that’s how the night went. Shoot a little to the north, shoot a little to the south. There was something spectacular no matter where we looked.
It was hard to believe we’d gotten so lucky!
The whole night was so wonderful. Fireflies, aurora, Milky Way, stars, a slight breeze, warm temperatures, the lapping of a quiet lake. You can’t beat it. And I felt lucky that we were there.
Milky Way AND firefly!
We left the beach a little after 1 a.m. as the mist from the bay started to move over the Milky Way and the aurora had fadded.
Notice all the light pollution from Caseville.
We had a 2.5 hour drive back home. I smiled the whole way.
Nothing but stars and the tail end of the Milky Way overhead.
Change Is Hard 