Big Meadows to Echo Lakes

this weekend I went backpacking at lake tahoe. I went on a section of the tahoe rim trail from big meadow to echo lakes, and then part of an old pony express trail back to the trailhead making it about a 25mile loop. the weather was gorgeous and the scenery awesome.

the hike starts off as an easy stroll through the same meadow from last weekend, but splits off a mile into it.





one of several alpine lakes, round lake, on the trail.






this scene made me hear "heidi, heidi" in my head for the next few miles.... as I trudge through the south truckee river valley.






another alpine lake. I camped at this lake, showers lake, at about 8300ft. this is the view from where I woke up.






icefields in july ? yes, at about 9000ft elevation. there were several icefields some of which were still across the trail. thsi section of the trail pretty much just opened up the last week or so.





random scenic view as I was coming down from the ridge/mountain on my way to echo summit.






a much apreciated refreshing water fall/stream toward the end of the hike on part of the poney express trail.





over all it was a really nice trip, but by the end my legs turned to butter from all of the elevation changes with the backpack (7300 -> 8300 -> 9000 -> 7300 -> 8000 > 7500 -> 8000 -> 7500 -> 6000 -> 7300 ft) most of it in one day.

more night photography...

last night I was out taking some sunset photos. I was trying to play around with the exposure and white balance setting, but didn't get any images I really liked, except maybe this one:


while I was setting up my tripod and camera for the shots on a bridge over a highway, a highway patrol stopped by to see what I was doing. he was probably hoping to bust a sniper or something and seemed a little annoyed when it turned out that I was just a harmless dude taking some sunset pictures and sped off.

later that night I shot some pictures on campus. I like this shot and how it turned out.

I took a bunch of shots in the arboretum refining my low light technique. for this photo I fixed my white balance (5500K), so the camera wouldn't try figure out what it should be. I also took some film photos with my 35mm camera, but have to wait until I get the roll developed (and scanned in) to see how they turn out.

tomorrow night we have our official class.

Hike and swim....

this weekend I went on a hike in the sierras with the sierra club and a friend. it was nice to get away from the heat of the valley and enjoy a nice walk in mountain meadows, woods and a swim in a beautiful mountain lake. the whole hike was something like 7 miles (3.5 in/out).

here is a meadow called "big meadow". i wonder why it's called that. we hiked through it to get to the trail that leads up and over a small range to the lake.




this is dardanelle lake. the water was cool and there were lot's of rocks to jump off into the water. lot's of people there camping and just enjoying the lake and the scenery. my friend and her dog swam to the rock at the far end of the the lake.



one of the several streams we crossed... dakota loves water, but didn't want to swim in the lake. this stream had some small trout in it, but dakota didn't notice.




dakota is sunbathing at the lake. it's rough being a dog ! the "beach" at this lake was gentle slopes of granite going into the water.





dakota and her new buddy ursa practicing their foraging skills in the woods. it's not like dakota would be able to catch anything, let alone figure out what to do with it.




wow... the air is really clear here and you can see for miles...






another view of the mountains...







all int all it was a nice escape fromt he heat of the valley (105+ this weekend). this hike is definately a "do it again", maybe during the week when there are less people on the trail.

I started a night photographyt class. so far, we only had the first class meeting were we looked at some samples of things that can be done to get some ideas. we also talked about equipment. I decided to go out and experiment on my own a little before the next meeting to get a feel for it. i have done a little night photography in the past and liked it a lot and am excited to get back into it.

none of these images have been edited with photoshop or gimp (what I would use anyway). I usually don't diddle with my photographs and like to show them how they are. I will comment if an image has been doctored, beyond what the camera can do to it. I don't think there is anything wrong with using photoshop to alter images. in fact, I believe it's an artform in itself. I do, however, wish photographers would disclose if they used photoshop to alter an image that they publish.

I used a digital camera for these shots. the camera has a manual mode, including manual focusing. I did use the special low noise imaging mode. normally digital camera's are very noisy during low light photography. in low noise mode, the camera does some averaging to eliminate the random noisy pixels. the color balanced was left in "auto"; life on the edge, I guess. also, a solid tripod is a must have for this sort of photography, although interesting effects can be had with hand holding.

here is a pretty little fountain. the light is from very diffuse sodium vapor lamps. the scene itself was very dark. so dark that it was nearly impossible to frame the shot in the vewfinder and impossible to check the focus. pretty much took a guess. it took a couple of tries and this is what I came up with.





I have taken star streak photos in the past and always liked them. this time I decided to frame a short star streak with some trees. the stars form the head of the constelation scorpio, with libra being behind the right tree. star streaks are interesting to me, since I also like astronomy.







here is a different sort of shot. there is a lot more light here than in the previous shots and it's a different kind of lamp, which gives it a different tint and more colors. there was a dog there who was really friendly and later a cat strolled by. they weren't around for this particular shot.





I haven't decided yet if I want to shoot film for the class, instead of the digital pictures. in some ways digital is easier, since you get nearly instant feedback about the picture you just took. I do like fillm. it's very organic and I like that there is less complexity... i.e. you pretty much get what you get, rather than the camera trying to help you by adjusting white balance and trying to reduce noise, etc... you do have to wait to get the film developed.

today we are putting down our best canine friend and companion who has been dignosed with acute leukemia last week. happy trails buddy; we'll miss you.