Morning light and fall color with an early snow fall from the Deep Creek Valley Overlook in Great Smoky Mountains National Park
Last fall we were treated to a relatively rare (for me, at least!) mix of fall color and snow. We had driven up to Clingman’s Dome in the Smokies for sunrise, only to be chased back down by gale-force winds and blowing snow. The morning light a few hundred feet below proved to be a good consolation.
October is definitely my favorite time of the year here in North Carolina. We have a number of interesting adventures planned, including a long-overdue visit to Florida (not for fall color) so stay tuned for updates on our travels. Whether you manage to see snow or not, I sincerely hope that your October is a wonderful one!
The Whalehead Club at Currituck Heritage Park near Corolla, North Carolina
I set this up to auto-post on 9/1 and hopefully it will work!
This is one of my favorite photographs from a visit to the northern Outer Banks back in 2009, and I thought it might make a nice intro to fall. The nice clear sky hints at the return of autumn while retaining just a hint of summer’s warmth. I had walked around this building earlier in the day and loved the windows. The possibility of a reflection of the sunset in those windows at dusk were what brought me back.
The building is known as The Whalehead Club and is located at Currituck Heritage Park near Corolla, North Carolina. It is the restored private residence of northern industrialist and conservationist, Edward C. Knight Jr. and now houses the Whalehead Club Historic House Museum.
Moon Over Price Lake at Sunrise, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC
Well, how did that happen? We just finished June and already July is over! Of course that means we are edging toward Fall, and an end to Summer’s heat is just around the corner.
Price Lake is a hit-or-miss spot for me photographically. A decent photograph here generally depends on getting something interesting to reflect in the water. Sometimes it is fall color, sometimes you can catch some good clouds at sunrise or sunset. Such was this case on an August morning back in 2005. One morning prior to attending the annual Camera Clinic at Grandfather Mountain, I was up to shoot the sunrise and shortly after the sun came up I ventured down to the lake to see what was happening. It’s a little hard to see in this photo, but a nearly full moon was playing hide-and-seek in the clouds. I got a few shots with the moon in the clear, and a few with it partly or mostly obscured.
This photo was taken with my Canon 20D and 17-40 lens. It was originally processed using Photoshop Elements, then reprocessed using each of the prior versions of Lightroom. For this calendar I converted the file to Process Version 2012 and updated my settings one more time. It’s amazing what newer software can do with photos that were taken with cameras that are now sitting in storage.
This photo is all about “HOT” to me. And wow, is it hot! We made plans to escape to the mountains for the weekend, and while it is maybe 10 degrees cooler, it’s still HOT!
Hopefully July will moderate a bit, but for now, we have heat aplenty. Enjoy this wallpaper for the month, and we’ll see what August brings.
Sorry, but I’m having so much fun going through my Alaska photos that I’m going to stick with that theme for this month’s wallpaper calendar. I got a number of good shots in Glacier Bay, so stay tuned to an upcoming post with more photos. This one sort of best fits my criteria for wallpaper, so hopefully it’s a photo you don’t mind looking at for a month or so while summer here gets geared up!
It’s hard to imagine as I sit here with the temperature outside hovering around 90 that I was standing on the deck of a cruise ship in boots, wool socks, long underwear, a hat and gloves! I tried to bring some of that cold home with me but I think it slipped out of my bag in San Francisco. 🙂
I hope everyone has a splendid June. We’ve got a few birthdays in the family in June, so special wishes to those-who-know-who-they-are!
South Beach Marina, Hilton Head Island, South Carolina
Here’s something a little different this month. A simpler and more graphic photograph, the kind of photography I’ve been doing more of lately…seeing the extraordinary in the ordinary.
While this photograph was taken on Hilton Head Island, SC the location isn’t really important. The photo isn’t about Hilton Head. What it is about is the combination of red, white and blue in a simple, graphic design that to me represents that feeling I get on a sunny summer day with a great clear blue sky. That feeling of being on vacation!
Lots going on these days, so while I hope to send off a few more posts before the Big Adventure, it may be a too little hectic. But you’ll hear from me, don’t worry!
For those of you who I forced to spend a few extra days in March…sorry. The weekend got away from me and before I knew it, well you know.
One of my favorite sunrise locations at any time of the year is Pounding Mill Overlook, on the Blue Ridge Parkway just south of the junction with US-276 that runs between Brevard and Waynesville. It’s either hit or miss here, but generally speaking if you aren’t socked in with clouds you’ll get something worth pulling the camera out for. Fog in the Pink Beds is always a good bet, and a nice golden glow from the rising sun makes for a doubly special sunrise.
Things may be a little quiet here for the next week or so as we head out on our next adventure, but with any luck I’ll come back with some nice shots of the Shenandoah National Park area. They had a little snow at Big Meadows this morning, so you just never know what you might run in to!
I’m on an Alaska kick lately, and looking over some of my old photos has me thinking about going back. March is a month of transition here in the Southeast, while winter (or what winter has been this year) lingers elsewhere. While this photo was taken in August (believe it or not) it shows lingering snow above soaring mountains and deep blue water.
I hope you enjoy this journey into the archives, and I hope you have a wonderful March!
Sunset along the Pantego Creek in Belhaven North Carolina
This has been a strange winter so far. And not just here in North Carolina, but people I talk to all over the country are wondering what’s going on. Well, it’s February, so we’re not out of the woods yet, winter-wise. But at least here in the South we can look forward to spring being right around the corner.
It was 65 degrees here in North Carolina today, and I washed my car! Changes are in store over night tonight but I’ll brag while I can!
The coast is a special place any time of the year, but it takes on an amazing quality in the winter. Crisp, clear skies and often some great color both at sunrise and sunset. Our favorite beach within a reasonable drive is Hilton Head Island in South Carolina. Amazingly this photo is from a visit there nearly 5 years ago, in January 2007. It’s really hard to believe how quickly time flies.
