Monthly Archives: June 2007

A Picture Is Worth a Thousand Words

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A picture may be worth a thousand words, but is it worth a camera lens?

I decided to work on my Ridgefield addiction this past weekend by visiting new places instead. Friday after work, instead of heading home, I went up to nearby Tualatin Hills Nature Park.

Saturday I worked around the house, and Sunday I headed up towards Mount Hood to hike the trail to Mirror Lake and then the summit of Tom, Dick, and Harry Mountain. At the summit, I had a beautiful view of Mount Hood before me, a less clear view of Mount Jefferson way to the south, and could barely make out bits of Mount St. Helens to the north.

The light wasn’t that great for taking good scenic pictures, so instead I set up my tripod and started doing something I picked up on a few years ago while hiking in Yellowstone and the Tetons: taking goofy self-portraits of myself when I’m out on the trails.

I started off with a picture of me pretending to fall off the mountain, then a variety of other poses. One of my favorites was me standing majestically like the explorers of old, eyes gazing into the sun and out into the frontier, towering over the majestic mountain, the great mountain which is not nearly so great as myself.

It’ll be a great picture for the book jacket whenever I finally finish my novel.

Having had my fun, I took a few quick pictures of Mount Hood and decided to head back down to Mirror Lake, hopefully for some nice pictures at sunset. I turned around to grab a drink of water and to start packing up when a sudden strong gust of wind kicked up over the ridge. I heard the sickening sound behind me, the sound of my tripod falling over and smashing into the rocks.

My wide angle zoom was smashed to pieces, although the glass seems to have been spared. I had my favorite camera attached, the 20D, and fortunately it wasn’t completely destroyed. The onboard flash will never work again, but the rest of the camera seems to be working OK.

Unfortunately that left me with no lens for scenic pictures, however, no matter how beautiful the light got as I hiked back down the mountain. I had my telephoto lenses with me, but wildlife was no where to be seen, so pictures were pretty much over for the day apart from a quick picture of the massive trillium that were blooming all over the place.

I’m not sure what happens now, if I try to repair the lens, pick up a new version of the same thing, or go for something wider and maybe with image stabilization. But I’ll need to decide soon, as right now my widest lens starts at 100mm.

Call of The Gambeler

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A Gambel's quail calls out at sunrise at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge

My alarm clock rang at 4:00am and I was on the road a half hour later, heading south out of Albuquerque and towards Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. Bosque is best known for the spectacular fly-ins and fly-outs of snow geese and sandhill cranes during the winter months. It was late spring now and those birds were long gone, but it was my first visit to New Mexico and I wanted to at least get a feel for the refuge.

Even if it wasn’t the prime time to visit, I hoped for a few surprises.

The dark sky lightened as the minutes and miles passed, with the sun threatening to rise as I pulled into the parking lot of the Visitor’s Center. There were no other cars in the lot and I knew the center would be closed, but I hoped to find some trail maps and refuge information.

When I opened the car door, I was greeted by a primal call coming from up the hill. Another call came, and then another. I didn’t recognize the call, so I grabbed the camera with the big telephoto lens attached and headed up the steps and towards the calls.

I moved slowly but anxiously until I saw a wooden pole with signs pointing in various directions. In the dim light I could see its top was crowned with a carved bird in the shape of a quail. I was a little disappointed when I guessed that the call’s were probably just a recording and no more real than the carving, something to give visitor’s a taste of the birds of the refuge. I decided to return to the car and head out onto the refuge proper.

But before I could take a step, the carved quail raised its head and gave a loud call, and suddenly I knew the bird was no more wooden than I was.

I continued on into the little desert arboretum and other quail were calling all around me. It was a delightful little moment, to go from not sure if I’d see much of anything that day to being surrounded and serenaded by these birds from their high perches. The sun peeked above the horizon and I found this male in a nice location and angle to the sun, and only had to wait for the sun’s rays to reach him and for him to make his call.

I didn’t have to wait long.

A later look at my bird book showed them to be Gambel’s quail, a species I had never seen before.

But names didn’t matter for now. I stood alone and watched and listened, mesmerized by my welcome to Bosque.