I've Moved!

Hey...I've moved to a different blog site for now and have a new address:

http://RockNest.net

I've added new posts, so come on over and check it out. Love to see you there!

Shalom, Pamie

Tall Ships in Gig Harbor

The Lady Washington and Hawaiian Chieftain sailed into the Puget Sound last month, so Bilbo and I caught them while they were in Gig Harbor. Many of you have seen the Lady in the movie Pirates of the Caribbean as the HMS Interceptor. I was delighted to have the opportunity to finally get up close to her.  I didn't take a sail on either one of these majestic beauties, but for a nominal fee you can either take a scenic trip or be a part of a battle sail wherein the two ships reenact actual battles at sea whilst you are aboard. Very fun...maybe next time I can do that. But for now, I was thrilled with shooting at them with my camera (a Nikon rather than a Canon--pun intended). Here are both coming back into the harbor post-battle: 

The Hawaiian Chieftain is in the foreground and the Lady Washington in the back. During the "battle sail" they had their sails down in full regalia, but during the trip back in to port, they had them all rolled up and lashed down.. Here's the Chieftain again sailing into Gig Harbor:

I don't know if the captain of Lady saw me snapping pictures or not, but he steered way around and came in at an angle where I was able to catch her with Mt. Rainier just behind her. I couldn't have set up the shot better!

 

  

This particular night was quite overcast, though if you look closely you can see the last vestiges of sunset to the left of the mountain. By the time these last shots were taken it was around 9pm and I was using my new lens, a Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8. This lens does beautifully in low light conditions as you can see here.

A couple of days later, Bilbo and I went back after the clouds cleared and I was able to get a couple shots to show the harbor and the mountain in sunshine. Rainier is truly majestic...and I love that, on this day, she had a thin band of cloud at her midpoint:

There is something fantastic to me in the smell of the salt air. It transports me to some of my earliest childhood memories with my brothers paddling me around in a small boat on Hood Canal. We would slowly glide through the water staring down at all the amazing creatures and underwater landscape just below us...the wonderment of childhood. I still get excited butterflies in my stomach and joy in my heart each time I smell that  remarkable smell!

Our Cushman Adventure

So...here's my first attempt at blogging. I was never really very inspired to have a blog before now, but photography has changed everything. Now, my eyes are open to so many facets of life around me that I had previously taken for granted. Call me jaded if you will. I guess when one grows up with such marvelous beauty surrounding them, it can be seen as merely ordinary and common. No longer! When I look through the lens of my camera, I am awestruck at the beauty and majesty of the world around me. I am determined to leave no stone unturned in my pursuit of taking in all the glorious surroundings afforded me in this part of the world...the Pacific Northwest...the last vestiges of Eden left on the planet.

Yesterday Fred the Red, her oldest son Justin, and I went to Lake Cushman to visit her childhood haunts. On the way we stopped in Union at the Dalby Waterwheel (see pic). What a delightful roadside attraction! I can't believe I've lived so close for most of my life and never stopped by to check it out before! It is like stepping just off of the road into an enchanted interruption from reality. We lingered long enough to stretch...drinking in the beauty, and warming our souls.

Then it was back on our way toward Hoodsport, but before we went very far, we spied a majestic bald eagle casually perched on a piling just feet off the road. I pulled over and we quickly rolled down the windows of the car as quietly as we could. We dare not open a door for fear of alarming this majestic bird...but, alas, our cameras were tucked "safely" in the far back of the car. Thankfully Justin was able to slowly reach around, stretch, and bring the cameras up front. So he and Freddie got some terrific shots before the great bird of prey departed. It was incredible how close we were...absolutely thrilling!

Next stop, lower Cushman Lake. There is a delightful park here where we walked around, ate our picnic lunch (mmm, the Nanaimo Bars were a spectacular finish to the meal!), and snapped some more shots. I love the lichen hanging from the trees like in the rain forest further to the Northwest of us. Since we went mid-week, there were hardly any other people there...a couple of gentlemen fishing off the pier, and a man and woman playing badminton. It was so peaceful. I was finally starting to cast off some of my accumulated stress from living in civilization. It does a heart good.

But there was more to come at

the resort! This is where my soul
really started to relax. The immenseness of the mountains surrounding us with the quiet solitude of the lake...it was breathtaking...causing me to feel very small in the whole scheme of things. The mountains you see in the pictures are of Mount Washington and foothills in the Olympic Mountain range. I didn't want to leave, but there was still so much more to see further up the road, so after walking out onto the pier and enjoying the magnificence of it all, we decided it was time to move on again. At this point in our venture the weather was beginning to change with the grey clouds beginning to cover the skies once again (this IS Western Washington where it rains 10 months out of the year), and the humidity was making the 65 degree weather feel far more balmy than we have experienced in many months, so we were all quite happy to move on for now. And the best was yet to come!

Up at the boat launch, the humidity seemed substantially lessened. Here again it was so peaceful and serene, I could stay in that moment forever.

Even the air smells different up here, with a freshness you don't encounter in more urban areas...all the trees surrounding you with their oxygen production working to supply us with that very essential ingredient which, though unseen, we cannot live without. I am so looking forward to the next time our travels take us back!