New bike

Check this out, Brand new Kona "Dawg" dual suspension mountain bike. Picked this up while down in Vancouver!

Most fellows get to middle age have a mid life chrisis, revert to 20 year old mentality and buy the sports car of their dreams. Not me I reverted to my early teens and bought a bicycle... LOL

A balancing act

I was hiking in Oklahoma and came across these two rocks. Yes, these are two completely separate rocks that are wedged between two other rocks with the force of gravity holding everything together. I couldn't believe it and hiked to the top of the hill to check it out. I even walked across the two rocks and checked to make sure they were separate.

In hindssight that may not have been the smartest thing in the world to do!

More fall colours

Here are a couple more pictures. This time from Stanley Park in the heart of Vancouver. Interesting side note... Stanley Park was named after Lord Stanley who I believe donated the land which now is the Park. This is the same man who donated his silver cup as a prize for the hockey teams of his day... Thus the name Stanley Cup! If I'm not mistaken he was also involved in or paid for the construction of the famous Lions Gate Bridge which spans Burrare Inlet linking Vancouver to North Vancouver.

Fall colours in Lynn Canyon

Lynn Canyon is a jewel of a Park in North Vancouver. I only wish I had more time to explore around and take additional pictures. The light that day was good for pictures and all the fallen leaves added colour to the shots.

U2

In my last email I stated that my Wife had purchased some tickets to see some Irish dance troupe or other coming to Vancouver and that I would be allong pretending to enjoy myself... I was joking of course. This is the second time we have been to see U2 in concert, the first time was in Honolulu a couple of years ago. We were not dissapointed, it was an excellent concert, these guys are quite the performers! Photograph by Jacob McCabe (my step-son).

A Bloomin Cactus

That makes me think of a bloomin onion and that makes me hungry! For those of you that have never eaten at an Outback Steak House you may not understand that reference. Sorry about that!

I had to climb half way up the side of a mountain in Arizona to get this shot. It was good exercise but it reminded me how out of shape I am!

Arizona Sunset

This was taken just outside of Phoenix, AZ.

One more from under the sea

The honu, Hawaiian for turtle. They make swimming in the ocean look effortless, which for an old man like myself is not so effortless!

More form the waters around Maui, Hawaii

Lurking in the Shadows

This was taken in the waters off the island of Maui during a scuba diving trip.

Another random Hawaii picture

View of Diamond Head Crater and Waikiki from Punchbowl Crater.

A little more color

I took a little walk the other day between the downpours of rain and came across this bright tree. I zoomed in just to fill the frame with the leaves and this is what I got. Bright, bright colors. I wasn't wearing the right camouflage for this time of year, now that I think about it, one of my hawaiian shirts might have worked just fine!

Random Hawaii Picture

I haven't taken any pictures to speek of in the last little while, at least nothing good enough to post here, so I picked this random Hawaii picture for today's post.

This is a picture from the "Valley of the Temples Memorial Park" on Oahu which you have to go through to get to the "Byodo-in Temple".

Changing of the colors

It won't be long before everything is brown from the cold or covered in white from snow. All of the leaves are starting to "drop like leaves" around here! LOL

Just before the frost

I took this photo about a week ago before our first heavy frost hit. These sunflowers got planted late by one of our neighbors and I didn't really think they would get bloomed before the first frost but they bloomed and were ready just about a week before the frost. Some people just have really good luck!

Two more views from Quatse Lake

I took these two pictures several years ago up at Quatse Lake one still winter morning. Though I have never gottten around to it I intend one day to print the two and put them in one of those frames that takes two pictures.

Picking up the left overs

I guess I'm stuck in bird mode. I came across these birds feeding on the left overs of a soy bean field that had just been harvested. I don't know what kind of birds they are but they look like they belong around the water. Since it has been raining every week for the last several months the soy bean field had water in it so I guess they had the best of both worlds.

Another couple fallish pictures

Both of these pictures are of Quatse Lake on different days. Both are unmodified, as shot out of the camera. Now I just have to remember how I did the bottom picture...

One Ugly Bird

I'm not sure what the ornothological name for this bird is but around here we call them "turkey buzzards". They will each just about anything.

More fall colours

Had fun with this shot... If I took it one way the clouds were highlighted out and the other way and the foreground was almost black. So I cranked the "Active D Lighting" (Nikons built in HDR function) to Extra High and retook the picture, then using the post processing in camera editing I again applied the "D Lighting" function and was able to get a well light foreground and still see the clouds.

Now I just have to find a nice bit of scenery to take pictures of and quit playing around with all the buttons and dials on the camera °~° LOL