Foggy morning at Quatse Lake

A couple of experimental pictures with the new cell phone a couple of days ago. Still doesn't hold a candle to a proper camera but it's getting closer!

City Lights

This was taken the same night as the last photo I posted but I turned the camera back towards the south.

The orange glow is from the lights of Duluth, MN about 70 miles away from where this shot was taken.

Moonshadow

Who sang that song?? Surely somebody besides me is old enough to remember.

And no cheating by looking it up on Google!

Crawling on the forest floor

There's fungus among us!

It looked like a little critter had been digging out around this one for some reason. Maybe a mouse needed an umbrella.

I have found at my age that the hardest thing about getting shots from ground level is trying to get back up off the ground!

S'More Light

There's nothing like sitting by a fire on a cool evening with good friends and enjoying the night sky.

The only thing that makes it better is chocolate!

It rained!

A lot! 

The first day we were there they got two inches of rain in two hours. Needless to say the creeks and rivers were running.

The rest of the time we were there the sun was out and the temperatures were in the 70's. Just the way I like it!

The land of 10,000 lakes

And it says so on their vehicle tags!

This was our morning view while staying in Minnesota. Our friends live on one of the many, many lakes there and if it wasn't for the four feet of snow and below zero weather they get during the winter I might consider moving there.

It's a photographers paradise with bears, moose, eagles, lakes, waterfalls, etc. all over the place when you are in the northern parts. At one point we were only about 45 miles from Canada.

The end of the road

I have lived in the central part of the United States all of my life and have driven the Interstate highway system extensively but I have never given any thought to the fact that an interstate highway actually ends. That is until now. 

My wife and I decided to get a way for a while and go see some friends in Minnesota. We also opted to drive instead of fly and take a few days getting to our destination to see some sights.

As weird, and possibly stupid, as it sounds it had never dawned on me that an interstate highway actually ends. So just in case you are wondering, I-35 ends in Duluth, Minnesota right next to Lake Superior. Which I might add is one BIG lake!

You see it on the maps and hear about the different things that go on in and around the lake but standing on the shores gives you a whole new perspective.

All in all we had a great trip and I actually got to take a few photos. I will be posting several of those over the next few days.

Recent bird pictures...

A couple of recent bird pics. The top one is a Red Tailed Hawk and the bottom one is a Canadian Bald Eagle... :)

The Thunder Rolls...

 

and the lightning strikes.

 

I know you are all finishing the song in your head.  Had severe storms push through the area last night and they were lightning filled! But they were also very rain filled also so I was limited on how long and where I got to photograph. Here are my best two. Have some others I may try to play with but these by far are the best!

The Bridge

Paul was half right, this is a suspension bridge however, it's for cars and not people.

When I first heard about this bridge I thought the same thing about it being a walk bridge but when we finally found it it turned out to be a bridge for vehicles. The sign says nothing over 5 tons but when you drive over this bridge the first thing that comes to mind is, "what the hell was I thinking!" there's no way this bridge holds 5 tons.

The bridge is made in sections and each section moves as you drive over it. The bridge creaks and pops, swings and bounces and in general, makes you extremely nervous. The steel cables suspending the bridge are starting to unravel and several have some broken strands in them.  And there is a large hole in the bridge that was patched instead of repaired. Of course you don't see that until you are in the middle of the bridge at the point of no return. It appears this bridge has long been forgotten by the county and it's maintenance personnel. 

Once I was on the bridge, with no way to turn back, I started thinking about how I was going to get my wife and myself out of the car when the bridge collapsed and we were in the river below. Thankfully that didn't happen but it was a strong thought in my head the whole time we were on the bridge.

The really bad part about driving to the other side is that the road doesn't really take you any where. You have to go back the way you came which meant we had to drive over the bridge a second time. Needless to say my wife was not to happy about that and I can't really blame her.

Apparently people drive back and forth over this bridge on a daily basis getting to the lake and state park on the other side but I can't say that I am in any big hurry to drive over the bridge again. Walk maybe, but I don't think my SUV will be crossing the bridge again any time soon.

West Coast Canadian humour...

Logging Camp reduced speed zone...

Stormy Seas

I'm reaching into the Hawaii files again. These were both taken on the windward side of Maui near Pai'a.

Water Dog / Sun Dog

Some recent pictures of Buster and Sunny.

I finally got a chance to unload some of the pictures off my camera and onto the computer...

It's all just "water under the bridge"

My wife and I went for a drive this weekend looking for something to photograph and we came upon this bridge. 

Getting to this spot was an adventure not for the faint of heart. I will follow up with some other photos in a few days and explain then.

It's magic!

When I took this photo there were several people on the beach. Thanks to the magic of Photoshop there are no people in the photo!  Photoshop is so much easier than trying to get a bunch of people to get out of your photo. LOL

Picture or it's just another fish story...

Normally I'm not one to "Toot my own horn" but I guess I'll make an exception this one time... Not to mention I don't have any other recent photos to post.

I caught this beautiful 10 lb. Coho off the Seagate Wharf in Hardy Bay just over a month ago. Now all I need to do is find enough time to try for another one before all the fish head upstream and the weather turns to it's cold, wet and windy mode!

Abandoned Little House on the Prairie

 I do still own my camera and I do know how to use it! Just been super busy with work and life. I have went out and took some photos just not a lot of time to do anything with them. So I took some time to day to share these with you guys. Hope you enjoy and I will try to do my best to get on here and share more of what I do take. No promises though!

Thor

Although it did rain here yesterday we didn't see any lightning, or that much rain for that matter. I pulled this photo from my old files.

My apologies...

Work and life, especially work, has gotten in the way of taking photos and being on the blog for all of us here.

In the future I hope to do better at keeping up with the blog. Things should start slowing down here a little as winter arrives and you will get to hear me complain about the cold and snow!

The photo above was taken the the Wichita Mountains Wildlife refuge in Oklahoma about five years ago.