Never Follow Me Anywhere

[Honu-Hugger]

Yesterday I finally took my hike to photograph some mountain lakes in the area. I was planning to go Monday and every day this week it has rained/snowed in the morning, but cleared before noon. Yesterday began the same way, so I went. I hiked in and could have snowshoed out! It was a blizzard the entire day, nearly a foot of snow at elevation. And now: I'm sitting here looking out the window at a beautiful clear blue sky.

While this was going on yesterday I was reminded of being on Oahu once. We decided to drive up to the North Shore and unknown to us there was a world surfing tournament going on, except it was periodically on and off because the waves were TOO high, 30 to 40 footers (60 to 80 feet from trough to crest) and what did I have with me for a camera? A little P&S Pentax 105 IQ Zoom. So the following year I went back armed to the teeth: two heavy duty Sachtler tripods, 400/3.5 and a 1200/11 Nikkors, binoculars, etc. I set up on the beach and the entire North Shore was as smooth as glass -- you could have skipped stones across it! A lifeguard actually came over and said (verbatim),"What in the hell are you doing here?" I felt like such an idiot. Trust me: if I'm out there photographing, it ain't happening!

D2

P. S. I'll add a few details:
60 mile drive to the trailhead over an 8,700 foot summit (we're at 6,000 feet here), 4.5 mile hike uphill for 1,300 feet to the first lake (as far as I went yesterday). However, every day is a good day and a day in that sort of scenery is superb, even if it is in a blizzard!

 

[nwcanonman]

Honu-Hugger,
Hey, it sounds like the perfect day (blizzard) to me! Remember, the best camera you have is the one you have with you. I'll bet the pics made with the P&S came out great ~ ; - )

 

[Doug]

"Interesting" weather can lead to more interesing photos! A bit of mist and/or precipitation can be useful. Did you get any pics on your blizzard hike? 😉

 

[Honu-Hugger]

I did manage to get a few, but was quite honestly concerned about blowing snow packing into the lenses (it was wet and heavy snow). And it was just one of those typical "dealing with nasty weather" epsiodes -- gloves, cold hands, dropping things like lens caps, things in and out of zip-loc bags.

My intention was to spend the entire day up there and hike out after sunset. I had 24 rolls of film with me along with four cameras and a few extra lenses -- kind of like the embarassing episode on the North Shore (probably why I thought of it so much yesterday). The bright side is I don't take that stuff too seriously, I was laughing about it while it was going on. There are five lakes in this area and the third is really stunning: limestone cliffs and beautiful blue water (it's above the tree line and no residue in the water). Oh well, another day!

D2