Still Got It

Driving east I saw plenty of the big, newfangled windmills spinning on the hills overlooking the Columbia, but they just don't have the charm of this old guy, toiling away all by himself along the edge of the Palouse. 

Mustard with Clouds

 I might have found the last Palouse canola/mustard field that was still in bloom! Other than the colorful patches this scene is little empty of subject matter...I was trying to stay away from the red barns, and guess I overdid it a bit...but this is mainly what you see driving through the Palouse so in that way it's quite a good representation of the region. Structures of any kind are very few and far between. Rolling fields and rolling clouds as far as they eye can see. 

Awakening

Well, I'm finally coming out of hibernation...such a long absence on the blog!  My last photo was snowy, and this scene in eastern Washington (somewhere between Richland and Walla Walla) looks like early summer.  We're actually still in spring here, and it's been an overcast, rainy, and colder than usual spring which is why I've not been out with my camera much.  I think that's about to change because we've got sunshine all week so wildflowers should really start blooming soon!  As for today's photo...I can't resist an occasional puffy cloud, cheery sky photo.  And when I was in eastern Washington earlier this week it was still gloomy and drizzly west of the gorge, so this sunshine was something to savor! It also happened to be super windy, which shows a bit on the crops that are all bending in the wind.  Sorry to not know what is growing here; I forgot to take a close look. At the time I was more interested in the wheat growing along the edge of the field; leftover from last season, and the fact that the "soil" seemed to be mostly sand.

Friday Harbor

The Marina at Friday Harbor on San Juan Island, just before sunset.  

 It's a large marina, and completely open to the public which is rare, 

so we had a fun time wandering around and admiring the boats.

Marina water is always nice and still, good for reflections.

An occasional boat came in or out, and there was a harbor seal 

hanging around too. As an added bonus, we got those great popcorn clouds!

(They might show up again on the blog in a post or two!)

Linking to Weekend Reflection.

Leaf and Sky

Lonely little birch leaf floating in Klineline Pond today, 

puffy clouds reflected in the water.

Perfect fall afternoon.

Linking to Weekend Reflections.

Some Cloud

Fall weather is on its way in the Pacific Northwest.  Clouds rolling through quickly these days. This lone cumulus cloud was so nicely framed yesterday afternoon  during my walk with Clover.  I was heading steeply downhill in our subdivision, and only had my 50mm lens, so I ended up cropping out some houses.  Roof visible in the lower left, and I believe that's a middle school in the distant foreground.  Happy fall everyone!

Layer Cake Bluffs

Finally a break in the weather!  We had some sunshine over the weekend, and actually had already planned a trip to Goldendale just to get on the sunny side of the gorge.  On our way back, we stopped for a hike at the old Lyle Cherry Orchard trail.  No orchard visible here, although I read there are some old cherry trees at the top of the trail.  We only made it part way up because we didn't allow enough time to do the entire trail.  We got through the steepest climb, and the part way up the remainder of the climb along the plateau, which my guide book called the "Layer-Cake Bluffs".  Pretty view, with the grass greening up a bit, and the powdered sugar clouds covering the sky.

Spring Weather

Signs of spring all around, including in the skies. Weather patterns are rolling through quickly this week, rain then sun then clouds, etc. Rainbow weather. I could see a sheet of rain falling yesterday afternoon, even though we had sunny skies, and thought that someone was getting a fabulous rainbow. It wasn't my lucky day though. 

Clouds and Mist

 Another of my stops in the gorge, this time at Viento State Park. I love driving through the gorge in the winter months because it's often so misty like this.  Last year we stopped at a Starbucks for a cup of tea, and they had just switched their tea brands.  The new green tea was called Emporor's Clouds and Mist, and we thought that was the greatest name, because it was a cloudy and misty day, just like this one.  So somehow Clouds and Mist has stuck with me as a description of the gorge. 

Cascade Locks 2

East-facing view of the Columbia near Cascade Locks. The stretch of river between Cascade Locks and Hood River is often the border between weather patterns, because the river bends here and it's right at the thickest part of the Cascade range.  Calm in one direction, choppy in the other; blue sky in one direction, clouds in the other. Dramatic clouds today reminded me of an impressionist painting.

Linking to Weekend Reflections.

November Sky

A red, white, and blue theme for today to showcase some fabulous November clouds.

Palouse Study #3

Continuing my Palouse series with a cheery crayola scene... Visiting the Palouse, I got a sense of the region right away, but conveying that sense in a photograph has been tricky for me. I think it helps to have a subject in the frame; it still shows the vastness of the terrain, and in fact maybe even more than with just open field and sky. And as for subject, I always love a red barn!

Palouse Study #2

I visited the Palouse last spring during a college-shopping trip; that was my first chance to photograph this grain and lentil-growing region.  Then I tended to photograph in a more abstract way, which I have a habit of doing.  This year I decided to try to get a better landscape view and in fact I never changed my 17-55mm lens the entire time I was there, which is really rare for me because I love my zoom lens.  I struggled with the larger view though.  Over the course of the day I decided that a higher vantage point looking down was better, but I don't entirely object to a flatter view like the one photographed here.  There was certainly no shortage of rolling hills, shades of green, and puffy clouds for me to practice on!

Lake Michigan with a Cloud Frame

One of many paths leading to the beach at the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore in Beverly Shores.  This one happens to be at the old Red Lantern. The lake was starting to shift to its usual blue-green color as the sun emerged from behind a thick cloud band. Some puffy clouds kindly lingered to frame my shot.  If this were a clear day (no haze), and I were using a zoom lens, a tiny Chicago skyline would be visible at the horizon line in the center of the picture.

Linking to Skywatch Friday.

In the Clouds

Another view of the gorge, lost in mist and clouds.  We finally got our rain yesterday, 

along with a very misty day.  It was a very good day for a chai!

New Direction

Well, I actually wanted to pick up the camera yesterday, which I consider a very good thing.  I'm not really sure why this particular parking lot scene inspired me, but I'm not going to question it too much either.  I've had a couple of day trips in mind to do all month, and hopefully now that I'm feeling a bit more inspired and energetic I'll be up for taking a drive with my camera later this week.  Also, just on a side note, after a long dry summer our rainy season is finally arriving!  I'm sure I"ll be sick of it by March, but right now I'm loving it!!!

Heading East

The Cascade Mountains, and the Columbia River Gorge cutting through them, create two very different ecosystems to their east and west.  Photos from the last three days were all taken within several hours of each other, and show the transition of both terrain and weather as you pass from Western Washington through the Columbia River Gorge and into Eastern Washington.  This is what most of the eastern part of the state looks like, rolling hills, grasslands and farm fields.

We had a six hour drive to our destination of Pullman, Washington which is in the southeast corner of Washington along the Idaho border, so I didn't have a lot of time to stop and take photos.  But these clouds and fields kept mocking me until I couldn't take it any more.  I pulled over along the side of a desolate exit ramp and took this photo, which gave me a little elevation over the scene.  I ended up liking it a lot better than I thought I would, I think because it seems to have a lot of depth to it.

In terms of photography, I have a choice between two lenses, my 17-55mm (wide angle lens) and my 80-200mm (zoom lens).  I almost always choose the zoom lens because it lets me focus in on an interesting pattern or shape, and I like to abstract a scene that way.  I'm much less comfortable with my wide angle lens.  I know I'm supposed to have foreground, middle ground and background, and I really struggle with capturing all that; somehow it's just too much to put together for me.  This photo is lacking foreground.  I can't remember what was along the side of the road that I could have used as foreground, but I remember thinking that it wouldn't work.  So I left it out completely, which should make the scene seem much flatter, but the clouds and field rows do give it a lot of depth, so it came out a lot more interesting than I was expecting.

Almost Spring

The spring weather is showing up a little early here, with sunny skies and cheery clouds all week.  Those of you who follow the blog regularly know I have a fondness for red barns.  And in this weather, there was no way I wasn't stopping to photograph this idyllic scene!

Hay Castle

Another version of yesterday's clouds. 

104° and Sunny

That was our weather forecast today, which is the same as tomorrow's and coincidentally, yesterday's.  Clouds don't figure into many weather forecasts in the summer here, and I tend to avoid photographing too much sky if I can help it.  It's usually a blank canvas in the worst sense.  No mention of clouds in today's forecast, but when I left the house this afternoon to run some errands in town, look what I saw!  This is why I chose to drive in the opposite direction of town, and why I'll have to run my errands tomorrow.  But hey, we had clouds!!!