We opted for a quiet dinner on the boat. Football. Turkey. Apple pie. And all the fixings. Niiiice.
Sunset at anchor in our cove. Happy Thanksgiving to you!
Tag: photography
Wild Basin Wilderness Preserve.
Today I went birding with my friend, Doray, to Wild Basin Wilderness Preserve. I’m a novice. I was able to get a lot of amazing photos of tree branches. 🙂 If I ever get an amazing photo of a bird, I may share here. But for now, I won’t bore you with it. We did see several kinds of birdies, so I’m calling it a success.
Here are two non-bird shots from the morning:
Wing on wing.
Monte and I crewed for Lori on Camelot this afternoon in the beer can regatta. And we won! It was a beautiful, chilly, windy day. Awesome.
Twelve hours after full.
Happy Super Beaver Moon!
One shot as the moon was just rising over the tree tops in my yard:
and then one later, higher, and brighter:
Twelve hours before full.
My best shot of the supermoon rising last night. Not as good as I would have liked. I played with ISO, aperture and shutter speed. Forgot to take off polarizing filter (doh).
Flutterbys.
In Big Bend we hiked the Window Trail and descended into a cool, humid part of the trail where there were hundreds of butterflies in residence.
At home, this week, I was happy to see that some butterflies remain here in Central Texas.
Knocked one off the bucket list.
Over the weekend I took a roadtrip with 4 girlfriends to Big Bend National Park in far southwest Texas. I’ve lived in Texas over 20 years and have never made it out there. And it was long overdue. It is all that they say it is. Big, beautiful, rugged, inspiring, with mountain, desert and river views to die for.
Six and a half hours by car from Austin, we made it to Ft. Davis by about 7pm Friday night. We had reservations to attend one of the evening Star Parties held 3 times a week at the University of Texas McDonald Observatory, and made it with a little time to spare. The skies were dark and the stars were out. The Milky Way was amazing. The stars and constellations visible to the naked eye were too many to count. Through the telescopes they had placed for visitors, I saw Saturn, the Andromeda Galaxy, M11 star cluster, and the 2 star clusters in the Perseus constellation. If you’re going to make the trip all the way out to Big Bend, you really should combine it with a trip to the observatory. Get tickets ahead of time online. They sell out frequently and have to turn people away.
Saturday morning we drove to Big Bend and hiked inside of Big Bend National Park. Saturday afternoon we did the Window Trail – to experience the Chisos Mountains part of Big Bend. Four hours round trip, a moderately challenging hike, with breathtaking scenery all along the way.
We started Sunday at Santa Elena Canyon at dawn – to experience the Rio Grand river part of Big Bend. It was about an easy 2 hour hike roundtrip – though we had to bushwack a bit to get onto the trail. The Rio Grande has sliced a 1500′ deep canyon through the mountain there. At sunrise, the face of the sheer mountain walls glow in the brightening sunlight.
Sunday afternoon we hiked the Mule Ears Springs trail – to experience the Chihuahuan Desert part of Big Bend. A 3 hour hike, moderate difficulty, mainly due to the rough terrain and 90+ degree temperatures. Packing water with you is a must!
Another very awesome trip. We hiked our butts off.
Little dude.
One of the turtles I saw from the jetty at the Port Aransas marina; he was just chomping on the seaweed like he was at a salad bar:
Lovely glow.
Taken about 30 minutes after sunset Sunday night. Venus is sneaking towards the horizon.
Super hunter’s moon 2016.
I enjoyed playing with my big-girl-camera while photographing the moon last night. The first one was right after it rose above the horizon, and the second was shot a while (and many frames) later. I was especially pleased that I got a good shot or two given that I took them from the boat. It’s a magical time for a moon dance….
Beach weekend.
We spent the weekend at Port Aransas – to see wooden boats, birds, waves and to soak up some salt air. I love autumn on the Texas gulf coast.
Scenes from the weekend.
We rafted up with Marty & Sue in Bee Creek over the weekend. No wind, but we had beautiful weather.
We were treated to an exceptionally stunning sunset Saturday evening. This photo is not edited; the colors really were that amazing.
And in the morning we were surrounded by hazy fog rising off the warmer-than-air lake water.
Twas beautiful, indeed.
Late bloomer.
I planted a 2-gallon sized Pride of Barbados shrub yesterday. It’s a bit late in the season, but I’m hoping that planting it now will give it a good month or so to acclimate to its new home before the cold weather hits. That should make for a good winter’s nap before spring. We’ll see. If this one doesn’t pan out, Monte’s starting a few from seed.
Birdies above.
At home I am feeling the absence of the little birdies and squirrels lately. They started making themselves scarce about the same time a hawk was spotted swooping around the trees in our yard. Hopefully this won’t last long.
In the mean time, I was thrilled to see a flock of 20 or more Monk Parakeets flying around the Lamar & 51st street area as we headed home from dinner tonight. We stalked them for a while but didn’t get a great shot.
This is a picture of them near one of their nests. I count 16 or so in this shot. Kind of reminds me of a musical scale with the birds as the notes.
Sheila365 