Mount Shasta

Mount Shasta, CA
Canon EOS Rebel T5i, EF 17-40mm f/4L USM, f/8, 1/80s, ISO: 100

I'm starting to get back into the normal rhythm of things after my Thanksgiving trip up North.  I took a little under two thousand photos.  I'll be spending the next week or so going through them.  I wonder how much money that would have cost me in film and processing back in the day.  A photographer had to know what he/she was doing back then.  Now, a lug like me can drive around and press the button on the camera until his finger turns blue then sift through the crap to find the occasional gem.  Gotta love technology.

Lake Tahoe

Lake Tahoe, CA
Canon PowerShot SX40 HS

Lake Tahoe is famous for its clear blue water.  No doubt.  This photo was taken three years ago in January.  It's obviously a winter shot based on the snow on the hills and ice on the water.  Tough to beat Tahoe in winter.

Photo selection inspired by Geogypsy's Foto Friday Fun 138, image #6768.

Stalking the Spruce House

Spruce House, Mesa Verde National Park, CO
Canon EOS Rebel T5i, EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 IS II USM, f/18, 1/800s, ISO: 1600

Hiking down to Spruce House exposes the cliff dwellings to a number of interesting views.  It's a short hike (about a mile) and not very difficult, but it's also not flat until you get to the Spruce House.  We toured three cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde.  Cliff Palace was the most impressive.  Balcony House was the most adventurous.  Spruce House was the most intimate and easily my favorite of the three in part because we weren't stuck in a guided tour group.

Visitors at Spruce House

Spruce House. Mesa Verde Narional Park, CO
Canon EOS Rebel T5i, EF 17-40mm f/4L USM, f/10, 1/100s. ISO: 100

I think it's easier to imagine what life would have been like living in the cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde with people in the pictures.  It gives the photos a sense of scale and movement.  I had conversations with most of the people in this picture.  The gentleman in green is my friend Jim.  We went to college together and have been friends ever since.  He's accompanied me on a few road trips recently, but now he's met a lady so I suspect it may be just me and Pongo for a while unless I can figure out a way to get my wife to accompany us.  She hates camping.

Spruce House

Spruce House. Mesa Verde National Park, CO
Canon EOS Rebel T5i, EF 17-40mm f/4L USM, ISO: 1600. f/13, 1/800s

A lot of restoration work has been done on the main attractions at Mesa Verde.  I use the word 'attractions' with all of the touristy vibe that goes with it.  Mesa Verde is the closest thing to Disneyland that I've encountered at a National Park.  Guided tours.  Lines.  Semi-fabricated attractions.  The cool thing about Spruce House is that it's condition is a lot closer to what it was when people lived in it than when it was first discovered, I'm sure.  Would we be better off seeing things in a more natural state, though?  I'm not sure I have an opinion one way or the other. it's just a question I've asked myself since visiting the park.

Golfer Crossing

Paradise Valley Golf Course, Fairfield, CA

I was in one of those golf carts and this sign didn't make me feel any safer about crossing this particular road.

Anise Swallowtail

Anise Swallowtail -- Moss Landing, CA
Canon PowerShot SX40 HS

I can stare at butterfly pictures for a long time.  They are nature's masterpieces.  I'm agnostic with a hard lean toward atheism, but if someone wanted to convince me the world was artistically conceived by some higher power and used the butterfly as their first argument I just might be swayed.

Photo selection inspired by Geogypsy's Foto Friday Fun 137, image #9860.