First post of 2013, it’s been a busy month. The first week of February my mom, dad, and I traveled to Key largo for vacation. We stayed at the Key Lime sailing club, which had a ton of fun stuff for us to do out on the bay, yes, including sailing. We went snorkeling twice which was awesome both times. We also went to the Florida Everglades where we saw tons of neat birds and alligators. It was a really great trip. There are a ton of pictures in my flickr gallery, and here are but a few of them.
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This fall Tracy noticed that some of the crabapples had been disappearing off of her bonsai tree. We found the culprit this weekend, and the kitties found him too.
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I snapped these photos of a helper we have for keeping the bushes at the back of our lot in check. There are actually 2 of these little guys, and their mom. We’ve seen them a few times this summer. One time the two young ones took turns running through the neighbors swing set. They were dodging back and forth through the swings. Most of the bushes in back are nothing special, but we keep an eye on our lilac bushes, they’ve been fine so far. I really like the stripe down its neck.
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This year on vacation to Eagle Crag Lake in the Adirondacks I took my mom’s kayak down to the swamp at the end of the lake. I’ve done it several times and this year decided to bring 2 of my cameras with for some photos. Its a pretty neat place to go. There is no path or road around the swamp so you are really alone. There is a lot of neat plants and wildlife to be seen. I saw several Kingfisher’s hunting for fish. No beaver’s to be seen or heard this year, but I assume they are around. Here’s a few photos I took, and a panoramic as well. Enjoy.
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Tracy’s mom has some huge butterfly bushes this year, and they were just covered with tiger swallowtails this year. I brought along my flaky Infrared Digital camera to try and take some shots to see how they look in IR. It was pretty tough, those butterflies would not stay still, and it was difficult to get really close because they just fly away. I was persistent though, and got a few neat shots.
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Wow, three updates in one day? I must have a lot of free time, or just catching up over Memorial Day Weekend. Tracy and I went to my parents house for dinner today, and they have a lot of birds that like to show up at their many feeders. I always say I will bring my camera with some time to see what I can photograph, and this time I did. A couple of Baltimore Orioles showed up and I was really impressed with the shots I got. All photos taken with a Canon 70-200mm lens. Click to enlarge. Bird photos can be found in my flickr gallery.
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This last photo is of the second Oriole that shows up. He has much brighter plumage.
I have a few more photos you can view them in my flickr gallery.
Tuesday 11/17/2009 Day 5: Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge
After visiting the awesome Valiant Air Command Warbird Museum in Titusville, we headed up US-1 towards the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge. The refuge is closed 3 days before a shuttle launch to prevent people from hiding out to see the launch from up close. The refuge borders NASA Kennedy Space Center, and we were sure to drive down to the beach to get close to the pads, although we had already seen the launch the day before. The majority of the pictures from our trip to Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge are available in much larger sizes in my Flickr photo gallery.
After briefly stopping at the visitor center for a map and directions we headed out to take a few wildlife drives, and race out to the manatee viewing platform. Unfortunately there were no manatees at the viewing area, so we returned down the road and took the Blackpoint Wildlife drive. It was an awesome drive and we saw tons of birds and wildlife.
On the way to the wildlife drive we saw many vultures, some Great Egret’s and some Snowy Egrets.
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Once we started on the drive we saw several alligators, and some more birds, as well as an Osprey on one of the Bald Eagle platforms.
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We toured the wetland area and saw lots of birds including lousiana herons.
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We saw a Bald Eagle land on a far away platform. On the way out we shooed a snake off the road so it wouldn’t get run over.
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After doing the wildlife drive, we headed down towards the seashore on a winding road through the marshes. There we got some super close up views of a great blue heron.
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Then after rounding a corner we had to stop the car after another alligator was blocking the road. He was huge! There was no way around, so form a safe distance we got out of the car to see him and take some photos before he slid back into the water. A definite highlight of the whole trip.
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We then made it down to the seashore where we could see the launch pads at sunset and the beach. It was a great end to the day and to the whole trip.
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As always, larger pictures of our full trip to Florida are available from my Flickr photo gallery.
Sunday 11/15/2009 Day 3: Florida Institute of Technology and Cocoa Beach
On Sunday we took a break from our traveling to relax before the shuttle launch. We did go south to Melbourne and the Florida Institute of Technology to walk through their botanical gardens which was nice. There were lots of varieties of palms, bamboo, and lizards too. A lot of the trees had giant pathos plants growing all over them, but the leaves were huge compared to how large they get indoors in Rochester.
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For me, it was fun to see lizards everywhere, but I have a hunch they are like squirrels down there to Floridians. I took the opportunity to take some infrared photos while we walked through the gardens, as the palm plants make really stunning pictures.
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After we walked through the gardens, we went back to the hotel to spend the day at the beach. There were strong rip tides because of the remnants of Hurricane Ida that went up the coast, but we still did some wading. It was a very rough surf, and you really got pushed around by the waves and currents. But you gotta go in the ocean when you go on vacation, so we did.
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As always, larger pictures of our full trip to Florida are available from my Flickr photo gallery. Day 4 includes our photos of the shuttle launch.
Well August is traditionally a vacation month, and so far this month I’ve been to Saratoga twice and spent a week in the Adirondack Mountains near Tupper Lake. Too many photos to handle. For now I will direct those interested in seeing Horse Photos from Saratoga to view them in my Flickr Gallery.
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I have added a few photos to the Infrared Photo Gallery as well, including this image of a snake sunning itself on a dock in the Adirondacks.
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