While Mike was home sick we took Pierce for his first visit to the Everglades National park at the Anhinga trailPIERCE FIRST TRIP TO EVNP

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Last Saturday I watched about 6 alligators dig out a channel that had been silted in. The channel ran from Taylor Slough to the Lake at Royal Palm. My boss, Jackie, at the Park says gators will do this sort of activity when they build Gator holes. Gator holes are usually round, with a bank going all the way arround. We don't know why, they build Gator holes. (Assume to get to Water)

The joke is so that they are assuring a supply of fresh water in the lake. Taylor Slough is at the mercy of the Miami Water managers.

I am sorry but I deleted the photos in error when I cleaned up my drive, and formatted my cards.

Hi again.  If I haven’t already bored you to tears with all of my bird pictures…here are a few more from Anhinga Trail this am.  Pat and I arrived at the park at 7 am.  It was extremely overcast and chilly.  The sun didn’t come out until well after 8 and we thought we were going to freeze to death.  It’s always a few degrees cooler over there for some reason.

I started out shooting with my 70-200 lens, but when the sun came out, I switched to Pat’s 80-400.  Still trying to figure out all of the right bird settings at the appropriate times (yeah, right)!  I think these photos have too much noise in them, but I’ll share them with you anyway.

We had a very friendly Wood Stork that was all about posing for us today.  He was very close to us and didn’t seem to mind all the photography going on around him.  We also followed a tip from Colin about a Great Horned Owl up in a tree near the visitor center, but even the reach of the 80-400 wasn’t really enough.  Plus we were standing next to a guy with a huge 500mm lens on a lovely Gitzo tripod with a Wimbley head on it!  OK>>>NOT FAIR!  Then he showed us up by adding a 2x teleconverter.  That’s about the time I packed up and called it a day!

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my 2 week vacation.  It will be hard to go back to work on Monday…I already know what I’ve got coming.  Thank you for viewing my photos and enduring all of my nature adventures.  Amy

http://hookedonphotos.zenfolio.com/p734205376

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Since you all are pulling from archives, I remembered I had this one from my Washington, DC trip in July.  We took a day to go see the Great Falls Park in Virginia.  I'm on the right and my 2nd cousin is on the left.  I'll try to also come up with some original entries as well.

Great Falls Shadows  

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A very merry Christmas and a happy new year to everyone from Mosel Manor.

Christmas in a bush park on a hot summer day consists of our sons doing some fishing, a lunch of prawns and oysters followed by cold turkey and ham off the bone with a potato salad and garden salad. Too hot for hot food. Fortunately, today was overcast and that kept the temperature down to about 29-30 degrees C. When the wind blows, it "snows" gum leaves from the trees... The closest we'll ever get to a white christmas.

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Yesterday I met up with Colin and Helen down at Anhinga Trail.  Colin, who volunteers down at the park, was our tour guide for the day.  Helen (a member of our photo club) brought her 10 year old daughter and 6 year old son for our day long adventure.  We started at Anhinga Trail at 8 am.  We drove all around the park with Colin and saw many things that regular park visitors would probably never see.  Our main goal yesterday was a 1.6 mile hike down Snake Bight Trail, which leads you to a tiny boardwalk overlooking the Florida Bay.  We were hoping for high tide, which would bring the birds closer to us...no such luck.  We arrived at the end of the trail (a 40 minute hike each way) at around 12:30 in the afternoon.  It was fairly hot when we got to the end of the trail and the boardwalk had no shade covering.  It was also about 2 hours before high tide.  I was so impressed with Helen's kids, who did not complain even once and all the time were very interested in learning from Colin.  Although very far away, through some binoculars, I saw my first Roseate Spoonbill.  Also, Helen spotted a Bald Eagle high in the sky...that was also very cool.

I was exhausted after this long adventure and ended up in bed with a migraine for the rest of the day and night...probably from not drinking enough water.  

I've added a few of my photos to the Recently Added gallery on my site:

http://hookedonphotos.zenfolio.com/p536076514/

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OK Gang,

Here are my shots - Well, at least the ones that were worth posting.  As Amy said, we finally got the group together and had a great time at our first outing.  I think now that we finally did it and all had a great time, we should be able to do this on a regular basis.  I for one vote we go back to the 'Glades.

In fact, I had such a great time that I went back into the park later that afternoon to visit the Anhinga Trail guring the golden hours.  I definitely want to go back!

And, a very special thanks to Colin, who graciously took a few of us on a personal tour of some of the best spots.  As a lot of you have heard by now, we got to witness a gator on the prowl, and had the chance to see him leap out of the water numerous times as he chased an Anhinga swimming around him.

I have a few of the shots of the gator making his move posted in the link below.  I'll have more as I continue to process the images I took.  In the meantime, I hope you enjoy these.........

http://capturedinlight.zenfolio.com/p677060144

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I was at a park earlier this year when I snapped some pictures of this father and daughter flying a kite together.

Hope you enjoy.

Kite Flying - 1 Kite Flying - 2 Kite Flying - 3

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This is a set of bird phots taken this weekend. Tricolor heron was fishing in taylor Slough. The Red Sholder hawk was watching me drive the wrong way on a one way street to get his photo. Then he couldn't decide which side was best, The morning glories were just so nice in the early light. When is a coot not a coot went it is a coot and a reflection of a coot. Ended with this great egret. An interesting day in the Park.Everglades National Park Nov 2007

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Yesterday I arrived inThe Park just before sunrise and there was a strong breeze blowing off the ocean. This clump of sawgrass flower caught my attention.

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A fun day at Westlake Park in Hollywood.

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Wow!  I had no idea that I had taken so many pattern pictures on my vacation!

1. ~ the Mall of the visitor's center at Mt. Rushmore, where every state and territory is represented by it flag.
2. ~ a composite photo of several shots of the Crazy Horse Memorial mountain during the evening light show.
3. ~  examples of terracing at Mammoth Springs, Yellowstone National Park.
   

All States Flags Light Show On Crazy Horse Memorial Mountain Terracing at Yellowstone Nat'l Park - Mammoth Springs Terracing at Yellowstone Nat'l Park - Mammoth Springs

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Walking through the park I saw many repeating patterns. Trying to post ones that haven't been shot by anyone yet...these were all taken with my P&S camera.

Bike rack Bleacher Chain link Nothing but net School windows Sign post

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Attended the 18th annual classic car show in Downtown San Bernardino on Saturday.  This is the largest cruisin' car show with over 2,100 pre 1974 cars.  The cars can cruise on a 3 mile route from 9 am to 9 pm.  They have reserved spots along the route so they normally cruise for an hour and then park for a few hours before cruising again.  Many of the cars have big 400 cu" engines and they are allowed to have the headers undone so it can be quite loud at times.  Here are a few of the cars.01 Route 66 02 Route 66 03 Route 66 04 Route 66 05 Route 66 06 Route 66 07 Route 66 08 Route 66 09 Route 66 10 Route 66 11 Route 66 12 Route 66 13 Route 66 14 Route 66

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I took a little stroll through the park today to see what kinds of repeating patterns I could find and this is what I came up with!

Hope you enjoy.

Brick Wall Wooden Gate
Band Shell Ceiling - 1 Band Shell Ceiling - 2
Stone Walkway Band Shell Roof

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Early evening on the Great Salt Lake's Antelope Island State Park brought massive clouds and microbursts.  The lack of wind made the lake surface a perfect mirror.

As the thick clouds rolled in, the building shadows seemed to be gaining at the heels of the retreating seagulls and sand pipers.

A picture perfect end to a great day on the lake. Antelope Island 4 - Great Salt Lake, Utah

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While in Alaska I saw enough glaciers to last a lifetime.  There were tons.  In Alaska there are over 100,000 glaciers, and I'd swear I saw most of them (or a few dozen at least).  

These rivers of ice are mammoth.  For example, in the photo "Mendenhall Glacier 0999," I'm standing a mile away from the glacier face, and the face is 100 ft tall.  The calvings in these pictures don't look too large, but the park ranger in Glacier Bay told us that the calving we saw was chunks of ice about the size of a car.  The glaciers that fall into the ocean leave ice bergs (or "berg bits" as the little ones are called), so we saw a bunch of those too.  

Glaciers

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Took this picture a few weeks ago while at a park with my daughter.  I should have named this picture "exhale" - decided to post with everyone else's cloud posts.

Humorous Cloud  

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Our week in Kentucky didn’t yield as many pictures as vacations usually do because it was a family reunion. But here are a few shots to go with this month’s challenge. I shot this first one at Cumberland Falls State Park looking out from inside a cave and used the cave entrance as a silhouette to frame the shot. Reverse Silhouette This one is Betty Boop standing at the shore of Lake Cumberland at sunset. Betty Sparkles This one was taken through the car window as we zipped down US 441 through Bell Glade, FL at 65 mph.Leafless Trio

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I decided to drive by the park on my way home. Glad I did as I could see this beauty at the waters edge.

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