Wyoming Skies

One of my favorite spots on earth is the northwest corner of Wyoming where you'll find two gems of the US National Park System. Both Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks offer the visitor a tremendous wealth of stunning sights from the waters of their lakes and rivers to the brilliant colors to be found in the skies from dawn through dusk. This week's SKYWATCH FRIDAY & SCENIC SUNDAY post is a view of the godlight at sunset from my perch up on Mount Washington looking toward the west in Yellowstone National Park.

Wyoming Godlight ~ Yellowstone National Park

This week's second image is taken from the banks of the Snake River in Grand Teton National Park looking up at the early morning light kissing the peak of Grand Teton Peak.

Teton Dawn ~ Grand Teton National Park

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Signs of Spring!

Ahhh.... Spring is truly arriving here in North Texas. I'll allow Mother Nature to share her show with you  - She speaks far more eloquently than I ever can!

White Throated Sparrow

Purple Wing Violas

Dark Eyed Junco

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Enjoy Visions of other places through MY WORLD

A place where images do the talking- WORDLESS WEDNESDAY

More Feathered friends? Try WORLD BIRD WEDNESDAY

Fabulous Floral Fun? TODAY'S FLOWERS

Kaikoura Skies: A natural fireworks show!

During my 2009 visit to the South Island of New Zealand I had the great pleasure to spend time in the fishing town of Kaikoura on the northeast coast. Kaikoura is a very unique place in the world as it has vistas of the ocean and snow capped mountains from the shore. During my short visit there I was able to see sperm whales, huge "crayfish" (what we in the United States call spiny lobsters), fur seals, and some of the most amazing dawn & dusk skies I've ever seen!

As part of the Skywatch Friday and Scenic Sunday memes, I'm sharing two of my favorites image from Kaikoura.

The first image is a dawn image looking out toward the Pacific Ocean from the rocky beach.

Kaikoura Dawn

The second image comes from the same beach and is a shot that I had missed the previous morning so I set up to get it at just the right moment as the sun burst above the horizon and between the craggy rocks.

Starburst

Click in either image to see it in the original gallery

Spring has Sprung! (Finally!)

Yesterday we took my daughter back to college after her spring break and spent almost 8 hours on I-35 between Dallas and Austin, Texas. We were sitting  in the car at 4:22 pm local time when the moment of the Vernal Equinox passed. While the scenery along the interstate was less than inspiring, we did pass by a patch of our beloved state flower, the Texas Bluebonnet which reminded me that there is indeed a lot to look forward to here in Texas come springtime. The expectation for this year's crop of wild bluebonnets is not good as we had a relatively dry autumn, a ridiculously cold winter, and a drought stricken last two months.

In hope that there are good bluebonnet images to be had this spring I am posting these from last year in the hopes that those of you not fortunate enough to bein Texas during the early spring can enjoy a bit of Texas in far away lands!

Bluebonnet Hill

Bluebonnet Sky

Beebonnet

Click in any of the images to view it in the original gallery.

This is a post to the MY WORLD Meme

Pretend you did not read my words above and this qualifies for WORDLESS WEDNESDAY ;-)

If you like more flowers, visit TODAY'S FLOWERS

Busy as Bees!

Today's post was inspired by my friend, Mark Moffett's extraordinary photo spread of exotic pollinating creatures in the March Issue of National Geographic. On  my visit to the Dallas Arboretum for their "Dallas Blooms" event, I was able to spend time with my current favorite flower, the Iceland Poppy (Papaver nudicaule). As this is the weekend of the Vernal Equinox, I wanted to share the recent images of Iceland poppies and their pollination.

Preparing to Pop

Click in any of the images to see them in their original gallery!

Interested in Pollinator? Visit the Pollinator Partnership- They do great work!

Visit Macro Flowers Saturday or Flowers on Saturday for more bloomin' fun!

Also see the fun at TODAY'S FLOWERS & MACRO MONDAY.

"Remarkable" Dawn

Today's post is of dawn over the Remarkables mountain range just outside of Queenstown New Zealand. The image was taken on my last morning in Queenstown and came after a rather sleepless night as we had just experienced the effects of the word's strongest earthquake of 2009.

The night before, I was in bed in my hotel just before 8:30 pm (had to be up well before dawn to get this shot you see here!) and heard the glassware in the mini bar start to jingle and then the bed started to quiver ( the bed was NOT equipped with "Magic Fingers"!). I realized we were having an earthquake and stood in the door as "protection". I was on the 4th floor of my hotel and could definitely feel the building swaying. I remember thinking the whole building was going to collapse. Was I better off to be up that high or to try to so down the stairs to the street? I recall not liking the results of either scenario! Of course the quake did not last long ( about 70 seconds by most accounts). The quake epicenter was centered about 136 miles from my hotel and was later determined to be a 7.8 on the Richter Scale followed by a 6.1 aftershock. Because of my distance from the epicenter it was estimated that Queenstown experienced the equivalent of a 5.8 quake. Still pretty scary I have to say!  Thankfully there was minimal damage caused by this quake because the southern tip of NZ's South Island is sparsely populated and the building codes there are superb  due to the natural seismic activity there. HERE is the BBC's reporting of this earthquake.


The next morning was a cold, crisp morning and we headed out to the shores of Lake Wakatipu to set up in the predawn for what we hoped would be a brilliant sunrise. The earliest light did not have much in the sky to work with, but the clouds you see were nice enough to drift in and color up nicely to give this rosy warm glow right over the Remarkables.After happily shooting this scene, we headed further north to spend a few days near Aoraki/Mt. Cook to photograph New Zealand's tallest peak. Click HERE to see my recent post of LAST LIGHT on that magnificent peak.

Rosy Fingered Dawn Over the Remarkables

Lake Wakatipu, New Zealand

Click in the image to see it in the original gallery.

Enjoy more great images by visiting SKYWATCH FRIDAY and SCENIC SUNDAY!

A Visit from our Local Cooper's Hawk

The Highly efficient visit of our neighborhood Cooper's Hawk last autumn.He was yet to read "To Kill A Mockingbird".

Click in any image to see it in the original gallery.

This is a post to WORDLESS WEDNESDAY, WORLD BIRD WEDNESDAY, & CAMERA CRITTERS.

Mexican Plum Blossoms...Welcome Springtime!

For this week's MACRO MONDAY post I am sharing my most recent shots. On Friday morning, I put my macro lens through the paces as the Mexican Plum (Prunus mexicana) tree near my office was in full & glorious bloom. These blossoms were so inviting and the vernal equinox was so close, I just HAD to take advantage of the opportunity Mother Nature provided. I especially like how the anthers of these blossoms reach out from the center of the blossom in a gangly way.

Click in either image to see it in the original gallery.

Feel free to visit TODAY'S FLOWERS for other floral delights!

Macro Monday Mystery -- The Answer!

Last week I posted this image as a Mystery shot. And many of you guessed its identity. As promised, here is the great "reveal" of its true nature!

I really enjoyed the range of guesses and second guesses that everyone put into this! The image was taken at the Fort Worth Zoo and I cropped my not so great image of a zebra down to a more interesting view of the "pseudo symmetrical" pattern along his spine. All of your who guessed Zebra were indeed correct. and those of you who were afraid it was a shot of an animal rug need not worry as the zebra is very much alive and well. Interestingly, I will be enlarging the image and using it as if it were an animal skin hanging on a wall in our guest bedroom to go along with a similar image of a (living) giraffe's skin that I took elsewhere. Thanks for all your participation.!

Zambezi Sunset

Zambezi Sunset

This week's Skywatch Friday & Scenic Sunday post comes from my 2006 visit to Southern Africa. I was lucky enough to be able to present at a conference in Johannesburg, South Africa that June. To make good use of the long trip and to live out a lifelong dream, I booked two safaris. The first was at Ngala Private Game reserve adjacent to Kruger National Park. The second was in Botswana at the Chobe National Park. The trip from Ngala to Chobe entailed a two-day stay in the town of Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. As the name suggests, this is where the mighty Zambezi River falls more than 360 feet (more than double the height of Niagara Falls) into the Zambezi River Gorge. The falls is also more than a mile wide at this point. The evening before I kayaked the rapids of the lower portion of the Gorge, I was able to enjoy a sunset cruise on a flat-bottomed barge on the Zambezi just above Victoria Falls. Lucky, it was the dry season and we were treated to a stunning, cloud free sunset in addition to sightings of crocodiles and hippos.

Enjoy your view of one of Africa wildest rivers!

Click in the image for to see it in the original gallery

PS - several of you have already emailed and asked about any images I have of the Victoria Falls. Due to the mist that the the Falls kick up (the locals call Victoria Falls - "The Smoke that Thunders") it is tough to get a good view if the Falls from the land based viewing spots. As such I took one of the local helicopter rides to see the Falls  from above. The images are not great as I felt like I was holding on for dear life  as we sharply banked over the Falls.

Click in either image for a higher resolution version

Seeking a caption....

It's Wordless Wednesday and this shot needs no words! (But feel free to suggest a caption that I might want to use on "non wordless" days!)

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A Macro Monday Mystery

In honor of Macro Monday I am posting this macro shot for you to ponder. What is it? And to what does it belong? Feel free to share your guesses in the comments. I'll post the answer next Sunday!

The ANSWER is now posted...click HERE to see the reveal!

LAST LIGHT

Last Light  on Aoraki/ Mt. Cook

Southern Alps, New Zealand

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A post to WORDLESS WEDNESDAY, SKYWATCH FRIDAY, and SCENIC SUNDAY