Road trip to new York: Day 1 Washington

Today I headed off on my trip to new York via Yellowstone national park, Gand Tetons, Badlands and Chicago. 

My aunt was genuinely sad I was going even if she was putting this on for the camera. I will miss our good games of scabble. 

It started out a beautiful sunny day today as I was waiting to pass through the American border at 11am which took 2 hours! Lots of questions like why so much stuff in the car, how did I afford the car etc. They almost make you feel like you might be guilty of something. Welcome to America. 

Once through I headed to route 2 which went though the southern cascades which was meant to be a scenic route but unfortunately the clouds and rain spoiled any views, but there was this nice waterfall. 

The rain turned to snow as I headed over Stephens pass but once through the mountains the clouds cleared and I had a beautiful drive passing through Leavenworth, Washington's Bavarian Village. An interesting place in the middle of the states!

and got this shot before the sun went down. 

Next stop was Dry Falls which is an area that in the ice age apparently would have had an awesome waterfall. Unfortunately the sun ha already gone down so the shot wasn't worth getting on my medium format camera. 

Whilst reading about the area on the board I spotted a great looking waterfall called Palouse falls, I will have to find out where it is and if I have time to visit along the way. 


I then continued my drive to my destination for the night, Spokane motel 6, on the way stopping at Doxies for a nice greasy burger in a small town in the middle of nowhere. 

I arrived at the motel at 10.30, for  the last hours drive I was quite tired, and that wasn't helped by some of the long straight boring roads. 

It felt so good to lie in a bed after a 11 hours in a car!

.......

Almost.....

How many Km will this read in 2 months?!

USA trip day 1

USA road trip day 1

I began my epic trip across the USA today to New York at 10am.

The car is packed full of all my stuff and the weather is looking good for when I arrive in Yellowstone national park on Sunday.

I'm sat now at the USA border near Vancouver with a 1 hour wait. Fun times.

Shannon Falls

Today I went exploring around Squamish which is North of Vancouver, I just found myself driving around not finding anything that caught my eye for a great picture, I could see I am getting bored of the scenery as I have driven through this area a few times and also it is very similar to Whistler and Vancouver with trees and mountains. After most of the day wasted with not a single shot I decided to stop at Shannon Falls, I've been before in the morning but the light was terrible, and knew I needed to come back in the afternoon when the sun had come around the mountains to illuminate the water.
I arrived at the perfect time to catch this beauty, for me this is the perfect simple shot with just water and rocks as the elements and the sun shining nicely from the right at 90 degrees to the falls. A 4 second exposure gave me the lovely flow of the water.

This is what the falls look like without the smooth long shutter effect. Which do you prefer?

The weeping willow

Weeping Willow's are my favourite trees, looks wise that is, and there are plenty around Vancouver but until now I've not found one in a decent setting to photograph. The issue is that I like all my shots to be clean and clutter free which means no signs, roads, cars, horrible buildings or anything that ruins the scene. Simple and clean is what I search for and if I can't find it I won't take a picture.
I found this willow tree today in Jericho Park, finally one I could shoot with just sky in the background as that shows the greatness that is the willow, for me if there was anything behind this shot it would be ruined, I'm already slightly annoyed by the clouds at the bottom of frame!

I also decided to take another self portrait, getting in a little of the clutter of the surroundings, I don't ususally take landscapes with people in them but for certain shots like this it just helps to set the scene.
I keep thinking that I'd like to always have a theme through my shots with a girl in them with dark hair wearing a red jacket, it seems the best way to do that is to take the jacket and a wig with me wherever I go.

Rain rain and more rain

Even though it was raining all day I still managed to take a nice spring time shot inside with some of my Aunts flowers.

16km round trip hike to Norvan falls

Today I decided to hike to a waterfall in Lynn Canyon, I wanted to do this last month but there was too much snow on the ground and hiking in snow is no fun at all All in it was a 16km hike as on the way back I decided to go the long route that way I would get to see some new sites. There weren't any amazing sites that warranted my medium format kit but there where some interesting things to see that I captured on my Panasonic GF1. I'm still yet to see the bears everyone keeps going on about here.

THe area is an old logging site and mill so along the way I would see various rusting items with trees growing out of them.

There is also plenty of old growth trees that have long been cut down and mostly rotted away.

I would love to know how the tree below got like this, it was obviously cut down but then did this happen naturally?

The final destination of the Norvan falls, not that interesting as waterfalls go but a nice hike none the less.

Back to Vancouver - Spring

I'm back in Vancouver after a month in the snow of Whistler, I'm happy I got all the shots I wanted to get whilst there which is considering the weather there.

Spring is officially here and the cherry blossoms are blooming here, apparently Vancouver was designed so  cherry blossoms could be seen for the whole month appearing in stages throughout the city.

Having been around mountains for too long I wanted to venture into the city and explore there now, and too some shots in a style I started in London this year looking up the buildings, it's a style that for me makes the most out of the buildings height and repetitive features.

These have been the most interesting buildings I found in Vancouver, unfortunately it's not a city known for it's architecture, and most of the buildings are both business and residential with gives most of the buildings the residential balcony look. It's the business buildings above that interest me most.

A self portait

I finally took the plunge and snowboarded with my medium format gear on my back, although stripped down a little so that I wasn't carrying 20kg. On the way down this was a view that I was hoping to get someone skiing across in shot, but after lots of waiting instead I thought I would be in the shot. I almost wish I had also got one facing camera too.

Could this be the perfect shot of Whistler??

This is a shot that has eluded me for the past month, it has teased me every time I had been snowboarding hiding behind the clouds and finally over the last few days I got 2 versions, now the question is which is better??

The first shot was taken on a nice clear day  in the moning which was great as it required no waiting for clouds to blow out of the way which is a regular occurrence in Whistler.

For the second shot I was in this spot for over an hour waiting at 3.30pm for the right light to hit the mountains, but when it did clouds would cover the sun from the foreground trees so I would have to wait some more but it was certainly worth it. It would be amazing to get this on a clear day at sunset, but I am not allowed on the mountain much past 4.30 and also you wouldn't get the lovely illumination of the foreground trees for that so it would have just be of the mountains.

Please let me know your preferences as I really can't decide which is nicer as they both have their strong points!