It's fire season again so the sunsets are often shrouded in smoke and haze as they reach the horizon, and more often than not, totally wiped out by the thick smoke. Tonight it looked like being the latter as another beautiful summer day came to an end. But as the sun dipped into the murky atmosphere above the mountains it fell behind a couple of smoke 'bars' that gave it a distinct candy cane look which I thought was image worthy.
2 Comments
The back injury continues to haunt me but is slowly improving, so Sarah and I took a walk along the western stretch of the Bow River pathway close to home. We actually drove down to the river bridge on highway 22 where a good parking area started us off right by the water. I only managed 5km and confess I suffered for it later but it was nice to be walking, at least a little way.
Something that was not so nice is the early signs of autumnal colours, in the main shot below (click image for larger version) on the far horizon you can see large swathes of yellow. These aren't the canola fields ready for harvest, they are trees covering a large area and beginning to turn already. With winter ending so late this year it's worrying that autumn seems to be upon us in July. Perhaps the recent spell of cool nights has triggered the change and autumn will hold off but to be honest we can see the signs in the trees behind the house too, I swear if winter gets here early again I'm heading south like the snowbirds. The main shot below is taken from the top of the trail looking west, the gallery has captions to share along the way. The mountain blue jays that loiter around the garden brought their chicks for some seeds this morning. The parents were pulling the seeds from the seed bell and passing them on to the offspring. Frustratingly they did this behind the tree and out of sight, but on occasion the chicks would appear with a seed and I just had to make some shots of them.
The little guy in the main image couldn't look more pleased with himself as his juvenile beak is still wide gaping from his nesting days, this will narrow over the next week or so until it is gone so this little 'smile' was nice to capture. My back is well on the mend now and I really wanted to get out of the house and back to the mountains. Cecil joined me for a day shooting in K-country, even though I forewarned him that I wouldn't be going far from the car parks. We met up at our usual roadside spot and and set about storm chasing for a good 4 hours.
We drove highway 68 first calling at Sibbald Lake, then highway 40 stopping at The Wedge Pond and the kananaskis river bridge on Mt Allen Drive. We then continued as far as the turning for kananaskis lakes and stopped off at various parking areas on the lakes. Considering we were restricted to very short walks beside the car parks we found some nice images and had a great afternoon under stormy skies. As yet there are no signs of ill effects in my back so hopefully the recovery is well underway. The main shot below is of rental kayaks close to the 'Canyon' car park on lower kananaskis lake, the gallery has captions. Still suffering with my back (and so sick of it after two weeks) I find myself out in the garden with my camera trying to cheer myself up with some shots. I confess I was surprised by the number of things I found to shoot, so thought I'd share a few here.
We have plenty of dragonflies eating up the 'mozzies' and ladybird larvae eating their way through the aphid uprising. Spiders are sorting out any flying bugs that escape the dragonflies and our resident squirrel is constantly fighting off a huge selection of birdlife in a vain attempt to keep all of the sunflower seeds to himself. Overhead today was a rare Turkey Vulture, not rare as a species but very rare up here in Canada. It is a summer feeding ground for a few brave souls so seeing one here over Cochrane was a nice bonus. My back seems to be on the mend now and I hope to make a little foray into the mountains later this week so hopefully some stormy landscapes are coming. Since Sunday morning I've been stuck at home with chronic back spasms. It's an old injury aggravated by who knows what, but it has certainly put the brakes on getting out and about for the week. Today I've managed to move around unaided so things are returning to normal, as usual I couldn't wait to get my hands on the camera, so here's a shot of tonight's sunset just so people know we're still here. Hopefully I'll be good to go without painkillers by next week and back into the beautiful canadian wilderness for a short hike or two.
|
AuthorWe arrived in Calgary, Canada on 29th December 2011 to continue our journey. This blog is intended to keep our family and friends informed whilst we explore Canada.You can use the RSS feed below to stay updated. Categories
All
Archives
January 2024
The Shaman, West Texas
|