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| Lynn and I spent a few days this week in Utah's Bryce and Zion National Parks. I know that folks will be asking me which Park I liked the best. That will be a question that will be impossible to answer. These two parks are as different as Prague is from Budapest. Bryce Canyon is literally a fairyland of hoodoos and amazing granite shapes..lovely to view and to photograph. Zion is big and bold granite mountains in totally different shapes that are beautiful at sunrise, sunset and every time in between. We saw great wildlife in both Parks...pronghorn antelope and deer in Bryce and a couple of herds of bighorn sheep in Zion.
In Bryce lodging was somewhat limited to either the lodge in the Park or one of the almost 400 rooms at Ruby's. ruby's is conveniently located just outside of the Park's gates. We stayed at Ruby's which is an attraction in itself. They have everything that the traveler might need...restaurants, shops, laundromats and beauty shops. Lynn loved shopping in their gift shops. In Zion most of the accommodations are in the town of Springdale, Utah which is on the West side of the park. These lodges range from mid-level to quite luxurious. We were traveling with our dog, a shih tzu, so we were confined to hotels that accepted pets. No problem at Ruby's..more difficult in Zion, but we did find a really nice hotel, the Driftwood Lodge in Springdale that had extremely strict requirements for lodging a pet. Basically, if you left the room you had to take your dog with you! This is the first time that we have ever encountered this. We were told that if a pet was left in the room for even 10 minutes and the management discovered this it is possible that they would call animal services and have the dog removed from the room! It is difficult taking a pet on a trip to one of the National Parks anyway since dogs are not allowed on any of the trails and can only be on a leash in the paved parking areas! I assume that a few people were careless with their animals...and thus, this silly rule.
I did photography in both parks at both sunrise and sunset. I expect to have some photos that I will be proud of and will display some here shortly.
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| We have been on a driving trip to Colorado from Florida to visit the kids and granddaughter, Savannah. It was nice to leave Florida's hot humid summer to cool off. Little did we expect that we would be greeted by a heavy snowfall when we arrived in the Rocky Mountains at Breckenridge. It started snowing early this morning and has been dumping for at least 4 hours as I am writing this. We were fortunate to have been able to drive Trail Ridge Road through Rocky Mountain National Park just 2 days prior to this snow. It is common for the Park to close this highway following a snowfall. Trail Ridge Road is just short of 50 miles from the town of Estes Park to Grand Lake, Colorado. My quest was to photograph wildlife on this 2 hour trip through the mountains. This is what is called "the rut" when the male elk "bugle" to find a mate. We heard bugling when we left our hotel room in Estes Park before sunrise. We were told that we would most likely see wildlife after we crossed the Continental Divide. That's where we had seen many elk before. But we were surprised as we got our best sighting of elk on the east side of the Divide. I photographed a huge bull elk bugling quite near the highway as well as a small herd of females. Additionally, I was able to take photos of several bighorn sheep and a few mule deer. A successful trip indeed. Photos eventually. | | |
| Every once in a while I come to the conclusion that I really do live in an incredible place. The Tampa Bay Area offers so much for the visitor and the photographer. This week my friend Jack O'Connell and I decided to do a sunset photography shoot in Tarpon Springs. Tarpon is just about 20 minutes from home. It has been called the world's second largest Greek town. This little village along the Anclote River which leads out to the Gulf of Mexico is the home of sponge diving, commercial fishing boats and certainly the finest Greek cuisine in the country. And, Greek is spoken freely on the street. Here are a few photos.     
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| Lynn and I are spending a hot, but relaxing weekend in Florida. I did a model shoot with my friends from the Suncoast Camera Club last week. Shooting models is so much different than shooting wildlife! With models you have to direct them. With wildlife they pretty much dictate to you how you are going to photograph them. Your real only choices are to get on the side where the light is attractive when it's convenient. With lions, cheetahs and other predators that isn't always possible unless you want to risk being eaten (:g). I will be throwing steaks on the grill tonight. Here are a few of the photos that I took while hiking in Colorado a couple of weeks ago.  
Photo Credt- Jim Lucadem    
   
I hope that you have a great Labor Day! | | |
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