Oak Creek is for Sundays

Oak Creek is full of life! This Sunday, it was teaming with people escaping the summer heat and cooling off in the chilly waters of Oak Creek. I particularly like finding abstracts in nature here. I found myself picking out these abstracts because I have recently started teaching Photo 1 at Yavapai College, which means I am lecturing on principles of art and design to my class. The following photos convey these kind of elements: texture, pattern, balance, line, contrast, scale, depth of field, focus, perspective...

Hiking Little Bear Trail in Flagstaff

The day was overcast, rain threatened but it only sprinked briefly. The trailhead is via Sunset Trail off of Schultz Pass Road northwest of Flagstaff. The trail looped to the left through a couple year old burnout area and back up a steep hillside to descend back down through a lush forest. We experienced a 1,200 ft elevation change for this six mile jaunt. It was a decent workout rewarded with spectacular views.

spot of light

Olympic National Park - Part 3

Hurricane Ridge is just over 5,000 ft in elevation, about the same as Prescott. Hurricane Ridge had 36 feet of snow last winter, Prescott had (I guess) 12 inches. The flowers were plentiful, the air clear and blue. We were lucky to be able to see the entire range of mountains without the usual cloud cover. After wandering on Hurricane Hill, we drove over to Seattle, catching a ferry on the way. We ate dinner at Cedars, a nice Indian restaurant near the University. Dessert was at a local ice cream shop where everything is handmade. Capping off the trip, we saw the sun set on Mt. Rainier. We sure were lucky lucky lucky!

random folks



Lupine

Magenta Paintbrush

Oh, dear!

shot this photo from the moving vehicle (I was a passenger, don't worry)

Olympic National Park - Part 2

After a beautiful afternoon hiking in the rainforest, we drove to Rialto Beach to barbeque hotdogs and hike to the "hole in the rock". It was a longer walk on the beach than it looked. It must have been one mile each way from the parking lot. Too bad, the tide was too high to walk through the hole in the rock. It was well worth the views and amazing sunset. Our third day at the Olympics were spent on the northern end. We stopped at Crescent Lake and hiked to Marymere Falls. Later, we drove up to Hurricane Ridge... photos coming soon...

shadow cast from one of the rock spires

splash!

Crescent Lake

bright blue waters of Crescent Lake

clear waters of Crescent Lake

old fashioned Americana

Marymere Falls

Olympic National Park - Part 1

The highlight of our trip up to the Northwest was visiting the Olympic National Park. We camped 2 nights on the beach at La Push and did quite a bit of hiking. The first day, we arrived at Ruby Beach late in the afternoon. Afterwards, we drove a bit more to La Push to set up camp and witnessed a gorgeous sunset. The crashing waves lullabyed us to sleep both nights. Day two, we hiked in the Hoh Rainforest to Tom Creek. The forest was lush, quiet, and inspiring. Check out some of my fav pics:

Ruby Beach

sunset at La Push

cloudy morning at La Push

ferns at Hoh rainforest

vegatation everywhere

ferns growing on a tree

bearded trees

Tom Creek