“Gorgeous, amazing things come into our lives when we are paying attention: mangoes, grandnieces, Bach, ponds. This happens more often when we have as little expectation as possible.” Anne Lamott
My traveling companion this morning was Woodie Guthrie – OK on my car stereo – I bet you knew that – it was from a CD I purchased a while back to celebrate his 100th birthday. Original recordings – not much fussing or remixing – and he was great to sing along with. I am not sure why I mentioned that.
I have to admit to having some expectations for snow and views of the Mckenzie River but was sure open to what I would find. Snow was clinging to the trees at the 1,000 foot level so it was easy to find scenes that helped with what I had hoped for. The first stop was the Quartz Creek Bridge over the Mckenzie. I shot for over an hour and managed to get one shot that I like. Long exposure with a 10 stop ND filter.
Since I was very near the snow line I decided to head up river to the South Fork Mckenzie River road and was glad I did. There was so much more snow and the Forest Service road crew was busy plowing the road. I chatted with them a bit and they said they had plowed clear over the top but there were no turn-arounds and given my luck with turning around last week and not having my expert ‘diggers’ with me I opted for just a short run up the river. Along the road I came upon two horses romping in the fresh snow.
The trees along the South Fork were frosted and simply beautiful. I found a small area that showed me the strong straight boles of the trees against the softness of the snow and I stopped for a while just to look and to shoot.
Heading back I decided to stop once more at the Quartz Creek bridge and took a set of images (5) that I stitched into one just to give a more extensive view of the river at this location. This is a big image 52×23 so you may want to click on it to get a bigger view. It really is beautiful up there right now and if we get more low elevation snow I think I will head back for another try. No expectations! just perhaps some companions to sing with!!
Oh, gosh, gosh, gosh. Thank GOODNESS we didn’t have to hear the sing along…You DO need extra singers!!! I like the last two pics. The first of them is much more involved with detail than I would feel I could take, but the two colors (blue and black) work well. The last image, well, again it’s about color. Nice job!