Dingmans

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Today I went to Dingmans Falls in Pennsylvania. The main falls that you can see here are 130ft high. I read somewhere that it is the 2nd highest waterfalls in Pennsylvania.

Hurricane Irene washed away sections of the road up to the visitors center and it will not be repaired until later this year, until then the road and the visitors center are both closed. This added a 1.5 mile walk up to the visitors center to today trip in rather hot weather. Has kind of a post apocalyptic feel to it walking up the middle of a road with a pack and tripod on your back with no traffic and just the sound of the birds.

It was my first trip to this waterfall so I dont know how much water it usually has, I am guessing there is usually more as we have not had much rain at all recently.

Today was my first chance to use my new 10 stop filter for some proper shots. This "black glass" filter blocks out A LOT of light enabling long exposure to be done in daylight. Exposures can be a bit hit and miss because the camera cannot use autofocus or meter properly with so little light, so you need to focus and work out the exposure before you put the filter on then do some maths to work out what sort of time you need to expose for.

This particular shot is a 6 minute exposure. This has allowed the falling water to get that smooth smokey look in places, flattened the ripples and splashes on the water in the pool at the bottom and give some of the leaves a bit of motion blur as they swing in the breeze.

The other fall on this trail is about 80ft high and is called Silver Thread Falls due to its very narrow nature. There wasnt really enough water in the falls and it was quite obscured by leafy trees.

Both of these waterfalls are ones I shall return to in the fall. I think they will make excellent subjects when they have more water and the leaves change color and start to fall. :-)