Blue Canyon

On Saturday, my husband and I went for hikes at two local parks. It's been hunting season here for white-tailed deer, which curtails our use of our usual hiking grounds of game lands and local woods. To be safe, during hunting season, we only go to places where the hunters aren't. And of course we wear blaze orange, as Little Bear and Alex wisely advised. :-)

One of the places we hiked on Saturday was a little slip of public land alongside land owned by a local prison (that is gated and fenced, of course). The public land runs through a little canyon along Spring Creek, a stream that originates from the Big Spring in Bellefonte, PA.

When I was there on Saturday, I got some great, artsy, monochrome shots of a little spillway/dam on Spring Creek: all shadows and shapes and dark lines.

But the photo I posted to blip that day was one that made my heart smile: my husband luxuriating on a park bench at the next little park we visited, contemplating the meaning of life.

So I posted that shot, but all weekend, I thought about the spillway shot. I craved another go at nabbing it for blip. Tuesday morning, I awoke to heavy fog. A perfect morning for photos! So I took out for the canyon (which wasn't really quite ON my way to work, but near enough), my trusty camera in hand.

I stopped a few places along the way to take pictures. The yellow morning light was gorgeous; diffused through the fog, it was even more enchanting than usual. But as I approached the canyon, the light got trickier. The sun hadn't risen over the hills and trees yet. The canyon was gray, almost blue; with the fog, mysterious.

I parked my car and got out. As I approached the creek, a large bird landed on a branch near the spillway. I wondered if I might get lucky and stumble across a heron, but truth be told, it was just too foggy to tell! In the next second, I felt/heard the bird lift and rise. Large wings beating against the air; then it was gone.

My Canon has a "vivid" setting that I sometimes use; it boosts the color saturation a bit. With the vivid setting, the blue-gray foggy light was boosted to the color you see in the picture.

The spillway/dam I had been obsessing about is to the left in this shot. In the middle of the shot is a series of wooden barriers that are some kind of lock system to control and direct the water flow. And the branch that the large bird landed on - and launched from - is to the right of the locks.

I didn't have time to stay to watch the sun fill up the canyon. I wish I could have. But I could see a foretaste of it just above the trees. The wisp of green light at the top of the shot gives evidence of the coming sun.