Monday, December 6, 2010

Winter in Washington

The Friday, Saturday and Sunday after Thanksgiving Day we traveled to Spokane to bring our handicapped son, who had been home for the holiday, back to the facility where he is a resident. We also stayed in the area with him for a few days, since I had several days off from my work.

The weather on the way was very wintry and the passes were very bad, requiring chains or traction tires. We went by way of Stevens Pass and Highway 2 and stopped along the way several times to take pictures. At that point the weather was sunny, though it soon turned gray.






We also stopped along the roads in Eastern Washington for pictures, especially at an apple orchard where the frozen Golden Delicious apples were still on the leafless trees, making quite a colorful display against the leaden skies, snow, and bare trees.




In the Spokane area the weather was snowy and the roads bad, but we did manage to get out to one of our favorite places, Manito City Park, where my wife wandered around the grounds taking pictures of the snow while I stayed inside the conservatory with our son and took pictures there.



Sunday night there was freezing fog in the area and I went out at night and took some time exposures and flash shots of the rime covered trees and branches. They were spectacular in the dim light and I managed to get a few decent pictures, though focusing and exposure were very difficult.











10 comments:

Upupaepops said...

the third to last photo of the leaning tree is magic. Also the fir in the last the color and the white highlight of limb snow.. something about the colors here makes it other-worldly

did you work with a tripod?

Ron said...

The last nine shots were taken with a tripod. It was a rather dark night and very difficult to get the focus right (had to focus manually with most of them) and with anything more than a short distance away I couldn't hold the camera still enough to get a decent picture.

Ron said...

Should have mentioned that I was dealing with light from streetlights, etc., thus the differences in color.

Jim said...

When I saw the first two photos, Ansel Adams came to mind. I had forgotten how beautiful Washington was/is.
I love what you 'see'.
Jim

Ron said...

Thanks, Jim. We live in a lovely state, but right now it's windy and wet and the power is out and so we are sitting in a coffee shop waiting for power to go back on.

Ron said...

Should have added that it's quite a compliment to be compared to Ansel Adams.

Jim said...

That time of year! We lost our power on Monday for 7 hours.....went to my Dad's to wait.
Makes one appreciate the things we take for granted.
Jim

Ron said...

Ours is back on again - was off for about 4 hours over a large part of the county. Haven't heard yet what the cause was.

Makarimi Abdullah said...

The pictures really beautiful...hope I can feel the snow again for snowshoeing ;-)

Ron said...

Not into snowshoeing, but I am going skiing tomorrow. That's about the only thing the snow is good for, in my opinion.