“I think good dreaming is what leads to good photographs.” — Wayne Miller
Thank you for all the new views and likes from last week, it helps keep me inspired.
Looking for some new quotes to use. If you have any, please put them in the comments.
Sunday, 03/23/2025: Posted photo — New Dawn Arts Center.
New Dawn Arts Center in the Community Church.
Monday, 03/24/2025: Posted photo — Mini Rose.
When shopping tonight instead of hiking due to freezing rain and dangerous trail conditions. Came across some mini roses and took my weekly flower photo.
Tuesday, 03/25/2025: Posted photo — Lime.
Nice color and textures on these limes.
Wednesday, 03/26/2025: Posted photo — Do Not Climb.
When on a walk today and came across this sign near the old growth forest. There were many rocks to boulder, but that would damage the fragile ecosystem in the area.
Thursday, 03/27/2025: Posted photo — Sunset.
A great sunset from the mountain. I did not stay to the end of the sunset. Just went up, took this photo, and headed back down.
Friday, 03/28/2025: Post photo — Wachusett Mountain.
Had to visit a vendor for work today and stopped to take this photo. If you look at the trails, they spell out “SKI”.
Saturday, 03/29/2025: Post photo — Wood Stove.
Raw day today so I stayed inside and had a fire in our wood stove.
“Taking pictures is like tiptoeing into the kitchen late at night and stealing Oreo cookies.” — Diane Arbus
Thank you for all the new views and likes from last week, it helps keep me inspired.
This week will show you some of the animals that I encountered during my travels.
Sunday, 03/16/2025: Posted photo — Prairie Dog.
One of the campsites we were camped, was a remote campground in Badlands National Park. In this campground and the surrounding area, there USGA was doing a study on Prairie Dogs. These were some that were near my tent.
Monday, 03/17/2025: Posted photo — Camping Bison.
In the same campground, there was a bison that used the site markers as scratching posts. This bison also showed up in the morning. The remote campground had only 10 sites. All eyes were on the bison. People did come out of these tents as the bison moved away.
Tuesday, 03/18/2025: Posted photo — Ducks.
These ducks were in one of the rivers at Yellowstone National Park. I did look up the type of ducks these are but did not write it down.
Wednesday, 03/19/2025: Posted photo — Elk.
This elk came to visit us at the first campground we had in Yellowstone.
Thursday, 03/20/2025: Posted photo — Bison by River.
At the second campground in Yellowstone, we took a walk in the morning and saw this bison by the river. There was a plaque at this location that stated that this was the exact location that the idea to make Yellowstone a national park was born.
Friday, 03/21/2025: Post photo — Mini Cow.
One of my sister-in-law’s animals.
Saturday, 03/22/2025: Post photo — Feasting Bald Eagle.
This Bald Eagle just caught a fish, brought it to the top of this tree, and had its dinner.
“No place is boring, if you’ve had a good night’s sleep and have a pocket full of unexposed film” — Robert Adams
Thank you for all the new views and likes from last week, it helps keep me inspired.
Sunday, 01/19/2025: Posted photo — Leading Lines.
Photo challenge of the week — Leading Lines. I took many photos today to try to fit this theme. This was the winner. The lines are leading you down the seawall along the beach at Hampton Beach NH.
Wall at Hampton Beach NH
It was a cool day to be on the beach. When walking with the wind to my back, it felt warm. When I was walking into a headwind, you can tell it was frigid outside with the wind chill.
My bother made this one and just electrified it. He made one for one of his granddaughters during the summer and wanted to make one for himself.
Over all of GuitarSound board using tarp grommetsInscription on neck
As you can tell by the inscription, he is also a hiker. He was the past chairperson of the local chapter of the AMC and is now on the AMC Board of Directors.
Imagine the perfect citrus — super easy to peel, extra juicy and amazingly sweet. This is a hybrid of the satsuma, navel and mandarin orange varieties developed in 1970’s.
Dekopon Mandarins
I have posted many times before, the supermarket that I go to every week has a great assortment of fruits and vegetables. I like taking photos of them and doing research on them before purchasing them.
Wednesday, 01/22/2025: Posted photo — Coating a Japanese Yew.
Some snow on a Japanese Yew at my office. I like the contrast of colors.
Patches of snow
Thursday, 01/23/2025: Posted photo — Moon from Office Window.
I looked out my office window last week and saw the full moon. I took out my camera and took a photo for the moon through the office window.
I have people tell me that my moon photos are great and they wished I had something in the foreground, do I took this photo with the branches in the foreground.
Full moon in the morning
Friday, 01/24/2025: Post photo — New Hampshire Marine Memorial.
“It started as a grave marker… and became a monument!” This started out from a father wanting a grave marker for his son lost at sea in 1945. What his efforts brought after many years of endeavor, was a memorial at Hampton Beach to all New Hampshire sons and daughters lost or buried at sea during World War II.
Looking out at seaHonored names
This monument is across the street from the location of a cubing event that took place last weekend. I saw this monument as we entered for the competition and I went out to take it before the snow.
Saturday, 01/25/2025: Post photo — Training Hike.
Today I held a training hike to introduce people into winter hiking. I know that we are part way through the season but it was the first opportunity for a training hike. A few weeks ago, we (the Wachusett Hikers) had a conference call with people that wanted to learn about winter hiking. It was an informative call and some people wanted a hike planned to practice we talked about.
Summit photoSome gear inside my pack
I set up this hike to be the training hike. There were some that signed up for the hike and canceled last minute, as with typical hikes. Even if there were only one person signed up, I was going to do this hike. The temperature today was in the low 20’s (F) and the sun was shinning. This was so far the warmest day of the week.
I showed them my full winter gear and talked about which item was needed for local hikes and upcountry hikes. We also discussed layering for heat control, how to used microspikes, what type of microspikes to purchase and what type not to purchase, how to keep your water from freezing, how to properly adjust their hiking poles and how to use them properly, and other topics. It was a great hike and it made the two hikers that joined me more confident in their abilities. That was the main purpose of the hike.
As a bonus, we saw a bald eagle flying at the summit. By the time I took out my phone camera, it had flown out of range.
“It’s weird that photographers spend years or even a whole lifetime, trying to capture moments that added together, don’t even amount to a couple of hours.” — James Lalropui Keivom
Thank you for all the new views and likes from last week, it helps keep me inspired.
This week will only be photos. Did some commentaries on my photos that I wanted to post this week, but did not have the opportunity to finish so I am posting only photos. I will finish this week’s photos for next week’s blog.
Sunday, 01/12/2025: Posted photo — Grand Tetons.
Monday, 01/13/2025: Posted photo — Alaska.
Tuesday, 01/14/2025: Posted photo — Bird in Bryce Canyon.
“To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place… I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.” — Elliott Erwitt
Thank you for all the new views and likes from last week, it helps keep me inspired.
Sunday, 10/20/2024: Posted photo — Past Foliage.
The foliage has past in my area. We do not have bright, vibrant colors. We have the browns of fall. The sky was a great color blue and the contract between the leaves was amazing, especially with the brightness of the sun.
Monday, 10/21/2024: Posted photo — Comet.
If you look closely to the middle of this photo, you can see the comet that I posted last week. The comet is very hard to see with the naked eye tonight. You can see it very clearly when using binoculars and I was lucky to capture it with my phone.
Tuesday, 10/22/2024: Posted photo — Full Moon.
Last week I experimented with new software to stack my photos of the harvest moon. This is a second attempt at it. I am much happier with tonight’s photo. I also used my “moon” lens tonight, getting better starting photos of the moon prior to stacking.
Wednesday, 10/23/2024: Posted photo — Milky Way.
Used a different software tonight to take a photo of the Milky Way. The moon is my primary photography subject. I would like the Milky Way to be my second subject, except I live in an area with many trees so it is a difficult subject.
Unlike moon photos that I have been taken for years, I have only been taking Milky Way photos for a few years.
Thursday, 10/24/2024: Posted photo — Lightning.
I took this photo a few years ago. I was looking at old photos this week, saw this one, and wanted to share it again.
Friday, 10/25/2024: Post photo —Fenway Park.
The baseball championship started today with the best team winning game one.
I that honor, I posted one of my favorite photos from the oldest ballpark in MLB, America’s Most Beloved Ballpark, Fenway Park.
Saturday, 10/26/2024: Post photo — Acorn Cleanup.
Last week I posted about all the acorns in our yard, today I started to clean the up.
“I really believe there are things nobody would see if I didn’t photograph them.” — Diane Arbus
Some thought and event for the week.
Sunday, 08/25/2024: Posted photo — Moon.
Bright blue sky today. The moon was looking impressive against the blue sky. The moon is my main photograph subject and I feel that I still need practice taking photos of it. Some people say my moon photos are boring since that is not much in the foreground. Sometimes I believe them and attempt to take photo of the moon with a foreground. I do not want to “Photoshop” the moon into a photo, so I just keep doing what I do best—practice my moon photography.
Monday, 08/26/2024: Posted photo — New Hat.
OK, this is what I look like during a hike. I am not very good at taking selfies. I had a hat for over 25 years. It traveled the country and the world with me. It has been in all 50 states with me, and in the 10 countries I have visited. Just for your information, the 10 countries include: The United States, Canada, Mexico, Iceland, Norway, Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium, France, and the Bahamas. I almost lost it a few years ago riding the roller coaster in Legoland in Bulland Denmark. My hat and I have put in thousands of miles hiking.
The brim of that hat stated to fray and needs repair. I attempted to get the same type of hat as a replacement, but the company is out of business. This hat is similar and a different color than my previous one. I may repair it since we have been together for so long.
Let us see if they make them like they used to. If I last 25 more years, I hope to have this hat with me.
Tuesday, 08/27/2024: Posted photo — Robert Goddard.
Robert Hutchings Goddard was an American engineer, professor, physicist, and inventor who is credited with creating and building the world’s first liquid-fueled rocket, which was successfully launched on March 16, 1926. This is a photo of a scale model of that rocket.
The Goddard family lived near where I grew up in Worcester, MA and I have passed his family home many times in my youth. I was always proud to know that such an important person and his family once lived not far from the house I grew up in.
He did some of his research at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), the school that I attended for my post graduate work in Mechanical Engineering. I have been to his lab a few times when on campus.
This park is in Auburn MA not to far from the location that he fired off the fist liquid-fueled rocket.
I wanted to do something a little different for today’s photo. I took a photo of a bouquet of flowers and colorized the rose. Hope you like it. I have mixed feelings about how it turned out.
Setaria pumila, or Yellow Foxtail, is a summer annual grass that is quite weedy. Its natural habits include gravelly areas along rivers, vacant lots, lawns, grassy areas along roads and railroad tracks, fields, pastures. It is seldom found in natural areas, it prefers full sun with moist to slightly dry conditions.
I was out breaking in a new pair of hiking boots, and I walk by this grass. I just purchase my boots last Saturday and am going on a long hike in a few weeks. Do not want to go on a long hike in the White Mountains with boots that are not broken in. I pass by this type of grass many times during hikes. Today the sun was hitting just right for it to call to me to take its photo.
Friday, 08/30/2024: Post photo — Sunrise.
What a beautiful sunrise this morning. Captured this as I walked into work this morning.
As always, photo do not do sunrises or sunsets justice.
Saturday, 08/31/2024: Post photo — Composite.
I would like to start off by saying happy 32nd birthday to our little angel. Miss you and love you.
It has been a while since I did a composite photo. This is a photo of Round Meadow Pond looking at the dam. This is a composite of 16 photos stitched together using the Brenizer method. The Brenizer method combines multiple files to achieve a shallow depth of field effect in a wide-angle image.
I shot this with my cell phone since I was out walking so I do not know if it technically fall under this method. Always trying out new things with my phone camera. Still not as good as a DSLR, but cellphone cameras are getting better.
“The picture that you took with your camera is the imagination you want to create with reality.” — Scott Lorenzo
Things I did this week.
Sunday, 08/04/2024: Posted photo — Birthday.
Today is my birthday. It is also my brother’s birthday. We turned 60 years old today. When I was younger 60 years old was old. Now that I am 60, and still actively hiking, it does not seem so bad.
This is a photo of my brother, our dog, and myself in the mid 1960’s.
Monday, 08/05/2024: Posted photo — Heavy Rain.
Over the last couple of days, we have had periods of very heavy rain. This is a photo of the croquet course at the cottage. People were sitting around enjoying the day when the rain came and flooded the area.
There is great drainage in this area. Within an hour of the rain stopping, the flood waters were no longer. Before it drained, I was able to play a couple of games of water croquet.
Tuesday, 08/06/2024: Posted photo — Distortion.
The topic for one of my photo projects this week was distortion. Being at the lake, thee is always distortion of the sun on the water when there are waves.
I just happen to get lucky as a drop of water from a tree causes a splash on the sun making this photo better than I planned.
For fun tonight, I wanted to make a star trail photo. I will post the star trail photo later this week. Tonight was the only clear night of the week. With the early week’s rain and the remanence of a hurricane this weekend, this was the best, and only night, to do so.
This is a composite photo of 10 of the over 600 photos I took last night. I live in an area with ambient light, as you can see around the tree line. I did take these photos during astronomical night, but the neighbor left his light on all night.
Thursday, 08/08/2024: Posted photo — Flies on Goldenrod.
During my walk this afternoon, I saw some goldenrod. Not unusual for this area. I did notice that this plant had several flies on it. I took out my cellphone and took this photo.
I was expecting the flies to fly away, but they did not seem to be bothered by my presents.
Friday, 08/09/2024: Post photo — Star Trail.
This is the start trail photo that I noted in my Wednesday post. This is a composite photo of over 600 seventeen second shots.
When I was reviewing the photos, I did notice what looked like the Milky Way. The photo on Wednesday was my attempt of developing the Milky Way in my photos. If I thought about it, my settings would have used Milky Way settings on my camera and not star trail settings. Poor planning on my part.
Saturday, 08/10/2024: Post photo — Hike.
This morning, I took a hike to check out the trail conditions on Wachusett Mountain. There are relatives here from Florida, and I wanted to check out the trail conditions as a possible hike. The trails were very muddy so I would find an alternative hike.
As of the time of this writing, we have not hiked yet. I do have a plan on a drier hike when we do hike.
“Photography has nothing to do with cameras.” — Lucas Gentry
This week’s blog features some of the scenes from my vacation.
Sunday, 07/28/2024: Posted photo — Milky Way.
During my vacation, I attempted to take a Milky Way shot. The first two nights, I practiced at a couple of different locations. Both these locations had a large amount of ambient light. I was hoping that when we traveled away for civilization, the sky would be darker. No luck. When we were away from civilization, either the moon was too bright, or there was cloud cover. Here are my test shots.
Monday, 07/29/2024: Posted photo — Ganoga Falls.
We went to Ricketts Glen State Park in PA during this trip. This park features 23 waterfalls along a 5 to 7 mile trail (depending on your direction). We were able to see 18 of these waterfalls. This is the largest of the falls. Ganoga Falls has a height of 94 feet.
Another fall at the park is RB Bicketts Falls. This 36 feet waterfall is a wonderful example of the cascading falls in the park. The hike we took had about 800 feet in elevation change over some easy and difficult trails. The trail we took was marked the most difficult trail in the park. It was well worth the hike.
Ozone Falls is the second highest falls at 60 feet tall. The water was flowing well in the park. It will be great to go back in the fall, after the snowmelt, to see how much water is in the river. We camped two nights at Ricketts Glen to be able to hike and rest up before we moved onward.
Thursday, 08/01/2024: Posted photo — Bee on Flower.
Back home after vacation, we went to the cottage. My wife’s family has their reunion the first Saturday in August every year. I am always in the lookout for bees on flowers since I need practice on talking high speed photography.
Friday, 08/02/2024: Post photo — Rainbow.
Rain today. Rain this time of year produces rainbows. The strange thing about rainbows is that no two people see the same rainbow at the same time. They are based on your perspective.
This one started out weak, and then became stronger and then a double. The photo is an attempt to capture the full rainbow using the panorama setting on my cellphone.
Saturday, 08/03/2024: Post photo — Nature.
Just a shot of a log with moss on it to close out the week. When I returned to the office, I had one day to get up to date with my work before customers and auditor paid me a visit.
This photo was taken during the family reunion. Great to see old and new faces once a year.
“To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place… I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.” — Elliott Erwitt
Here are some mountains that I have seen during my travels.
There were many great views of the mountain in the park. Took this photo was in the morning when the water was calm. There was someone sleeping in a hammock just outside the frame of this photo.
Monday, 06/24/2024: Posted photo — Grand Teton National Park.
Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
The Tetons are great and majestic mountains. Took this one just after sunset in the golden hour.
Tuesday, 06/25/2024: Posted photo — Lake McDonald.
Glacier National Park, Montana
This was my first view of Glacier National Park. We did some hiking with a mountain goat and her children on this trip.
Wednesday, 06/26/2024: Posted photo — Prince of Wales Hotel Waterton Lake.
Waterton – Glacier International Peace Park, Alberta
When we arrived at the park, the ranger saw that I had a camera. She told me of the spot to take this photo. It was up a private road used just by the rangers.
Thursday, 06/27/2024: Posted photo — Along the White Pass Yukon Route Railway.
Alaska
We took a ride on the White Pass Railroad on our trip to Alaska. We did go into the Yukon to turn around. This is one of the mountains along the way. This photo is in color.
Friday, 06/28/2024: Post photo — Lake Louise.
Banff National Park, Alberta
I did not know that Lake Louise was a famous lake. We just stopped in to take in the views. It was crowded when we arrived in the morning and was very crowded in the afternoon when we continued our journey.
Saturday, 06/29/2024: Post photo — Mount St Helens National Volcanic Monument.
Washington
Been to Mount St Helens many times since it erupted on May 18, 1980. I am amazed with the way nature is recovering. The first time I went there was ten years after the eruption and there were still logs floating in Spirit Lake.
Today I went out looking for the remaining waypoints at the High Ridge Wildlife Management Area. I found all but one. This one is driving me mad! The other waypoints were in the general vicinity of where they were located on the map. The map gave me a general area since the eastern and northern scales on the map were different. When I attempted to triangulate from known coordinates to find the location, the bearings did not line up. Now that I have the coordinates of more waypoints, I can zero in on the location.
These are a couple of views along the way. The ground was very icy from the snow/sleet/ice we had yesterday (Saturday).
Monday, 03/25/2024: Posted photo — Morning Moon.
Today is the official day of the March full moon. It was a little cloudy in the morning, but I was able to get this shot in the morning. I was attempting to get the ring around the moon with my cellphone camera.
There was a planned full moon hike with the hiking group that some friends and I have founded. The day was turning out to be sunny, yet the ice was still hanging on. During the hike, I attempted to frame this shot. This is what I consider one of the best views from the mountain. The way the barn just sits out in the open makes this view.
Tuesday, 03/26/2024: Posted photo — Sunset.
Last night’s full moon hike was good and bad. The good part was the great sunset photos with the ice. The bad was that there was a cloud bank over Boston, so we did not see the moonrise.
On the way down from the summit, we were on a very icy trail with ice being thrown at us from the trees. The wind was picking up and it sounded as if it were raining ice.
Great day to be on the mountain.
Wednesday, 03/27/2024: Posted photo — Relay for Life.
Once again, I am doing the Relay for Life (RFL). The RFL is an event organized by the American Cancer Society to raise money for research and to help cancer patients and their families.
This is the address to send money if you want to donate. The RFL will take place in June.
Relay name: RFL of Greater Gardner Team name: One in the Spirit SK #: 6AYVG9 Relayer’s name: Joseph Ciras
If you do donate, message me so that I can get credited for the donation since was the caregiver for my bother.
Thank you for your help.
Thursday, 03/28/2024: Posted photo — View from the Trail.
During a recent hike, I attempted to frame this view. This is what I consider one of the best views from the mountain. The way the barn just sits out in the open makes this view.
The trail that has this view is a trail that is not used very much. I do not understand why. It is off one of the main trails. Might be because of all the rocks on the trail. It is not difficult, just tricky. It is one of the few trails on the mountain that you do not see many people snowshoe on during the winter.
Friday, 03/29/2024: Post photo — Ice on Fence.
I wanted to show these photos earlier in the week. These are some artistic photos from Monday night’s hike. I have been receiving many positive comments on these photos, so I am sharing them with you.
Saturday, 03/30/2024: Post photo — The Great House.
The Great House. Unearth during roadway construction, the Great House was built in 1633 and was the first public building erected in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in Charlestown MA. It is now part of the Freedom Trail. I had training today in a building that as just off the Freedom Trail by a few hundred feet.
Photo by Joseph Ciras 