Blogs from New Mexico, United States, North America - page 89

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North America » United States » New Mexico » Albuquerque November 24th 2008

That's what it looks like out here. Serene, peaceful, beautiful, and full of culture. Farmington, New Mexico - something about it was interesting and way too many Navajo-ians were abundant. I think that walking into the Wal-Mart, Ash and I were the minorities. What are Asians and African-Americans out there?? Yes, we were only in Wal-Mart for water and powerade. Farmington proved to have great Mexican food and cool Aztec Ruins. Onto the Canyon! We went first through Monument Valley, which is where all the cool scenes in Star Wars (the first one remade) was filmed, or based off of so I thought. Fairly interesting, and we ventured onto sacred Navajo land where my total non-rednecky Honda Civic went offroading. When the guide tells you to be careful about snakes/spiders/scorpions and your compact car isn't taking ... read more
Canyon2
Edge
10-3

North America » United States » New Mexico » Las Cruces November 20th 2008

After 2 weeks in Mexico, I got a flight out to the Mexico/El Paso, Texas border called "Ciudad Juarez". Family bit concerned as is in the midst of a drug war and is also the place where hundreds of young women's bodies have been found in the outskirts after being raped and murdered. The police are believed to be involved in these rings. In the end, I got a bus from the airport to El Paso in the middle of the day so no real story to tell. Purpose of trip to New Mexico was to visit my sister and brother-in-law. Had a good week that involved hiking, sledding down white gypsum dunes (formed from gypsum being absorbed in the mountain water, drying and blowing down into this area) and eating lots of Tex-Mex food. In ... read more
Mex Nov 08 024
Mex Nov 08 025
Big flag and me

North America » United States » New Mexico » Albuquerque November 19th 2008

Day 11 - Tuesday, November 18th - Santa Rosa, NM to Albuquerque, NM We catch a few sites additional sites of Santa Rosa as we leave town. We bypass going into the Route 66 Auto Museum so as not to get behind so early in the day. Too late we realize we probably should have wandered in given its unique offering of sixty restored classic cars and trucks on display. We head right to the expressway to begin a busy day. We’ve decided to take the Santa Fe Loop which is an earlier version of Route 66. In addition, we decide to take a side trip to Las Vegas, NM - didn’t even know there was a Las Vegas aside from Las Vegas, Nevada. From Santa Rosa, NM, we turn off I-40 after just a few ... read more
Santa Rosa, NM - Route 66 Auto Museum
Santa Rosa, NM - Esso Station
Santa Rosa, NM - Rio Pecos Ranch

North America » United States » New Mexico November 19th 2008

Had another fun day and learned a lot. I shot these images HAND HELD with my 500 mm lens! For most of you that may mean nothing. But the lens alone weighs 8.5 pounds. Add the weight of the camera body and I'm holding somewhere around 10 pounds and a lens sticking out about 2 feet with the lens shade attached. Normally I use a tripod and Wimberley Head for all my telephoto images. But one of the instructors specializes in hand holding long telephoto lenses. So I decided to give it a try. Actually I wound up with fewer frames with half a bird in it (or blue sky with no bird) than when I use my tripod. At any rate I was pleased to discover I can capture sharp images while handholding in good ... read more
Sandhill Crane 2
Snow Geese
Afternoon landing

North America » United States » New Mexico November 18th 2008

My time here at Bosque is flying by - pardon the pun! I’m having a great time here even though it seems like there are fewer birds here than last year. In addition, the Sandhill Cranes seem to be taking off BEFORE sunrise and flying back into the ponds AFTER sunset. As a result much of the time I’m trying to shoot in very low light. As you will see in my images posted with today’s entry, I’ve been trying to get some pan blur images. I’m pretty happy with a few I’ve gotten. Sunday evening when editing images I noticed a disturbing dark curved line in many images I was processing. After considerable pondering, emailing a couple of photography friends for suggestions and inputs, extensive testing and a conversation with Canon Tech Support, I concluded ... read more
Kill Deer
Outstanding in their field
Cranes and Geese

North America » United States » New Mexico November 15th 2008

What a fun day at Bosque del Apache NWR! I was a little lazy and didn’t get up for the predawn blastoff. I did head out shortly after sunrise for a morning shoot, not expecting to get much. I was pleasantly surprised to discover I had a few keepers when I edited the morning shoot after breakfast. It was COLD here this morning. Only got down to 30, but the wind was BRISK and I was bundled up. After editing the morning shoot, I went to the Owl Bar and Restaurant for the traditional Green Chile Cheeseburger! When I went out for my afternoon shoot at the refuge, I spotted someone I knew. Walt Anderson - the creator of the Better Beamer (my photographer friends will know what that is) - was standing next to the ... read more
Snow Goose
Banded Snow Goose
deer

North America » United States » New Mexico » Albuquerque November 15th 2008

So, doing a show at 9,000 feet above sea level was quite interesting. You could totally see it on the kids during the show- that they were out of breath. We even heard it a few times. They did a great job, even with one kid (Fiona) out because she was sick. Load out went pretty smoothly; I got a pretty generous compliment from the house LD about one of my favorite cues in the show- he commented when it happened and then again after load out. Maybe I do know something about this design stuff! I really enjoyed Colorado- it was beautiful! And it was a small town, everything within walking distance. All of the shops that were open (many were closed for the off season) had the owners’ dogs in them- my kind of ... read more

North America » United States » New Mexico » Soccoro November 14th 2008

Hello from Bosque. It was an easy day and 150 miles from Santa Fe to Bosque. I got settled in, picked up my rental car and made it to Bosque in time to watch an evening fly in. I only had to drive a little over a mile from the campground to the pond where I watched several hundred Sandhill Cranes arrive. Here are a couple of images from the evening. Hopefully I'll get up in time for sunrise and an early morning blast off.... read more
just after sunset
Reflections

North America » United States » New Mexico » Santa Fe November 13th 2008

Today was my last full day in Santa Fe. Friday I’ll break camp and head south to Bosque. This became - quite by accident - my ‘down day’ for this week. I plan to have some down time (at least in the middle of the day) while at Bosque but this was a welcome break. It was a beautiful sunny day here but fairly brisk and windy. I did a few things around the RV during the morning and early afternoon (including trying to post this entry but the site was bogging down) and went into town for a few hours in the afternoon. Wednesday was another fun day. I visited the Santa Fe Photographic Workshops offices and had a most pleasant visit. The friendly folks there gave me several good recommendations for a photographic drive. ... read more
St. John's Church
Wooden statue
another statue

North America » United States » New Mexico » Santa Fe November 11th 2008

Greetings from Santa Fe. This is the coldest it’s been since I left home. Monday while I was eating breakfast, I was welcomed to New Mexico with a brief snow shower! It was mostly cloudy, windy and cold Monday. Tuesday was a bit nicer with the sunshine, but it sure got chilly as the sun went down. My propane furnace has kicked in each of the last two evenings as the temps dropped below freezing. I discovered this is definitely the off season here. As I strolled around town yesterday I learned the historic plaza was fenced off and under construction. Then I looked down the street and saw scaffolding around St. Francis Cathedral. Sunday I was told there was a good city tour via tram. I decided that would be a good way to get ... read more
plaza
Performing Arts Center
St. Francis Cathedral




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