Trinidad, California

In the northwest corner of the State of California there is a little town called Trinidad. It is a sweet little place perched on a hillside overlooking the Pacific Ocean. A short squat red and white lighthouse next to the road on the southern edge of the town looks over the boats moored far below by the pier that juts out into a protected cove. The view from here is toward the south and it is expansive. Venturing around the town to the northwest side you will find a sweet little beach with some very nice views. The easiest way to access this beach is through Trinidad Beach State Park where you can easily access a trail that winds back and forth down to the beach.

As with so many sites I visit I first discovered this one on the internet where I found an exquisite image taken by Patrick Smith. It was a time delayed shot taken with the aide of a ten-stop neutral density filter and the colors and textures were wonderful. I wanted the experience of shooting a similar shot, so on my way to Oregon I made sure I had time to stop and explore Trinidad.

Landscape photography, really good landscape photography, needs to have certain characteristics or elements. Some you can control, like making sure the image is sharp, getting the composition right, selecting an appropriate depth of field. But some things we have no control over, like the weather, the drama in the sky, and the colors that show up. This is why many photographers will say it is one part skill and one part luck.

Well, you just have to make the best of what you are given. On my first visit to Trinidad it was overcast, not much detail in the sky, but a nice, fairly even light. I shot some images as it was late afternoon and a bit of a wait for sunset. The image above is one of the ones I took that afternoon.

That evening I returned hoping for a nice sunset. There was no dramatic cloud cover, but gratefully a bit of fog just above the horizon to allow the sun to play some color into the scene. Here is pretty much the same shot as above, just a different time of day with different conditions.

If you enjoyed this post you might also enjoy the East Side of The Sierras

Comments

Family Life Of Red Foxes

The family life of a red fox is a joy to observe. The kits are very much like puppies, jumping on and chasing each other almost the entire day. Of particular interest is how the Vixens teach the kits to eventually become self sufficient around their food supply. There are two vixen in this family unit, the mother and grandmother, and I can not tell them apart. The kits you see here are still suckling from their mother. But by this time in their young lives she is well on the way introducing them to game. In the beginning she will stash the game, encouraging the kits to forage for it. The next step in the process you can see here, where she brings game directly to the kits. Here she is dropping a rabbit for them. At this stage in the teaching she has killed the rabbit. The next stage will be for her to bring them live game. The little black one grabs the rabbit and makes a run for it getting away from his siblings. A...

Red Foxes

I had never experienced anything quite like photographing red foxes. I was with them nearly all day, for three days in a row. I was so taken by them, especially the way they related to each other. Above is the dog fox, the adult male of the group, with one of his offsrping, a female kit fox. In this family group there were two vixen, one was the grandmother, the other the mother of three kits. The adult females attended the den all day with one or the other going off to hunt, returning with food for the kits. Missing most of the day was the dog fox and when he would return the kits all gravitated to him. All of the kits seemed to adore the dog fox but the moments between him and his daughter were especially touching. What a gorgeous, photogenic animal he is. When I returned a year later he was still there and there was a whole new brood of kits. I am hoping to return again this year having missed last year due to a bout ...

Art Display At The Center For Spiritual Living, Santa Rosa

The Center for Spiritual Living Santa Rosa, has a wonderful program that encourages artist members to display their work. The work is hung in the Social Hall and typically has about twenty pieces hanging for two months at a time. On March 1rst I will be hanging several images taken in Iceland, along with some wildlife images, including foxes, coyotes, eagles and kites. I will also have some paintings by my mother and two of my own. I am pretty excited about this showing. One of the pictures I will have in the show is of Godafoss, a beautiful waterfall in Iceland. When I first saw pictures of this waterfall I knew I wanted to go to Iceland to take pictures of it. This composition required gettin into some very cold water.

Notes To My Mother

Search This Blog