CLOUDLAND CABIN JOURNAL - May 2008

Part A - May 1st-7th

Cloudland Journal Archives, Cloudland Cabin Info Page

Cloudland Deck Cam, May 8th, 7:13am - clearing and spectacular today after a stormy night

May Print of The Month

Updated Wednesday evening

05/01/08 It is very late tonight - actually early this morning (4am) - and the wind has been howling for a good 24 hours at least. If it had been light I probably would have seen some deck chairs fly by my window. No moisture with all the wind - clear starry skies above - but I'm hoping we get some rain pretty soon as things are beginning to dry up a little bit around here. The month of May (one of my all-time favorites) is coming in like a lion for sure, and an angry one at that.

We had the most wonderful time at the grand opening of the Tower complex at the hospital in Harrison on Monday - must have been a thousand people there, including all the members of my immediate family (some came down from Illinois for the event), plus other good friends. We got a personal tour of the new facility by the CFO, and got to talk with dozens and dozens of other staff as well as tons of folks from the community. I knew these big canvas prints would be help with the healing process of many patients for many years to come, but I discovered something I had not quite expected.

Quite a few of the staff members came up to me and talked at great length about how much they were already enjoying the canvas prints - I could see pleasure in their faces and hear joy in their voices. I know working in a hospital can be a tedious and difficult job, and often extremely depressing, yet these wonderful folks seemed uplifted somehow by the prints, and I hope that feeling carries on into the future.

I got a chance to spend a bit of time alone with the great and honorable Congressman John Paul Hammerschmidt, who was the keynote speaker for the event. I had wanted to take his photo in front of the large canvas print of the waterfall that I named after him, and he graciously waited for me and took all the time I needed, then talked about the waterfall and the canvas print. He is one of the best that has ever served our country in Washington, and our state can be might proud of the work he did, and continues to do.

Congressman John Paul Hammerschmidt with his waterfall at the opening of the Tower addition in Harrison on Monday

(we both are wearing our business suits)

It was also a great pleasure to spend time with my family - which I only see once or sometimes twice a year. We all got together afterword for dinner as well. It was a grand day all around and a highlight of my professional career and personal life.

I'll be leaving the cabin here shortly to venture into the wilderness and do some work with the photographer from National Geographic, Peter Eastwood (oops, I mean Peter Essick). The wild azaleas have started to bloom along the Ozark Highlands Trail and Peter wants to get some photos of me taking photos of them, something I need to do anyway. Before I meet up with Peter at sunrise there is a scene I want to photograph along the Mulberry River at first light - I'm hoping there is just enough time in between for me to drive to meet up with him so I won't be late! It is quite an honor for me to be asked to pose for such a great photographer - he really is one of the best that Geographic has ever had, and they are the best of the best to begin with! The only issue is going to be that while Garrison may have a face for radio, I became a photographer for a reason - I should never stand IN FRONT of the camera! But as my lovely bride is fond of saying, even a blind pig can find an acorn in the forest so perhaps there is a chance I'll crack a good smile for his camera (or perhaps he will capture my good side - I look great in silhouette!).

May is going to be one heck of a terrific month with much travel and photography, AND, on May 18 we will have a really neat announcement to make especially for Journal readers. For now I have posted the new Print of the Month - in honor of Mother's Day I have selected one of my favorite wildlife photos of all time, the momma deer and her fawn (shipped within two days of order). This print is specially priced as both a print only or as a matted print in either black or white mat. And for a limited time ALL previous Prints of the Month or Black Mat Print series are available at the special prices - just go to the new Buffalo River Gallery link here and make your pick - with everything else going UP in price all around these days we thought it would be nice to have something actually cheaper than normal.

AND I have posted the dates and some basic info about the 2009 workshop schedule - at least the spring part of it. I will add more complete info later today or tomorrow but we are accepting deposits now for all the workshops. There are also a couple of one-day photoshop classes that have been added to the 2008 schedule. We will be moving into a new facility next year for our weekend workshops so that everyone will have a private room and full bath, and these will be mostly shooting workshops with more trips into the wilds to photograph the great natural beauty of the Ozarks.

Looks like it is time to hit the road - more later...

LATE NIGHT UPDATE. It was a delightful morning spent with the famous Peter Essick in the Marinoni Scenic Area along the Ozark Highlands Trail. It was just breaking day when we started down the trail and almost immediately found a nice patch of wild mountain azalea in full bloom. Peter is quite unlike any other photographer I have worked with - he basically just wanted me to "do whatever you do" and he took pictures when he found something to his liking. (I'm used to being directed into certain locations and poses, but Peter was good enough he simply went with the flow.)

It was overcast and the light was beautiful, and with each step we went deeper into this little scenic canyon I was reminded of heading into a rainforest or jungle or something else of another world - it was LUSH in there! The umbrella magnolias were just starting to bloom, along with scores of little wildflowers dotting the green landscape. This is a tight little canyon with opposite walls coming pretty close together as you hike along. I am rather fond of this area as it was one of the many sections we diverted the trail into away from the logging road up on the ridgetop where the forest service had originally planned the route to be (they did not have the "fire" middle name back then - they were good guys).

Peter hard at work

We climbed down the steep canyon wall to the small creek below that was just barely running. I shot photos as Peter shot photos, and then I shot photos of Peter shooting photos of me. It was a terrific experience for me to be in the company of someone of such tremendous skills - and so many major National Geographic spreads to his credit (I read somewhere 18 of them, but I suspect that was an old report). This was Peter's fifth or six trip to Arkansas to take the photos for this article, and it will be his last - the article will be out this fall and he has to get the images to the editorial staff in just two weeks. While I don't expect that my ugly mug will actually end up in the article, it was still great to be a part of it all. THANKS PETER (and Mel too!).

On the way home I stopped and photographed one of only two swinging foot bridges that I know of - this one spans the Mulberry River near Catalpa. The light was pretty nice and the river a beautiful shade of green - which is often the case after recent floods like we have had. As I was leaving the bridge a guy in a US Government truck was trying to figure out who lived at the other side of the bridge - not sure if he was doing a census or trying to collect taxes.

Swinging bridge over the Mulberry River

The forest is getting dried out already now that the vegetation is sucking up billions of gallons of water a day - we need some rain up here, and please keep it coming...

05/02/08 We had a pretty good storm roll through just before daylight - right on time, way to go weather service! As the girls drove off to meet the bus I sat in the darkness sipping my earl gray tea with french vanilla coffeemate and watched the electrical storm that was upon us - both dogs ran and jumped into the front seat of Pam's car to get away from it all. At first I heard little pings, then they got louder, and louder, and then the little hail was drown out by heavy rain. The lightning bolts that were everywhere were some of the WHITEST and widest I had ever seen, and several of them hit inside the canyon directly in front of or to the side of the cabin. There were not loud bangs as has been the case with these of late - not sure what the difference was.

A few minutes later the girls returned and reported the road was blocked with a couple of live trees that had blown across the road "get the chainsaw!" Amber cried out - she HAD to get to school today to finish up some work in English class (or she would have to take a final exam, which she has already tested out of all other classes). So I put on my rain jacket, grabbed a pair of special "turbo" hand saws, and the two of us sped off into the pouring rain. When we got to the downed trees I jumped out and got to work right away - I was still within a time frame where I could meet the bus and not have to drive her all the way into school, but it would take a lot of luck to get the trees sawed in two and drug out of the way. I worked as hard as I could at the trees while bright flashes hit all around me, and the heavy rains continued. I was able to cut through both trees with relative ease, and in no time I was back in the car - we pulled up to the bus stop just as the little school blazer arrived - YIPPIE COYOTE! And Amber went off to school.

I returned to the cabin only long enough to get my ducks in a row and then I was back on the road again, looking for a couple of particular waterfall scenes as daylight began to creep into the landscape. Some of the creek were flowing well while others were bone dry - including the ones I wanted. Since I had a MOUNTAIN of work I had to get done today I quickly gave up and drove back up to the cabin. Fridays are always so HECTIC around here - give me a week of Mondays please! (so that I have all week to get my work done).

Looks like the line of big storms is about to pass by us and we'll probably have lots of sunshine for the rest of the day - that will be good for me since I will be over in the print room making large canvas prints all day and I won't feel like I need to be out shooting waterfalls! Peter from National Geographic needs one last shot of a waterfall today and I hope he got enough over there to make that happen...

EVENING UPDATE I got my printing done in record time today, and with clear skies and no forest fires I decided to make a quick trip down to the river with my real camera (that means 50 pounds of gear!). We'd had some rain overnight but I was kind of surprised to see how FULL both Whitaker Creek and the Buffalo River were - in fact probably as high as I had ever seen either one of them up close - holy cow! But the waters were running clear, no mud at all, another surprise.

It didn't take me long to get my feet wet, and soon I was standing about knee-deep in whitewater. I had seen this whitewater from the back deck this morning and imagined I could get a scene with whitewater in the foreground, brilliant-backlit trees across the middle of the frame, then some pure blue sky (without forest fire smoke) at the top. Son of a gun, that scene was before me, and I spent about an hour out there in the fresh water having a blast - I mean working like a madman! Aspen swam and swam while Lucy took up residence on a nearby bank, making sure I was doing everything OK.

The Buffalo River

The recent floods had realigned part of Whitaker Creek, and also brought down tons of new stones that all seemed to be about 8"-12" in length. They were all very smooth and clean. Not too long ago they were probably breaking off of the bluffline high above, eventually being washed on down into the streambed, then tumbled and tumbled and wearing smooth until they came to where I found them today. A rolling stone gathers no moss - absolutely true!

I pushed on through thick brush heading upstream, and found another spot to take a few photos. This one was not a normal scene for me, but in my quest to open up my vision a little bit for the new landscape book I am seeing more things than I have done in the past (I think?). I still find a majority of my compositions by simply spotting something that looks right, and for some reason when I waded out into the water of this semi-quiet pool and squatted down to almost the water level, one of those scenes jumped right out at me (I spend a bit of time in odd positions looking for such scenes, but it is still often a surprise when one of them finds me).

My "squatting" shot

There were a couple more scenes and then I had to stop and rest - pushing the button on that camera is a lot of work you know! Don't have a clue why, but the spot I choose to rest was on a pile of sharp rocks. Even the dogs would not come sit with me - they remained up on the river bank and stood guard. That was a good thing too 'cause about five minutes into my rest both dogs jumped up and started to snarl and growl, sniffing the wind, with the hair standing straight up along their backs - that is their BEAR warning, and no doubt they got wind of a bear headed our direction. The wind was coming from across the river so I was not too worried, and I just knew that since I didn't bother to get my camera out and ready for when the bear appeared, that a bear would indeed appear. But that was not the case - no bear sighting today. But from the way they dogs were acting I suspect an old bear was just over there, sneaking around in the thick brush.

One last shot of the river today

The sky remained pure blue and the sun bright. I turned around and headed back downstream, and then started to make my way up into Whitaker Creek, but it was time for another rest. This time I sat down right in the middle of all those new polished stones I had found before. With nothing better to do I started looking closely at those stones to see what I could find. And what I found was a spider, right there between my feet, about a half inch wide. Looked like a female with a pretty large egg sack. Then I spotted another spider. And another. And another. I counted 11 spiders within about a four or five foot area. I wondered what they were all doing (looking up at me no doubt). None of the rest had egg sacks, just the lady at my feet.

And I also counted a single ant, making his way up and over what must have been giant stones to him. And that was it - just one ant. How many times have you ever seen just one? Ants are the Lays potato chips of the bug world for sure.

Oops, one of those spiders crawled right up into my boot (that was turned upside down so water could run out).

I never made it very far up into Whitaker Creek - the light was pretty harsh back in there and the wind was tossing the trees around pretty good. So I decided to call it a day and headed back up the steep mountain, figuring I could probably make it only stopping to catch my breath two or three times. Hum, that did not quite happen - I stopped to blow before the top of the very first rise! I counted 11 stops before I finally made it to the base of the big bluff - fat and out of shape I am for sure (and also packing 50 pounds of camera gear, but mostly fat and out of shape!). It was GREAT to reach the lower deck of the cabin - AND I got to use a newly-built set of steps that Pam's dad put in the other day. Sitting on the back deck of my wilderness cabin with my feet propped up after a good climb out of the canyon below on a brilliantly-beautiful spring afternoon - doesn't get much better than that. I reached for my tall glass of bourbon and coke and, oh shucks, I haven't told you about that yet, have I?

After YEARS of fighting some sort of medical condition that has sent me to the doctor a number of times in severe pain, I was finally able to get someone to tell me what the heck was wrong - at least tell me some issues that might be causing all of my trouble. Turns out I have some pretty severe allergies, including one to YEAST - the reaction I had while being tested to yeast was the worst they had ever seen at the doctor's office - yea me! So it looks like I must steer clear of anything with yeast, which includes all types of booze (and, of course, I absolutely LOVE bread, but no more, or at least not in such quantities as I've enjoyed in the past). AND for all of you who have put up with my "I'm allergic to MUSHROOMS" forever - guess what - I AM ALLERGIC TO MUSHROOMS! Ha! So the doctor is brewing up some sort of liquid for me to take each day that will help build my immunity to some of these products, and in the meantime I have gained a good bit of relief of late from some other medication I've been taking - AND I have been able to get a good night's sleep now for the first time in my entire life. Of course, sometimes that only means five or six hours of sleep since I have to get up so early, but even that is much better than it used to be.

Come to think of it, I plan to be standing on the top of a certain tall bluff at first light tomorrow morning, which means I will have to leave here around 4am so I had better make this post and hit the pillow. I HIGHLY recommend that you get out and enjoy this spectacular springtime we are having right now if you get the chance this weekend!

05/03/08 When I fired up the car at 4:30 this morning the "check tire pressure" warning came on and told me I only had 17 pounds in the right rear tire. That was a great start to my day for sure. But the day got better from that point on.

It was a lovely predawn hike into the Kings Bluff area early this morning. I wanted to see if I could catch the luminous light on these neat "crown" rock formations in this scenic area. When I arrived I realized I had worn a heavy sweatshirt over my normal garb - and it felt really good since it was COLD out, with a howling wind! This was supposed to be May, but the temp was right at 40 degrees.

I had followed a crescent moon all the way to the parking area that hung in a deep blue clear sky. But when I arrived at the top of the big bluffline a herd of clouds had gathered on the western horizon, and more were collecting behind me in the east. Some of those clouds began to light up with nice colors as they raced across the sky. The sun never did actually arrive, but I had some fun working with the stone and the light and the wind and the cold.

Some of the "crowns" at Kings Bluff

A while later I scrambled down below the bluff and found myself in not only one, but five different "caves" that had been carved out under the big bluff. One of them was guarded by a sea of brilliant green ferns that were growing beneath a towering entrance. I am always drawn to these opening - not so much for what they are but for what the view is from the very back. I tend to ignore stuff on my way in and wait until I get to the very back and turned around before I pay much attention. This particular cave had a wet floor - in fact there was a small creek running in there. I found a reflection of that towering entrance in the water and spent the next twenty minutes admiring the view and trying to capture it with my camera.

Then it was onto another cave, and another, and another.

Oh, and then I came upon this single wild mountain azalea bush that was in full bloom and guarding the entrance to another cave - I didn't even bother to go inside that one but did spend a good bit of time with the azalea bush and trying to get the wind to stop long enough so I could take its picture. The aroma from this little bush was just amazing.

After a quick trip into town to get my tire fixed I made a side trip on my way back to the cabin to photograph a hillside scene Pam and I had spotted a week or two before. It was on the highway that leads down into Osage Creek. The pastures and trees were lush with the bright greens of a springtime in full swing. The overcast sky had begun to break up, which sent giant lightbeams back and forth across the hillsides I had my camera pointed at. I ended up shooting about 75 photos of the exact same scene with different patterns of light and darkness from the sunshine and moving clouds.

Then I realized three things - first, I was almost out of camera battery juice. Second, I was almost out of memory cards for the camera. And third, that I really needed to take a photo from on top of Roark Bluff today! So I made a quick dash back home to download my images and clear off memory cards, and to grab my battery charger (to plug into the AC outlet in the car). I did not have time to wait for the batteries to charge but I figured I could get enough juice in them during the drive over to Steele Creek to make it through one more photo session. (and I was right)

"How deep is the water right there?" I asked a guy in a canoe. "About knee deep." OK, that was great with me. I had brought along my little blow-up boat but did not really want to use it just to cross the Buffalo River, so I went ahead on in after that encouraging report (it LOOKED a little deeper than my knees, but not too deep). Turns out the water was about knee-deep, on an elephant! All I will say is that about mid-way through my trip across the river my voice got suddenly very high-pitched! And I made it OK, but man the water sure was swift - I used my tripod legs to steady me as I inched my way across.

A few minutes later I was standing high atop the might Roark Bluff and it was just spectacular up there! The sunshine was backlighting the trees and the meadow far below, and the river looked really nice and GREEN too. I spent some time getting up the nerve required to crawl along a narrow fin of rock with my camera gear in order to get to "the spot" that I discovered nearly 20 years ago - it provides the ultimate view of this massive bluff without anything in the way. At the end of my crawl I had to lay down flat on the really-narrow fin of rock and move the camera (mounted on my tripod) actually out over the end of the rock fin in order to get the photo. I lay up there for 30 minutes and shot a bunch of photos with and without canoes in the scene. Then I carefully crawled back to "dry" land and to safety - whew, I was GLAD to be off of that rock! Each time I come to this place I tell myself that will be the very last time. As I packed up my gear and took one last look around I wondered if it would be it this time.

The view from high atop Roark Bluff

05/05/08 Shhhh - don't tell anyone, but I am playing hookey for a little while today - I should be spraying canvas prints or cleaning up the print room or mowing the lawn or clearing off the deck or a dozen other things that are on my to-do list today - OR I really should be taking a NAP! But instead I decided to take a little while off from normal chores and have a look at some images I made early this morning - it seems that I don't get much time these days to actually look at photos, the time is mostly spent running around trying to find good scenes and photograph them. I often get in a frenzy like this when a book deadline is approaching - then once I get all the photos taken I get into a marathon session of pouring through many thousands of them and selecting a few to process for the new book. That will happen once again this year - probably in early June - but I just had to sneak a peak a little bit this morning.

I had planned to be on top of some tall bluff at sunrise today, but decided to stay closer to home so that I could get back to the cabin after shooting an hour or two so that I could get some much-needed work done (you see how well that plan worked). So I headed into the nearby woods to a favorite spot where I hoped to find lots of umbrella magnolia and mountain azaleas blooming - both seemed to have popped out with great beauty in the area this past day or two.

It was kind of chilly at first light but warmed up quickly - a heavy pack and rough terrain will do that. I could hear water rushing in the canyon below - that meant waterfalls were still running well. The sun began to light up the tops of the surrounding ridges, and I knew my photo time would be limited, so I quickened my pace (easy to do when going downhill!). When I landed at the bottom next to the creek a few minutes later my spirit fell even lower - nothing was in bloom, not a tree or a flower or a bush, nothing but GREEN! I guess this little protected canyon was a week behind the rest of the wilderness above - my trip had been for naught, although I knew the hike back UP the steep hill would burn off a few calories so it would be worth it anyway, even if I did not shoot any photos.

I hiked around a while and made sure there was nothing to photograph, then turned around and begun my trek back out. But before I left the creek I took one last look - hum, there was some really nice color on the water surface - deep greens and blues and golden glow from the sunshine reflecting. I thought, what the heck, and set up my gear and made a few photographs. Then that big old bright sun began to bust through the trees and messed everything up!

In my quest to expand my vision a little bit I decided what the heck, I would INCLUDE that sunshine in the photo and see how it looked. And then I got lost in the moment and spent the next hour making photos of the creek and then the waterfall below, shooing it from behind and directly into the rising sun - something it says in camera owner's manuals never to do! It was a pretty nice little photo session and I was glad to have added another scene for the new book (not sure exactly which one yet though).

On my way out I took a detour over to look at a patch of yellow lady slipper orchids - I was kind of surprised to discover only a single yellow boat bloom - normally they are all open by now, but I guess that is just another sign of our late spring this year. (last year it was a month early) I carefully set up my camera gear and took a number of photos of this most beautiful of wildflowers - I never tire of seeing or photographing them. There were lots of other plants up and out of the ground, but just no other blooms - perhaps in another week or two. The showy orchids nearby are beginning to bloom as well, but not a single umbrella magnolia bloom to be found this morning.

Speaking of blooms, we had a wonderful time yesterday at the 4th annual Books In Bloom festival at the Crescent Hotel in Eureka Springs (outdoors in the gardens). Lots of famous authors there speaking and selling books, and the weather was absolutely perfect! This was our first visit and I hope they ask us back. And one feature that I especially enjoyed - someone came by about every twenty minutes to see if I wanted any cookies! They had a lot of cookies, sandwiches, lemonade, and iced tea for the authors - only problem was that I was told last week I'm also allergic to COOKIES! Holy cow, can you believe it! But I managed to slip several past the cookie censor (my lovely bride) with no ill effects. As always, it was GREAT to meet so many Journal readers - you guys are everywhere!

Speaking of my bride, I guess I had better get this posted and back to work before she gets home (from delivering Mexican dip to a party at school). Today is Monday, and except for the stench in the air from the giant forest fire they set yesterday that is still hanging in the air, it is a GLORIOUS day in the wilderness and a fine beginning to the week!

Here are a couple more images I found from recent shoots:

Dogwoods and redbuds

One of the many neat rocks at Kings Bluff

And another one from this morning...

I get notes all the time from folks who are shocked at what the forest fire service is doing to our land and with our tax dollars. Lot of them get caught up in the mess and have to abondon their vacation plans, or worse. Here is an example from a note I got about the big 4,000-acre burn on Sunday - Hwy. 16 is one of the major state highways that runs along the spine of the Ozarks - Sunday was probably the peak spring weekend in the Ozarks. Way to go guys - burn it all up and do it on a Sunday to boot! Why are we burning up our tax dollars, baby birds, wildflowers, many endangered species, and endangering human lives?

<<(I'm a fan of the Journal and caught your slide show at the Lyric this last Holiday season.)

I was out and about yesterday ~ JRA (just ridin around) enjoying the spring weather ~ when I found myself on Cave Mountain Road near the crag parking area.

(I came in through Boxley Valley and was going to exit on 16 below Redstar.)

Big Mistake.

As I arrived at 16 I was engulfed in zero visibility wood smoke and swirling embers of the fire reaching the 16 fire break.

(I had passed a group of 5 to 7 four wheelers, a jeep, and other folks headed towards CR 414 and / or Dug Hollow or the Crag ~ but no fire people ~ and nobody stopped / mentioned the burn ~ which I was driving straight for and knew nothing about.)

Arriving at 16 at the time the fire did~  I had no idea where the fire was coming from or where to go ~ so I guessed and gunned it for Fallsville hoping that I (a) could make it and (b) could stay on the road and (c) wouldn't hit anyone or anything in the process.

North of Arbaugh the smoke cleared some and I ran into the first Forest Service Fire Truck headed towards the opposite direction ~ they didn't even stop until I stopped and starting backing up ~ so I could figure out from them what was going on and how to get the heck out of there ASAP.

They told me that the "roads" (meaning only 16) were blocked at Redstar and just before Fallsville, (and commented that I must have come from an "interior road"), I told them that I came from Cave Mountain and that when I made it to 16 that there was zero visibility with embers crossing the road and that there were people behind me and cars parked at 16 and CR 5 (Cave Mountain Road) ~ at which point they just sorta shook their collective heads and went on their way off into the smoke.

I consider myself pretty safe in the woods and I make it a practice to be prepared. So when I made it home yesterday I was pretty shook up about how I could have become a statistic yesterday by just driving down from Cave Mountain with no warning and no clue about what was happening at 16 ~ and with no way to know.

I also wondered about the tourists back there and if anything happened to them or the cars parked at 16.

And I wondered what the Forest Service would have said (if God forbid) any loss of lives or property would have come about yesterday from people on "interior roads" who went into the fire zone without knowing about it.

Because I'm a local I try and stay alert and aware of what the Forest Service and the Park are doing particularly when it comes to prescribed burns at all times.

But there has to be a better way than what happened to me yesterday ~ I was in an area that was not designated to burn yesterday ~ but I crossed into the fire zone during a Sunday "drive in the park" without any way of knowing that fact.

BTW - You should have seen the looks on the fire crews and the roadblock personnel peoples faces as I drove out of the fire zone on "blocked 16" yesterday ~ their expressions of shock and disbelief said it all ~ I was lucky yesterday.>>

05/06/08 Pam had to make a run into the greater Ponca metroplex to pick up Amber yesterday afternoon, so I thought I would go along and have her drop me off in some woods I knew about where the were umbrella magnolias were in bloom. I waved bye-bye and left the road and immediately was engulfed with a very thick forest. There was a narrow game trail leading away from the road and into the deep woods, and this trail beckoned me to follow it, so I did.

A minute later I was walking slowly across a very steep hillside on the trail, and with every step I took the forest got darker, the trees loomed larger, and the "jungle" around me got thicker. The path was taking me down, down, down, and while I knew it would be a steep climb back out, I followed, my mind beginning to wander up into the trees and I was lost. I stopped once and just looked around agasp at how primeval everything looked - GIANT beech trees, oaks, hickories, gums, and of course, umbrella magnolias that were indeed in full bloom - their pure-white blossoms were the only bright spots in an otherwise very dark place. It felt, well, kind of spooky, yet I continued on the rocky path, at times having to grab a hold of a sapling to keep from tumbling over.

The path led down to a small creek that was nearly dry, and filled with jagged rocks that had been scoured clean by recent floods - they were light-colored limestone instead of the darker sandstone I normally see in these creek bottoms. That made sense since directly above me in the drainage was Cave Mountain Cave, a famous underground passageway that had been carved out of limestone beds deep within the hillside. I looked around the streambed for a moment and found a large and very heavy piece of solid steel - I could hardly move it an inch - I wondered if it had been part of the old saltpeter mining operation that was going on at the cave entrance during the civil war - the Yankees raided the operation and shut it down.

It was still a couple of hours from sunset yet this forest I was standing in was really dark, almost nighttime dark. The big trees towered above me and disappeared up in a thick canopy of dark greens - I could not even begin to see the tops of the trees. Some of the smaller trees were the magnolias, and many of them were covered with dozens of the bright white blooms. Most of them were way too high up in the trees for me to photograph though - a bit of a disappointment. But I was still a happy camper to have literally stumbled onto such a neat and deep dark forest.

As I began to scramble around and climb up the other side of the hill I noticed a pair of blooms that were nearly on the ground - that was what I was looking for! I climbed up to them and found a small magnolia tree that had been broken off about half way through its trunk, and the heavy leaves and blooms had weighted it down. I put down my camera gear and set up for a shot, wanting to move in really close to the open bloom.

Did I mention that it was DARK in this little forest? Really dark. My exposure time was more than ten seconds, and as luck would have it, a slight breeze began to filter in through the trees and the bloom started to move around. The steepness of the hillside and my camera position had me on my knees for this shot, and while the breezes moved the bloom around I could only kneel there and wait it out, hoping for about ten seconds of stillness.

And then one of those times happened - it FELT like I was being watched. The hair on the back of my neck stood straight up. OK, now Ernst, this place really LOOKED like a spooky place but things never really happen in such places - get on with the photo and quit dreaming! And then I looked up and had a moment of terror - there was someone staring directly down on me - it was a bear, or at least a bear face. I could see no more, just his face. And it was round with small ears - hum, round face and small ears - that equals a large bear - YIKES! The thick brush he was standing in covered up the rest of his body - I could only see that round fur and tiny ears and those EYES! The moment certainly did match the surroundings. My heart pounded loudly and I nearly turned blue from holding my breath - Mr. Bear never moved a hair, and those eyes just drilled holes right into me.

And right in the middle of this I just happened to remember the bloom, and I noticed the breeze had actually quit - so what the heck, I TOOK THE PHOTO! Oh well, if I was going to be eaten by this bear at least I would have one last picture. My camera makes quite a loud sound when it takes a photo, and when I looked back up at the bear he was gone - simply vanished into the dark forest. But where had he gone - perhaps he just wanted a better position at the dinner table!

The next few minutes were pretty anxious indeed - obviously he knew who I was and where I was so there was no sneaking away from him, or needing to be quiet. So I knelt there for a little while longer - never got another shot without the breeze blowing - then I just said what the heck, packed up my camera gear and continued on up the steep hillside, literally going hand over fist and grabbing onto whatever I could that seemed attached to the hillside. I stopped every now and then to look around, but I never saw anything - at least anything that was real - I must have seen a dozen more bears that were not really there!

About the time I made it to the top of the hill my lovely bride with daughter in tow arrived to collect me. I turned around and took one last look around. Sometimes I get to feeling like a bear in the deep, dark woods, and I have a kinship with them. I wanted to come back and spend some time in this little patch of forest, and perhaps meet up with Mr. Bear again.

Here is the shot I took while under the watchful eye of Mr. Bear

And here are a couple of photos I took today while on our way into town to run some errands...

Kings River Falls

05/07/08 We are finally getting some rain now this evening - not a drop all day until now, but every bit is welcome. I spent some time out on the back deck watching the clouds roll in, feeling the air get colder and wetter. And now, the music of an early summer rainstorm!

It was a little foggy early this morning and I decided to return to the "bear forest" to see if I could get an image that conveyed some of the primeval forest that I felt yesterday. It turned out that the fog was up high and did not reach that far down the mountain, but I enjoyed an hour or so of stumbling around in this steep-hillside jungle. At one point while I was setting up for the image below of a giant beech tree, I looked directly across the ravine and saw a dark object over there, right where I had been just moments before. Had the bear returned to let me know it was HIS jungle and that I was not welcome? Nope, it was just big old black camera bag that I had left over there in my haste to get a photo while the air was still. Silly me.

One of the giant beeches in the bear forest

On the way back home I stopped in the middle of the road, turned off the car, and stepped outside and up to the fence to admire a view that I had seen a hundred or more times. It was that of a rolling green field and a small stand of tall trees at the far end, which are always silhouetted against the rising sun. There was no sun today, just fog, but the pasture was especially green and I decided to take some photos of all that green and the trees and the fog. There was a warm breeze blowing, and such a pleasant feeling in the air that I just kind of hung around a while, moving my camera along the edge of the field and shooting the trees and the green and the fog from different locations and with different lenses. It was as if something were keeping me there, to enjoy the moment a little while longer. There was no traffic, no noise other than the breeze and birds that filled the airwaves with their own brand of morning music.

And then while I was looking through the camera making one final composition, a spot of yellow began to appear in the fog. It quickly grew larger and brighter and more yellow - it was the SUN! Since the fog was so thick the yellow ball never did grow into the burning intense sun that it normally is - it remained a soft yellow ball in a sea of fog for nearly a minute. Knowing the scene might not last long I frantically ran down the fence to get to a spot where I could line up the sun right in between the main group of trees and this one lone tree on the left. Then I made about a dozen exposures. It was a very simple composition and easy exposure, yet, for me, it seemed to be the earth smiling back at me. A moment in time, a slice of the day, when everything and everyone was at peace and harmony with each other. And then the yellow evaporated back into the fog, not to return.

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