splitrock lighthouse

When most people think of Minnesota, they probably imagine fields, lakes, farms, and snow but when you get up north of Duluth and the Lake Superior coast you get small mountains, amazing streams and waterfalls and a rocky coastline.  Back when I lived in MN, the state government shutdown for a while so I took that opportunity to head up to Lake Superior and see some of the state parks without people in them (parks were shutdown too).  I got to Splitrock Lighthouse late in the afternoon and spend the night perched out on the rocks to get this other photo of it too at night silhouetting the stars :)

find it here:  47°11’59” N;  91°22’12” W

Gooseberry Falls

This area is about an hour north of of Duluth on the shore of Lake Superior. Since the state of Minnesota was closed, this park area was closed too, but you could just park on the road and it was a short walk to the falls.  I never realized that this part of Minnesota had so many cliffs and bluffs - I’m looking forward to exploring this part of the state more now that I’m living here.

Find it here:  47°8’34” N;  91°28’3” W

The Tetons Lay Beyond

I took this photo on the first day of our trip to Jackson Wyoming this summer.  This is very near the southern entrance to Teton National Park one of the most beautiful places I have ever been - you can’t go wrong taking a picture in any direction. This one is just outside a horse pasture at one of the first pull outs into the park.

Find this here:  43° 48’ 36” N; 110° 31’ 40” W

Get Bent!

Is this one crazy tree or what?  While driving in to Coulter Bay to see Jackson Lake in Wyoming, this tree caught my eye a ways down an empty parking lot.  It was so unique that I had to stop and take a picture.  I’ve seen trees bent before for landscaping reasons (with cables, etc) but this one was just in some random part of a parking lot in the middle of the “island” strip that ran between two lanes.  I took this shot from a very low angle and the lens I used is so wide, it lets you get up real close.

Find this here:  43°54’15” N 110°38’39” W

Teton Pastures

The whole Jackson, Wyoming, Teton National Park, Yellowstone area is just amazing. One scenic view after another. If you’ve never taken the time to visit this part of our country, you’ve done yourself a disservice. There is days of exploring and learning to do here and beauty in every direction you look. It’s almost impossible not to take a great picture no matter what season or weather. This picture was taken just as we entered Teton National Park on our way to Yellowstone. I think we started off pulling over into every little turnout (there are many) and reading the monuments, taking in the view. You can’t help but want to stop, but then after a bunch, we realized if we continued on with this, we’d never make it to Yellowstone!

If you want to see the exact spot where this picture was taken, I geotag all my pictures. You can click on the picture to get to my Flickr photostream which has a map or click this link here to get to a Google map look for the green arrow.

Find this here:  43°48’37” N;  110°31’40” W

Beach Day at the Edge of the World

Coulter Bay on Jackson Lake in Teton National Park. There was this really cool storm forming just west of the Tetons in Idaho. We were listening to an Idaho AM radio station broadcasting the emergency warning and hearing the lighting “pops” crackle through the radio. This beach is covered with these large flat/smooth stones thus the course look to it.  Just after taking this photo, it started to rain, one of those really cold summer mountain rains, it was awesome!

Find this here:  43°54’21” N; 110°38’51” W

Lone Tree in Teton National Park

After spending two days at Grand Teton National Park this lone tree caught my eye just as we were leaving the park.  We had just finished a great trail run around Jenny Lake and went back to take a few more pictures.  While the Tetons are beautiful, I think this might be my favorite picture from the trip.

What is really cool is the ability to geotag your photos.  If you click here, you’ll see a green arrow  on Google Maps where I was standing and just to the east is the tree and its shadow.  Even cooler, is if you go into Street View, you can pan to the right and see the tree from the road.  Technology is amazing!!

To do this, I added a diGPS Pro to my Nikon D700 which stays connected all the time.  It’s just a small dongle that hangs from the neckstrap on a custom little 1” strap I made.  I haven’t noticed a drop in battery life and it only turns on when my camera is on.  There are other solutions to geotag photos, but they all either require you to find the location on a map after (on your computer) or the dongle records the location constantly then you have to match that up to your pictures afterwards (based on time) on your computer using special software.  With the diGPS, it writes the GPS data into the EXIF info of the picture when you take it so there is no fussing around afterwards.

Find this here:  43° 42’ 21” N;  110° 43’ 28” W