Camping Last Weekend II

[mountainvisions]

<p>Last weekend Aim, Colvin and I had the pleasure to avoid any crowds. Our wildlife to human ratio was severely skewed, despite the Adirondacks being an absolute zoo. I commented that it appeared to be more like Central Park than Adirondack Park.</p>

<p>I've gotten really good over the years at finding obscurity during these weekends. Often we see fewer people than a typical weekend. We even watched the fireworks in relative peace and quiet high up above Lake Placid. For a while I thought we were alone, but eventually about 10 people showed up just before sundown. Still, a stark difference between 10 people and thousands .5 miles and 600ft below.</p>

<p>This weekend we saw beaver, otter, bald eagles, herons, loons, a deer, moose tracks, and the usual assorted small animals and birds. Of course the Canadian Gray Jays swooping down over the boat on a small river are always interesting.</p>

<p>Saturday and Sunday we paddled the St Regis River, Meacham Lake, and the Osgood River. One of my absolute favorite paddles, although it was a little early (yes, July is early way up here) for the wildflowers, the Joe Pie Weed was starting to bloom and the Pickerel Weed also. Not as pretty as 3 years ago when we last paddled it, yet!</p>

<p>Monday we started out in the Northern High Peaks, the largest tract of wilderness east of the Mississippi River and ended our day paddling in complete solitude on Henderson Lake (no photos in this post, but will follow). Henderson was private for almost 180 years but in 2003 this incredible deep water lake was purchased by the state and included in the NYS Forest Preserve. Ringed by the High Peaks Wilderness in 3 directions, it is breath taking! It's also got tons of character with steep rocky (cliff lined) shorelines, waterfalls, and access to more paddling via portages.</p>

<p>Of note for us, Colvin learned to swim on Henderson, and the both of us swam about 1000 meters, although he didn't join me in the middle of the lake, he is far more trusting of me than Caney was, and will swim with me. It was there I decided the Pentax W90 will be purchased soon enough! Floating on my back at water level in the middle of Henderson, I really wanted my camera!</p>

<p>Anyway, a few shots taken with the Pentax K-7 and various lenses, including the Sigma 10-20, Pentax 21mm DA Limited, and Sigma 70-300. The panoramic was taken with the Nodal Ninja N3. Stitching was 100% flawless, no need to manually correct anything. I did 50% overlap to correct any exposure issues, although at 6:30am there really aren't many to correct while shooting due west! It's a total of 30 images at 70mm. This is just a test copy from JPEG extractions at 1/4th res, and then downscaled to 3000px for web viewing.<br>

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<a title="Lake Placid Ski Jump and High Peaks Wilderness by Mountain Visions, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4115/4767629076_083a448b0f_z.jpg" alt="Lake Placid Ski Jump and High Peaks Wilderness" width="640" height="66" /></a><br>

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<a title="Fireworks Over Lake Placid & the High Peaks by Mountain Visions, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4119/4771702409_f664844fb8_z.jpg" alt="Fireworks Over Lake Placid & the High Peaks" width="640" height="384" /></a></p>

<p><a title="Colvin Harrison by Mountain Visions, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4080/4772251444_fd1e5f96d0_z.jpg" alt="Colvin Harrison" width="596" height="640" /></a></p>

<p><a title="Early Morning On The St. Regis River by Mountain Visions, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4143/4768526469_9bfaa797a9_z.jpg" alt="Early Morning On The St. Regis River" width="640" height="494" /></a></p>

<p><a title="Pulling over a downed tree by Mountain Visions, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4141/4771612857_5c54abcb07_z.jpg" alt="Pulling over a downed tree" width="640" height="425" /></a><br /> caption on flickr explains this one...but basically if you are paddling rivers you are going to have to either portage, pull through, or pull over various obstructions on any given river. Some years there are none, others it's chocked. Not so oddly this was the scene of "The Sky Is Falling" in 2007...can you guess which tree it is!Oh, and if you are lucky enough to paddle the Osgood, you can thank me for clearing a portage around the second blowdown (which could not be pulled over). Took about 30 minutes to cut down trees and branches but it's crystal clear!</p>

<p><a title="The Sky Is Falling - Osgood River by Mountain Visions, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1438/1200571446_c127843ce8_z.jpg?zz=1" alt="The Sky Is Falling - Osgood River" width="427" height="640" /></a></p>

<p><a title="Pulling Over A Small Beaver Dam by Mountain Visions, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1135/1199685169_90a74bcb1b_z.jpg?zz=1" alt="Pulling Over A Small Beaver Dam" width="640" height="457" /></a></p>

[jgredline]

<p>Justin,<br>

I know what you mean. You would think that I would like to be where the crowds are and that is normally true, but I am not much into the holiday crowds.</p>

<p>That fireworks image is really nice, certainly the best I have seen ''period'' I could see you selling quite a few of those...Good to see Colvin doing well....But above all, It brings me joy to see you doing this with your soul mate...You are a lucky man.</p>

[mountainvisions]

<p>The conditions were almost perfect for this vantage point for the fireworks, but IMO the image isn't really printable beyond postcard or maybe 5X7. Too many irritations for me.</p>

<p>Two things that bother me 1) the wind was just subtle enough to force me to use the 21mm which was a bit too wide (the other lens I took up was the 70-300) 2) the spot lights on the Olympic rink (not visible in this photo but I have a few non fireworks shots that illustrate it) illuminated the smoke in ways I didn't like. Oddly, before the fireworks started the spot lights were stationary, and looked really cool. Thought they would add to the shots.</p>

<p>The 43mm or 55mm 1.8 would have been ideal, I didn't have the 43mm, but the 55mm was sitting in the car.</p>

<p>Thanks, I do enjoy paddling with my wife, actually it's why I nixed getting a second solo boat (for us to paddle together but separately) over shelling out more money for a second tandem flatwater tripper. Paddling tandem (along with multipitch rock climbing) is one of those test sports for a marriage. We happen to do both pretty well together. Having paddled mostly everything in the Adirondacks under class 2 that doesn't require serious portaging, I'm looking forward to a lighter tandem boat next year to get to more remote locations for weekend trips. There are a dozen or so trips that I have had on the list that just require much lighter boats to even consider!</p>

<p>Of course having paddled in the Daks for a decade and still having plenty left to explore is a great thing! Even better, the more remote, the less people...another great thing!</p>

[shots worth sharing]

<p>I can understand your frustration with the fireworks shot but it must have been very cool to watch from that vantage point (despite the crowd ;~). I really like the canoeing shots, though. The pano is amazing--you really are a wide-angle freak (30 images?!) Are you going to print it and, if so, at what dimensions ?</p>

[mountainvisions]

<p>At 10:1 aspect ratio it would need to be at least 96in long. 96in prints aren't cheap (about $150-300 for the print from a decent print shop), so it's not something I would probably print for the heck of it. It should be flawless, the curvature you see in the middle isn't distortion, it's actually the field slope, so the sky is the limit for printing size. But the aspect ratio is the killer for printing.</p>

<p>Typically I wouldn't do a 10:1 ratio, actually the point of the panoramics to me is opposite that, to get the images as height and width proportional as possible while maintaining a high res image. Usually a 4 to 1 ratio is about as crazy as I get because above that printing becomes a nightmare. But I was out there and i really liked the idea of the field in the foreground with the ski jumps on one side and the HPW on the other. That and the fact I just wanted to see how well everything worked going that extreme.</p>

<p>With the K-7 and a calibrated panoramic head, doing stuff like this is almost too easy.</p>

<p> </p>

[MattB.Net]

<p>Wow, very nice! That pano is crazy! Is that all done in Photoshop or do you use a more specialized tool?<br>

I deal with a lot of trees on the trail and when I used to paddle more, on the river too. It can be really scary when paddling class 3+ whitewater that's really moving and come upon something like that around a bend. I hate it when they are really fresh and have tons of scratchy branches to climb through!<br>

I didn't bother with trying to take pics of the fireworks much this year either. We watch from our yard and there's too much light pollution to get a good shot. Plus I wanted to just hang out and drink beer with my friends and family.</p>

[shaloot]

<p>The pano is pretty wild, just wish I could see it larger and in all it's glory. My favorite is the canoe shot with Colvin, I even tagged it as such on flickr!</p>

[russel_yee]

<p>You guys are killin me with these camping posts, I haven't gotten out even hiking or camping this year because of a torn meniscus(sp?)... I'm totally jealous and I wish I had some camping pics that didn't satisfy me=D<br>

I like the clouds from the canoe... Im' a sucker for wide angle clouds.</p>

[mountainvisions]

<p>Matt,</p>

<p>I hear you about the strainers on white water, we've encountered a few over the years. I remember running the Buffalo River in Arkansas and my boat getting pinned. The river was fairly high, and slightly above my class 2 skills, so it was a bit scary all the way around.</p>

<p>In the shot the tree has no branches, but the second one was a tangled mess, I figured I could have cut a path through it and pulled under, but the potential portage was slightly easier than cutting 4-5, 4 in fresh pine limbs with a 12 in saw.</p>

<p>The fireworks can be hit or miss, sometimes it's better to just sit back and watch. I took only 5 shots with the fireworks, quite a few more before or after for either the sunset or for star trails.</p>

<p>This was from 2 years ago in Lake Placid!</p>

<p><a title="Independence Day - Lake Placid, New York by Mountain Visions, on Flickr" href=" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3282/2662395077_2c79e3b8a7_z.jpg" alt="Independence Day - Lake Placid, New York" width="417" height="640" /></a></p>

<p> </p>

[mountainvisions]

<p>Somanna,</p>

<p>Thanks, I like that shot a lot too (it's actually my wallpaper right now). I always like starting at or before sunrise when paddling. It's very peaceful out there at that time, and the wildlife is active, not to mention the light is beautiful.</p>

<p>I've been dragging my butt on reactivating my flickr account till my "cash back" money goes into my Paypal. I thought I transferred it a week ago, turns out I must have existed before the last click through, take a look either tomorrow or this weekend and you should be able to access the 3000px version, free accounts are limited to 1024px.</p>

 

[mountainvisions]

<p>Russel,</p>

<p>I think the reason we both like the wide angle shots with the clouds is it's really the only way they work. Blue skies are way too boring with a UWA.</p>

<p>Get that meniscus fixed, it's an in and out procedure, usually no rehab needed. You'll be out camping/hiking before the end of the summer...or just get a boat and paddle, hornbeck or placid boat works make boats as light at 10lbs, getting one to the water won't even bother your knee!</p>