I often carry a camera with me as I go about my day-to-day activities. Sometimes I even activate the shutter release!
These photos were all made in the month or so since we returned from our road trip. During yesterday’s rain, I remembered to take the memory card out of the camera and see what had accumulated.
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After finishing my errands this morning, I took a stroll (with camera in hand) around downtown Peterborough in a light rain.
The light was dull and flat, it was not a day for black and white photos, but the rain did make the colors really pop!
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This afternoon, I spent some time at Bailey Brook in Nelson. This brook has two very nice water falls separated by about a quarter mile of stream containing numerous small cascades. The stream was flowing well as we had about a half inch of rain yesterday.
The lower falls is visible from the road and is the smaller but more photogenic of the two. The upper falls has a very nice swimming hole at its top. I did not avail myself of this amenity today. It was breezy and the temperature was in the mid-50’s! The skies were partly cloudy with periods of bright sun (not so good for photographing waterfalls) and periods of thick clouds (good for the task at hand). The clouds were moving quickly so I never had to wait long for the light to change.
Bailey Brook is one of the few places in our neck of the Monadnock region where I have observed skunk cabbage*. There were newly emerging plants at numerous locations along the edge of the brook.
Damp feet and knees were a small price to pay for the photographs I made.
Color Work
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Black and White Work
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* Edit: Joan says that this plant is American False Hellebore, NOT skunk cabbage. I have enough trouble with odes… plants are too much for me!
This afternoon I took a walk in the woods behind our house. My goal was to visit (and photograph) two small woodland streams,
The nearest one (about a quarter mile from the house) was a bust. Too little flow and too much light (contrast).
The second (about another half mile along) panned out well. Just the right combination of flow and light.
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Meetinghouse Hill was the original center of Antrim. The original meetinghouse was built near the summit in 1785. The associated cemetery is still well maintained an offers nice views of Mount Mondanock after some recent logging activity on the southwestern flank.
The meetinghouse building was moved to the foot of the hill (maybe a half mile trip) in 1832 and was purchased by the Antrim Grange in 1894. It still used as the Grange Hall and they are in the midst of a campaign to restore the building. Across Meetinghouse Hill Road from the Grange is the Uplands, an old farmhouse and barn. The Uplands is the home of our friends Victor and Lynne who run a bed and breakfast there.
Last Friday, I spent some time on Meetinghouse Hill making photographs.
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Last Friday was cool and partly cloudy. Perfect weather for photographing flowing water. The snow is almost gone, but the spring runoff is still near peak.
I spent a bit of time with neutral density filers and tripod, making photographs at two different small woodland streams during the day.
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Spring has been v—e—r—y s—l—o—w in coming this year.
However, by the end of last week the majority of the winter’s accumulation of snow was gone and things were looking up. I even got to try out the grill Joan had bought me at Edmund’s Hardware Store ladies night back in December.
There was so little snow left that the treasure hunters were out. On the 11th (last Wed.) I ran into a fellow with a metal detector while I was walking the un-maintained section of Brimstone Corner Road. He had found four very old buttons by searching around one of the old cellar holes.
Then, on Sunday and Monday, we got two inches of frozen rain (i.e. ice pellets) and, for good measure, some 35 degree rain on top of that!
Spring be damned!
Today, Joan and Ben Pratt headed out on Gregg Lake to do the first water sampling of the year. The temperature was about 35 degrees and there was a stiff breeze blowing when they headed out about 9:30 this morning. The temperature was up to 45 degrees by mid-afternoon when they returned home from delivering the samples to the lab in Concord. They report that the water temperature was 4 degrees C from top to bottom!
Here are some random photos made over the past week.
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Yesterday, hoping for good light, I took my camera along on my walk. The hope was just that.
For most of the walk the sun was out full resulting in harsh, direct light.
The problem (for photography) with harsh, direct light is too much contrast; harsh, deep shadows accompanied by bright, hot highlights.
When nature hands you lemons make lemonade:
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The calendar says “spring”. The weather says otherwise.
We are still having daytime temperatures in the high 30’s and low 40’s; night time temperatures have been generally below freezing and as low as the high teens. This is perfect weather for maple sugaring and from what I hear this has been a banner year for such.
This past week brought a few inches of new snow. Fortunately, it is April and the new snow was mostly gone within a day. However, there are still pockets of the winter’s snow still hanging on here and there in the woods.
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