We Defected to the West! DLR 2013

[jenseib]

Well i replied earlier...or thought I did, which means I probably put the reply in some other post.
Those are gorgeous shots.

 

[mom2rtk]

Well i replied earlier...or thought I did, which means I probably put the reply in some other post.
Those are gorgeous shots.

Thanks Jen.

All you have to do is find every single post you made in the past day and find the missing words!

 

[amandaw]

Lovely pics from the beginning of the summer trip! I've never travelled out west (except to Vegas ) and love seeing the scenery! Glad you were able to get shots of the goats and still make it through the tunnel!

 

[KCmike]

I simply love your travelouge images. Oh what fun (especially for the photographer!).

 

[mvf-m11c]

Your outdoor pictures are very nice and I really like your last picture of the lake.

Speaking of the Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 lens, I am renting it for my upcoming trip this weekend to the DLR. After reading your trip report and talking about it, I had to try out this lens for the trip. I am not ready yet to buy it and if I am satisfy with this lens during the trip, I might buy it.

 

[PrincessInOz]

Excellent! I was hoping you would share some pictures of your road trip. I love the Canyonlands area.

 

[mom2rtk]

Lovely pics from the beginning of the summer trip! I've never travelled out west (except to Vegas ) and love seeing the scenery! Glad you were able to get shots of the goats and still make it through the tunnel!

Yeah, we were sweating making it through that tunnel. Through the years we've had some serious delays in the course of long road trips. I was really happy to just miss this time!

The west is an amazing area. I am actually looking for non-direct flights to DL this year again just so we can land in Vegas and see the scenery from the sky again.

I simply love your travelouge images. Oh what fun (especially for the photographer!).

Thanks Mike. Definitely heaven for a photographer. I totally lose myself in my shots out there.

Your outdoor pictures are very nice and I really like your last picture of the lake.

Speaking of the Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 lens, I am renting it for my upcoming trip this weekend to the DLR. After reading your trip report and talking about it, I had to try out this lens for the trip. I am not ready yet to buy it and if I am satisfy with this lens during the trip, I might buy it.

I hope you'll check in after your weekend trip and give us a report on the lens. I'd love to hear what you think of it.

Excellent! I was hoping you would share some pictures of your road trip. I love the Canyonlands area.

I was sort of "meh" about Canyonlands for a while. It's cool, but has a lot of stiff competition out in that area. But the more we have explored, the more I'm loving it.

 

[mom2rtk]

June 5, 2014:


It was 42 degrees when we got up the next morning. Let's just say I was a little nervous about the idea of getting into a raft and floating down a cold river. But I didn't go all that way to change my mind. So off we went. We had about an hour's drive to our rafting spot near Glenwood Springs. The scenery from that point on was amazing though.


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Thankfully they had wet gear for us to rent, so I was able to stay fairly warm. It turns out the water volume was way too high so we ended up swapping from the Colorado to the Roaring Forks river. They said the water we were floating on had been snow pack less than 48 hours earlier. Brrrrr......
It was a nice mix of calm waters and whitewater. I'm pretty sure I took on the most water of anyone in the raft (lucky me!), just luck of the draw based on where I was sitting.

I had bought a new waterproof camera before the trip, and I enjoyed trying it out. My biggest issue on the trip was having my feet fall asleep from the tight water socks I was wearing. At one point I actually had to take them off to get the circulation going again.

I think we all enjoyed it a lot. It was not a wild ride, but it was a great way to ease us into a new experience. I think Drew and Timmy are anxious to do the more challenging version next time.

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The river was actually outside its banks most of the way.

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We did see a variety of wildlife along the way, including this eagle:. I would have enjoyed photographing him with my good camera but had to settle for what the waterproof point and shoot could do:

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There really wasn't supposed to be an island here. It was supposed to just go to one side of this vegetation but had spilled out of its banks:

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As we got closer back into town, our guide explained to us how the they had built this cool feature into the river. It's a perpetual wave for surfers. I'm still not clear on how they did this, but it apparently attracts world class surfers for the novelty of surfing the Colorado River (this was the area right after the Roaring Fork meets back up with the Colorado). That's what led to this rather odd photo:


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In addition to my shots on the waterproof camera, we bought a CD of photos from the rafting company's photographer:

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The surfers are supposed to yield to the rafters, but this surfer apparently did not get the memo and came way too close.

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[mom2rtk]

June 5, 2014 Continued: Into Moab


The hardest part was not having a hotel room to go back to and clean up. We stopped for lunch in town then headed back out on the road again for to drive several hours. We were headed for Moab that night and wanted some time in that park before dark. In spite of wanting to get to our next hotel and clean up, we opted to take the slower scenic route into Moab. We accidentally took that scenic route into town on our first trip in 2005 and fell in love with it. It did not disappoint. We stopped at one pull-out after another taking photos while Timmy and Katie threw rocks into the river.

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The road follows the Colorado all the way into Moab.

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We labeled this formation "Scooby Doo Rock". Hopefully you'll see why.

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More rock throwing. We were definitely not at risk of running out of rocks to throw into the river.

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One of the things I liked about my waterproof camera was the panoramic feature:

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[PrincessInOz]

Janet - Love the shots! Glad you made it into the water and it looks like soooo much fun! That road into Moab looks so scenic and wonderful.

We started in Phoenix last year and went to Sedona, Grand Canyon, Page, Monument Valley and ended up in Pagosa Springs in Colorado. Your pictures are making me wish I had another road trip planned.

 

[YodasMom]

Absolutely gorgeous photos of the Utah canyon lands, Janet! And, the action shots of the raft trip are great! Looks like a really fun, full day!

I just have to get back out there!!! Looking forward to more shots of that trip!

 

[mom2rtk]

June 5, 2014 Continued: Into Arches

It was already getting late into the day so we drove straight into Arches National Park when we got to town. I mean, we were just going to get dirty again anyway, so no need to shower and get cleaned up.

We have been to the park several times but it had been several years since our last trip. We each had some favorites we wanted to visit (or photograph) in the park, but we didn't really have a plan for that night.

Our favorite sight in the entire park is the emblem they use on the Utah license plate.... Delicate Arch. We viewed it from a distance on our first trip in 05. To get a close look you have to make what I consider a very challenging 3 mile round trip hike. Not being the athletic sort, I pushed through in 2010 to get there but didn't feel the drive to do it again this time. Here's a shot from 2010. Robbie and Timmy are the 2 people near the bottom of the frame in navy and medium blue shirts, giving their mom a heart attack. There are a lot of steep drop-offs in that area.

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There was another viewing spot that required only about a mile and a half round trip hike, so we decided to give that a try.

Here's the wide shot at the end of the trail:


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And the close-up:

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Not as impressive as seeing it up close, but that hike almost did me in 4 years ago, and I definitely wasn't up to it that night. And it was already late enough that we would have had to do the hike back to the car in the dark. And that's something we weren't prepared to do (no flashlights). I wasn't fond of the late day lighting from this view either, so started thinking it might be a good idea to come back early in the day and see it in different lighting.

We headed out of that area to the Devil's Garden area next. I had never been out to see Landscape Arch. We started that hike in 05, and Katie wanted to be carried before we got out of the gate. And it was a very hot day and we had no idea how hard the hike was. So we bailed. It was time to go back and make good on it.

One of the frustrating things that time of day is that some things will be illuminated by a glorious late day setting sun while other things will be shrouded in shadows. I had no idea where Landscape Arch stood in relation to the setting sun, so we took a chance and just went. It was a 1.6 mile round trip hike. Timmy loves this sort of vacation where he can climb and explore. I have to admit I like this sort of vacation a lot more now that the kids are older and I can count on them not to do anything too crazy or risky.

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I move slower than the rest of the group and take my time taking pictures along the way.

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Since I move slower, the kids got there first. I met them on the path with them basically telling me to turn around. I had just missed the most spectacular lighting with the setting sun just peeking through the arch. I thought they were kidding, but they weren't. I kept going, but when I got there all I got was shadows and flat colors. I didn't even walk the rest of the way down. It was rather unimpressive. Well, photographically speaking, certainly not geographically speaking. One of the interesting things about this arch is that a 73 foot section actually fell off in 1991 while a tourist was video taping. You can see it here at 2:17.


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Of course, all I had to do was turn around to find the amazing lighting I wanted to see on that arch:

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I snapped a variety of shots on our way back out of the park, but only the ones on the pretty side of the street.

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Here's a quick shot from the car of one of our favorite formations, Balanced Rock:

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By the time we got to the front of the park, the sun was almost gone. But I snapped this one to show the perspective of how you enter the park. At the bottom of that hillside is the Visitor's Center. We had to descend via a series of switchbacks.

IMG_6943 by mom2rtk, on Flickr

 

[mom2rtk]

Janet - Love the shots! Glad you made it into the water and it looks like soooo much fun! That road into Moab looks so scenic and wonderful.

We started in Phoenix last year and went to Sedona, Grand Canyon, Page, Monument Valley and ended up in Pagosa Springs in Colorado. Your pictures are making me wish I had another road trip planned.

It sounds like you got more than a cursory look around. You covered some serious ground. Did you go on a jeep tour of Monument Valley? That's still on my list. We have been through there a couple times and photographed the valley from the visitor's center, but haven't been out into the valley yet. And we haven't done Sedona yet.

If you went into Page, did you get out to see Horseshoe Bend? Sitting here looking at my photos today I decided I want to raft around that bend! I have to label that my favorite sight in all of the desert southwest.

Absolutely gorgeous photos of the Utah canyon lands, Janet! And, the action shots of the raft trip are great! Looks like a really fun, full day!

I just have to get back out there!!! Looking forward to more shots of that trip!

Thanks Karen! It was a lot of fun. But honestly, I only cared about doing it so I could get a different view of the scenery. I enjoyed using the waterproof camera, an was mostly happy with the images. But in a raft like that I really missed the wide angle lens on my DSLR.

 

[YodasMom]

Thanks Karen! It was a lot of fun. But honestly, I only cared about doing it so I could get a different view of the scenery. I enjoyed using the waterproof camera, an was mostly happy with the images. But in a raft like that I really missed the wide angle lens on my DSLR.

If I ever did a raft trip, it would only be to get photos of the scenery from a different perspective, too......LOL!!! I'm not much of a water adventurer, so I don't think it's going to happen though!

 

[PrincessInOz]

It sounds like you got more than a cursory look around. You covered some serious ground. Did you go on a jeep tour of Monument Valley? That's still on my list. We have been through there a couple times and photographed the valley from the visitor's center, but haven't been out into the valley yet. And we haven't done Sedona yet.

We did a twilight jeep tour through Monument Valley. Prior to this trip, I was in the same boat as you. I'd been to MV before and only looked at it from the visitor center. But then, I was pregnant on that trip and we decided not to do anything too bumpy.

This was my 3rd trip to Sedona and we spent 3 nights there. I think that if I were living in the US, I would seriously consider living there.

If you went into Page, did you get out to see Horseshoe Bend? Sitting here looking at my photos today I decided I want to raft around that bend! I have to label that my favorite sight in all of the desert southwest.

We had two things on the bucket list to tick off in Page. Horseshoe Bend was one and the other was the light beams in Antelope Canyon. I got both done on this trip. We also did the float trip down the Colorado round Horseshoe Bend.

If you're interested, the TR with the pictures can be found here.
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=3185788

I'm still trying to finish this TR off before I head to SoCal again.
Aside from the road trip, I did bookend the road trip with Anaheim and Orlando. Head to the second post for the quick links. You should be able to find Page and Monument Valley somewhere in the middle of the trip.

 

[PrincessInOz]

Gorgeous shots at Arches. I love how it glows when the sun hits the rocks.

 

[DisneyFreak06]

Wow. Just WOW.

 

[mom2rtk]

If I ever did a raft trip, it would only be to get photos of the scenery from a different perspective, too......LOL!!! I'm not much of a water adventurer, so I don't think it's going to happen though!

You know what they say about great minds, right? I'm totally ot a water adventurer. But I'm still glad we did it.

We did a twilight jeep tour through Monument Valley. Prior to this trip, I was in the same boat as you. I'd been to MV before and only looked at it from the visitor center. But then, I was pregnant on that trip and we decided not to do anything too bumpy.

This was my 3rd trip to Sedona and we spent 3 nights there. I think that if I were living in the US, I would seriously consider living there.


We had two things on the bucket list to tick off in Page. Horseshoe Bend was one and the other was the light beams in Antelope Canyon. I got both done on this trip. We also did the float trip down the Colorado round Horseshoe Bend.

If you're interested, the TR with the pictures can be found here.
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=3185788

I'm still trying to finish this TR off before I head to SoCal again.
Aside from the road trip, I did bookend the road trip with Anaheim and Orlando. Head to the second post for the quick links. You should be able to find Page and Monument Valley somewhere in the middle of the trip.

You did it up right, didn't you! Thanks so much for the link to your TR's. I can't wait to go read more details! If we ever get to the point that we're considering some of those things (floating Horseshoe Bend, or the MV jeep tour, or the slot canyons) I'll definitely pick your brain. Those are all things on our list.

Gorgeous shots at Arches. I love how it glows when the sun hits the rocks.

There's just something about those rocks and that sunlight. I just can't get enough of it.

Wow. Just WOW.

It really is a WOW sort of area. Just amazing.

 

[KCmike]

This road trip looks like so much fun! I'm drooling over these landscape images. Keep em' coming please.

The link you provided on the falling rock is one of those things that you think in the back of your mind but press on especially when your at National Parks.

 

[jenseib]

Such awesome shots. And that surfer colliding with you is kind of scary, but you all look like you are lauging about it. If you were really on your game you would've gotten that shot too!