Janet Brien's photos with the keyword: lake

(+10 insets!) (This image looks best at full size! :D) (Please scroll down to Today's Pictures for more information about the insets) A Proper Exploration of the Island Steve and I finally felt satisfied with our visit to the amazing tidal flats and made our way back over to the trailhead to begin our hike along the coast. On one side, deep, thick, healthy forest headed up and away towards the center of the island while the trail hugged the edge of the coast on the other side, with wonderful views of the ocean all the way. Seafaring vessels could be seen in a constant stream and we would often stop and look out between the trees to watch as they went by. Smaller ones were common--sailboats, yachts, jet boats, fishing boats and others we couldn't identify. Large watercraft made their presence known as well--container ships and oil tankers cruised silently by far out on the water and ferries too--huge ones unlike the cute little guy we rode on to get to the island. Of course we couldn't resist taking lots of pictures and you'll see plenty included today as insets. The weather couldn’t have been better on this wonderful day--it was overcast and cloudy but perfectly comfortable! I wondered if it would be terribly windy but it was just right—a bit of breeze but nothing strong or blustery. How lucky we were. There have been plenty of times when it's been raining on a day that we'd hoped to go on a hike; other times it might be sunny but the wind was just furious and miserable! You always throw the dice when it comes to the weather and we always appreciated good fortune! Into the Forest We Go! Eventually the coastal trail headed inland and we disappeared into the shadowy forest with its tall trees of mixed species. Most were conifers that filled the air with their rich, pungent pine aroma and muffled the sounds of our footsteps as we walked on the needle-covered path. Making our way through the forest, I could not help feeling a warmth of gentle presences around me—more than just the trees that I normally felt. I sensed there were others around us and it was a bit peculiar to me as I have only felt this on a rare occasion. Who knows if it was just me wanting to feel that there was more going on here than just a cool island with a lovely hiking trail. All I can tell you is that it was very different and I felt very good there. Through the trees we saw the forest opening up with flashes of water beyond. It was a beautiful small lake covered with lily pads and water plants, dead conifers spiking up to the sky in the center. Logs littered the edges, some of which were covered by moss and dense thickets of plants. We were enchanted by the beauty of this lovely, emerald gem, and enjoyed the view for many long moments, taking in all the details we could before we took pictures to remember this special place by. Walking on towards our bikes, it wasn't long before we arrived--along with our massive appetites! We pulled out our spread of cheese and sausage, bbq pork rinds and fauxtato salad, along with lots of water, and sat on a driftwood log for our feast. How nice that we were back at the tidal flats to sit and look out at that wonderful place again. What a Ride!! AKA: WHEEEEEE!!!! :D Once we were satisfied and ready for a bike ride, we got everything stowed away, put on our backpacks and helmets and off we went! Both of us have recently replaced our old mountain bikes and cannot believe how easy it is to make it up steep hills now. The new gearing on current bikes is really impressive, so instead of pushing our bikes up these fairly substantial hills, we rode all the way up without stopping! AMAZING! Both of us were gasping for breath when we finally reached the crest but felt extremely pleased with our successful climb. As it turned out, we'd gotten the hardest climb out of the way and the rest of our ride was full of fabulous screaming downhills, zipping through the forest on nice, wide trails and plenty of lovely views accented with glimpses of the ocean through the trees. It was a fantastic ride and we were totally exhilarated as we finally emerged from the cover of trees and arrived back at the visitor's kiosk. Island Stewardship and a Wave Goodbye There was just a few minutes before the ferry arrived so we looked around at some of the interesting informational displays they'd set up to describe the island's history and explain the plans they had for the future. The island had gone through many changes through the years. It had been used as a fish salting plant, a shipyard, a sandstone quarry and even a luxury resort. However, today it is a protected marine park and set up for its traditional purpose—a medicinal healing destination and a place for First Nation people to come together for special events. We were very impressed that these gentle folk had returned this island to a better place and felt extremely glad for the opportunity to explore its beauty. When we saw the little ferry approaching in the distance, we waved to the friendly fellow there who was now talking to another couple and walked our bikes down the ramp to the dock. What a fantastic day it was--what a great adventure! We were so happy that we'd gotten the chance to visit. Today's Pictures The main image today shows the beautiful lake that we found on our hike—Mallard Lake—and I think you'll agree that it's pretty cool. I could have easily spent an entire day taking pictures here, and it's probably a good thing that I didn't have my macro lens with me or I'd still be there! Insets include lots of boats that we saw, a panorama of the forest, a view of the ocean through the trees, another picture of the pond, and a pretty feather that I noticed on the trail. I hope you like the show! :) Pam, this place really was so very magical. Everything about Saysutchun was special. The experience of visiting this place would have been so nice to share with you but I hope that my writing and pictures have captured the experience well enough that you can picture it for yourself! I hope all is well with you, it's been cold and wet here but otherwise very nice! *BIG HUGS from southern Oregon* :) Explored on 2/02/20; highest placement #10.

(+8 insets) (this pano is terrific at full size!) Trip Talk: The Problems of Structured Travel Have you ever been on a really, really long trip before? The longest I’d ever been away was a 28-day whirlwind tour of Europe when I was a mere 21 years old. Steve had been on a three-week trip before we met but this trip to Vancouver Island was to be six whole weeks when all was said and done. Even though we’d planned our accommodations and made possible itineraries for each destination, we hoped there would be ample time to relax and just absorb the surroundings wherever we went. We’d learned from our past trips that the acceptable minimum stay at each destination was four days, with five days being better. However, as it turned out, the very fact of having a finite amount of time took away our desire for carefree spontaneity. As well, we felt an obligation to do and see as much as we could at each place because in the backs of our minds we couldn’t help thinking that we may never see this place again. We didn’t want to “miss anything”. But isn’t that the opposite of what a vacation is supposed to be? What’s the point of rabidly running around an area to the point of exhaustion? Granted, Steve and I didn’t actually do that. We did our best to be reasonable and not put too much into each day. However, both of us still felt a level of disappointment whenever we moved on to the next leg of our journey. It was rare that we felt that we’d had enough time to experience a place as we’d wanted to. One day while we were on a gorgeous hike to a place called Marble Falls, we spent some time chatting about the trip so far. We both felt stifled and pushed along just when we were getting to know a place. We felt frustrated that we couldn’t just have a day to do nothing at all if we liked. Steve wanted to be able to just go out fishing for the whole day if he wanted. Or maybe just stay in the rig and take a day off by playing a computer game. Or whatever he felt like that wasn’t necessarily the best choice for the day. I was upset because taking any time at all to write about the trip felt too selfish so I just didn’t. As well, macro photography was something I did only a few times during the entire six weeks. I need to be creatively free without pressure so I can creep around and be “in the moment”. Because we had limited time at each spot, I couldn’t just relax and enjoy my creative pursuits. That made me very unhappy— I felt like I wasn’t allowed to express myself creatively and that’s not what I’d signed up for. We needed a different approach to allow us to feel satisfied by our experience of each place. In other words, we really need to go “Full-Time”. Instead of spending 4-5 days at a place, we need to spend an undefined amount of time that allows us to stay as long as we want until we’re ready to move on. That means we’ll need to sell our house. No surprise but we have all the more reason to work towards that goal. Ugh. Not a chapter I want to be part of but the end result will be freedom and enough coin to afford a bigger, better RV. Something for us to look forward to! ———— Today’s Pictures One of our campsite destinations was near a place called Port Alberni, located fairly close to the center of Vancouver Island. With so many fun activities available to us, we decided to try fishing at nearby Sproat Lake. Tempted by reports of excellent fishing, we soon made our way out to the large, four-armed lake by way of a relatively short hike. The hike turned out to be a lot longer than we anticipated and our fishing gear got heavier and heavier as we trekked along. However, we didn’t know how beautiful the trail would be and soon felt the misjudged time was well worth it to find this gem. We were surprised by a super cool suspension bridge, a little waterfall, and lush beautiful forest along the way. Eventually the trail spilled out onto the shore of Sproat Lake and the sight simply took our breaths away! Main Image: the view of Sproat Lake when we got to the end of Fossili Trail. Inset 1: Steve catches a branch! Fishing turned out to be a bust for us, but we loved being out there in such a pretty place. Steve did catch a small Sculpin, but they’re not good for eating unless you’re ocean fishing and get a really big one. Inset 2: Vertical panorama of the trail we walked on. What a lovely forest it was! Inset 3: Panorama of verdant Fossili Trail. So lush and green! Inset 4: Another vertical panorama of the trail, I just love the way these pictures look! Inset 5: The wonderful suspension bridge along the trail, we were so happy because we love these bridges so much. What’s funny is that I’m afraid of heights and suspension bridges bounce, sway, and move freely as you walk on them. Terrifying much? Um, yeah. But my love for the construction and appearance of these marvels supersedes my fears and I am able to force myself to cross them without freaking out! :) Inset 6: Where we parked the truck, I noticed a possible view if I scrambled over some boulders and fallen trees. With Steve urging me on, I approached the opening in the forest and I saw a huge meadow lined with timber. I really liked the way this row of tall, slender trees looks, standing guard over the vista. Inset 7: This is a panorama of the timber-lined meadow when I moved past the trees. Inset 8: On the way home I asked Steve to pull over so I could take this picture, which shows how beautiful the area around Port Alberni is! :) Pam, I think you would have loved this hike and the lovely time we spent out at the lake. Most of the forests we visited on Vancouver Island glowed vibrantly. They felt so welcoming and left us content and happy. Forests at home feel almost desperate from the heat and lack of water. What a difference. I expect that’s the same where you live too. Well, I do hope that you are having a good day! *BIG HUGS* Explored on 9/10/19; highest placement #6.

(+1 inset) (Once again, sorry for the length of this post--I'll be doing this whenever we are out in the RV. If you want to know about the picture, just scroll down to the bottom. :) ) It's Tuesday night right now and I'm about to go to sleep…Steve and I went on a bike ride after lunch that turned out to be quite exciting! We were entertaining the idea of riding around Lost Creek Lake, which is supposed to be about 20 miles. However, we weren't sure if that was a very wise idea, given that we've only just started to get ourselves back into shape and our last ride at home was only 8.5 miles. We thought we'd start off by riding on the bike path that led down to the camp marina, just a few miles away. Funny enough, the path we took actually led the wrong way and brought us right back to our campsite! We couldn't stop laughing as we turned around and tried again, this time choosing the correct turn that we'd missed. Through lovely woods and over narrow wooden bridges, we made our way down to the marina and stopped to look in their little store. It had the bare minimum of supplies, all at twice the price they should be--big surprise…not! :D The marina was small but fun to see and I got a few pictures while Steve relaxed outside the store. While I was taking pictures I discovered the paved but lumpy single-track path that went along the lake and soon we were bouncing along the trail and enjoying the adventure. However, we soon realized that there hadn't been any maintenance done this season and we found a few poison oak branches that we narrowly avoided. Even though the trail was there, it became more and more worrisome as we continued. Many downed trees across the trail required us to carry our bikes over them, more and more poison oak was in the pathway and finally we couldn't even avoid the leaves which brushed against our arms as we rode by. There were many places that I couldn't ride my bike over--roots and rocks in the path, unexpected steep spots, bridges that could not be ridden over, etc. Then we encountered a spot where erosion caused a tree to fall into the lake, taking most of the trail with it. We could walk our bikes past the missing trail but just barely. Beyond that, a very steep hill going down and around a curve…and that was enough of that. Our nerves were shot. We'd hoped for an easier ride and this was just too much. We both ended up with poison oak on us and when we got back we took turns taking showers and we're hoping that we successfully washed the urushiol oil off of our skin before it's been able to give us rashes. Time will tell…keep your fingers crossed for us! Dinner was delicious barbecued New York Steaks and more yummy garlic-and-herb-spiced asparagus and Portobello mushrooms sautéed in butter, but I added green onions this time…NOM! Desert was brownies we made before we left on our trip…so tasty! :) We relaxed for the rest of the evening--Steve in the hammock outside with Molly, me working on my pictures inside with Pumpkin…such a nice evening! Finally we watched a show and got Pumpkin settled in for the night before diving into bed ourselves. :) Goodnight all! :) --------- I'm so happy that I'm able to upload pictures…I was really worried about it because the signal is nearly non-existent here. Thank goodness Steve's phone signal is working! We are going to look into a signal booster for the future. It's really important to us that we can hook up to the net. For now, I'm just hoping that I'll be able to upload a couple of pictures each day! As I sit finishing up this post, I'm outside at the picnic table, listening to the birds and feeling a warm breeze dance through my hair. Steve is chilling in the hammock which he set up in a pair of nearby trees, Molly is relaxing in her outside pen and Pumpkin is chortling to her music inside while she enjoys the view outside through the blinds. What bliss. (Heh, a Red-Breasted Robin just ran across the site, under the hammock and over to some trees…lol) This morning Steve and I hopped on our bikes and did a repeat of the ride we took around the park on our first evening, which included a lovely 3-mile woodland bike trail. You can't beat a meandering trail complete with dappled light and a couple of narrow bridges to cross! We even surprised a fox along the way, such a beauty. The forests here are a mixture of deciduous (Maples and "leaf-shedding trees") and evergreens like pines and cedars. Because of our nearly non-existent internet connection, I'll only be posting one extra picture along with my main picture. Today's picture was one I took yesterday when we walked out to see a view of the lake. The tiny beach had this magnificent stump on one side which made a nice focal point. I am also including a really lovely picnic spot with a lovely Maple tree overlooking the meadow. I have lots of other pretty views of the camp ground but they'll have to wait! :) Pam, have you done any camping here in the US? We are coming to realize that this RV camping business suits us quite well, heh. It's one thing to read about its popularity and why people enjoy it so. It's another thing to live it. Yep. We love it. I hope that you have a good day…you'll be in my thoughts my dear! :) *BIG HUGS* Explored on 5/9/19; highest placement #5.

(+4 insets!) Sun shining into my cozy little nest woke me up at 6:30am this morning. Pulling out my earplugs, the world was filled with the songs of waking birds in the trees and geese in the distance. It was so fabulous! (see my first inset!) I went up front to snuggle with Steve for about 15 minutes--we both slept very comfortably and felt great! Then we got up to the sound of Pumpkin peeping happily at us. As for our showers, we discovered that if we put her into her plexiglass travel cage, it sits perfectly on the toilet seat while each of us showers…perfect! Pumpkin adores the sound of splashing water so this way she can be in the bathroom with us, whistling and carrying on like the silly girl she is. :) Because we'd done a "trial run" of staying in our RV on our property, there were absolutely no problems with taking showers and getting our day started…how awesome is that?! :) Once Steve had dressed, we set Pumpkin up in her cage and took Molly out on her leash and I took my Sony with me to get some early morning pictures. What a lovely day it was!! Wisps of clouds dotted the bright blue sky and the rippling water twinkled with sun shining on it…so pretty!! I walked out onto the floating dock down to the far end and sat down to soak up the atmosphere. The singing of the birds in the trees was so wonderful to hear. I could see the thick marsh not far off that was a din of birds making all variety of noises. It sounded like an over-booked convention and I looked forward to getting a closer look either today or tomorrow in a canoe. For now, I took pictures of a coot which was swimming around in the reeds, a pair of mallards and some too-far-away ducks I'd never seen before. Got a few pictures of grebes too. None of the birds were really close enough though. I'll cross my fingers for better pictures at some point during our stay. (my last inset shows where I sat!) (By the way, last night I got some really nice pictures of some Brewer's Blackbirds and I hope to get those processed and posted at some point. There is a flock that lives at the resort so getting pictures is a simple thing.) It was the perfect temperature to just sit and enjoy this amazing place…how fortunate we were to have this chance to stay at Upper Klamath Lake! What a pleasure. After enjoying the lovely solitude and beauty for a while, I made my way back to our home away from home and at noon we had a brunch of eggs and sausage with avocado on the side. YUM! Steve is now performing a bit of minor repair to Pumpkin's small hiking cage. We'll take her with us on a little walk along the shoreline while Molly guards the homestead. :) We won't go too far but it's sure to be great fun. :) We just got back from our walk! There was no trail along the shore…much too rocky…but there was a road which followed the lake and there are no cars so it was peaceful and beautiful. We wandered for about a mile or so and stopped at a pretty resort where we all enjoyed some snacks at a picnic table overlooking the lake and its little marina. Pumpkin had a lovely time with us and enjoyed the attention of some folks who came by, totally amazed that we took our parrot with us in a hiking cage! :) When we told them that she's been to Yosemite and loves Tuolomne Meadows and the famous Mist Trail they were properly impressed! :) Our girl's been around and she loves it! :) Well, the barbeque is heating up and we'll be having steak for dinner so it's time to close this report for now! :) My main picture is a view down one side of the RV park's dock with Steve at the end, hands behind his back, appreciating the view. I love this picture because it shows the amazing view of the lake, the dock, and Steve, who was largely responsible for making this dream come true for us. He is content and happy. Everything has worked out perfectly. We did it right. We took our time. This is our reward. How cool is that? :) I'm including a number of insets: PiP #1: My view as I peeked out the window of my "nest" this morning! (This image is poor quality but the view isn't! :D) PiP #2: A beautiful view just a few feet from our RV out onto the lake first thing this morning! PiP #3: A pretty view of the left-side dock with a framing of trees PiP #4: This is where I sat at the end of the dock this morning, drinking in the beauty and serenity of this place. Isn't it amazing? :) Pam, I am sending my happiest wishes your way! And thank you so much for your lovely comments about my trip so far! We're having a lovely time! *BIG HUGS* Explored on 4/24/19, highest placement, #1.

About a month ago, Steve and I went with our friend up to Cottage Grove and took our bikes on a 35 mile ride in the area. Most of the ride included views of this amazing reservoir! Isn't it just breathtaking?!!! From Wiki: Dorena Reservoir (also Dorena Lake) is a reservoir on the Row River in Lane County, Oregon, United States. It is located 6 miles (9.7 km) east of Cottage Grove. The Dorena Dam creating the reservoir was completed in 1949 as one of the thirteen dams of the United States Army Corps of Engineers in the Willamette Valley. In June 2012, the Corps of Engineers approved a project to begin producing hydroelectric power from the dam. Set at the south end of the Willamette Valley and criss-crossed by the coast fork of the Willamette River and the Row River the area was susceptible to periodic flooding from large snow melts in the surrounding mountains. In the 1940’s the United States Army Corps of Engineers began construction of dams which created the Cottage Grove Reservoir and Dorena Lake. Dorena Lake has become an enormously popular summer vacation destination with its Baker Bay Marina and camping and Shwartz Park campground. Visitor estimates top 80,000 people annually.

After hiking to the summit of Wizard Island and spending time enjoying the view, we all headed back down again to be in time for the afternoon boat. I watched this group of people having a good time sunning and swimming in the very cold but exhilarating water...if I'd brought a swimsuit, I'd have jumped in too! This image was taken during the MeetUp hike to Crater Lake: Wizard Island on August 18, 2011.

Mt. McCloughlin can be seen in the distance. This image was taken during the MeetUp hike around one side of Howard Prairie Lake on August 11, 2011.

This image shows the shore of Upper Klamath Lake from a canoe! A couple of months ago, Steve and I drove down to Klamath for fall colors shots, and we rented a canoe to visit the marshlands along the edge of the lake. I didn't have time to work on the pictures but they are next on my list after I'm done with my Clayfolk show. Here's one of them, and I hope you likeit!