A New Year...A New Blog

I have been thinking of starting a blog for sometime. I am not sure if anyone is interested in what I have to share, but, I hope a few of you will get some useful information out of this, maybe an occasional chuckle, and enjoy a few of my pictures.

Most of my excursions involve my children, ages 9 and 3, both girls. However, for the first weekend of the year, the kids were visiting grandma at the coast, so I was able to enjoy a child-free, peaceful day in the Columbia River Gorge, along with testing out my new tripod and play with a few techniques I have been trying to master.

Anyone that knows me knows I spend a lot of time in the CRG, in fact, my Twitter profile even lists this as my location. Which is not a stretch of the truth. I spend the majority of my free time there, especially in the summer months. (However, if we determine where we live by the amount of time spent there, then I live in a tiny cubicle, in an office tower, in downtown Portland, but I digress).

That being said, how else would I choose to ring in the new year. One could not have picked a better day. No crowds (I assume everyone was at home nursing hangovers, or just didn't want to brave the rain). A walk along Mirror Lake, watching the swans and listening to the Canadian Geese. Standing at the bottom of a waterfall, that is usually crowded, with not another soul in sight. Well, other than the man, because someone needs to carry the camera gear.

No concrete, no smells of car exhaust, the only sound is rushing water and the occasional bird in the trees around me. This is heaven .