06.12.08

Back in IL… but dreaming of snow.

Posted in photo, travel, vacation, yellowstone at 11:41 am by heidihoho7

Well it’s official, i’m back in good ole Illinois. Its been a crazy week, not to mention the 3500 images i’m trying to edit in between side jobs and social gatherings (i’m about half way through my full edit). I’ll be posting a full gallery in a few days somewhere else, but until then i’d thought i’d put up a few more pics of a few things i missed, last day shots, and a few fun people shots to show what it was really like as well…

Overall it was one of the best workshops i’d been to in years, so i’d suggest this Yellowstone photo tour to anyone! It sounds like we saw more animals than most visitors and i credit our guide Dale for that, he has a huge network in the park. Even with all the snow which limited some of our locations we still saw numerous animals, many with babies. Dale also knows A LOT about photographing wildlife and was a huge resource each day. He also made sure we didn’t get too close to the wildlife – when you have your face stuck to the camera and big mama lens you can sometimes forget how close or how far the wildlife really is, and made sure we got out of bed so we could catch many of these animals as well.

I’d also like to say that i had such a great time with my “photo gals”. It may be hard to understand for some but I rarely get into “real photo mode” which really allows me to focus on photography, talk geeky camera talk, and really think about what i’m doing. Most of the time i click the shutter and run off to the next location or subject, with these gals (and guys) we are really able to work each location – even if it happens to be the van in a rainstorm We share lenses and ideas and it really becomes such a creative week for all of us. And a thanks to Art for putting up with the giggling and quick van stops. And I can’t forget Chuck, my nurse the first night. Our evening debriefings with him were the perfect endings to each day.

People pics courtesy of Kay Beaton and Barb Edelblute!

Here are a few more shots that i liked… a few of these from a super rainy day (sheep) and the others were last day or so when i actually decided to get up in stead of sleeping in (can you imagine!?). Enjoy…

We had an amazing round of rainbows, culminating with a huge double rainbow as we were leaving the park, just in time to get the arch with the rainbow

Our last sighting was of this coyote, both on her way to the hunt and no the way back with her catch!

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06.06.08

Peeing coyotes are my forte…

Posted in photo, travel, vacation, yellowstone at 4:33 pm by heidihoho7

So our photo tour is coming to a close, and i’m not sure that i’m ready to head home yet. i miss my bela and kitties but this park is just so beautiful. You just never know what you are going to see each day. Yesterday was a great day, we ended up having 3 different coyote sightings! and oddly 2 of those times i got photos of the coyote peeing, what’s up with that? We again got great photos of Rosie and the cubs as well as many other animals- moose, bison, pronghorn….

I forgot to add links earlier, so if you want to check out Dale’s tours go to Franz Foto. My friend kay has posted some pics as well, and oddly they are always way different than mine! She has some fun ones of me with my “big mama” lens… Take a look at Kay’s blog.

We’ve heard some funny things on this trip and i thought i’d share one of them… “would you like a camera with that lens?” which is too true considering how many wildlife photographers there are in the park, just about everyone has the big daddy with them.

Ok on to the photos!

We started the morning off with a moose & baby sighting, we’d already seen her before but they were in a better spot this time and i got some that i really liked. The other is of a silly Pronghorn Antelope in Lamar Valley – i did get a “serious” shot as well but i loved his face in this one!

Rustic falls, aka Bridalveil (as there is always a bridalveil) was quite pretty, and i was the only one who went to check out the terraces from Mammoth Hot Springs

Artist point is a spot i really wanted to hit as my “Grammy” had taken a picture there of Lower Falls many years ago on her visit to the park. I think my picture is very similar and i thought of her while i was there A big group of bison

A cool rainbow in Lamar Valley (AKA La-Far haha) as well as Rosie and her cubs and the multiple coyotes we saw throughout the day.

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06.05.08

Steamy and burned… and a wolf!

Posted in photo, travel, vacation, yellowstone at 12:07 am by heidihoho7

So its been a few days since i’ve added an update, and its been a crazy few days! Normally we wake up quite early and spend anywhere from 6-10 hours out in the morning, followed by a siesta in the afternoon. I’ve been able to check email or take a much needed nap during those times. Followed by another few hours out in the evenings.

Today was a bit different! We ended up driving south towards Old Faithful which is over 50 miles from gardiner where we are staying each night. Now that doesn’t sound far but when you are going 30-45 mph most of the time and then factor in the wonderful tourists who turn into idiots at the sight of a bear and it gets much much slower. So as we worked our way south we kept finding wonderful things to photograph (more details below). Before we knew it, it was noon so we decided to stay in the area for lunch and make it a long day with an early return. Well we always claim we’ll get done early, but as always we keep seeing things to stop for. It ended up being a 13 hour day and i’m super tired! Both me and my roomie Kay are now in bed at 9:00, with a “late” wakeup time of 6am, we’re so happy!

Ok on to more details! So to start from the last update, since then we’ve seen a few different moose, 2 with babies. One is a very sad story (the baby got mangled by a bison and they fear it has a broken back. we did see it moving but it looked pretty shaky). We have seen so many black bear, i think we saw about 8 just yesterday! We had fun shooting a bear from the van and then camping out to view “Rosie” and her 2 cubs. We also saw a few different sets of rocky mountain bighorn sheep, most with babies and oh they were so adorable!! They run along the cliffs like they are on a playground. We spotted a group late one afternoon on a cliff that has a dropoff of about 1,000 ft. Flowers are just starting to bloom so we stopped to enjoy the color. We’ve grabbed a few waterfall shots as well.

This morning started out a set of coyotes running right in front of the van! No chance to take photos but a great start to the day. Not long after we spotted a bull Elk walking through a meadow with a stream and steam behind him, a beautiful sight! Much of the morning was spent taking photos of bison with their calves.

We stopped for a bathroom break not far down the road from the bison. A few cars pulled in all excited about something. We quickly found out that a wolf was running along the river. We all dropped what we were doing and grabbed our cameras and ran to the riverside just in time to see the wolf cruising along. He came and went quick, although the cars following him were still around for a long while causing quite the traffic jam. You can see the van how we left it! We also found an elk and a baby just down the river as well

We then continued on to the thermal features – we visited some cone geysers and some spring pools that have that amazing color range. It was a bit windy and pretty chilly so there was a lot of steam. And apparently a lot of sun, silly me i forgot to put on my sunscreen! So now i’m burnt like toast!!

We spent a lot of time exploring the different thermal features and made our way to Old Faithful. Now i have to admit that i had high expectations. I really thought it was going to be a high geyser, but it left me a bit disappointed. Oddly i felt that the lodge was more worth the visit. It is an amazing log building with a huge lobby that is 4 stories tall and wide open in the center. We treated ourselves to some ice cream and decided to head home as we were getting super tired. We of course got sidetracked by a few more thermals but eventually made our way home. Ok with 1 more bear stop.