The creek is split in two until it reaches the high school. One arm of it flows from behind my house while the other flows from the train tracks about 1/2 a kilometre away. As you know I walk the section behind my house a lot but sometimes I venture to the other arm of the creek for a slightly longer walk. On the walk over to this second arm, someone has planted some gorgeous irises in their front yard.
English Iris
Walking down the creek path to the high school and over to the other arm I noticed this tree/bush covered in these starburst-shaped things. I believe these are the remnants of the flowers after the petals have fallen. Or maybe they are seed pods that have opened. I can’t seem to find anything to tell me what they are.
Starburst
Whatever they are, they are interesting enough to photograph, and sometimes that’s all that matters. As I explored a little further down the path I came across this snail slowly making his way up a very large leaf.
Snail on Leaf
Snails are so darn weird. Their eyeballs are at the end of what would be antennae on an insect. So odd and so very cool.
Our second day in Algonquin Provincial Park we decided to do the Mizzy Lake Trail. This trail is over 15km so we decided to spend our day on this trail which meant packing a lunch, water and some snacks to get us through the day.
Mizzy Lake Trail
We stopped at the Visitor’s Centre before starting our trek and noticed that there had been a couple moose sighting on Mizzy Lake trail. I was excited to see that and hoped we would be lucky enough to see at least one of these beautiful creatures.
As we hit the trail things were pretty good but soon we were inundated by bugs. Black flies and mosquitos has discovered us and although we had some sprays it wasn’t enough to get them to stop buzzing around us.
DragonFly Iris
I think I needed a swarm of dragonflies to hang out with me. I have never put as much repellent on as I did today. At the halfway point of the hike we stopped for a lunch break overlooking a forested valley below us.
The views are breathtaking (sorry no photo for this one as I was busy eating my sandwich and enjoying the view). I could have stayed there all day but it was time to move on. And I’m so glad we did because as we turned the corner there he was. A magnificent moose was half submerged chomping on some lily pads. I mean, come on, how lucky were we? He was not that far away from us and just come coming closer.
Hungry Moose
It was hard to move on after seeing the moose but we still had half the trail to hike so off we went leaving the moose to his lunch. When we got back to the hostel we planned out our evening and one of the things we decided to do was a night shoot. Although we had a bright moon we hoped we could get some good photos of the stars.
Smoke Lake
The spot we choose had a little shack hidden in the distant shoreline and I tried my best to get a shot of it but with the moon so close to it and the trees keeping it in shadow it was difficult to get a great shot of it.
Moonlit Shack
Maybe next time we visit we can plan for a moonless night and try this out again.
Tonight’s meeting with the Brampton Photo Group consisted of a slide show of member’s Black and White images along with a macro presentation. Afterwards we headed outside to do some evening macro shots. Here are two images I shot that evening.
Leaf Study
Purple Iris
I wanted to venture further around the bend but I started getting eaten by mosquitoes which soon put an end to the evening.
