Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Vancouver Island – Summer 1992

With another cold chill to the air today – to remind us that it’s still winter – I decided to dig thro’ some old hiking photos to make us all feel a little warmer.


Ahhhh! Summer! With a T-shirt and a blue sky… There, I’m feeling a little bit warmer already.

A few weeks before this photo was taken in the mountains of British Columbia, I had graduated from a Toronto college, sold almost everything I owned and bought the camping gear that I would live in for the next few months. I went wandering…


It’s a little hard to notice, but the T-shirt that I’m wearing in the above photo is from a restaurant in East Lansing, Michigan called “Bilbo’s” – inspired by J.R.R. Tolkiens novels. Menu items included the Tom Bombadil Sandwich and Ent-chiladas! This photo always reminds me of what a landscape might look like in the Shire. I’ve always called this photo ‘My Hobbit Trail’.


It took many hours to meander alongside a mountain trail to reach it’s upper plateaus, and the distant vistas made it all worth while.


This was the area where I saw my first-ever Bald Headed Eagle. I knew that any attempt at taking a photograph would prove unflattering (who wants to see a dot in the sky) so I simple soaked in the scene with my mind and imagined what the eagle might be looking for as it was whisked away by the breeze.


Throughout this mountainous region there is so much to see. I’m sure that I could have taken the same trail, day after day, for my entire life and still see something new, every time! Occasionally I would stray off of the path to investigate sounds that I would hear in the forest. This photo is of one of my discoveries. I was walking over a small bridge that crossed a calm stream, yet I could hear the sound of falling water. Just a small distance away this waterfall was hiding.


It’s hard to say which I like better: 1) The view from the top of a mountain or 2) The view from the bottom. LOL!


This is the one-and-a-half man tent that has spent many nights under the stars.


This is the same lake as the above photo and this lake is on the top of a mountain. You can tell because there are no mountains to be seen at all – just clear blue skies for miles and miles…

I hope that you’re feeling a little warmer, now, too!!!!

Jim

No comments: