At the River

Yesterday was a sunny afternoon, so I stopped by the Chena River near downtown.  This section of the river is downriver from the power plant which discharges warm water back into the river, giving us open water along this stretch of the river all winter long.  Everywhere else the river ice is still thick and won't go out until sometime in April.  The ducks you see in the photos are among those who elected to spend the winter here--either very stupid or very smart to conserve all that energy by not flying south.  They manage to survive the winter because a gentleman in town dumps grain at the river's edge every day for them.  He waits until it's too late for them to begin migrating south before he begins feeding.  I'm sure the ducks will be as happy to see the snow melt as I will!

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I'm linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.

Vermont in the Fall

I'm adding a little color to a snowy winter by going back to our roadtrip in October 2011.  The photos below were taken on October 11th in West Bennington, Vermont.  The River is the Walloomsac River.

The Henry Covered Bridge crosses the river and is 127 feet long and built with a town lattice truss.  It was built around 1840 and rebuilt in 1989.  Unfortunately the contractor replaced all the old Vermont spruce and oak wood with southern pine and ash.  Nonetheless, it's still a beautiful bridge.

Of course, with such a picturesque scene I had to play just a little.

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I'm linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.

Icy Waterfalls

 We're back today along the Seward Highway on Turnagain Arm outside of Anchorage.  As you travel along the road, on the one side you see the beautiful mountains and the water in front of the mountains.  Click HERE and HERE to see my previous two posts on the Seward Highway.

On the other side are mountains too, and all along the road you see waterfalls.  They were mostly still frozen, but some were a combination of ice and water.

Gold miners arrived in the 1890s and small settlements and trails were established along Turnagain Arm.  In 1918 the railroad was completed, and the road was finally complete in 1951.  The Seward Highway is one of the most scenic in the country but can also be dangerous.  Winter driving conditions can be hazardous and it is prone to avalanches.  Summer brings many tourists and there are numerous turnouts, but you still need to be on the lookout for those people looking for the perfect photo!

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I'm linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.

Patterns in the Water

Last week I posted photos I took along the Seward Highway of Turnagain Arm.  Click HERE to see those photos.  The mountains dominated the scene in those photos.

So today I thought I would bring our vision down a bit and look closer at the water.  The sun was shining brightly and the tide was coming in, carrying chunks of ice and other debris.

When there is spectacular scenery around you it's easy to overlook the quiet beauty closer at hand.

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I'm linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.

Mountain Reflections

The Kenai Mountains are reflected in the waters of Turnagain Arm of Cook Inlet along the Seward Highway near Anchorage, Alaska. 

I am linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.

Autumn Reflections

These shots were taken the same day as the last post while we were in the Hudson River Valley in New York on October 25th, 2011.  These are of the lake at Olana, the home of Frederic Edwin Church, one of the Hudson River School artists.

 

 

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I'm linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.

Fountain Color

On October 30, 2011, we visited Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania.  It was the day after an early snowfall, so you can glimpse remnants of the snow.  Not all the fountains were operational, but the Open Air Theatre Fountains were dancing to music. 

Moving in a little closer.....

.....and adding some ink outlines.

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I'm linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.

Icy Water

Two weeks ago we took a short road trip north of Fairbanks to Eagle Summit.  When you take the Steese Highway north out of Fairbanks for eight miles, you come to a three-way intersection.  Turn left and you are in Fox, go straight ahead and you are on the Elliott Highway north, which connects to the Dalton Highway, probably better know as the North Slope Haul Road, at Livengood.  The Dalton goes all the way to Deadhorse and the Prudhoe Bay oil fields.  Because we were hoping to catch sight of the migrating Forty Mile caribou herd, we turned right, going northeast on the Steese Highway.  We did see quite a few caribou, but unfortunately we did not see the huge numbers that had been reported a few days earlier.  The light wasn't the greatest for photos.  Even though these photos were all taken between noon and 1:30, the sun didn't come up over the mountains. 

The road follows the Chatanika River for a ways, and there are many creeks near the road.  The area has a large number of hot springs, and even on a cold winter's day there is open water along the road.  The highway crews have to keep a close watch because if conditions are right it can flow over the roadway, making it impassible.  The header and the photo below show a view of the terrain along the road.  If you enlarge the photo you will get a glimpse of some of the caribou we saw.  The road goes up and down to the highest point at Eagle Summit, which is where we turned around.  If you continue on, the road travels to Circle and the Yukon River.  Circle was founded in 1893, and the whole area was mined extensively during the gold rush, and there are still a large number of operating gold mines.

The two photos above were drive-bys through the window, but we stopped for the next three shots.

I added ink outlines to the last photo to bring out some of the details.

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I'm linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.

Peaceful Waterfall

I'm still escaping from the winter snow scene out my window. I took this photo back in October in the Japanese Garden at the Butchart Gardens in Victoria, British Columbia.  If I sit quietly and listen really hard perhaps I'll hear the gentle splashing of the water.....

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I'm linking up with Tricia's Watery Wednesday II.