Perfect Day, Part 1!

Yesterday we took a 15hr road trip (Rico drove the entire way - what a champ!), starting out at 3am and returning home around 6pm!  It was a long day but so worth it.  The first 2 1/2 hrs were pretty uneventful driving from Auburn to Portland.

Originally, I had 3 or 4 places picked out that I wanted us to stop at and explore.  We ended up with many more than that because a lot of the waterfalls along the Historic Columbia River Highway are visible from the highway pullouts - which makes it extremely easy to stop and see the sights.

{Left click on the photos for enlarged version}

We started off our day at the end of Larch Mountain Road, which leads to Sherrard Viewpoint.  We were kind of worried at first because on the drive up, it was super foggy and we couldn't see anything beyond the road.  Luckily halfway up, the sun started poking through and eventually at the top, as you can see, we didn't have any issues!

Sherrard Viewpoint boasts a view of 5 mountains.  Mt. St. Helens (left), Mt. Rainier (center) and Mt. Adams (right).

Mount Hood

Mt. Jefferson

Luckily, from the parking lot, there was only a 1/4 mile hike to this scenic viewpoint :) 

After that, the sun had burned off most of the fog so we were able to open the sunroof and cruise around with the windows open.  We discovered that we could usually tell when there was going to be a stop coming up because we could hear the waterfalls through the sunroof which was really cool.  We caught quite a few that weren't listed on the map by listening for them.

Crown Point Overlook Vista House - as you can tell, we couldn't see anything from here...the fog was still too heavy.

Latourell Falls

 Rico insisted on a Vanna White for this one, haha!

 This was one of falls we heard but wasn't on the map!

Sheppard's Dell was right off the road.  The trail led down from the road and right up next to the falls.  It was really cool and it had some great shots from under the bridge as well.

 Wahkeena Falls

 

 The above shots were from the off-the-road pull off.  But they have a little bridge at the top...I managed to talk Rico into coming up with me - it was only about 1/4 mile up so it wasn't too bad.

Multnomah Falls

One of the most talked about falls of the Columbia Gorge. This is one I insisted on seeing and I'm glad we got there early.  Lots of people were just starting to pull in as we were leaving, so we missed the crowds.  The sun coming through the trees created a really cool lighting effect though it was hard to catch...

 One of the other highlights of the trip was supposed to be the Fruit Loop in Hood River.  The Fruit Loop is a scenic route around the town which is situated in a valley bewteen Mt Hood & Mt. Adams, filled with fruit farms and wineries.  Little did we realize that most of the early blooming fruit had already been picked.  Rico humored me and still drove around and here's what we saw.

 We stopped at Hood River Lavender Farm to see if any of the lavender fields were in bloom but apparently they've been having the same bad weather we've been having and they're blooming season is still a few weeks off.  The manager graciously let us roam around her farm and take pictures.

 I picked him in the garden and decided to take him home!

Rain Rain Go Away...

It's almost mid June and it's still pouring outside...though the rain pattern seems to have a break in it for the next few days.  We're so going to take advantage of this!  I came across this website about scenic drives of Washington and have been itching to get out and see them.  Of course for the past few weekends, we've either been busy (Photowalk) or it was raining (rain does not make my pictures look good).  So tonight, we are taking off super late (or super early depending on how you look at it).  We'll be leaving around 3am to make it down to Portland then head over to the Columbia River Gorge in time for sunrise (morning light & sunset make great photo light opportunities).  It's about a 3 1/2 hr drive so we should arrive just in time.  With the weather outlook gorgeous (blue skies and around 75 degrees) I expect by the end of the day we'll be swamped with people out and about, taking advantage of the nice weekend (another reason to start out early).

The other things I want to go see are:
Rattlesnake Ridge (which has an amazing view despite the horrible name!)

Cape Horn Loop

Coulee Corridor
So if I can recruit some of my photo buddies (hint hint!) to go with me, these should all be fun day trips!

Today at work, they recruited us to help serve brunch to the high school seniors (my hand is sore from scooping out so many eggs, it's hard to type!).  They look so young to be graduating from high school (way to make me feel old!!).  But then again, there are some of them that are way too mature looking to be high school seniors!  That reminds me though, they officially set the date of my 10 year high school reunion for October 15, 2011.  I haven't completely decided if I want to attend yet...but it'll probably depend on where we're at at that time, too.

Confession: I fell off the wagon...the exercise wagon that is.  I haven't been to gym since Sunday (and I feel guilty every night when I'm cozy on the couch and going to bed on time to get a good nights sleep - but obviously not guilty enough to go to the gym this week!).  But I do plan to go tonight and Sunday (Saturday might be out because of our day trip).  But good news...I'm down to the last notch in my most favorite and warn belt and my comfy, tight jeans are now almost too loose!  Though the scale isn't showing much change, my clothes definitely are :)

Paparazzi For A Day (I Heart Faces Photowalk)

Yesterday was the the 1st Annual I Heart Faces Photowalk and I am so glad we participated.  Amanda, Erika, Rebecca and I loaded up our equipment and headed up to Seattle at 7:30 in the morning, leaving ourselves enough time to find time to find parking spots for two cars (one at the end of the route and one at the beginning).  Turns out we were incredibly smart for leaving an hour and half early for a half hour drive.    Lets just say the four of us definitely don't know Seattle like the back of our hand!  But we did make it to our meeting spot on time, after a few U turns (my specialty).

After a week of rain, we were pleasantly surprised to get gorgeous blue skies and no rain in sight.  We were prepared to carry umbrellas around all day (to protect the cameras) but that would have been uncomfortable and awkward!

We had 3 models, rotating between the groups as we walked around downtown.  Imagine 5-10 people surrounding one woman who is posing.  It honestly felt like we were paparazzi!  We had people come up to us asking what was going on a lot.  Some of the girls started having fun with it and said we were shooting scenes for a movie, haha!

It was a win-win situation.  The models get free photos to build their portfolios and we get free experience with our camera and photos to build our portfolio if we so desire.

{Left Click on photos to see full size}

Katie Heart

Li Leung

Simone Grant

If I could change one thing about yesterday it would have been the time we started and how long we were able to shoot.  The sun is up around 6am these days so to get great light, I think we should have started around then instead of 9am.  And according to the national rules, we were only allowed to shoot from 9-11am so it didn't give us a lot of time for setting up tripods and such (I didn't use mine at all - though I did carry it around the time.)

Since portrait photography isn't my forte, I also shot some stuff around the girls.  

 This is a non-photoshoped photo...the clouds reflected perfectly off the glass building.

At the end of the walk, we all went to the Old Spaghetti Factory for lunch ...mmm!  Since we were in Seattle anyway, Amanda took us over to one of the other well known sights ...The Troll under the Fremont Bridge.  Meet The Troll:

 Pretty, ain't he??

I completely stole the idea of the under the bridge shot from Amanda - Thanks Mandy!!

A borrowing concept...

http://www.borrowlenses.com/category/nikon

I've been perusing multiple photography blogs and came across something a little different.  Apparently there is a whole market out there devoted to renting lenses.  So you can rent lenses (or bodies or just about anything else) to try them out for a trip or to test drive them before you buy brand new.  I thought this was kind of cool since I don't know many people with my camera and definitely not a lot that would loan out their camera equipment!

Craigslist Love

This past weekend, I finally did what I said I was going to do.  

About this time last year, Rico and I cleaned out the garage, threw out a lot of stuff and reorganized it so we could actually walk in there.  I also made a pile of my wedding decor that we had saved and was still usable.  Well this weekend was gorgeous (the gray rainy Seattle weather is back in full force this week though) so I got the camera out and started photographing/inventorying what we had stockpiled from the wedding.  I then posted it on Craigslist to see if we'd get any bites.  And sure enough, we were able to sell our first box of foam Plumerias on Sunday (to a lovely girl who is getting married in a Florida destination wedding).  I'm loving the whole Craigslist thing!

We have one more box of margarita candles that we didn't even put out because I forgot to in the rush of the reception day.  What a waste there!

We're keeping the lanterns that we got for super cheap at Bed Bath & Beyond on clearance.  When we bought them, we knew we wanted to save them for our future house - they'll look great on a deck or in the garden/backyard.

Other than that, Rico is swamped right now with homework (finals are coming up so apparently they are trying to cram everything in at the end of the quarter).  But despite that, he's lost 8lbs on his Biggest Loser diet.  Tonight we're having dinner over at Billy & Nakita's (with their adorable son Aiden).  I have no idea what we're having but it probably won't be healthy.  I guess I'll just have to do the best I can and try to implement the whole portion control thing...wish me luck!