New Blog

I have started a new blog on WordPress as it gives me more flexibility and I can now upload sound and video clips. All the content from this blog is on the new one. You can find me now by clicking here. See you there.

Venetian

The $1.5 billion Venetian Hotel. Absolutely mind boggling 5013 rooms! The Grand Canal Shoppes is an extensive 500,000-square-foot themed, indoor retail mall. The area features cobbled walkways, a reproduction of Venice's Grand Canal complete with real gondolas and a replica of St. Mark's Square. The Guggenheim Hermitage Museum, the 65000 square foot Canyon Ranch SpaClub, and 19 remarkable restaurants, all waiting to make your visit a great one. Seems a bit over the top to me. Even if you aren't staying there you must at least go see it.
[Panasonic LX3]

Grand Canal Shoppes -

Valley of Fire Moonrise

Another image made in Nevada's Valley of Fire recently. I had to quickly scramble over rocks to get to where I could line up the moon just how I wanted. It was only after getting back to the car that I remembered I'm not in Alberta anymore. Things like big spiders and scorpions could easily be hiding in those same rocks. So needless to say I was quite a bit more cautious from that point on.
[Canon 5dMKII, 24-105mmL ]

Rogers Spring

Rogers Spring is one of several natural springs that occur near Lake Mead in Nevada. It is a hot spring caused by geothermal activity deep within the ground at the base of the hills nearby. A small stream flows from the spring towards Lake Mead watering a few palm trees and undoubtedly some wildlife along the way.
[Canon 5dMKII, 24-105mmL]

Valley of Fire State Park

Looking back east towards the entrance of Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada, I remember the completely exhilarating and yet panicked feeling I had because it was all so beautiful and foreign to me. I had no idea what to expect and wanted to see it all. The problem was I had only maybe 20 minutes of sunlight left. Where does one pull over to make an image? Maybe if I was to just go around one more bend just ahead, maybe that's where the most spectacular part of the park is!! Maybe I'm already looking at the best part and should just stay put. It does get better than this image shows, in fact the further we drove into the park heading into the sunset, the more spectacular the scenery became! We headed up one of the roads in the park well after the sunset, where my exposures were getting into the 10 seconds at 500ISO range when the ranger put his lights on and told us the park closed at sunset and we would have to turn around. If you get anywhere close to Las Vegas and can afford the afternoon to take a short drive(1 hour each way), do stop in to see this place. It really is special!
[Canon 5dMkII, 24-105mmL]

MGM Grand Hotel

After returning home on Sunday from Las Vegas, I haven't had much time to process my images. This is one of the first few done. There is definitely no shortage of the "WOW" factor in that town! One's sense of scale is completely out of tune with your mind most of the time. Everything is done on a grand (pardon the pun) scale.
[Panasonic LX3]

Turdus migratorius - not!

We just returned from spending New Years with my brother's family in Calgary. I, of course, took a couple hours off from visiting to walk along the Bow River in Carburn Park. I cannot visit my brother and not go for a walk through this beautiful park which stretches for about a kilometer or so along the Bow River. You are virtually guaranteed to see a lot of wildlife, including deer, numerous species of ducks, Bald Eagles, and Canada Geese. You might even see an owl or porcupine if you look real hard. Well this afternoon I even saw two robins who, not living up to there scientific name, have decided to brave an Alberta winter! They let me approach quite close and you can see it's puffed itself up for insulation.
[Canon 5DmkII, 100-400mmL]