Category Archives: Travel Blogs

The Mendenhall Glacier

September 21, 2013 Troy 1 Comment

When traveling to Alaska one of the sights on most people list is to see glaciers. Juneau provides the opportunity to see a glacier up close. There is s short trail which will take you relatively close to it. For an even closer view, using a kayak will allow you to explore this beautiful ice sculpture even closer. Our adventure took us over the Nugget Falls Trail. As you near the glacier, the sound of rushing water overwhelms the air. The trail begins to clear and there is the impressive Nugget Falls pounding its way into the bay.

This rushing water appears as though it is coming right out of the mountain because the river above the falls is hidden by the landscape. Once this sight has been absorbed you continue looking over the rest of the scenery and almost take a step back after spotting the Mendenhall Glacier. Seeing the icebergs that have fallen off and are floating nearby, the size of the glacier, colors that you’ve been expecting to see but still are unprepared for, and the texture of that blue ice created from melting waters. To think about all of the stone this glacier has eroded away under its massive size and realize all it takes to destroy this moving sheet of ice is a steady flow of water carving away every hour for days and weeks, even months. What a spectacle of natural forces at work.

As the clouds move so do the colors and peaks created in the glacier providing a different view. The urge to swim to the glacier become stronger. Just to walk on it and touch. No, these waters are to cold and there is no good way around the water fall or over the mountains to touch the ice created hundreds of years ago. You have to settle for the view. A very memorable view. Once you’ve taken in the glacier there is more to explore here. In August salmon begin running up stream to spawn. This brings other wildlife as well such as eagles and bears looking for an easy snack.

Unfortunately we didn’t see either along the stream. It was still a beautiful sight and entertaining to watch as the salmon make their way upstream. There was plenty of evidence that bears had been here – fish skeletons along the side of the steam and pathways from frequent use along the shore. Timing just wasn’t right. Plenty to explore at Mendenhall.

Alaskan Adventure, Troy's Blog

Images From Alaska

September 15, 2013 Troy 6 Comments

Not exactly what you had in mind? While I like these pictures and they were all taken in Alaska I’m just showing my sad sense of humor. Well, mostly. The other issue is how to choose only a few pictures from the many we have. Here’s some other images:

Hopefully these are more of what you wanted to see. There will be more in the coming weeks as I continue to go through the many photos.

Alaskan Adventure, Troy's Blog

Anticipating Alaska

September 8, 2013 Troy 6 Comments

An Alaskan adventure was one of the most anticipated trips on our board once we decided it was time to explore the National Parks Monopoly Board. Anytime someone asked where we were headed this year and found out it was Alaska there were nothing but positive remarks. Either they had been there and would like to go back or would love to go there. We were amazed how many people have traveled to Alaska, usually on a ship. With so many positive comments how could one not be excited to go? Was it possible to have too high of expectations and be disappointed that Alaska didn’t live up to them?

After a few days of exploring Olympic National Park and touring Seattle, the time had arrived to board the ship towards this highly anticipated destination. We were fortunate to share this experience with a number of friends and family who decided to join us for their first cruise making it even more memorable. For the first time our ship left the dock before our 4 o’clock departure time catching us off guard as I usually like to be out on a deck as we set sail. Hmm… maybe I had better pay closer attention to time on this trip. There’s a history of me getting on board at one of our stops right before we sail. In fact, I’ve been the last one getting on the ship before. I could very well miss this ship if I try to do that this time. Noted!

Seattle faded into the horizon and two other ships were in tow as we left Puget Sound bringing rougher seas and more ship motion. A little time settling into our state rooms and then dinner. Completing dinner there was little to see outside as darkness had fallen bringing eagerness for the next days views as we enter Alaskan waters. Juneau, Skagway, Glacier Bay, Ketchikan, and Victoria oh my.

Morning light began shining in the window. A quick look out of the window showed why the ship seemed to be rocking so much – 15 –20 foot swells along with clouds and fog making the shore difficult to see. From time to time the mountain ranges would appear however nothing more impressive than we had been accustom to seeing over the last couple of days. As the day at sea wore on, the clouds and fog continually increased reducing visibility considerably. The cold and wind made taking a stroll outside unenjoyably. Being restricted to the inside of the ship there wasn’t much to do that day but eat. Guess we were in the right place for that. From time to time the shore would reveal slightly taller mountains exciting those who saw it as these indicated what might be ahead.

Day two brought calmer waters as the ship was now sheltered on both sides by mountains and clearer views of shore. Snow was beginning to show up near the peaks on mountains proving the journey further north. If it wasn’t for the snow and cold it would be difficult to know if you were in Alaska or Hawaii as the shape of the mountains looked very similar. As the day entered noon the first glaciers began appearing however the picturesque landscapes were only partially visible due to the low hanging clouds. Still they were beautiful to see. What amazing color these glaciers have even under this dreary sky. At this point I was a little disappointed because this type of weather was in the last forecast I looked at for most of our Alaskan Adventure. That meant peering at these vistas from inside the ship and not being able to see them in all their grandeur. O.K. it was too early to let this dictate my attitude for the rest of the trip. There was still much to see and do.

On to Juneau!

Gaining Life Experience, Troy's Blog

Making the Most of 1 Day

August 24, 2013 Troy 3 Comments

Do you ever have a day that starts early and is jam packed with fun things to do all day and ends late? They don’t come around very often it seems but when they do you can look back on it and know you made the most of each hour given to you on that day. That’s how our day going out to Washington was. We knew it was going to be a full day but not quite sure how long.

Our morning began at 3 AM which was just a few minutes before the alarm would be blaring at us to wake up. Instead of waiting to be assaulted by a noisy little box we got up, turned it off and began the days journey excited for the adventure ahead. Less than an hour later the car was packed and headed to join a few family members on our way to the airport. By 6 AM more family members met us at the airport and we were grabbing a quick breakfast while waiting to board the airplane taking us to Seattle, where this vacation would begin. Shortly after 10 AM beautiful mountain vistas began appearing outside of the airplane windows and before we knew it the popular Mt. Rainier was below us with Seattle just ahead.

Quickly disembarking, well as quickly as several hundred people can get off an airplane, it was off to get luggage and take the light rail downtown where the cars were. Once everybody was safely secured in their respective automobiles it was already time for lunch. Wow this day seems to be moving quickly! With lunch in the rear view mirror it was off to Sequim to spend the night just outside of Olympic National Park. The route took us into Tacoma and around Puget Sound before heading towards Sequim. It took about three hours to drive from Seattle to Sequim getting us there just after 6 PM.

At this point much of the group just wanted to get dinner and relax from a long day of travels. Admittedly I was tired but adrenaline pushed a small contingent to begin exploring Olympic National Park. A few minutes to grab the camera and a bottle of water before settling back into the car for a 45 minute drive to the nearest visitor center while grabbing a bite to eat on the run. We arrived at the visitor center just as they were closing but decided to finish our meal on one of the nearby picnic tables and enjoy the evening and the surroundings before heading up the mountain the Hurricane Ridge.

As soon as the car doors opened at the Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center a fawn and mother black tailed deer were there to great us. Most likely looking for scraps from the numerous visitors there early that day. Seeing wildlife really enhances a visit to any national park making the experience feel more fulfilling. The evening was upon us and the sun was heading for the horizon so any exploring needed to be completed soon. Hiking a nearby trail, a spot was found to gaze into the horizon as the sun marched towards it, spreading it’s amazing colors throughout the sky. I couldn’t think of a better place to be during the remaining few hours of this day.

Darkness continued to creep closer and closer to us but not to worry. First of all, we were fairly close to the car and secondly we had flashlights this time, not like in Acadia National Park. Having been practicing night photography I thought this would be a great opportunity to capture a gorgeous night sky so off to a nearby picnic area to setup the camera before it was too dark. Just as the stars were beginning to peek out a bright light appeared on the horizon. It must have been a full moon. The mountainous landscape lit up all around us. Well, photos full of stars and possibly the Milky Way were out of the question. Obviously I did not do my homework on the timing and phases of the moon this night. What do you do when handed lemons? Take pictures of the moonscapes I guess.

Spending the next hour taking photos it was time to call it a day. While the camera was shooting away at the night sky I realized a day like this when you take advantage of every minute of breath makes many other days mundane by comparison. The question of how to take advantage of every breath most days arises instead of falling victim to the daily routine we get so use to that we almost lose the appreciation of the day. Arriving back at the hotel it was after 1 AM – 22 hours after the day began. With a smile I quickly drifted off to sleep excited to continue our adventure the next day.

Life Experience Gained: Mountain landscapes from an airplane, The Seattle landscape, lightrail, downtown Seattle, Puget Sound, Olympic National Park, and most importantly the first time I conscientiously realized how much I enjoyed this day and all we did.

Photography Experiment, Troy's Blog

Help Stop Photo Blur

August 18, 2013 Troy 1 Comment

Frequently enough photos are blurry. I decided to check the settings some of these pictures and see how many of my blurry photos violate Peter Carey’s rule for sharper images which you can read about here. The image above has a focal length of 55mm and exposure time of 15 seconds. Yes, the camera was on a tripod as I was taking night photographs trying to capture the thousands of fireflies flashing about. Unfortunately this was in a city and there just was too much light for effective lightning bug pictures. According to the rule of thumb, the exposure time should have been 1/55 second or faster. if the camera was handheld. In this instance the camera was probably bumped.

Another case where the shutter speed is too slow for the focal length. This was taken at 21mm focal length and 1/2 second exposure time. It should have been at 1/21 second or faster in order to produce a sharper image. Taken again in the evening with the light going away quickly so the camera was compensating for the reduced light.

The above image was taken with a focal length of 21mm however the shutter speed was 1/30 of a second producing a sharper image. Another one of those details to improve my photographs.

Photos, Troy's Blog

By the Fire

August 12, 2013 Troy

What does this photograph say to you?

For me, it’s a reminder of camping, enjoying the lightning bugs and a sky full of stars while relaxing by the fire and enjoying casual conversations.

Travel Preparations, Troy's Blog

Only a Short Time to Take it all in….part II

August 3, 2013 Troy

Now that the airfare is confirmed it’s time to reserve hotels right? Not quite yet. At least that is not my order of planning. My next step is to spend a little time researching what sights I want to see and activities I may want to do. This allows me to find hotels closer to the places I want to spend time at helping eliminate transportation time and possibly costs. Also, if there is something that you want to accomplish while in your place of destination but require reservations in order to assure you get to do it such as a Red Sox game at Fenway or watch the Celtics in the TD Garden you have a little head start on others giving you a better chance to do that activity. In our case it was eating at the Union Oyster House. We probably could have made it in there without the reservations but we may have had to wait and spend more time to get in taking away from other sights.

Since Boston is such a historic city we definitely wanted to visit it’s past. A very quick web search brought up the Freedom Trail which included most of the places we wanted to see. Looking over each sight on the Freedom Trail we prioritized the list because there are so many stops on the trail and there wasn’t enough time to really see all of them and have time to do other things. One of my other high priority stops was the Bull & Finch pub used as the basis for the hit comedy Cheers. Now that I know what sights we wanted to see I searched for hotels closer to those destinations and figured out modes of transportation while in Boston. Boston has a pretty good train network allowing you to get around to many of the key places. Also, take it from me, driving in downtown Boston is quite stressful due to the traffic and narrow streets.

*Money Saving Tip: Many hotels will give you a reduced rate if you book them online and pay for them in advance. This can save up to 20% if you know that is where you will be staying. Be warned, once you pay in advance there is no canceling these reservations.

For us, we chose to stay in one hotel for a couple of days and on our last night move to a different hotel which provided a shuttle to the airport the next morning. Taking some time to plan what we wanted to do in Boston allowed us to see what we wanted and do what we wanted. Each hour was not planned but just a general idea of things to do that day. The exception was dinner reservations which had a finite time. Knowing your goals ahead of the adventure can help fulfill your needs for your vacation which does require a little bit of research and planning.

To Read further on exploring Boston check out these pages:

Visiting Cheers

The Freedom Trail

Travel Preparations, Troy's Blog

Only a Short Time to Take it All in?

July 28, 2013 Troy

Finally, our vacation has arrived. Better hurry and pack because the flight is early tomorrow and we need to get going in order to avoid missing the plane. Once you’ve arrived at your destination it’s time to find a hotel and check before deciding which sights to see. It seems that the fast pace at which our lives move, the trips we take have become shorter. How can you take in all of the sights with very little time? With only a few days to relax and see the sights a little planning will help.

It took a little time to make to flight arrangements or a driving plan to arrive at your destination. Doesn’t it make sense to spend a little bit of time to figure out what you want to do and where you want to stay once you’ve arrived at that destination? I understand that it’s no vacation if you have every hour of each day planned. That is not what I’m writing about here. Let me go through an example of planning our adventure to Boston.

Our very first objective was to look over transportation cost to Boston. Since we were leaving from Minnesota and time was a factor flying was determined to be our best choice of getting to Boston. After figuring out we would be flying, it was time to pick the dates.

*Money saving tip: flying on a Tuesday or Wednesday can save a significant amount of money. Often times we save enough money to stay an extra night in a hotel and then some.

I use sites like Expedia and Kayak to find which airlines and which dates are the most affordable. Sometimes I will go directly to the airlines website if I’m trying to use rewards to help reduce our overall flight costs. If you fly frequently enough, signing up for rewards programs either through credit cards and/or the airlines can really help keep costs down especially in these times of higher airfares. Yes, it does require some extra time to sign up for and earn these rewards as well as use these rewards but it can be worth it.

Let me provide and example: on our trip to Boston in 2011 we were able to get 4 airfares from Minneapolis for $500. Without our rewards programs it would have cost us almost $400 per airfare for a total of $1600. That’s over a $1,000 in savings! This required us to use 2 different rewards programs which can be a little tricky when booking the flights if you want to get everybody on the same flight. You need to first check each program and which flights are available through each to find which one match and then go through and book them selecting seats next to each other. This is some of the extra time required to use these programs. For those that are saying sure you could do that in 2011 but costs have gone up since then, We recently booked 4 fares from Minneapolis to Seattle for $500 this summer so it’s still possible.

To Continue Reading for more tips click here….

Photography Experiment, Troy's Blog

JPEG and RAW

July 21, 2013 Troy

Whenever possible I shoot in both RAW and JPEG. This has a couple of advantages for me. First, I can immediately view JPEG on a laptop or tablet to make sure the camera settings are what I’m looking for and to view the images I just took a little faster than bringing up the RAW images. I use the RAW images when I want to edit a photo. Is this necessary? That’s what I wanted to find out by taking a RAW image and a JPEG image of the same shot and see how much of a difference there was in editing it.

The photo above is the original picture as shot by the camera. It’s a little over exposed as I was using a slower shutter speed in an effort to get that silky motion in the water. That’s why this image was chosen. I wanted to see if the RAW image and all its information would provide a better picture after it was edited due to all that information. You can see the edited RAW image below.

I’m certainly no expert at editing photographs but I am attempting to improve in an effort to bring out the beauty hidden in most pictures so that others can get an idea of what that photo was intended to show. After a few tweaks the photo above did not turn out all that bad. The water is still to bright but much of that information was clipped from the photograph making it impossible to retrieve.

This next photograph is the JPEG version of this shot. I attempted to keep as many of the edits the same as possible between these two photos to see how they would turn out. As you can see, there is not much difference between them on this post. I will confess that the JPEG took more time to edit in an attempt to make both pictures look the same. The difference becomes more noticeable at 100% resolution.

Here you can see a portion of the images at full resolution. Can you guess which one is the JPEG and which one is the RAW photograph?

The JPEG version is above and the RAW version is below. At this magnification you can see the RAW version is a little more clean and crisp. Admittedly some of that has to due with the sharpening I applied to each one. The JPEG version likely has a little higher sharpening applied than the RAW version accounting for some of the difference.

My conclusion: JPEG is a perfectly acceptable format when using smaller size images. If I wanted to use a large print of this shot, I would definitely go with the RAW format after editing. To see Peter’s article which is the basis for this post in the photography experiment series, check it out here.

Photography Experiment, Troy's Blog

Chasing Waterfalls

July 13, 2013 Troy

I did it. I went chasing waterfalls. And I did a fairly poor job of it in my opinion. One of Peter’s rules about waterfalls, which you can view here, is to avoid shooting in mid-day. I think every waterfall I photographed was mid day. Unfortunately there were time constraints and photographing waterfalls at another time wasn’t much of an option. This was an attempt to get the silky motion with shutter speeds of 1/10 second but it was just too bright out and I wasn’t able to change the aperture and ISO enough to prevent over exposure. Using editing software I was able to get most of the picture back from being over exposed but the waterfall is still to bright to really get the full effect of motion. You can see the picture before editing below.

When looking at the original, it is surprising how much you can do to improve the photograph.

This next picture was taken using the auto settings on the camera. Since it was so bright out the shutter was able to move fast and essentially stop the water motion. Fortunately there is enough water volume going over this fall that stopping motion works in this case.

Here is perfect opportunity to try the silky motion by slowing down the shutter as the light likely would have allowed for it as well as the lower volume of water cascading over the falls. Unfortunately, this was taken before reading the ‘Shooting Waterfalls’ post by Mr. Carey with a point and shoot camera. Guess I’ll have to try it again another day.

This photo is of Pigeon Falls at the Minnesota – Canada border. Here is another case where silky motion would have been interesting. Although using a slower shutter speed may have altered the rainbow between the falls reducing its effect. Again this picture was taken before reading the waterfalls post and with a point and shoot camera. Hopefully I’ll have another opportunity to photograph these falls. Will the lighting bring the rainbows again next time?

While enjoying a creek I decided to play with a slower shutter in an effort to get the silky motion and this was the best I did. There was no tripod so this was 1/10 second shutter speed while hand holding the camera. In fact none of these waterfall pictures were taken using a tripod. Not bad for holding the camera if you ask me. Taking more time I would set the camera where it would be still and take a longer exposure photo to get even more silky motion.

Definitely room for improvement in shooting waterfalls. I will most likely get the opportunity while visiting Alaska later this summer. I suppose getting out for more practice might be a good idea before then.

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