Trip report - days 4-6
Days 4-6 - June 2nd-4th
As I mentioned in the previous post, I arrived at Grandfather Mountain on Friday evening. This was the first major stop on the trip, for the Grandfather Mountain Nature Photography Weekend.
Grandfather Mountain is an interesting place. It is a nature preserve that is not publicly owned. Rather, it is owned privately, currently by the Morton family. Hugh Morton, the family patriarch, and a famous photographer in his own right, passed away on June 1st, literally the day before the nature photography weekend was scheduled to start.
The entire weekend had a tone of sadness to it, thanks to the passing of Mr. Morton. The folks who organized the weekend had all worked very closely with Hugh, and it was obvious that they were all very saddened and distraught by his passing. His children and grandchildren were all present during the weekend, and stated very clearly that they intend to carry on his traditions at Grandfather Mountain, and keep events like the photography weekend going.
So, that out of the way, on to the narration.
I arrived at GFM at around 6:30 in the evening, in the spitting rain. I first stopped at the front gate, where the nice man pointed me down the road about a quarter of a mile behind me, to where the registration for the weekend event was. After backing my bike down the steep grade where the gate was, since a u-turn was certain disaster, I headed over to the meadow entrance, and luckily found a small piece of pavement to park the bike on.
I checked in, meeting Doug and Cesar in the process. These are two people from the Pentax-Discuss Mailing List. Doug is the guy who runs the list. Doug and Cesar were helping to run and organize the weekend. After a bit of conversation with them, in which I found out that Doug rides a CB750, I saddled back up in my rain gear, and headed back to the main entrance gate to ride up the steep driveway to the picnic area.
Apparently, folks were expecting me. I got an enthusiastic greeting from the folks in the PDML camping area when I pulled in, and barely had a chance to get my helmet and earplugs off before the greetings started. I pulled off most of my gear, and made my greetings. I met Frank and Dave (the Canadian contingent), Scott, Cory, Nico, Rick, Mark, and probably a couple of other people that I'm forgetting. Nico was nice enough to receive a UPS shipment for me of my camera bag and hiking boots, so I picked those up from him. Cory was also nice enough to offer crash space inside his hybrid trailer, even if I did have to curl up on the couch. This was much appreciated the first night, since it rained.
After getting things all set up at camp, we went up the mountain to the visitor's center for the opening greetings in the lecture hall there. The opening remarks were suitably emotional and respectful, in light of Mr. Morton's passing. Mark's presentation on stitched panoramic images followed this. I learned that these should be done with the camera in the vertical orientation, for maximum vertical resolution. Once I finally get a real digital camera, I'll have to try it out. Where is Mr. Caloccia with his LEGO mindstorms creation when you need him? :-)
After the presentations were over, we headed back to the campsite, ate hot dogs, and drank beer. Much conversation followed. Mark shoots a lot of motorsports photography, along with the rest of his work (see his website here, and we talked a bit about car racing and motorcycle racing, Kenny Roberts, Nicky Hayden, Mat Mladin, and Ben Bostrom.
Eventually we all got tired and retired to our respective sleeping quarters. Much snoring ensued. There was a bit of rain overnight, which made me thankful that I was inside a structure with a roof on it.
Saturday morning dawned with sunshine and puffy clouds. I, however, was still sleeping when the sun rose, even though several of the other folks got up to photograph the sunrise from the top of the mountain. I got up around 8 or so and wandered around mumbling a bit until Dave and Frank managed to get the coffee maker going on the camp stove. Bacon was cooked and consumed, and it was good. After breakfast, Cesar showed me some of the lenses he had brought, and I borrowed from him a 15mm f3.5, and a 17mm f4.0 fisheye (both Pentax lenses), and his Bogen tripod. Cory, Scott, Frank, and I drove up to the parking lot near the mile-high bridge on the mountain. Scott, Frank, and I decided to do some shooting near/around the bridge, while Cory headed up to attic peak. I shot some with the wide-angle and fisheye lenses, and I'll post those pictures once I get them scanned (I still shoot film. I was shooting slide film all weekend). The wind was blowing HARD on the mountain, and the cables on the bridge were singing at us. Still I managed to get a shot or two from the middle of the bridge, and Frank kept himself occupied with shooting the people who were shooting in the area around/near the bridge. Scott and I took a quick hike a small ways up towards attic peak, but decided that our time was a bit short to make it all the way out there, and the rocks on the trail were still VERY slippery, which made climbing treacherous.
Scott, Frank, and I made the trek back down to the campsite, and stopped in at the guest cabin nearby, where Don Nelson, the man running the weekend, was staying. He had made some DELICIOUS chili, which he graciously offered to us, along with some cold beer. We had a bit of good conversation, and then left Don so that he could rest up for the evening events. Scott pulled out his changing bag and developing tank, and developed the Tri-X that he shot up on the mountain on a picnic table at the campground. The folks who were submitting pictures for the photography contest had pulled out their laptops, and were madly downloading, editing, and burning their pictures to CD. Scott pulled a flatbed scanner out of his truck, and scanned his Tri-X. He didn't have a burner on his laptop, so we used my SD card reader to transfer the files to my laptop, and burn them to CD. He got his CD turned in JUST in time. :-) Dave had done some shooting with an IR filter on his camera earlier in the day, and he got some absolutely fabulous shots. More on that a bit later.
After the mad dash to get the pictures turned in, we headed back up to the visitor center for dinner. Dinner was "barbecue" with the trimmings. Not being from North Carolina, I didn't know what to expect. It turns out that in western North Carolina at least, "barbecue" is pulled pork. Which is yummy. There was also really good cole slaw, baked beans, string beans, and other yummy trimmings. After dinner were a couple more lectures. Before the first lecture, Cory and I had noticed the light getting better and better outside as the sun started to sink into the west. After the first lecture was over, we ducked out and headed to the top of the mountain. We had thoughtfully packed the cameras and tripods into his truck just for this very purpose. We got up to the top of the mountain about a half an hour before sunset, just as it was starting to color the hills in purple and orange.
The wind was blowing about 60 miles an hour, and it was COLD. I set up the tripod, and kept one hand on it to keep it from blowing over. Put the camera on, and proceeded to shoot 2 entire rolls of the sunset over the next hour or so. Once again, I WILL post at least one picture of this sunset. It was too good not to.
We headed back down the mountain again, and back to the campsite. Much beer was drunk. Norm (also from the Pentax list) had shown up earlier, and proceeded to make drunken intercontinental phone calls. It seems that the more beer you drink, the more the bugs leave you alone. This information will be stashed away for future use.
We eventually all collapsed into hibernation in our various sleeping places, and more snoring ensued. Next morning we woke up for breakfast at the visitor center.
Breakfast was grits, bacon, biscuits, and gravy. Mmmmmm southern breakfast. My arteries clog just thinking about it. After breakfast was the last lecture, done by a "retired champion" of the photo contest from previous years, Charles Braswell. He is a plumber by trade, and a photographer by choice. He showed some BEAUTIFUL work that he simply does in his spare time. After his lecture was a presentation by Mark and Bill about how NOT to win the photography contest. After the not-winners, the winners were presented. One of Dave's IR photos, the one shown here, took second place in the scenic category. Go Dave!
After the awards were presented, I stopped in at the gift shop and bought a shot glass and some postcards. Then we did a group shot outside of the visitor center, and headed back to the campsite. I packed up the cameras for Nico to ship back to me, and packed up my stuff into the bike luggage once again. I took the opportunity to send back some dirty laundry with the camera gear, to lighten my bags a bit. It was 3:30 in the afternoon before I was done packing and ready to go, and was threatening rain. I said my goodbyes, and plotted out my route south, with the help of Tom (another Pentax lister), who rides a Harley when he isn't hauling around his camera gear. The sky had clouded up as the day went on, and the rain was threatening as I rode out, with my rain gear on.
As I mentioned in the previous post, I arrived at Grandfather Mountain on Friday evening. This was the first major stop on the trip, for the Grandfather Mountain Nature Photography Weekend.
Grandfather Mountain is an interesting place. It is a nature preserve that is not publicly owned. Rather, it is owned privately, currently by the Morton family. Hugh Morton, the family patriarch, and a famous photographer in his own right, passed away on June 1st, literally the day before the nature photography weekend was scheduled to start.
The entire weekend had a tone of sadness to it, thanks to the passing of Mr. Morton. The folks who organized the weekend had all worked very closely with Hugh, and it was obvious that they were all very saddened and distraught by his passing. His children and grandchildren were all present during the weekend, and stated very clearly that they intend to carry on his traditions at Grandfather Mountain, and keep events like the photography weekend going.
So, that out of the way, on to the narration.
I arrived at GFM at around 6:30 in the evening, in the spitting rain. I first stopped at the front gate, where the nice man pointed me down the road about a quarter of a mile behind me, to where the registration for the weekend event was. After backing my bike down the steep grade where the gate was, since a u-turn was certain disaster, I headed over to the meadow entrance, and luckily found a small piece of pavement to park the bike on.
I checked in, meeting Doug and Cesar in the process. These are two people from the Pentax-Discuss Mailing List. Doug is the guy who runs the list. Doug and Cesar were helping to run and organize the weekend. After a bit of conversation with them, in which I found out that Doug rides a CB750, I saddled back up in my rain gear, and headed back to the main entrance gate to ride up the steep driveway to the picnic area.
Apparently, folks were expecting me. I got an enthusiastic greeting from the folks in the PDML camping area when I pulled in, and barely had a chance to get my helmet and earplugs off before the greetings started. I pulled off most of my gear, and made my greetings. I met Frank and Dave (the Canadian contingent), Scott, Cory, Nico, Rick, Mark, and probably a couple of other people that I'm forgetting. Nico was nice enough to receive a UPS shipment for me of my camera bag and hiking boots, so I picked those up from him. Cory was also nice enough to offer crash space inside his hybrid trailer, even if I did have to curl up on the couch. This was much appreciated the first night, since it rained.
After getting things all set up at camp, we went up the mountain to the visitor's center for the opening greetings in the lecture hall there. The opening remarks were suitably emotional and respectful, in light of Mr. Morton's passing. Mark's presentation on stitched panoramic images followed this. I learned that these should be done with the camera in the vertical orientation, for maximum vertical resolution. Once I finally get a real digital camera, I'll have to try it out. Where is Mr. Caloccia with his LEGO mindstorms creation when you need him? :-)
After the presentations were over, we headed back to the campsite, ate hot dogs, and drank beer. Much conversation followed. Mark shoots a lot of motorsports photography, along with the rest of his work (see his website here, and we talked a bit about car racing and motorcycle racing, Kenny Roberts, Nicky Hayden, Mat Mladin, and Ben Bostrom.
Eventually we all got tired and retired to our respective sleeping quarters. Much snoring ensued. There was a bit of rain overnight, which made me thankful that I was inside a structure with a roof on it.
Saturday morning dawned with sunshine and puffy clouds. I, however, was still sleeping when the sun rose, even though several of the other folks got up to photograph the sunrise from the top of the mountain. I got up around 8 or so and wandered around mumbling a bit until Dave and Frank managed to get the coffee maker going on the camp stove. Bacon was cooked and consumed, and it was good. After breakfast, Cesar showed me some of the lenses he had brought, and I borrowed from him a 15mm f3.5, and a 17mm f4.0 fisheye (both Pentax lenses), and his Bogen tripod. Cory, Scott, Frank, and I drove up to the parking lot near the mile-high bridge on the mountain. Scott, Frank, and I decided to do some shooting near/around the bridge, while Cory headed up to attic peak. I shot some with the wide-angle and fisheye lenses, and I'll post those pictures once I get them scanned (I still shoot film. I was shooting slide film all weekend). The wind was blowing HARD on the mountain, and the cables on the bridge were singing at us. Still I managed to get a shot or two from the middle of the bridge, and Frank kept himself occupied with shooting the people who were shooting in the area around/near the bridge. Scott and I took a quick hike a small ways up towards attic peak, but decided that our time was a bit short to make it all the way out there, and the rocks on the trail were still VERY slippery, which made climbing treacherous.
Scott, Frank, and I made the trek back down to the campsite, and stopped in at the guest cabin nearby, where Don Nelson, the man running the weekend, was staying. He had made some DELICIOUS chili, which he graciously offered to us, along with some cold beer. We had a bit of good conversation, and then left Don so that he could rest up for the evening events. Scott pulled out his changing bag and developing tank, and developed the Tri-X that he shot up on the mountain on a picnic table at the campground. The folks who were submitting pictures for the photography contest had pulled out their laptops, and were madly downloading, editing, and burning their pictures to CD. Scott pulled a flatbed scanner out of his truck, and scanned his Tri-X. He didn't have a burner on his laptop, so we used my SD card reader to transfer the files to my laptop, and burn them to CD. He got his CD turned in JUST in time. :-) Dave had done some shooting with an IR filter on his camera earlier in the day, and he got some absolutely fabulous shots. More on that a bit later.
After the mad dash to get the pictures turned in, we headed back up to the visitor center for dinner. Dinner was "barbecue" with the trimmings. Not being from North Carolina, I didn't know what to expect. It turns out that in western North Carolina at least, "barbecue" is pulled pork. Which is yummy. There was also really good cole slaw, baked beans, string beans, and other yummy trimmings. After dinner were a couple more lectures. Before the first lecture, Cory and I had noticed the light getting better and better outside as the sun started to sink into the west. After the first lecture was over, we ducked out and headed to the top of the mountain. We had thoughtfully packed the cameras and tripods into his truck just for this very purpose. We got up to the top of the mountain about a half an hour before sunset, just as it was starting to color the hills in purple and orange.
The wind was blowing about 60 miles an hour, and it was COLD. I set up the tripod, and kept one hand on it to keep it from blowing over. Put the camera on, and proceeded to shoot 2 entire rolls of the sunset over the next hour or so. Once again, I WILL post at least one picture of this sunset. It was too good not to.
We headed back down the mountain again, and back to the campsite. Much beer was drunk. Norm (also from the Pentax list) had shown up earlier, and proceeded to make drunken intercontinental phone calls. It seems that the more beer you drink, the more the bugs leave you alone. This information will be stashed away for future use.
We eventually all collapsed into hibernation in our various sleeping places, and more snoring ensued. Next morning we woke up for breakfast at the visitor center.
Breakfast was grits, bacon, biscuits, and gravy. Mmmmmm southern breakfast. My arteries clog just thinking about it. After breakfast was the last lecture, done by a "retired champion" of the photo contest from previous years, Charles Braswell. He is a plumber by trade, and a photographer by choice. He showed some BEAUTIFUL work that he simply does in his spare time. After his lecture was a presentation by Mark and Bill about how NOT to win the photography contest. After the not-winners, the winners were presented. One of Dave's IR photos, the one shown here, took second place in the scenic category. Go Dave!
After the awards were presented, I stopped in at the gift shop and bought a shot glass and some postcards. Then we did a group shot outside of the visitor center, and headed back to the campsite. I packed up the cameras for Nico to ship back to me, and packed up my stuff into the bike luggage once again. I took the opportunity to send back some dirty laundry with the camera gear, to lighten my bags a bit. It was 3:30 in the afternoon before I was done packing and ready to go, and was threatening rain. I said my goodbyes, and plotted out my route south, with the help of Tom (another Pentax lister), who rides a Harley when he isn't hauling around his camera gear. The sky had clouded up as the day went on, and the rain was threatening as I rode out, with my rain gear on.
