ANGELA B. PAN

If you remember Memorial Day weekend 2018, I went on the Old Rag Hike trail in the Shenandoah Mountains with my cousins. Well, a few weeks before Memorial Day weekend this year, I was trying to come up with a plan and asked everyone again if they wanted to go on another hike. Luckily, most were free and we ended up going on a hike that none of us had ever been before, Hawksbill Summit Trail.

It was a short stroll compared to Old Rag, but the elevation on the hike was no joke. In about 3/4th of a mile, you climb an elevation of 672 feet. So pretty much going straight uphill the entire way. I’m not exactly sure how long it took us but I want to say less than an hour. Once you get to the top, it’s totally worth it.

Luckily we started the day early by starting the hike at 9 am. There weren’t many other people on the trail yet and the trees covered the sun for most of the way which probably made the whole experience that much easier. By the time we reached the summit a few clouds had rolled in so I asked my cousin, Mona to sit on some rocks and pose for me. I loved how the jagged rocks were sticking out of the mountain. It was a little iffy actually getting her to that spot though.

You may have caught my other cousin, Karen on the summit too in last week’s post. LOL.

Overall, I would do this hike again if I were looking for a quick hike in the Shenandoah Mountains. It was strenuous enough to get a good sweat in, but it didn’t take all day which was nice.

My camera settings for this image is F4.0 at 1/2000th sec and ISO 500 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm

Now that I’m feeling a little better, the blogs can go on as normal 🙂 Thank you for all your kind messages. They really made me feel better quicker.

I had been holding out on all the images I captured during Memorial Day weekend because I really wanted to be more thoughtful with those blog posts. So here it goes…

This image was captured the Thursday before the weekend had even started and it was totally unplanned. We got really heavy thunderstorms in the afternoon that seemed to have come out of nowhere and then all of a sudden, we lost power. With no power, Andrew and I were just bored, staring at each other so we decided that we may as well as go out and take pictures. Well, I was taking pictures while Andrew got some fresh air.

The US Marine Corps War Memorial (Iwo Jima) is the closest landmark to our house. When we arrived, there were 3 tour buses full of people standing around and taking pictures. I figured with so many people around the memorial, it would probably be best for us to walk over to the Netherlands Carillion which has a fantastic view of the DC skyline and wait out the buses for a bit. Hopefully, by the time we’re done, all the buses will be gone.

My wish came true!

We walked back to Iwo Jima and no one was there. We had the whole memorial to ourselves. I was so excited, I started snapping away. Eventually, I made my way over to some trees and were looking for some framing compositions when I saw this man come. He must have just gotten off of work, it was around 5:30p when I captured this and if I had to guess, he probably didn’t have any power either. I just love the way he was standing there and soaking it all in, I had to capture it.

My camera settings for this image is F13 at 1/500th sec and ISO 500 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm.

I’m so sorry to say that with the unexpected emergency, I won’t be able to lead the photo walk this Saturday. I am so upset because I was really looking forward to it but Focus on the Story was able to get Jarob Ortiz to fill in for me. I know it will be a great time. Just in case you missed it, click here for all the details.

#WordlessWednesday 

Long story short, I woke up yesterday with severe pain in my stomach. I was rushed to the emergency room and had to get emergency surgery.

I’m resting now but still wanted to explain why the blog posts may be lacking this week. Sorry about that!

Here are some pretty palm trees with a bird flying through them <3

This image has been shared more than 3.6 million times.

Probably much more than that but with so many people showing it to their friends and family, I know my name has been lost and I can’t keep track. To say it’s been an honor is an understatement. The number of conversations, emails and private messages I’ve received about this one image has been overwhelming but so humbling. Even to this day, 7 years later, I will still get messages in my email box specifically about the emotions people have felt about it.

This post isn’t to brag or to show off. It comes from the bottom of my heart. The deepest gratitude I can offer to the beautiful city I call home, all those who have taken the time to tell me how much this image has meant to them, and especially all the veterans and families who have been impacted by the Vietnam War.

So I wanted to take a moment and talk about the story behind the image, Vietnam Veterans Memorial at Sunrise:

It All Started 11 Months Prior. January 6th, 2012:

I woke up for sunrise with every intention to photograph the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. I had visited the memorial one time before but did not come out with images I was super excited about. After a conversation with a friend, I decided I needed to go back.

Little did I know, the sunrise that morning was going to be EPIC!

Click here to read more