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If I had to guess Sue’s favorite part of our 2017 road trip, it would either have been Santa Fe, New Mexico or the Saguaro National Park in Tucson, Arizona. Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed Saguaro National Park but while we were there, we were in the middle of a huge heat wave. I thought Arizona was hot in previous visits to the state, but it was so HOT when we were there. Even after sunset and the sun went down, it was still so humid and hot. I even remember hearing on the radio that mailboxes were melting. That’s HOT! Holy cow. And how many times can I say hot in a row? LOL

Since it was so humid and hot, we only spent an hour or so around sunset in the national park. The rest of the time was spent in our hotel’s outdoor pool. We wanted to go when the sun was lower and maybe a little bit cooler, but that didn’t make much difference but you better believe there was lots of ice cream afterwards. Out of all the places on our roadtrip, I hope to visit Tucson again sometime soon because I actually enjoyed the time while we were there. It seemed like a super cute city with so much to do and see. We just didn’t get enough time. I just remember waking up the next morning and wanting to get out of the heat wave as soon as possible. The next stop on our trip was Los Angeles and that was nowhere close to being as hot. So we made our way over and spent the rest of our time in California before flying back home.

My camera settings for this image is F3.5 at 1/320th sec at ISO 400 with my Sony A7II and 28-70mm lens.

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It seems like everyday this summer has either been super hot and humid or super rainy, right? There hasn’t really been an in between in a while. This image was actually taken on one of those rainy days. It rained the night before and it rained right after this image was captured so I was really surprised when color actually came through the clouds during this sunrise. And as a side note super lucky that I left the Reflecting Pool right before it started pouring. The whole morning was really dark so I love the way the pink and purple hues brought out the contrast.

Now that I have my 70-200mm, I’ve been challenging myself to keep the lens on my camera without switching to one of my defaults.  It’s actually a lot harder than it sounds but I think it’s really interesting how subjects that I photograph all the time seem so different. I’ve always talked about getting really low or getting high could help make things look different. Well, getting a new lens can do the exact same thing. I captured this image at focal length 112mm.

Besides the color and the reflection, my favorite part about this image are the ducks. I always get so happy to see them, especially in the summer time. There seems to be new baby ducks all the time. Of course they could be the same ducks that I’m seeing over and over again, but they’re just so tiny that I can’t even imagine being more than a few weeks old.

My camera settings for this image is F4 at 1/60th of a second and ISO 1600 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm. The reason the ISO is up so high is because this image was captured handheld.

Hope you all have a great weekend!

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We had a change of plans to our original travel itinerary. When we arrived in Santa Fe, New Mexico we were exhausted! Like barely can hold a fork up to my mouth but I’m so hungry, kind of tired. Luckily we were able to switch hotels up and stay one extra day in Santa Fe. We just lost a day in Los Angeles which is no big deal since both of us had been before. That allowed us to sleep in the next day and explore Santa Fe a little more. Neither Sue or I had been anywhere in New Mexico but we immediately fell in love. Santa Fe is such a cute little city with so much character and charm. I also liked how there weren’t a lot of people there and you felt super safe just walking the streets. So we were happy to be spending an extra day there.

Using her pinterest skills, Sue found this place, Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument. It’s about an hour away from the city but so worth the drive. It was a beautiful hike around these amazing white rock formations. If you’re thinking about going, try your best to make it to the second half of the trail. That’s where you encounter all the slot canyons and at the end you will see the ‘christmas tree’ rocks. Rocks that look like little tents or christmas trees 🙂 It was beautiful. But HOT! Bring plenty of water. What was also nice was standing in the middle of the slot canyons. There was just enough shade to protect you from the sun but the breeze through the canyons was unbeatable. It almost felt like air conditioning. ALMOST.

As soon as we were done with the hike we drove immediately to the gas station for popsicles. The most excellent reward for such a hot hike.

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I’m home! and I’m exhausted. Who knew driving over 3,000 miles would wear a girl out so fast. But in the past 10 days I created memories that would last a life time. So many great adventures and sights. In the end, looking back at all 7 states we drove through I could honestly say that I would not have changed a thing. I had a freakin’ B L A S T!

This image was from our very first stop in Covington, VA at Falling Springs Falls. Upon arrival, I didn’t know much about it. I just knew it was a huge waterfall really close to the road and on our way to Nashville, TN so it was the perfect pit stop to get out and stretch our legs. Little did I know that it was SO beautiful. My favorite part was being able to see the waterfall from the very top of it AND the very bottom. All you had to do was climb a couple of rocks and you were there! It kind of reminded me of Slijalandsfoos in Iceland because you can actually walk behind it too. Too bad we weren’t wearing our bathing suits or I would of wanted to jump in.

I definietly want to come back here on a hot summer day with Andrew and Frankie. It’s only 3 hours away from where we live. Frankie doesn’t like getting wet but I’m sure he’d enjoy the trail and hanging out outdoors with us.

I still can’t believe we drove all the way to California. There’s a lot to catch up on so be sure to check out the blog for the next few days and I’ll be uploading a youtube video as well. I don’t even remember half of what I filmed so that should be very interesting. HAHA!

 

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If you’ve ever been to Moab, Utah, which is your favorite park to visit? Is it Arches National Park? Is it Canyonlands National Park? or Dead Horse Point State Park? Right now, it’s hard for me to decide Every time I think about any of the parks, I just think about how hot it was. We were only in Moab for one full day but it was extremely hot and cloudless the whole time. As seen above. But if you ask Andrew, his was Canyonlands NP.

However, I wish we could of spent more time in Arches. We were there for sunrise and had a great time walking around some of the shorter trails like Devils Garden and Fiery Furnace Viewpoint. The whole plan was to spend sunrise and sunset shooting Arches and visit the other parks during the day. When it came time for sunset, we drove up to the entrance and found out it was was closed due to road construction. Womp Womp. There was no way to get in. I was hoping for this epic shot of Delicate Arch at sunset and we were going to stay to shoot the stars. So this whole trip, I didn’t not get to see Delicate Arch which seems like the main attraction 🙁 Now I have a reason to go back.

So this image was shot at sunrise at Courthouse Towers. I was super impressed by all the rock formations and the shadows that they were creating. I even heard a lady giving a tour while I was shooting this saying that there were over 2,000 arches in the park. Thats nuts-o. I think there are some arches in this image that the national park would consider an arch. Do you see them?

This was shot at f/11 at 1/160th of a second ISO 250.