ANGELA B. PAN

I’ve lived in Northern Virginia my whole life. I was born in Fairfax hospital and only time I left was when I went to college in Richmond, VA. But I’m not sure how much that really counts because I was back in NoVA every weekend anyways. So I’ve basically lived here my entire life and I remember all the things that used to be here. Like, who remembers when there used to be that big Best store? or when there was no Mosaic District and it was just a huge Multiplex Movie Theater? So seeing all these new buildings pop out of no where and new transient stations being built is so crazy to me, especially in the Tyson’s Corner/McLean area. That place has changed so much, but I think it’s all for the better. I love how the new Silver Line on the Metro will go directly to Dulles Airport. It will make it so much more convient in the future.

So just for fun, I thought it’d be cool to see what it’d look like from the Greensboro Metro Station at sunset. I’ve never been on the Silver Line before but I knew this had to be a crazy, cool view. I was right!! How awesome is that? Shout out to the Wendy’s that’s right next to this metro station. That was the first place I drove to on my own once I got my drivers license. LOL!

But there’s still one view that I want to get. I think the BEST view is that from 495 from Maryland going into Virginia. How do I stand safely on the highway to capture that view? Or is there another way? If you’re from the area, you know what I’m talking about! Man, the skyline has changed soo much it’s crazyyy and it’s only going to change more as the years go on.

So here it is, the deer story! As Andrew I were walking around Sprague Lake in Rocky Mountain National Park around sunset, we noticed about 3 or 4 deers drinking the water. I thought it was the cutest thing ever and from a distance, I started taking pictures. Then we noticed some other people even closer to the deer walking towards them. The deer didn’t seem to be scared or anything because they didn’t run away, so after witnessing that, I wanted to go closer, obviously.

We slowly walked closer to them and noticed that there were so many more than just 3 or 4. There were like at least 10 of them! AND there were some baby deer too. They were sooooo cute. Pretty soon there was a big group of us people surrounded by all these deer! I’ve seen deer before but not this many at one time and never this close up and calm. All of us were taking pictures but moving really slow to not scare the deer. But eventually, after standing there for about an hour observing the deer, the sun had set and it was getting dark fast.

Andrew and I decided to break away from the pact of people and continue on to the trail to walk back to the car, but the deer had another idea. As soon as one of them saw us walking past them, he started CHARGING AT US!!! OMG scariest ish EVER! So I ran towards Andrew, looked behind at the deer and he CHARGED AT US AGAIN!!!! By the third time he charged at us, Andrew and I had ran so far down the lake that we put everyone else in between us and the deer. At one point, we heard this lady scream “Stop Running!” In my head, I was like ‘lady, are you crazy?!?!’

After freaking out for 20 minutes, I confessed to Andrew that I had made eye-contact with the deer and that’s probably why he charged at us. Oh man. Never again deer! So we ended up back tracking and taking the long way back to the car.

The best part is that I got the beginning of the first charge on video! It will be up on youtube soon but I stopped recording as soon as I realized what was happening. Biggest regret- turning off my camera 🙁 Oh well, I got a little bit of it that I will share soon….

We arrived in Estes Park, right outside of Rocky Mountain National Park around dinner time. So naturally, our first stop was to get some pizza. OMG you need to try this place called Antonio’s Real New York Pizza. The pizza was outstanding! And believe me, I’ve had a few slices in my day and I really liked this pizza. And to walk off all those calories we headed to Sprague lake right after dinner in Rocky Mountain National Park.

It’s a super easy walk around the lake thats about a mile long. It was perfect because each side of the lake provided some amazing views. Good thing I had my neutral density filter with me because the sunset wasn’t actually as vibrant as this image makes it look. The clouds were looking very nice but the longer exposure by the ND filter really brought out that extra umph of color that it really needed. It also helped that it was a very calm and peaceful evening with not a lot of wind to create ripples in the water. So if you’re a fan of reflection shots, Rocky Mountain National Park has tons of them. From all the lakes to puddles. Everything is just so reflective and beautiful. You would love it.

The settings for this image was F5/6 at 1.6 seconds at ISO 400. I used my 16-35mm wide angle lens to try to capture as much of the scene as I could. I didn’t have my tripod on this one but I managed to find a good ledge to balance this on. The key is to try to get your camera body and lens to stabilize on something to make sure theres no extra shake. If your lens isn’t leaning against something or supported somehow, it probably won’t work out as well.

Walking around, I spotted this guy and I had to take a pic. Not only was the light perfect on him but he reminded me of Daryl from Walking Dead. But only if he was a photographer and not a walker slayer. What do you think?

At around sunset, Andrew and I found ourselves at the Big Chief Overlook. If you’re planning on visiting Dead Horse Point State Park in Moab, Utah, I’d highly recommend starting here. It’s at the very tipty top of the park but it’s great because you get these amazing PAN-oramic views of both sides of the park. The best was that I was able to follow the sunlight wherever it was going as it was setting. It can get crowded with people up there, but the ability to walk around the corner was amazing. I got so many cool shots from up there.  And how beautiful are these rocks against the falling sunlight? They were literally glowing.

Andrew and I spent a lot of time up there. We actually stayed up there way past sunset. Almost to the point where we could start seeing stars out. Not talking or anything, just enjoying the view. At one point, I told him to take some pics with his phone, so he took this one.

Pretty cool, huh? And all with no photo instruction from me. LOL. We joke that he’s this amazing photographer when in fact most of the pics he takes either has a finger in the corner or they’re really blurry. If you’ve seen some of his other iPhone pics, this one is definietly a major achievement. Seriously.

My settings for this image was F11 at 1/160th of a second. Super fast shutter speed to capture this beautiful moment. So glad I got to spend it with Andrew AND Daryl.

I love Colorado. There I said it. I fell in love on our trip. Everything was absolutely amazing. As soon as I stepped out of the airport in Denver, I could definietly tell a difference in air quality. It was just so fresh and crisp. The weather was absolutely perfect the whole time we were there, 70 degrees with a little breeze.  I really think it’s something I could get used to but I don’t know if we were just lucky with the weather or if it’s always like that in the spring/summer. Either way, I was lovin’ it. (Like McDonalds).

At one point, Andrew and I were walking around after we had a big lunch and we saw this lady with her dog. We stopped to talk to her for a little bit and as we were walking away, Andrew said “I never realized how many nice people there are”. LOL! I thought that was hilarious but so true. I feel like everyone in DC is always in such a rush to get things done. You can definietly tell the slow paced, enjoying-life/nature type of of people in Colorado. Seriously, I can’t wait to go back.

This image was taken in Rocky Mountain National Park on the last day we were there. Andrew thought he “discovered a secret” vantage point however, it was just the parking lot of a museum. Moraine Park, specifically. We didn’t have a lot of colorful sunsets while we were there, but we did have some pretty cloudy ones which is really all you need. I shot this with my 16-35mm at F/10 for 4 seconds with my Ice Neutral Density filter. At one point we spotted a herd of deer running around on the grass in the foreground which was so cool to watch. But don’t worry, I’ll have more deer stories for you in the future. Oh man. HAHA.