The Hills are Alive

We had a good time with our friends John and Claudia today.  We went on a good hike to the fire tower above Cone Manor.  As we were coming down from the top I asked my cooperative friends to help me out with my blog photo today.  They had fun with the instructions.....can you guess what I asked them to do?

My pen

Hobbes loves to play with pens and I think he was challenging me not to take this one away from him.  He won.

Six Pence Pub

Tonight we got into Blowing Rock late, so we decided to have dinner at the bar at Six Pence Pub downtown.  Here are a few scenes from the bar.

Wet leaves

Today after a morning rain I found a few colorful leaves on the ground.  Fall hasn't really shown itself in Charlotte yet, but there are a few hints of the beauty the next few weeks will bring.

Tea olive blossoms

I'm drawn to our back yard by the wonderful fragrance of an old tea olive tree flanking this stone garden path.  The tiny white blossoms carpet the walkway beneath the tree and the aroma is heavenly.  I took this with my wide angle lens and, although there are some elements of the image I like, for some reason the composition is awkward to me.  I think it would have helped if I had stood at a different place relative to the stones, but I'm not sure.  Maybe I'll go back and crop it at a different angle to see if it looks better. At least I'm learning when composition feels right and wrong, even if I can't fully explain why....

Wine and lights

This is probably the closest I've come to just forgetting to post. A last minute iphone snap of the tabletop at dinner tonight. Not much of an effort, but it's done.

Fall colors

I set out this afternoon to capture the quickly fading fall color. It's a gorgeous day with clear deep azure skies and the only thing missing? The leaves in BR just aren't very pretty this year. My intent was to find some beautiful leaves that had fallen and arrange them in good light to get a nice colorful image. Well, unless I wanted just a pile of shriveled up brown things, I was out of luck. I did find some passable leaves, but they were so dry that the photo was pretty flat. The drought this summer has really taken the oomph out of the foliage, and even for "peak weekend" (with more than peak crowds!), the views are pretty ho-hum. So, here's my best for fall in the mountains. Maybe we'll get a better show down the mountain.