Layne's Lunch

Another one of the many water features at Butchart Gardens

Ok, here is a totem pole at Butchart Gardens.  Nothing impressive, just a bit log. 

There were lots of water features in Butchart Gardens.  I thought this one was kind of cool.  This was hand held.

Another shot at Butchart Gardens.  My brother asked me to take a picture of this water wheel so he could build one just like it in his back yard.   mmmm....

One more HDR of Butchart Gardens. 

Here is a water feature at Butchart Gardens.

Another HDR shot inside Butchart Gardens.  Incredible place.  If you are ever up there, it is worth stopping.

Here is an HDR of Butchart Gardens.  Amazing place.  I took way too many pictures. 

Ok, the snake isn't exactly in the grass, but snake in the dirt didn't sound that good.  This is the first in a series of shots that I took at Butchart Gardens near Victoria BC.  Here is a link to their web site: www.butchartgardens.com

Here is a shot of the inside of the mall in Victoria BC.  Nice mall.  Didn't buy anything, but they have really clean bathrooms.   This is a single shot RAW that I made into a 3 shot HDR.

Here are a few more shots before we leave Tracy Arm Fjord.

Here are a few more pictures of ice chunks for your viewing pleasure.

This is one of my favorite shots from our trip of Tracy Arm.  I took a lot of pictures of ice in the water.  Most of them didn't turn out.  Typically, the ice was overexposed.  I did an HDR of a single RAW image in order to get the ice texture to show up.   

Once we got close to the Sawyer Glacier, we started seeing seals resting on the ice.  I took these with my 300mm lens.  We were not as close as it might seem.  These pictures are cropped and enlarged a bit. 

Here are three shots of the Sawyer Glacier that I took from the ship.  The top one is pretty much what the camera gave me.  We did get a bit of sunlight for a few minutes, so the second one shows some more interesting highlights.  The third shot is an HDR that I made from a single RAW image.  I really liked what Photomatix did with the rocks and the clouds. 

Here are a few shots I took of the ship while we were in Tracy Arm Fjord.   I was impressed that the captain was able to get the ship so far up the channel.  Doing a little HDR on this last one.  Didn't turn out quite like I wanted, but I'm learning.  

A photo just doesn't do it justice. 

Again, the scenery was simply amazing!

Tracy Arm Fjord was incredible.  Everywhere you turned was another view of amazing scenery.  I had so many pictures of waterfalls when I got back that I ended up deleting a good bunch of them.  It was hard to capture the grandeur.

Here I am trying to ba a bit artsy-fartsy.  I thought we could start off the pictures of Tracy Arm Fjord with a black and white shot. 

These two pictures deserve some commentary.   Here we are in Tracy Arm Fjord, which is billed as one of the most beautiful spots in Alaska.  The cruise ship had just made it up to Sawyer glacier.   It was absolutely incredible!   As soon as the ship turned around and started back down the Fjord, I looked around and noticed that most of the people left the deck.  Show's over.  Never mind that we have about an hour left in the Fjord.   So where did all the people go?  I looked down and saw the people shown in the pictures below.    They were buying t-shirts and sweaters.  I couldn't believe it.  Let's see, I could watch seals, waterfalls and glaciers, or I could shop for overpriced clothing from China.  What should I do, what should I do? I was so dumbfounded by these people that I had to take a couple of pictures. 

Here are a couple of obligatory train pictures.  I'm sure just about everyone who has ridden the White Pass Railway has taken this shot, so I'll add mine to the ever growing collection.

Here are a couple of shots from the train.  It is a bit tricky to get a smooth shot of a mountain stream from a moving train, but these didn't turn out too bad.

This old train bridge is looking like it needs a bit of repair.

Here is a shot of the main lobby of the cruise ship.

Here are a few pictures at the Skagway dock. I don't know why I took this picture.