Monday, February 29, 2016

City of Rocks State Park, NM, Day 2

The Trailer Under the Stars
Monday, February 29, 2016, City of Rocks State Park, NM, Day 2, 0 Miles, 4,615.2 Miles for the Trip

Happy Leap Year to all! A slow day that, after my morning walk, was spent sitting around the campground. While sunny & temperatures in the mid 70's, it was a windy day so while sitting out I kept having to choose between shade, shelter from the wind, and sun to warm up. Never satisfied!

I did take some night photos last night. These are 20 second exposures (at f:2.8 & an ISO of 1250). While a longer exposure would let me include fainter stars, or a better image shot at a lower ISO, unless you have an equatorial mount for the camera, any longer than a 20 second exposure turns the stars into streaks. In fact, I may point my camera at the North Star (aka Polaris) & do a long exposure to make a star circle tonight. For the second wide image I waited out the airplanes - a pain to do on a 3 image panorama!

This is one of the few campgrounds that actually gets dark. Until moon rise, the only light was from the stars. I used a flashlight to show the trailer in the photos that include it. I also retook the campsite photo with the sun behind the rocks - no flare, and wandered around photographing some of the rocks.  More nighttime & rock photos at today's LakeshoreImages page.

I have new neighbors - they are from Germany, brought their VW camper van over to Nova Scotia, and are taking a 1 year tour of the US. They have a blog of their travels, although unless you read German, you will have to use the Google translator link they provide to read it.

Assuming the wind dies down enough to get the stove out to cook it, dinner will be a smoked Andouille Chicken Sausage sandwich, broccoli, & beans.

Until tomorrow -

1 comment:

  1. Nice night photography...You're at one of my favorite places.....Terrific night shots....BTW have you seen the new Affinity photo software Apple is selling...39 Bucks and change...just got it and so far I'm impressed...especially with the price...they have a bunch of u-tube videos.........anyway take care and safe travels...with I was out there...Horst sends

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