Category: Wildlife

A Trip to Northern Idaho – Part 8

by Michael

Our last day of adventure in Idaho started out as another chilly and wet morning. Wanting to give a new place a try, Karen and I started out on the river bank behind the University of Idaho, Coeur d’Alene. It was also windy. There were a lot of little chicks there and these two appear to be siblings, with one giving the other what-for.

I’m going to tell mom!

After not much going on there we headed back to the hotel to warm up a bit before heading over to pick up Janice. Out the window I happened to notice a magpie. I’ve been hunting for one of these the entire trip. They are like the common grackle here in Texas, usually everywhere, until you want to get a photo of one. This was the best I could do, through the dirty glass of my hotel window, but I can say I got one.

Magpie through a window

We headed north once more, looking for anything interesting. We headed up towards Newport and then over to Priest River. By then it was time for lunch. We stopped at a place called the Village Kitchen. Now, I had been craving an old-fashioned open-faced roast beef sandwich with mashed potatoes and gravy for some time and the first thing I noticed on the menu was just that. I was all in. The guy running the place looked more like a surfer from California than an Idaho mountain dude, but he was nice, and his jokes were great. Lunch came, and the food was excellent!

I’m glad we tipped well here!

As we were leaving I asked the guy if he knew of any cool waterfalls in the area. He gave me directions to some up around Priest Lake so we headed off in that direction. I found it on the map and plugged it into my GPS. We drove for a while, beautiful country, but when we got there we found the road blocked off with no idea how far it was to the actual waterfalls. I listened but did not hear the sound of rushing water anywhere.

We left, with me debating in my mind if we left without giving the place a fair shot but when we stopped for gas, I did some more quick googling and found that were were other falls not too far from where we were. We continued on and without seeing any signs, ended up on an old dirt forestry service road. After a few miles of my traveling companions questioning my sanity and directional ability, we arrived at a sign indicating the Roosevelt Grove of Ancient Cedars. The average age of the trees here is 800 years with some being 2000-3000 years old! Imaging being among living trees that were around while Jesus walked the earth!

Also at this place is Granite Falls. Another beautiful set of waterfalls for us to explore and photograph. Karen captured this of me while I was setting up for my first set of photos of the falls.

The intrepid photographer

As you can see from this photograph, the water from these falls are blasting down the mountain. No way I’m getting in those waters, but the rocks are slippery. I’m glad my shoes had good grips on the soles.

Granite Falls – Lower

Once again, while I was looking at the big picture, Karen was able to filter out the noise and notice the small beauty in the place. I really need to take a lesson from her on how to slow down and notice things.

Small beauty

After my initial shots I moved back to get more of the river that flows from the falls. I was able to carefully move out a little into the rocks in the river, but again was being very careful not to slip and get washed away.

Roaring river

And of course, we were finally in a spot were we could actually stand in some snow. After traveling all the way from Texas to see snow, we weren’t going to pass up the opportunity to stand in it and take a photo!

As we were leaving I noticed a sign pointing to another set of falls, but our time for this trip was up. As we arrived back at the blacktop, Karen had me stop so she could take a photo of the road lined with these huge trees. This is our path back home and our good-bye, at least for now, to Idaho.

It was a beautiful trip. Got to spend some quality time with our friend Janice, and got to see and photograph some beautiful scenery. I hope you enjoyed tagging along with us, even if this these posts come 3 months later. Maybe they provided some relief from the heat we are enduring right now here in Texas.

Until the next adventure,

Michael
Sharing God’s Creation, One Click at a Time

All words and photos copyright 2019 MHampton Photography
Equipment used: Canon 5DS-R, Canon 1DX II, Canon T6S, and various Canon lenses and Insta360 One X

A Trip to Northern Idaho – Part 5

by Michael

Welcome to part 5.

After a very good lunch at My Kitchen in St Maries ID, we continued to follow the road east out of town, following the St Joe river. We asked at the restaurant about the moose and were told that about around 19.4 miles there would be moose just lying around all over the place! We could hardly wait. Finally! Some big wildlife to capture!

On our way, we continued to watch to see what else we might see. It wasn’t long before we started seeing all sorts of eye-catching sights, such as this field of blue wildflowers. I’m not sure exactly what type of flowers these are, but I’m pretty sure these are not the blue bonnets we have been seeing in other places. Still though, a very pretty scene.

A field of pretty blue wildflowers

If anyone knows what these flowers are, let me know and I’ll update this page and give you credit for the knowledge, because I have no idea.

More pretty wildflowers

A little further down the road we came across a waterfall right off the roadside. Well, you know this is going to call for a stop and photos. Karen took this one but made the mistake of telling us she was taking it. Yes, I’m sucking in my gut. Hey! You would too if you had just eaten the burger I had! I was stuffed!

Me and Janice by the waterfall.

Throwing caution to the wind (this would be a recurring theme), I crawled down the bank of the roadway to get down at the water level. I found a place under the bridge where I got this shot. However, I had been so excited about jumping out of the car, I left my tripod so getting a longer exposure was not possible. My old hands aren’t as steady as they once were. Still though, this captures the scene rather well, showing the power of the water flowing down the mountain. Not all waterfall photos have to be with a slow shutter speed.

Roadside waterfall

And, of course, while I am “risking life and limb” for a shot (ha!), Karen is taking the beauty route and finding more pretty flowers up top. This is not the same as the field of flowers we saw before, but still very pretty. I noticed there are a lot of blue flowers up here.

Roadside wildflower

After driving well past the 19.4 mile mark on the road, we still had seen no moose. I was even driving extra slow, pulling over to allow others to go past us to keep from missing anything by driving too fast. Still though, there was plenty of beautiful scenery. Even the power pole couldn’t ruin this beautiful framed scene.

Framed mountain

Making our way back I saw a turn off for Killarney Lake and decided to give wildlife one last chance to make an appearance for the day. Time was running out and at this point I had pretty much given up hope of seeing a moose.

The drive around the lake was nice. It was relaxing to be off the highway for a bit. There were some waterfowl in the area so it wasn’t a total bust. Karen got this cinimmon teal duck (?) floating on the lake, just enjoying the afternoon sun.

Continuing on around the lake we saw a few other birds but it was mostly quiet. And then, as we reached the end of the road, I looked across the lake to a shallow marshy area and what was it I was seeing? Yes!! A Moose!! It wasn’t the massive herd we had been told about, and it wasn’t a male with a huge rack, but by golly, we got us a moose! We can go home happy now!

While the moose was on the other side of the lake, we didn’t get any close-up shots, but we were happy with the fact that we got to see one so we weren’t going to complain. Now it was time to head back to our room, relax, and prepare for our next day. Let’s just say that our little waterfall today had bitten me and I had some research to do!

Stay tuned for part 6!

Michael
Sharing God’s Creation, One Click at a Time

All words and photos copyright 2019 MHampton Photography
Equipment used: Canon 5DS-R, Canon 1DX II, Canon T6S, and various Canon lenses and Insta360 One X

A Trip to Northern Idaho – Part 4

by Michael

The next morning finds Karen and me back at Fernan Lake, once again watching the water fowl doing their thing. This great blue heron is a lovey bird to watch as it glides effortlessly through the sky just above the water.

GBH Fly-by

And then we notice something of a little drama unfold before us. There are several families of Canadian geese here and we noticed this one little one wandering around making all kinds of noise. It appears it has been separated from its family and was desperately trying to find its way back. I imagine it was calling out “Mama!! Mama!!” Or maybe it was yelling out “Marco!” Who really know? 🙂

“I’m lost!!”

The little thing made its way to the water and then made a beeline for a family that is swimming nearby. At last, the little fella (?) will be safe and back with his family. The little guy swims happily along toward the flotilla of geese, calling out all along the way.

“Wait for me! I’m coming!”

Well, apparently, this was not its family. One of the adults doesn’t take too kindly to this interloper trying to crash their family swim and bats it away, more than once. Karen and I were both caught off guard by this reaction as the brutal adult literally smacked the little one away from its family.

“Not on my watch!”

Rejected and dejected, the little one swims off again, looking for his family.

Poor little thing

Finally it sees its family, the largest one on the lake! I think we counted upwards of 14 little ones in this group! Now we’re not sure if the little one got lost, or if it ran away looking for a smaller family where it might get more attention. I guess it decided that if the attention it got from that last family was any indication of what the world was like, it would just stay with its own family and make do. It rejoined the group and they swam away, one big happy family once again.

One large family

Once we met up with Janice, we decided on following a tip I got on FaceBook about a possible place to see moose in the area. So we headed off for St Maries ID and the St Joe river where I was told the moose were plentiful, just laying around in the fields all over the place. This sounds promising!

On our drive, we noticed an opening in the trees next to the river and could see a group of American white pelicans fishing, so we stopped to grab some shots. Sadly, they were quite a distance away from the road, but since they such large birds, that didn’t hamper us too much.

Pelican skimming the surface

There were several of them floating around, but Karen caught this one just as it had nabbed its lunch. That’s a fish’s tail sticking out of its mouth. Aw, the circle of life (cue the music).

Pelican lunch

After the pelicans we made it to St Maries right around lunchtime. We ate at a place called My Kitchen and it was great. If you ever find yourself in St Maries ID, stop in and check it out!

After lunch we took a drive up the St Joe river, looking for the elusive moose! Next time…

Michael
Sharing God’s Creation, One Click at a Time

All words and photos copyright 2019 MHampton Photography
Equipment used: Canon 5DS-R, Canon 1DX II, Canon T6S, and various Canon lenses and Insta360 One X