Tag: Idaho

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

A Trip to Northern Idaho – Part 2

by Michael

Our second adventure day was to see another mountain, this time east of Coeur d’Alene named Silver Mountain. Unfortunately, we got there and it was just like Wally World, closed. They weren’t opening the gondola rides up the mountain until the next weekend, after we were to leave. Oh well, time to improvise another adventure.

On our way to Silver Mountain, we passed Old Mission State Park, so we decided to stop and see what it was all about. This was a mission that was set up to minister to the local Native Americans in the area. This is noted as being the oldest building in Idaho, being built between 1850 and 1853 by Roman Catholic missionaries and members of the Coeur d’Alene tribe. The Sacred Heart Mission served the local community for many years and featured the chapel, the priests’ home, and a school. The school burned down in 2011.

Sacred Heart Chapel

Next door to the chapel was the house in which the priests lived. While certainly sparse by today’s standards, 150 years ago, I bet this was living pretty well. Here is a 360 view of inside the clergy house.

Back outside, being from Texas, we found it interesting that there were blue bonnets growing here on the grounds. I guess they were trying hard to make this place feel closer to heaven. 🙂

Blue bonnets in Idaho? Who knew?

After spending the day looking for adventure, we had dinner and parted with our friend Janice for the day. I then decided to hop onto Facebook and see if there were any local birding spots. I got a reply from someone connected with the Coeur d’Alene Audubon Society who recommended we try Fernan Lake. We decide that would be our first stop of the day tomorrow prior to picking up Janice. You see, we love Janice, but she’s just not into birds. 🙂

The next day we do just that. After waking up and eating breakfast, we head out to Frenan Lake to see what it is all about. We were not disappointed. While there is public access at various points around the lake, it is also surrounded by houses and private property. Some of the houses were pretty amazing.

Houses overlooking lake Fernan

We found at the south end of the lake, one of the occupants was an osprey. It was there nearly every day, just waiting for us to catch it and take its photo. Karen got this one.

Osprey on branch

Spend enough time watching an osprey around water and sooner or later it is going to get something to eat. It apparently caught this small fish around the corner because I did not witness the catch, but it did honor us with this fly-by.

Osprey with lunch

There were also several families of Canadian geese in the lake. We saw groups of just a few to one with about 15 little ones in tow. This is one of the families of medium size.

Canadian geese family

And what kind of birding place at a lake would it be without an appearance of a great blue heron! These huge majestic birds make flying look easy. I mean if these huge lanky things can fly, why can’t I?

GBH fly-by

Near the north end of the lake is a patch of water plants with beautiful yellow flowers. It was a very peaceful spot to relax before heading out on another day of adventure in Idaho.

Water flower

And that ends part 2 of our Idaho adventure! Say tuned for part 3!

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 1

by Michael

These posts have been a long time coming. Karen and I took this trip back in May and I’m just now getting around to posting this. It has been a crazy summer with me trying to get my portrait business off the ground and at the same time forcing myself to learn new photo management/editing software. After using Adobe LightRoom for years, I finally decided to make the jump to Capture One. After trying several other competitors I found it the best at giving me everything LightRoom had, plus a little more, but without the monthly license fee. I do not mind paying for software, but to have to pay every month… forever? But, that is a story for a different post. As a side note, all photos in these posts have been processed using Capture One Pro software.

The main purpose of this trip was to visit our long-time friend Janice. We have known her for many years. We attended the same churches and were in a small Bible study group together. She moved from the Dallas area to Coeur d’Alene ID shortly after we moved from the Dallas area to Overton. Karen and I had talked about going for a visit for several years and finally decided it was time to just do it.

We knew very little about the area up there before the trip, and truthfully, due to the timing of the trip, coming right on the heels of Karen’s very busy tax season, we didn’t do a lot of research beforehand. All we knew was that our friend was there and it was supposed to be a beautiful part of the country. That was enough for us.

So, we flew into Spokane WA and met up with Janice for lunch. Our first day was spent getting settled and fed. Janice had a few places picked out to show us over the next few days so we could hardly wait.

For our first day of adventure Janice guided us up Schweitzer Mountain, a nice resort area north of where she lives. The first thing we noticed was all the beautiful mountains in the area, and yes, there was snow! (We haven’t seen much of that in our neck of the woods the last few years so yeah, we were a little excited.)

Entering the Schweizer Mountain Resort area

Taking the drive up the mountain we had to pull off on several overlooks to “look over” the beautiful country. It seemed like every turn opened up a new vista for us to enjoy!

Overlook from Schweitzer Mountain

As we continued up the mountain we wondered if we would see any wildlife. After seeing signs warning of bears we were hopeful of seeing some of those beautiful creatures. Not much farther up the road we did see some wildlife–not bears, but deer. Not as exciting as bears, but just as beautiful and we certainly stopped to enjoy them.

Deer along the road on Schweitzer Mountain

Once we made it to the top of the drive (not the mountain) there was the resort area and lots of condominiums, and a family of bears, or at least as close as we would get to bears on this trip. Of course, Karen made me stop so she could take a few photos. I’m glad she did. 🙂

Bear family hanging out at the condo

Once at the top we took the obligatory selfies and other photos and enjoyed the cooler air. It was pretty cold up there, and I did not bring “cold weather” clothing with me. I dressed more for 60 degree weather, it was closer to mid 30s and windy up there so we didn’t tarry very long. (Note, I’m still trying to figure out how to control 360 degree images in WordPress.)

After poking around up top we headed back down the mountain, only to stop at more overlooks. The scenery was truly breathtaking, from the snow-capped mountains, to the lake, to the dynamic clouds.

Coming down Schweitzer Mountain

At one point we were able to see a couple of small towns at the bottom of the mountain, which I believe are Ponderay (on right) and Kootenai (on left), along with Kootenai Bay on Lake Pend Oreille–at least if my Google Earth skills are not failing me.

Towns at the bottom of Schweitzer Mountain

A little lower down and we can enjoy the true majesty of the mountains as they reach into the sky with the boiling clouds. Very much a sight to behold!

Mountains reaching for the sky

That concluded our first adventure day, but there are several more to come!

Stay tuned!

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