We got up early again and it was clear — not the best conditions for moose photography. I made instant coffee to go and J started a mug of tea steeping. I cleared the layer of ice off the Jeep windows, and we left in the Jeep at 6:23.

We headed to Cameron Pass to look for moose. There were two medium-sized bull moose on the far side of the large willow patch, and we decided to keep going to look for something better. We drove down Long Draw Road to the meadow and small pond near the Trap Park Trailhead, and there weren't any moose there and the sun had risen enough that the area was receiving direct sun — not very good for moose photography.

We headed back towards Cameron Pass and stopped before reaching the top to photograph wildflowers that were still in the shade. Elephant Heads (far left) flowers grow in a cylindrical cluster, and as J says, they're very three-dimensional. In other words, they're fairly difficult to photograph because it's hard to either: 1) isolate one of the flowers, or 2) get enough depth of field to get the whole cluster in focus. I usually try for the latter, but today I discovered a great composition for the former (far left). While the "elephant head" isn't as well defined as on some of the flowers, it is isolated enough from the cluster to stick out.

I really wanted to photograph the Rocky Mountain Fringed Gentian (above right), and finally got around to doing that after I finished with the Elephant Heads. They're a wonderful dark blue flower that closes up when it's cloudy or when it rains. I found a nice specimen that was closed up and had some dew on it.
We returned to the RV around 8:40 and I photographed our resident Golden-Mantled Squirrel. It was quite tolerant of me, and even posed quite nicely (below left). Then I moved the perch I created for our hummingbirds so it was more at my eye level and I set up my Canon Speedlite 580EX II on a Wimberley F-1 Telephoto Flash Bracket with an M-6 Extension Post and an M-4 Macro Arm to position the flash considerably off axis. I was hoping that our female Rufous Hummingbird would model for me, and the flash was to help light up the small patch of red iridescent feathers under her chin, but she didn't. Instead, a female Broad-Tailed Hummingbird perched nicely for me (below right).


I went into the RV around 10:25 and downloaded the images I took this morning. Then I did some computer work. J left around noon to go for a walk.

I had lunch around 12:05. J returned around 12:45 and brought some guy with her. He had been cutting wood near our campsite, and the chain on his chainsaw had come loose. He had asked J if he could borrow some tools to fix the chain, so that's why he was at our RV. I got out a crescent wrench and large slotted screwdriver as he asked, and he was having a hard time getting the first nut off with the crescent wrench. As I was turning to go back to the RV to get a socket wrench, he asked if I had another crescent wrench. I had a 3/4-inch (19mmm) socket that he needed, and that worked much better than the crescent wrench. He finished fixing his chain and gave me some info on where to find wildlife in the area.

I went back inside the RV and finished my lunch then worked up a blog entry. Then I made a first pass through the images to downselect them in Capture One (C1). I processed some images for a stock submission.

We had dinner around 5:10 of leftover brats (for me) and franks (for J).

We left in the Jeep at 6:00.

We headed down CR-21 south of Gould because we wanted to find moose in a different setting than we had been photographing them near Cameron Pass. We saw lots of cows (as in bovines) but no moose. We took FR-740, a 4WD road, to Teller City and then Rand. We saw one medium-sized bull moose that wasn't cooperative near Rand, so the whole excursion was more like just going four-wheeling. Oh, I've been meaning to mention that the Michelin LTX A/T2 tires on the Jeep are great for the kind of 4WD driving we do on the back roads of Colorado. They work great while four-wheeling, and I especially like the quieter and smoother ride on paved roads that they provide compared to the BF Goodrich All-Terrain T/A KO tires that we had been using. Then we took CR-27 back to Gould.

We returned to the RV around 8:25 and I finished downselecting the images from this morning in Capture One (C1). It took me a long time to ID the gentian I photographed this morning.