Some pictures from our 2017 USA Road Trip ... part 1

Stormbringer

We started in Seattle, went through Clarkston and Missoula to Gardiner, spent a week in Yellowstone. Then down to Boise, over to Portland, up through the Olympic Peninsula and back to Seattle. A truly amazing road trip that topped last year, something I didn't think was possible.

As with last year's road trip, SWMBO took around 6000 photos. Here is a first selection, more to come when she's sorted them out.

Lake at Snoqualmie Pass en route to Clarkston:


On route 12 going through the Clearwater National Forest:


Sunset at Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone:




Sunrise the next day at Mammoth Hot Springs, overlook plateau:


It snowed whilst we were there:




And a few more landscapes:






Lake Yellowstone, just south of the Lake Hotel:


We saw a fair amount of wildlife:


















Thanks for looking.

thetrim

Awesome pics.  Next time, I recommend giving the little bear cub come honey to lure it to you and see if it'll let you pet it.

ewyllins

Incredible Pics dont forget to feed the wildlife

Eggdicted_Dawgfan

Man those pictures are unreal. Your wife knows what she's doing with that camera. Sounds like a great road trip. 

Eggdicted_Dawgfan

I can see the slobber on the bears whiskers. How far away was that taken? 

jdkeithbge

Your wife is a fantastic photographer!  Amazing pics.

Carolina Q

Excellent! Thanks for posting!

Wolfpack

Looks like an amazing trip- thanks for sharing your adventure. Let me know when your going next year

Acn

Phenomenal pics, thanks for sharing.

What are you shooting with?

krobertsmsn

beautiful!!!

Foghorn

Spectacular. 

GrillSgt

OT OT OT. Damnit you forgot OT. 

Great pics, looked like an awesome trip. RV? Camper?

erniemcclain

Bravo!!!

nolaegghead

Phenomenal photography!

Stormbringer

Thanks, folks.

@Eggdicted_Dawgfan that bear was about 150 yards away. The sun was in the perfect place, around 2 o'clock relative to the bear. It also wasn't moving and SWMBO had managed to get the camera stable on some rocks (see tripod comment below to Acn).

@Wolfpack we're already booked into Yellowstone accommodation for next June. On June 13th 2018 the core of the galaxy will be visible from Lake Yellowstone at a 14 degree inclination, so providing there's little cloud it should be perfect viewing conditions. It's this (not taken by us ... yet):



@Acn we use a Canon D60 with Tamron wide angle lens for landscape shots and D80 for everything else. The D80 has a Canon zoom lens and also a Sigma 150 x 600 zoom. The one thing we learned this holiday is to get better tripods, the picture below is of four wolves from a pack trying to take down a bison, it was about a mile away and the wobble on the tripod made it very blurred.



We were taken around Yellowstone by a professional photographer (Deby Dixon, highly recommend her) and she had some Manfrotto tripods. Those things are rock solid.

@GrillSgt we were in a Mitsubishi Sante Fe, staying in motels. No chains, unless we had no choice, ones worth mentioning as they were fantastic:

Missoula - Gibson Mansion
Gardiner/Yellowstone - Yellowstone Village Inn
Boise - Anniversary Inn
Portland - Benson Hotel (ok it's a hotel, but it was lovely)
Olympia - Manitou Lodge, near Forks

This is about half of the trip. SWMBO is still working on the other half.

Eggdicted_Dawgfan

@Stormbringer those are some very nice tools you have. Hopefully that buffalo put those wolves in their place like our buffalo does around here. Looking forward to the 2nd half of the pics. 

DoubleEgger

Very nice pics. I agree about the tripods. A quality carbon fiber (fibre for you folks) tripod with a good head is a must. 

YukonRon

These images captured are astounding. I love Yellowstone. It is visual sensory overload, as each time you pass the most cool or the most beautiful Vista, you have ever seen in your life, around the corner or over the hill is the next most cool thing or beautiful view ever.
Thank you for sharing. Sometimes people forget how beautiful and diverse our country is.
Awesome trip, I hope you enjoyed the experience. 

Kayak

@stormbringer Take a look at a Ravelli tripod. Solid as a rock, and you won't feel so bad when you finally shove it into the back of the closet after lugging it over hill and dale for a few years...

Stormbringer

@DoubleEgger that's what we're going for. The aluminum ones just weren't cutting it.

@Eggdicted_Dawgfan the wolves were sent packing that day, yes. It was fascinating to watch their strategy though, four of them went for a female, drawing the males away from the herd. Then from the undergrowth three wolves appeared and went for the calves, however the males saw this and when back to the herd. The wolves bugged out at that point. All the while a coyote was watching from a distance, hoping that something would get taken down and there would be scraps left over. I always thought wildlife documentaries spliced footage together to show this sort of stuff but nope, it all unraveled in front of us.

@Kayak thanks, we'll look into it. We have got a Manfrotto tripod for one of the cameras, we still need two more for the other camera and the spotting scope.

CigarCityEgger

Wow. Absolutely beautiful pics

Stormbringer

YukonRon said:

Sometimes people forget how beautiful and diverse our country is.

^^ this. I've started reading Blue Highways by Williams Least Heat-Moon, his journey is one to aspire to. The depth and breadth of culture, scenery and climate that he experienced is inspirational.

Mickey

Thank you for the post. Please keep them coming. 

JohnInCarolina

Awesome photos.  We have such a beautiful country - love that part of it.

THEBuckeye

America THE Beautiful

kl8ton

Seeing your post about part 2 of your road trip had me searching for part 1.  Is it possible that you could provide a windows desktop wallpaper service?  Yours is better than what microsoft finds to put up there!

gbvinla

Beautiful Photos of a scenic part of this great country. Thanks  

oldmandawg

Wonderful pics. Wish I could get out that way more often.

northGAcock

Beautiful shots....love the wildlife.

GATraveller

Great pics.  Thanks for sharing!!!