From Worst to Best

Cat Basin in Fog

These photos are from a long ago hike. One of the toughest days I have had backpacking … the “off trail” traverse from Appleton Pass to Cat Basin in the Olympic National Park. As we struggled across the side hill, the clouds came in and our visibility dropped. While we were on the sidehill, there was no real chance of losing our way, since we could just keep the uphill side to our right, until we ran into the Cat Basin Trail that comes in from the High Divide. We were tired and set up camp in a small flat spot above the trail. We were sorta miserable and thought the spot was one of the worse we had camped in. But in the morning, the cloud was gone and we were looking directly down into Cat Basin and a herd of a hundred or so Olympic Elk. It went from one of the worse camps we had to one of the best … in a few hours.

Elk in Cat Basin

Road and Deer

Fort Worden Roadway

Walking the roads in Fort Worden, you can often find yourself sharing the roads with deer. In the image below, the young deer (a yearling) is experiencing its first snow. It’s mother is off the road to the right … the teen-fawn seemed a little uncertain about this cold white stuff. And I imaged it was wondering if mom was going to order out dinner.

Greedy Little Buggers

Greedy Little Bugger

We’ve been having a cold spell here in the Puget Sound area. Cold enough that the nectar in my hummingbird feeders froze up. So, I’ve been shuttling them inside to thaw them out. Unfortunately, I’ll get one greedy little bugger keeping other hummers away. Even when it’s not feeding, it will perch nearby and chase off any other comers. Seems like an almost human behavior… when you reflect on the behavior of some of the worse examples of those in the news.

Standing Guard
Hogging the Feeder

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