One of the keys to observation is to keep your eyes moving. That means keeping your head moving too, including looking up. I have always tried to remember to include looking up. I have a lot of shots that I have taken looking up through the trees … and most of them are pretty boring. I like this one, though.
Taken along the Dosewallips Trail in the Olympic National Forest. Those are big leaf maples with a couple of spruce mixed in (and maybe a couple of alders in the top.
This was taken in early November and it wasn’t a particularly cold day. But it had been raining a lot and it had cleared off and there may have been frost overnight. I say “may have been” because we didn’t get a particularly early start and by the time I took this picture, it was almost 2 pm. You could see the sun hitting the trees and the mist coming off. Really very nice.
This was taken along the Dosewallips Road in the Olympic National Forest, just past the washout.
I thought I would share one of the last of the images from our recent hike up the Dosewallips River Trail. The images above was taken with my iPhone 16 Pro Max. Note the lack of a ‘sun burst’ where the sun is peaking around the maple. (for comparison, see previous post https://ajjphotoblog.com/?p=15948)
Below, another view of the Dosewallips River Trail. We both enjoyed hiking this section of the trail where there were lots of dry leaves to kick and crunch. A joy not to have to rake all these! (in the past I spent one day each weekend working on clearing the lawn of leaves this time of year)
Here’s another comparison between a main trail: above see the Dosewallips trail where the forest is reclaiming the old road and below, where a spur trail runs down to a unofficial campsite along the river.
It seems that there are differences in how individual trees in a particular location respond to the advent of fall … leaf coloration and leaf retention. For instance, the image above was taken the same day as the image below … and just a short distance away on the Dosewallips River trail in the Olympic National Forest. I suppose some difference is genetic and some is due to the amount of water each gives in comparison to the other.
