I have arrived at the Elephant
I slowly oozed out of bed this morning, still half asleep and fully dressed from my 3 AM Milky Way picture-taking quest. I put away a few things that tend to fall off the kitchen counter, slid into the truck’s driver’s seat, and slowly exited the City of Rocks State Park.
In no time, the 45° breeze blowing in my open window cleared the cobwebs from my mind, and it became all too apparent that it was 7:30 a.m. and I hadn't had a cup of coffee yet.
After a stress-free 125-mile drive, I stopped at the Elephant Butte State Park entrance and asked the person who takes your money if all the boondocking campsites on Ridge Road are still free to camp with an annual camping pass. She assured me they were, which got me over my first hurdle.
I then hot-footed it over to Ridge Road and, miracle of miracles, found my favorite boondocking spot empty. I slid out of the driver's seat, and five minutes later, my Lance camper had been transformed from a highly mobile camper into a home.
Since I ended up with some decent pictures of the Milky Way, I figured I would try to get a better picture tonight. I think the biggest problem with the Milky Way pictures I took at City of Rocks, other than having to get up at 3 a.m., is that nothing was interesting in the foreground of the image; it's just an empty field. But I think where I'm sitting now, the Milky Way will rise over the Elephant Butte Marina, which might make for a more interesting picture.... But that still doesn't help me get out of bed at 0 dark 30.
Theboondork
It took a while, but everything finally lined up, and I got a usable snapshot or two of the Milky Way. If you take pictures of stars all the time, it's relatively simple, but if you don't do it very often, like me, the camera settings are almost the complete opposite of what I'm used to using for normal pictures. It takes a lot of experimenting to get it right. But all in all, I still found that the biggest problem taking photos of the Milky Way is getting out of bed and standing outside in the cold at 3 a.m.
I had to drag out my tripod to take these pictures because the exposure is about 30 seconds long.
I’m going to take more Milky Way pictures tonight because I think the Milky Way will rise up near the marina, which might make a pretty picture.
My oldest son flew down to Louisiana to fish. He didn't rent a boat; he and a friend just fished from the shore and caught a few fish. My son is, without a doubt, the best fisherman I've ever seen. I swear he could catch Sailfish in a swimming pool if he wanted to.
A Black Drum.
A big Catfish.
A bigger Catfish. This one is almost 4 feet long. He always returns all the fish he catches to the water.