A Wet Day

The forecast for the mountains on Monday was for showers. I thought that this might make for a good photography day on the Lake Ann trail due to overcast lighting and mountains partially shrouded by clouds. I've gone out into the mountains before and had such success under a forecast of showers, photographing under nicely overcast skies while dodging a few quick squirts of rain.

This time, I was not so fortunate. It rained like the dickens all morning, even soaking through my backpack. My sandwiches were ruined. More tragically for the photographic prospects of the day, both of the cleaning cloths that I use to clean lenses and filters were soaking wet - and my filters were wet and smeared due to the rain. To top it all, I only had a few short windows in which the rain stopped falling and I could actually take any pictures at all. (Even if I use an umbrella in the rain, I still have to chase stray drops on my lens - which I couldn't do without cleaning equipment).

We'll start with the star of the show, Mount Shuksan. This image is from one of the backcountry campsites at the end of the trail above the lake; the big glacier smiling at you in the lower part of the frame is the Lower Curtis Glacier. The clouds at upper left are slightly overexposed, but not badly. I like them bright, anyway, it accentuates the idea of a clearing storm or shower, which was in fact what was happening. F/16.

Before I hiked the Lake Ann trail, I visited Picture Lake. It was not raining then, and I got a nice image of some fireweed with partially-shrouded Mount Shuksan in the background. F/6.3.

Here is a close-up of the flowers of false hellebore, or corn lily (Veratrum viride). Although most of the wildflowers on the trail were past peak, these were blooming everywhere. F/5.

Finally, an image of some lichen-festooned trunks from near the beginning of the trail. I think this is one of the better lichen/forest images I have, in terms of being a clear composition. F/14.