Nairn Falls

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Waterfalls seemed to be a popular part of our trip to Canada.  We did a short hike to the Nairn Falls, a short drive north of Whistler.  We chose a rainy day to make our walk but a combination of the right clothing and the tree cover the trails enjoyed for the majority of the walk meant this wasn’t a problem.  The rain certainly didn’t hurt the amount of water flowing over the falls.

The falls themselves are in stages.  The first section drops down into a gully which then reverses the flow out in the opposite direction.  This flow seems to involve going under some rocks so floating objects like logs get stuck whirling around on the surface but never getting downstream.  You can head down to a lower level to see more of the falls.  The rocks down to this level were a bit slippery given how much it was raining but there are some handrails for old geezers like me to stabilize myself with.  It was worth the trip.  The bottom of the falls had some strong flows crashing down and they really got your attention.

The downside to exploring the falls was that you were out in the open and the heavens really seemed to deliver while we were there.  Even with the rain gear on, there was only so long I wanted to be out there getting hammered on.  I made the climb back up to the top.  The interesting thing was how many people we saw on the trail out and back but how few seemed to explore the falls themselves.  Maybe they didn’t want to get too wet in the rain or perhaps they didn’t realize how far down you could get.  I’m glad I checked it all out.

Thai Delivery

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Before the time changed, it was possible to get some evening departures from Everett in nice light after work.  I saw that a delivery flight was scheduled for a Thai 787 and a Dreamlifter was due out shortly afterwards.  I figured this was a good one to go for.  The Thai delivery actually slipped a bit from its scheduled time and I was more than happy for it to do so as the light was getting better and better.  By the time the jet started rolling, the light couldn’t have been nicer.  It was also a heavy jet and rotated not far from me so I got a great angle on the takeoff and, as it climbed away, the purple in the livery seemed to glow.

High Tide Through the Drains

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The tide was very high when we got the parade in Cowes.  The water level was just below the street level.  Naturally, there was some swell, even though we were inside the harbor wall.  This meant the water was pushing back up through the drains that normally take water from the street down to the sea.  The water would force itself back up through the drains.  Sometimes it was just a small amount of water but the bigger waves resulted in a bit more flow back out of the drain.  Video is the best way to show this.  The metal of the drain cover had the level of corrosion you would expect for something with this proximity to the sea!

P-3s May Be Going But There Are Still Some

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A trip to Whidbey Island for me and Paul was aimed at seeing whatever we could get there on a random weekday.  In truth, though, what we really wanted was P-3s.  With the Orions rapidly being replaced by P-8s, they are getting harder to find and will soon be a memory.  Consequently, our fingers were crossed for some of Lockheed’s aging subhunters.  It turned out we were lucky.

It wasn’t a busy day for the turboprops but we did get to see a few.  A departure early on meant we were pleased to have had some success.  We also got arrival traffic later which certainly was pleasing.  Our only disappointment was that one of the planes was operating with a rare canoe under the fuselage.  We saw it in the distance (when the shots are horribly distorted by heat haze) but it was operating off a different runway from that which we were near, and we never were in the right place.  However, we did get some of its buddies so a successful day out.

Fall Foliage in Bothell

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The area around where I work has a lot of trees and they have turned out to be the sort of trees that get very colorful in the fall.  It is really nice to be able to look out of my window and see such vibrant colors when the sun pops out (which it does do in the Pacific Northwest sometimes).  I had driven down the road in the opposite direction to normal one evening and saw even more color so, when the sun was out one weekend evening, we diverted to the area so I could get some shots.

The richness of the colors is sometimes hard to represent with photos.  They don’t always have the impact that being there had but hopefully some of these shots will give you an idea of how pretty the street was.

Bye Bye United 747s

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The disappearance of passenger 747s from service continues.  Today is the last day for the United 747 fleet.  I do not have anything of their earlier versions of the jet but I have seen the 747-400s in service a lot and have flown on them a couple of times too.  I won’t be doing so again.  A flight from San Francisco to Honolulu will repeat the first service and was sold out a long time ago.  The planes have been heading to the storage yards in recent weeks and after today, there is one more to make the trip.  Now the 777s and 787s will be responsible for the long-haul services.

Whistler Sliding Centre

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For some strange reason, the first few days we were in Whistler, I didn’t think about some of the locations that should be there for a Winter Olympics.  Then I saw a sign for the Sliding Centre and decided to check it out.  This was the home of the bobsled, luge and skeleton events.  I don’t know what I had been thinking but the place really surprised me.  I knew that the course was down a hill and how fast the competitors go but I hadn’t realized just how steep the descent would be.  I figured sliding downhill on ice, it wasn’t hard to go really fast.

In fact, the run drops down some incredibly steep slopes.  We were walking alongside the track and it was really steep just going up the road.  Sadly, photographs never do justice to steep slopes but believe me when I say this place was steep.  The idea of coming down it on a sledge seems insane.  No wonder the crashes are so spectacular.  Not only that but the end of the course always seems to be on the level when you watch it on TV.  In fact, it goes back up the hill very steeply.  This was also totally unexpected.

We met a bunch of guys that were using knife like tools to shape the ice.  Apparently, they had been running that morning and we had missed it.  They were due to run the following afternoon but we were leaving before that.  It was a shame to miss the action.  As they weren’t running, covers were over the entire course to protect it from the weather but you could still peak between the blinds to see the track itself.  A very impressive place and I will have to try and get back there at some point to see the competitors in action.

Cormorant at Low Shutter Speed

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An impromptu shot of a cormorant is a good thing as far as I am concerned.  Normally when I photograph birds, I am shooting wide open at as high a shutter speed as possible.  However, this time I was set up for shooting at a lower shutter speed when the cormorant came by.  Consequently, the success rate was down a bit.  I did still get some shots though and the motion blur gives more of a feel of speed, even if it is just the water blurring out.

Off to Warsaw

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If you buy a car, you go to the dealer to pick it up.  If you buy an airliner, there might not be a dealer but you will still go to pick it up.  After the production test flights have been completed, the customer gets to carry out their own test flights.  If all squawks have been dealt with, time to pay and take the “keys”.  Then a crew from the airline will fly the plane to their home base.  This 787 had been handed over to LOT and the crew were flying it back to Warsaw.  Delivery flights are often obvious from the takeoff roll.  Fueled up for a long trip, they use a bit more of the runway than the test flights do.  In a short while, this jet will be busy plying the LOT route structure.

Hovercraft Transitions

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The hovercraft that ply the route between Ryde on the Isle of Wight and Southsea on the mainland have made a few previous appearances in this blog.  I knew that the old hovercraft were due for replacement and that the new craft were coming in to service and figured that I wouldn’t be back before the changeover took place.  However, the transition has not been smooth and there have been a number of technical issues with the new craft.  Consequently, they have brought the old craft back in to regular use until things are finally fixed.

When I visited the Island recently, none of them were running!  A large storm system was sweeping across the country and the high winds had brought a halt to hovercraft operations.  This was pretty disappointing to me.  However, it did have one unusual effect and that was that all four of the fleet were parked up on the slipway at Ryde during the day.  Over the years the slipway has been expanded and improved from its original configuration, but it is still a tight fit for four craft.  It would have been pretty interesting to see them all being fitted into place.  Maybe this will be my last time seeing the old AP1-88s?