Upper Klamath Lake, Rocky Pt. Resort

Steve and I woke up at about 6:45am this morning, SO EXCITED to go our very first RV adventure! We were almost completely packed and only had a few last things to pack before we were ready to leave. After a delicious breakfast of eggs and sausage, we got on our way at about 10am. A quick stop at a ranch store for few necessities and we aimed towards our destination of Upper Klamath Lake! The drive was incredibly beautiful as it always is, but I don't know if I've ever seen this trip during the vibrant glowing greens of spring. Combined with a bright, sunny day, it was postcard-pretty on our 1.5 hour drive from our home to our camping spot! We were so keyed up, excited and nervous, but we listened to music and just chilled out. Steve had no issues with pulling our "home away from home" and our full-ton, long-bed diesel truck pulled it as if it wasn't pulling anything! Hooray! Once we got there, the folks at the campsite were there to help direct Steve in the back up and positioning of the trailer but armed with walkie-talkies, I was able to do the job just fine and Steve got the trailer in place on the first attempt! He's so awesome! :D Getting set up was fast and easy and soon we were sitting down to hamburgers for lunch, YUM! Afterwards, Steve set up a hammock and enjoyed his handiwork with a well-deserved nap. :) Molly (our dog) and Pumpkin (our bird) both settled in with enormous happy smiles on their faces! They absolutely love this RV deal…heh…YES! Pumpkin was whistling non-stop and Molly was completely entertained by everything she saw. We couldn't be happier. Upper Klamath Lake is just GORGEOUS!!! I'll be sharing plenty of pictures but just didn't have time to post anything but my image for Macro Monday today. I took my older Mark II camera and went on a quick photo shoot but I wasn't happy with what I got so after lunch I grabbed the Mark III and spent more time wandering around. So many neat things to take pictures of! I ended up getting a whole bunch of really neat images that would have worked for Macro Monday but in the end, the picture I chose has a real magical feeling about it and that is the perfect mood for the day! :) Pam, I hope that you have had a nice day! You are in my thoughts and it would be such fun to teleport you to my side so you could be here in this lovely place too! *BIG HUGS* from Upper Klamath Lake!! :) Explored on 4/23/19, highest placement, #4..

(+4 insets!) Sun shining into my cozy little nest woke me up at 6:30am this morning. Pulling out my earplugs, the world was filled with the songs of waking birds in the trees and geese in the distance. It was so fabulous! (see my first inset!) I went up front to snuggle with Steve for about 15 minutes--we both slept very comfortably and felt great! Then we got up to the sound of Pumpkin peeping happily at us. As for our showers, we discovered that if we put her into her plexiglass travel cage, it sits perfectly on the toilet seat while each of us showers…perfect! Pumpkin adores the sound of splashing water so this way she can be in the bathroom with us, whistling and carrying on like the silly girl she is. :) Because we'd done a "trial run" of staying in our RV on our property, there were absolutely no problems with taking showers and getting our day started…how awesome is that?! :) Once Steve had dressed, we set Pumpkin up in her cage and took Molly out on her leash and I took my Sony with me to get some early morning pictures. What a lovely day it was!! Wisps of clouds dotted the bright blue sky and the rippling water twinkled with sun shining on it…so pretty!! I walked out onto the floating dock down to the far end and sat down to soak up the atmosphere. The singing of the birds in the trees was so wonderful to hear. I could see the thick marsh not far off that was a din of birds making all variety of noises. It sounded like an over-booked convention and I looked forward to getting a closer look either today or tomorrow in a canoe. For now, I took pictures of a coot which was swimming around in the reeds, a pair of mallards and some too-far-away ducks I'd never seen before. Got a few pictures of grebes too. None of the birds were really close enough though. I'll cross my fingers for better pictures at some point during our stay. (my last inset shows where I sat!) (By the way, last night I got some really nice pictures of some Brewer's Blackbirds and I hope to get those processed and posted at some point. There is a flock that lives at the resort so getting pictures is a simple thing.) It was the perfect temperature to just sit and enjoy this amazing place…how fortunate we were to have this chance to stay at Upper Klamath Lake! What a pleasure. After enjoying the lovely solitude and beauty for a while, I made my way back to our home away from home and at noon we had a brunch of eggs and sausage with avocado on the side. YUM! Steve is now performing a bit of minor repair to Pumpkin's small hiking cage. We'll take her with us on a little walk along the shoreline while Molly guards the homestead. :) We won't go too far but it's sure to be great fun. :) We just got back from our walk! There was no trail along the shore…much too rocky…but there was a road which followed the lake and there are no cars so it was peaceful and beautiful. We wandered for about a mile or so and stopped at a pretty resort where we all enjoyed some snacks at a picnic table overlooking the lake and its little marina. Pumpkin had a lovely time with us and enjoyed the attention of some folks who came by, totally amazed that we took our parrot with us in a hiking cage! :) When we told them that she's been to Yosemite and loves Tuolomne Meadows and the famous Mist Trail they were properly impressed! :) Our girl's been around and she loves it! :) Well, the barbeque is heating up and we'll be having steak for dinner so it's time to close this report for now! :) My main picture is a view down one side of the RV park's dock with Steve at the end, hands behind his back, appreciating the view. I love this picture because it shows the amazing view of the lake, the dock, and Steve, who was largely responsible for making this dream come true for us. He is content and happy. Everything has worked out perfectly. We did it right. We took our time. This is our reward. How cool is that? :) I'm including a number of insets: PiP #1: My view as I peeked out the window of my "nest" this morning! (This image is poor quality but the view isn't! :D) PiP #2: A beautiful view just a few feet from our RV out onto the lake first thing this morning! PiP #3: A pretty view of the left-side dock with a framing of trees PiP #4: This is where I sat at the end of the dock this morning, drinking in the beauty and serenity of this place. Isn't it amazing? :) Pam, I am sending my happiest wishes your way! And thank you so much for your lovely comments about my trip so far! We're having a lovely time! *BIG HUGS* Explored on 4/24/19, highest placement, #1.

(+2 insets) (Sorry for the War & Peace length…you can skip to the end for info about the pictures! It's important to me that I have a nice journal for myself, so this is excessively long! However, if you've been enjoying my adventures, go get a pot of coffee! :D) Last night after dinner, Steve and I walked out onto the dock and sat down to listen to the evening birdy show. So many kinds of birds I'd never heard of before. My favorites were the birds that sounded like laughing hyenas…one would start going and then a whole flock would join in. I couldn't help but laugh myself! :) Steve thought we could be more comfortable so he returned a few minutes with our new comfy deck chairs and a coat and hat for me. It was starting to get quite chilly with the sun gone for the day and the breeze was kicking up over the lake. My warm sweater wasn't enough but the coat and hat fixed all of that and we sat together in bliss. Almost all of the birds were in the marsh quite some ways from us and we could only see a few specks. We didn't care…being out there was such a joy. The lake and mountains all around were just so lovely. We heard flapping just overhead and saw a pair of Canada Geese fly in and land on the grassy bank nearby. Then we heard honking and in came another one. It nearly crash-landed on one of the two and ran after it, honking and flapping its wings. The two ran around with open wings, challenging one another before taking off and flying out into the lake, making a wide turn and coming back in again, honking the whole time. The third one flew off, honking, to land in the water far off. The two flew away, one chasing the other, and after a couple of minutes, one of them returned to land with the third one in the water. Well, well. Some satisfied honks and the pair swam contentedly away. What a cool thing to witness! With that we decided to head in. It was getting dark, cold and windy, and we were very happy with our commune with Upper Lake Klamath. Bedtime is just like at home with Pumpkin cuddling for an hour while we watch a tv show or part of a movie. We're hoping the tv we got can be better calibrated for proper color rendition but otherwise it's perfect. (Update: Steve fixed the color, yay!)(By the way, watching a show is a nightly routine to get our parrot ready for bed and something we've done every day for almost 20 years since we brought her home! :D) ------------ This morning Steve and I were awoken at 6am by a very loud beep that repeated every 30 seconds or so. We finally determined that it was the propane gas alarm but before we did anything else, Steve opened the doors to ventilate the trailer in case there were any fumes. We were surprised because there shouldn't have been any problems since we weren't doing anything out of the ordinary. Once Steve located the online manual he learned that the sensor was giving an "end of life" battery alarm. We'll replace that first thing when we get home. With the alarming (literally) early wake-up, we both went back to sleep for another hour or so and continued our happy new trailer tradition of a snuggle before starting the day. We are certainly enjoying our trailer and all of us are sleeping very comfortably. This campsite has "full hookups" which mean we have water, electricity and sewer too, so it's all been super easy for us, just as we wanted for our first time out in our RV. The kinks are also worked out for just about everything so our lists of "things missing" and "need to add/fix" are getting much shorter--hooray! Today Steve and I took a canoe out onto Upper Klamath Lake's canoe trail! As expected, we were really excited! After an early brunch of eggs, bacon, and an avocado--along with world-class espresso & cream--we put together a daypack with plenty of snacks, applied sunscreen, brought bug spray and bottles of water and headed out. Steve took his Canon 5D MkIII with our awesome 24-105mm lens. My choice was a no-brainer. I brought my awesome new Sony with its 25x zoom. I had to snicker to myself though…ever since I got my Canon 5D MkII, I'd been dreaming of coming back to Upper Klamath to "retake" my "inferior" pictures (they are actually just fine) taken with my old Canon SX30IS superzoom camera. And now, when I finally get the chance to retake those pictures with my MkII, I'm not doing it. I'm taking my Sony and laughing the whole time! (Also, even if I'd wanted to take it, we have only one 24-105mm and though this is the proper use of our 100-300mm, I'm just not going to deal with that monster lens…it needs a tripod. A tripod in a CANOE? Um…no. LOL. We need to sell that lens I'm afraid. It deserves a home where it will be used! Our canoe trip was a truly lovely experience, as we knew it would be. You cannot beat the beauty of that lake. What a nice time it was, paddling along the canoe trail and listening to the birds everywhere. The sounds of the water as we dipped into the lake and stroked along was soothing as was the lapping of the water up against the boat. Twinkling water and pretty ripples everywhere--it was truly a form of natural meditation to go on this adventure. So serene. We did have to laugh though…getting closer to the birds was not happening. The moment they saw our canoe, you could almost hear the birds scream "EEEEEEEEE!!!" as they took off and flew away! Oh well, we didn't care. Birds were not the only reason to visit this lake! :-) The weather simply couldn't have been better. Blue skies dappled with white sky sheepies, a light breeze and the perfect temperature. We were so happy! We stopped to nibble our snacks here and there, our canoe parked on reeds while we listened to the symphony of birdlife everywhere. Even though the hoards of waterfowl we'd envisioned weren't there, I did get a few pictures of some birds I have never seen before, including my picture of the day! :) One species which is common in wetlands is the lovely Red-Winged Blackbird, and though Steve and I have seen these birds (and now on our property too!), we've never had the chance to take pictures. We got many opportunities on our adventure, which made us both really happy! (I know I got at least one really nice picture but won't be posting it today…I'm so delighted though!) The scenery was also incredible and will be fun to post images of what we got to see! What a place. Totally spectacular!! At one point we passed by some manmade bird houses and sitting on branches nearby were a pair of lovely swallowtails who were contentedly preening their feathers. Overhead there were at least half a dozen more zooming around, diving low over the water and then up again, doing all kinds of acrobatics. All of them were twittering and carrying on grandly. It was straight out of a Disney scene! We were so happy for this aerial show! We ended up going for about 5 miles and both of us were ready to be back after 3 hours of paddling. My arms and shoulders will have a few things to say to me tomorrow morning, I expect! :D What a great time we had! Steve prepared dinner while I read my book "Paddle to the Amazon" in our hammock hanging between two trees, what fun. He knew I'd wanted to spend some time "hanging out" and was happy to accommodate for my "bucket list" item, what a sweetheart! Ok, I have to be done!! Today's picture is a duck that I believe is called a Buffelhead...if you know what else it might be I'd love to have it properly identified! The two insets include a Brewer's Blackbird that I photographed at the campground, and a view of the lake from the camp. So peaceful. :) Pam, I'm hoping all is well with you! Thank you for your sweet comments on my adventure so far! *BIG HUGS* Explored on 4/25/19, highest placement, #3.

(+1 inset) (please view large!) Now that Steve and I have been home from Upper Klamath Lake for a day, we've been reflecting on the differences. Most notably, it was only just entering spring there, though the temperature was quite nice and cold only late at night. Did you experience a long winter where you live? We did and I know that many places in Oregon had a very late winter too. Talking to the folks at Rocky Point Resort, we learned that they've only been open for business for a couple of weeks because their winter was about a month longer than normal--just like us. In fact, daffodils were just beginning to bloom there, whereas our daffodils peaked a month ago. Checking the elevation, I was surprised to find that Upper Klamath Lake sits at 4100 feet, whereas we are at 1500 feet. This all made sense to us when we thought about it and all of this explains why it didn't feel like spring hadn't arrived yet. I've only stayed at a campground once, many years ago, and that was traditional tent camping so it this place was very interesting to me. Modern campgrounds in the United States have specific sites meant for RVs and other spots are just for tents or small camper vans. Some spots have no "hookups" and are just a place to pitch a tent or to "dry camp", which means that you have to provide water and electricity. Fancy spots, like the one we had, included "full hook-ups", which meant we had electricity, water AND a sewer. Sewer hookups are uncommon but most campgrounds offer water and electricity hookups. It was all new and fascinating to me. Another interesting point is that sites are sorted by size of trailer. Many campsites, especially remote ones without the luxury of a lot of space cannot accept camper vehicles at all, only tents. Some can only accommodate camper vans or trailers up to 25 feet long or so. More often than not, campsites are only long enough for a trailer; the truck must be unhooked and parked beside the trailer. However, there are some campsites that have spots which will allow a very long RV AND a truck which doesn't even need to be unhooked! We're talking 80 feet or longer!! That's just astonishing to me! I really shouldn't be surprised because I've seen some unbelievably long combinations of truck + RV or huge motorhome + car towed behind. Still, I never really thought about it before! Did you know that in most cases, you reserve your campsite online? In fact, there are many places that are so popular that you must reserve a spot an entire YEAR (or longer) before you want to go!! And then, there are lots of places that don't allow reservation at all!. How would you like to drive all day to get to a campsite without even knowing if there is a place to pull into?! What do you do if you can't get in? It's a whole new thing for us to learn about and it's lots of fun to figure it all out. I'll be writing about what we learn as we go whenever it's interesting enough to pass along. I expect it's probably fascinating to some of you who live in Europe and don't see anything larger than camper vans. The difference between European camping and US camping totally blows me away and I figure it's fun to read about! I'll do my best to be entertaining! :) Today's picture was taken yesterday morning before sunrise when I stepped out of our RV and headed towards the dock. The colors in the sky behind the bare trees was just incredible. Part of me wanted to rush out to the dock because I didn't want to miss the sunrise but I simply couldn't miss this picture. I'm so glad I got it. :) My inset was the picture I thought about posting yesterday for Happy Fence Friday. It shows the Rocky Point Lodge and the actual "rocky point" which is the namesake of this beautiful place. I am very happy with the way the picture turned out but I don't think it's got the "wow-factor" I am hoping for in a main shot. I hope you like it! This lodge is a restaurant but it's currently being remodeled and because of the long winter they are far behind on the renovations. Maybe we'll get the chance to eat there some day on a return trip! Pam, I did a search for "lake" and came up with a picture that looks a bit like Upper Klamath, namely one of your pictures of Lake Arbuckle ! :D Such a lovely view. Looks like a wonderful place for a picnic! By the way, thank you for your sweet comments about our trip…and I hope that your day has been a nice one! *BIG HUGS* Explored on 4/27/19, highest placement, #2.

(+1 inset) Today I spent several happy hours taking pictures of and processing images for Monday's Macro Monday. In fact, I got so carried away that I totally forgot about my post today! Thankfully I have my next pictures all ready to go from our trip to Upper Klamath Lake! What a special occasion. How many times have you made yourself get up to see the sunrise? I bet there's a whole lot of you who are like me--that number is extremely low, maybe 5 times? I do get up earlier now and sometimes it turns out to be before sunrise but that's not the same thing. What I mean is…you're asleep. You either wake up because of an alarm that you set just for a sunrise or the light wakes you up…you're so tired and groggy and you don't HAVE to get up. It's entirely up to you. When I'm not forced, the result is usually rolling over and going back to sleep! What about you? I'm really happy that I won my epic internal battle to get out of bed so I could be part of the sunrise. I think part of my success lies in the fact that I'm old enough to know how it feels to really regret a bad decision. And I would have been very unhappy if I'd gone back to sleep. There really is something to be said of some sagely wisdom as the years tick by. I posted my silhouetted tree picture but I have other before-sunrise pictures that turned out well so I have two more to share today. The main picture is the left side of the dock with the glowing horizon and cool soft colors everywhere. I even managed to capture a duck in the water, huzzah! My inset is a look down the right side of the dock with the moon above along with a wispy jet trail. (By the way, I'll be posting sunrise images on the day after tomorrow, since tomorrow will be my Macro Monday pictures!) I'm really delighted with how well this new Sony is working out. Our ipernity friend, Roland (ROL/Photo), who was my inspiration to get this firecracker of a camera, gave me a tip about lowering the exposure by a stop in bright situations and it's really helped a lot. I've been able to adjust my images in my Camera RAW application and the dynamic range is super. Even though it wouldn't seem necessary in before-dawn images, the difference between light and dark is quite extreme and it's been wonderful to get better results with my pictures! YAY! Pam, I did a search for "sunrise" and found this beautiful sunrise image you got while in flight to Atlanta Wow, is that lovely. There's something really neat about capturing sunset/rises while flying. I'm glad you got such a nice picture, mine haven' been so successful! Hey, I hope you had a nice day today, you've been in my thoughts! *hugs*

(+2 insets!) Please view large! :) (I'm late again so making this short!) Every day that passes has both Steve and I feeling more excited about our next adventure. We had such a good time on our first RV trip that we're already booked for our next one! We will be going to a nearby destination again just to make sure we're not too far from home if we run into problems. We can't wait! For today, I'm finally posting the sunrise over Upper Lake Klamath. There were clouds in front so it's not a normal kind of sunrise but I really like the way it made the sunrise look. What an incredible moment to experience. I'm so happy I was there. Just look at this reward…even ducks flying by! I just couldn't have asked for more than this. :) I am also sharing two insets: one is a picture of birds on the water with golden light making the cattails glow, and the other is an abstract of the reflection of a jet trail on the water! Pam, I was thinking about my jet trail abstract so I looked up "abstract" on your stream. What a cool image your "Northern Lights" creation is! It gets a 10 on the Groovy scale! :D I hope you had a nice day my dear! *BIG HUGS* Explored on 5/1/19, highest placement, #1.

(+ 2 insets!) The days are beautiful now but it's still just above freezing on most mornings. By the time I get inside from my walk my poor fingers are numb! Ok, ok...I admit that my warm gloves are in our RV and I'm too lazy to go get them. So I've been using my lightweight gloves and they are laughably inadequate for the job. The result is that I have to sit by the heater to thaw my fingers out or put them in a basin of hot water until they're happy again. Sheesh, you would think that my fingers could handle 37-45 degree temperatures without screaming bloody murder. Noop. Ten little babies pitch a fit every day! This morning I thought I'd be clever. I put on TWO pairs of thin gloves, figuring that would do the trick. *sounds a FAIL buzzer* It was almost zero difference at all! Tromping into the house my ears were ringing with all of the screaming going on. Well, maybe I should stop being stubborn and get my warm gloves. Guaranteed that the morning I put them on it will be too warm outside to wear them and I'll be chucking them to the porch after my first lap! HAH! Today I'm posting several pictures from our canoe trip on Upper Klamath Lake. There were Red-Winged Blackbirds all over the place as we paddled along and the sunlight really made their shoulder patches glow a brilliant red and orange. This is the first time I've gotten the chance to get some good pictures of these beautiful birds. There is a pair which is now showing up at our feeders but they are a) never in good light and b) sitting on our feeder (phooey) so I haven't been lucky with them. Plus, the shoulder patches on our birds are much more orange with just a sliver of red. It's a remarkable difference! My main picture is a male who has puffed his feathers up and is making its characteristic song. It's the only time they seem to get hugely fluffy like this and I was overjoyed when I discovered this picture had turned out! If you would like to see these birds making their song, here's a YouTube video! I am also including a couple of other pictures that turned out well! I'm so happy that I now have pictures of this lovely bird! Pam, do you get Red-Winged Blackbirds where you live? I did a search on your stream but didn't see any. I did find a lovely picture of a Grackle and holy cow is that a looker! I love how "black" on a bird is "iridescent rainbow" in the right light! Stunning. I sure do hope you had a good day. Thank you so much for your comments about my pictures, I'm so glad that you have been enjoying them! It makes my day! *hugs* Explored on 5/4/19, highest placement, #5.

(+4 insets!) Holy cow, Steve and I were so busy today! We were out doing errands until dinner and then we had a bunch of stuff to do and ack! It's after 8 and I haven't written my post! Eeek! Eeek! I have been trying to get my scenery images finished from our trip to Upper Klamath Lake because I'm afraid that if I don't get them done now, they will be swept away by the never-ending river of pictures that keep on coming. We'll be leaving on our next trip tomorrow and so I'm just about out of time. Yes, I can go back and process more down the road, but it also might not happen. I actually finished more pictures than I'm posting today but these are all different enough that I can put them together into one presentation. Also, the type of picture is the same and I don't want to water down the beauty of the scenery. Our canoe trip on the Upper Klamath River Canoe Trail was about 5 miles in distance and we spent about 3.5 hours on the water. The views were just breathtaking and it was so relaxing out there that it felt like a state of meditation every time we were quietly paddling along. The peaceful, calming sounds of the water splashing as we stroked, the whooosh-splash as the front of the canoe cut a path through the water…it was wonderful. In the distance, hidden by the marsh, sometimes overhead, we heard the sounds of endless birdlife, many of which we'd never heard before and couldn't imagine what they might even look like. The warm sun on our faces, the breeze dancing through our hair, the smell of the lake and grasses, it all swirled together into an experience that can really only be understood if you are there. It was magical and so special…what a totally fulfilling day in every way. As the afternoon passed by, Steve realized that we needed to pick up the pace or we would arrive later than we were supposed to be out--4 hours--so we began to paddle in earnest. We only stopped a couple of times to take pictures, and one sight that I insisted on photographing was the main picture that you see today! The clouds were moving in front of the sun more and more as time went on and at one point I looked up and saw them edge-lit so perfectly, and to top it off, there was a magnificent reflection. I was over the moon when I looked at my pictures and found that this set had turned out as I had hoped. :) I am also including four insets to give you a better idea of what the views were like as we traveled along. I hope you enjoy the show--I only wish that each of you could have been out there with us taking in these vistas! :) (Sorry about the difference in exposures, I'm still working out the bugs!) Pam, I did another search for "lake" on your stream and this time I picked your Broken Bow Lake image! What a lovely image. Lakes make such wonderful photography subjects and your shot is truly lovely. Here's hoping that you had a good day today!! *BIG HUGS* :D Explored on 5/6/19, highest placement, #4.

Hi everyone! I just wanted to say hello and extend my virtual hugs to everyone who's facing this pandemic in your very neighborhood, perhaps in your own house. I apologize for not stopping by to visit...I am having a terrible time trying to be more sociable and I'm so sorry for neglecting everyone. :( I have read that in these strange times, people will act very oddly as they try to come to grips with these world-wide changes that have blanketed everything. For me, it means doing my best to distract myself with something that keeps me away from the news and makes me really happy--I play games on my computer. And right now I'm playing the adorable Garden Paws, an adorable title that has totally engulfed me. It's exactly what I was looking for! I'm raising darling farm animals, running around doing errands for town folk, picking flowers and petting and taming super cute wild animals on my travels. This is just what I was looking for. Today I'm posting a picture of a gleaming Barn Swallow that I saw when Steve and I went on our first RV trip. It was at Upper Klamath Lake and we had a fantastic time! We saw so many of these beautiful birds and my new Sony did a great job getting me the birdy closeups I'd been pining for! *** Pam, your words of wisdom have been wonderful to read and think about. You're right. This is nature's way of giving us a bit of a smack and making us see the real picture. It will pass...but what a lasting impression it will leave. I hope you guys are safe and well! *BIG HUGS from southern Oregon* Explored on 3/27/20; highest placement #1.