A Banff road trip morning

As I alluded in my photoblog here, Banff is over exposed as a photo destination. (See what I did there?) Still, I had wanted to meet up with Sean before he got deeply involved with a personal project, and he suggested a road trip to Banff area. We explored up the road to Lake Minnewanka, and Vermillion Lakes, which I had never been to.

The important part of the trip was the chat, mostly about our various projects, coping with the stresses of early retirement, and other topics relevant to our age, hobbies, and former profession. From that point of view the trip was a complete success. Not so much from a film perspective, but you can read about that in the link above.

Some of the chat has made me think about the changes to the world. It's common for the elderly to moan about how the world has gone to pot, and it's been happening since writing was invented. I referred to that a little here in a response to Janice. Since then Trump is out of office, the writing is on the wall for Kenney, Ford seems to have improved though I'm not following Ontario news and could be mistaken, and the biggest bully has stepped into what has turned into a huge pile of dog shit. Putin will never scrap this invasion mess off his boots. To be clear, it's the invasion that's the dog shit. Ukrainians are the scrappy underdog here, fighting for their homeland, and more power to them. I've donated some money.

Are things getting better? I'm an optimistic person and would like to think so, though I have to admit the 'Freedum Convoy' and related events have shaken my faith. There are still people protesting about COVID restrictions that no longer exist. Why? Because they think Kenney will re-impose them, just to personally inconvenience the protesters. Yes, that really is as stupid as it sounds.

Don't get me started on gas prices. There was a guy in the hot tub the other day on about the price of gas. He was convinced that the 'natural' price of gasoline was about a dollar a litre, and everything over that was the Trudeau carbon tax. The latest jump, from about $1.46 to 1.66, according to him, is a carbon surtax imposed to drive Albertans to their knees. (That's a quote.) Never mind that prices elsewhere are higher. Meanwhile, the Costco across the road has had to hire staff to direct traffic on the entry road. People are waiting in a long line for gas that is a few cents cheaper. Is their time worth nothing? How much gas are they burning as their car idles in the line up?

In the meantime, I'm keeping a low profile, working on my various projects. Linda is eagerly awaiting spring and making plans for the garden, but knowing full well spring is still on vacation in the tropics, working on her tan, sipping one of those tall fruity drinks with the little umbrella. 

I digressed there. Mostly on the Banff trip I wanted to shoot some film, and that didn't go so well, but there's some digital images I liked from the trip.

1. Sean contemplating his composition options.

2. 

3.

4.

5. I liked the tree against the mountain background and tried several times with different lenses. What was really needed was the tripod.

6. We were astonished to see open water, with a bit of mist every now and then. There's a hot spring somewhere nearby.

7.

8. Near Bow falls. There's probably a million of these three photos out on the web.

9.

10

Of the Day

Driftwood

I was pretty sure that wasn't a squid trying to lure me into tentacle reach. 

Peony

Lily

Film (6x9) There I was with the loaner camera at the downtown public library, after checking out the swanky new parking lot. For much of my time here that was a surface parking lot used mainly by people going to City Hall. We parked in it many times. During my time at Penn West I had an ironclad rule that I needed to be out of the office by a certain time so I could meet Linda getting out of her office. The Salvation Army Center of Hope is just across the road, and with the Mustard Seed and Drop In Center only a few blocks away, and that clientele sometimes leads to interesting street life. There's another view of this here, and I had to wait a few minutes so that some of that street life was not prominent in the image.