Quote:


Thanks, that is seriously cool.

--kypaddler

portage dog wrote on Nov 24^th, 2015 at 11:07pm:


If you are referring to the GIANT photo of the pike, in reality that was 5 days after we crossed paths. Of course it's the same shirt, I just have my sunshirt on over it!

Anna is our granddaughter, and she was really thrilled with our encounter with the two loons on Poplar Lake.  She was in the middle seat, back there just snapping and snapping away, holding her very nice little camera with one hand.  I was also photographing (some of my shots will come later) and when we saw the results, I was really quite proud to see that she got some that were much better than mine.  And different.

It was a magical afternoon on the water for us.  Anna loves the canoe country almost as much as we do, and the loons seemed to want to give us a "show to remember." 

These were going under the canoe, too.  And getting so close to us that I literally could not focus with my 70-200 zoom lens.  One would come up close and the other one would dive.  They entertained us up by the shore for a few minutes, then they headed out to the more open area of the lake.  We figured, "OK, the show is done."  But they still stayed fairly close, so we followed, and they let us get close again, posed in all sorts of ways (that is when Anna got several photos of the preening), and didn't seem at all threatened by us.  All in all, I think we were photographing them for more than fifteen minutes.

It was fabulous!  I have lots of loon photos, and some are ones I like better than the ones I took that day.  But that day was by far my favorite "loon day" because we were sharing it with Anna.  At the age of 12, she was just at the right maturity to really appreciate the majesty of such a huge bird and to have it almost close enough to touch.  (No, we didn't try to touch them; we would never do that.)

I sent db a representative sampling of our photos.  We got more than a dozen (each) that we liked.  We made a little book on Snapfish for our family and friends for Christmas gifts this year.  Just a lovely day out for a lazy paddle on the lake.  We paddled up to the end of the lake afterwards for our picnic lunch, and we did see them on our way back to the cabin later on, but we didn't disturb them again.  Some things you don't even try to replicate.

This has to be one of the most striking pics ever in the POD
If we had a best pic of the year contest, this would be my choice.