My husband and I took a nice drive yesterday, planning to go to Deadwood to see classic cars, but we were a week early, so Plan B had us making our way to Spearfish Canyon. We stopped and took the trail to Spearfish Falls, the one falls in the canyon that we hadn't seen yet, out of three...
Along the trail, a wooden bridge crosses Spearfish Creek...
Yellow leaves among the green... Need I say more?
Spearfish Falls at last; nice! The path leads fairly close to the falls...we could feel the spray thanks to the breeze. The other two falls in the canyon are Bridal Veil Falls and Roughlock Falls.
The trail to the falls is a loop; we crossed over the creek a 2nd time at this metal bridge on the way back to the car.
Further up the canyon road, we saw a couple people taking photos of something between the road and Spearfish Creek. Then I saw the hawk perched on a small, short sign. Holy cow! I told hubby to pull over, and jumped out of the car, all the while kicking myself for not having brought the 300mm lens, ARG! ARG! ARG! (Didn't need it for the Deadwood plan...but still I knew I should bring it "in case"...but did not)...I was able to get within 20-25 ft of the hawk to take photos, but the pics still came out unfocused, as I knew they would. Gotta have the 300 mm! I think this is a red-tailed hawk. Photo doesn't do it justice, he was gorgeous!
Along the trail, a wooden bridge crosses Spearfish Creek...
Yellow leaves among the green... Need I say more?
Spearfish Falls at last; nice! The path leads fairly close to the falls...we could feel the spray thanks to the breeze. The other two falls in the canyon are Bridal Veil Falls and Roughlock Falls.
The trail to the falls is a loop; we crossed over the creek a 2nd time at this metal bridge on the way back to the car.
Further up the canyon road, we saw a couple people taking photos of something between the road and Spearfish Creek. Then I saw the hawk perched on a small, short sign. Holy cow! I told hubby to pull over, and jumped out of the car, all the while kicking myself for not having brought the 300mm lens, ARG! ARG! ARG! (Didn't need it for the Deadwood plan...but still I knew I should bring it "in case"...but did not)...I was able to get within 20-25 ft of the hawk to take photos, but the pics still came out unfocused, as I knew they would. Gotta have the 300 mm! I think this is a red-tailed hawk. Photo doesn't do it justice, he was gorgeous!
AMAZING!!!! The canyon pics looks great,you have so many beautiful places around you..
ReplyDeleteIsn't nature simply beautiful?
ReplyDeleteSounds like a wonderful day as most are once we get outside and into nature. Great photos.
ReplyDeleteJ'ellen please contact me as I really like your Black Hills pictures. I think our sites have some common objectives. I would like to feature your site so lets at least discuss the subject!
ReplyDeleteIn your nice photo of the hawk...he seems to be staring right at you Jann...and the falls are beautiful!
ReplyDeleteWhat a beautiful place. You are lucky the hawk let you get so close. Our resident hawk never has let me get closer than a couple hundred feet. He is extremely shy. Coming home yesterday I frightened him up out of the grass. I was probably only about 40-feet away in my car but of course didn't have a camera and couldn't have gotten to it in time.
ReplyDeleteUsually this time of year I see an entire hawk family flying over the farm but not this summer. I'm wondering if something happened to the young hawks or perhaps there just were none.
Marnie