Whiskey Gulch Campground Views

4-23-2019

A Panoramic View

Whiskey Gulch Campground is a very easy turn-off to miss. It is almost only a driveway type entrance, and you are past it before you even realize it. We have been meaning to stop and check it out several times, but always missed the turn. Since we were often on our way to another locations further south it just never made sense for us to turn around, we would get there one day. So yesterday was a mountain/beach photo drive to the south, and very little traffic on the road so we finally made it.

Here is a panoramic view of the mountains across the inlet:

Big View

It was both a really good outing and a letdown of an outing. The whole reason was to go and get some fresh mountain view pictures to take. Even after having my camera for a little over a year I still have a lot to learn and remember. Simple things really, like make sure lens is clean, and most important of all, what is the ISO speed set at. You see I change it a lot from day to day and depending on what I am trying to do, and the weather. I do not always remember to check it. So almost all my pictures were shot in nice daylight conditions at 1250 ISO, so most of them looked really overexposed.

Here is a non-retouched JPEG image from the middle part of the panoramic creation.

Everything pretty much washed out flat and colorless looking. The sky was so much bluer than what the images showed. I was pretty bummed when I noticed the ISO setting, oh well, at least the software was able to fix some of my error.

It really is beginning to be spring in Alaska. Although Homer had some snow on Sunday evening. This weekend I got a nice shot of a Sitka Rose beginning to bud out, the pussy willows are out pussy-fying their branches and the Birch are beginning to bud out also. They even had green lawns down in Homer. Here at Whiskey Gulch Campground, the Alder bushes are beginning to leaf out also. Not a fantastic shot but it does show the greening and opening of the leaves.

Signs of the future

And since we have a signs of the future to come picture, here is one of the past:

The dried yarrow tops are nice to take pictures of.

Looking down to the beach

We do a lot of looking up, and looking out, and rarely do we get to look way down.

Just a little bit past the campground is a road that you can drive down to the beach on. It is a pretty steep road, and I would have to think twice if it was raining, since mud can be as slippery as ice at times. That's another post though.

Hopefully on the next excursion I remember to do a pre-check of my camera settings.