But it wasn't just the silhouettes that attracted me, it was also
the bright blue sky with incredible clouds and the birds constantly flying above my head.
But it was really hard to stay on the path when the water was far
from the shore... So I went off the beaten path and enjoyed walking on
the hard (almost frozen) sand, staying as close to the water line as
possible.
Trees and mountains... Whatever direction I pointed my camera at, the views were truly spectacular...
Strangely, all the birds preferred on the west side of the lake (I
don't know why, from my perspective the water looked the same on the
south side as well) and were in the air the whole time, taking off and
landing, so the others could take off and stretch their wings...
No wonder there were a lot of feathers on the sand... of different
colors and shapes... I think that on this day the feathers might have
been the only target, but I still looked higher and further from where I
was walking...
I was looking for bald eagles. The ranger we talked to a couple of
months ago told us that there are usually about 40-50 eagles wintering
here, so some of them would be friendly enough and wouldn't mind if I
took their portraits :) But the ones I could see from the middle of the
lake were too far away... So I went closer...
I actually managed to count over a dozen Bald Eagles sitting in the
tree branches. There are three of them, camouflaged, so it took a while
for me to find them :)
How many of these gorgeous birds can you spot here? hint - there
are four ;) And maybe a couple more that I couldn't find or that are
sitting on the opposite side of the trees :)
I returned back to the trail and continued walking and admiring the
trees along the path. Still wanted to capture an eagle or two, but it
wouldn't disappoint me if no one wanted to pose for me...
I met a couple of deer and turned around to try the other end of
the lake, where fewer bird watchers were hiking in big groups...
Didn't I tell you that the water around the lake is the same? These
ducks thought so too.. But I just asked myself - why I didn't see any birds just 15 minutes
ago, and now they're flying in and out looking for food.
I circled around and started walking again, but I went in the
opposite direction... Soon I spotted a bald eagle in a tree about half a
mile away... It was a promising start, I thought :)
5 minutes later I was close enough to admire the bird. I guess it
saw me from a distance, but as I approached it never looked at me. It
probably thought I was too big for breakfast, but too far away to be
dangerous. This gave me a chance to watch it before it decided it was
time to stop posing...
The eagle spread its wings, and a second later it was gracefully
soaring through the sky, moving further and further away from the tree
where it had been staying for a while.
It was a pleasant encounter. I looked around and saw no more
eagles. Probably the resting time was over, and they all flew off
somewhere else to have breakfast or to an important meeting where they
discussed annoying photographers and bird watchers who did not respect
the importance of not interfering with the personal space of eagles
(even though we never go too close and try not to disturb the birds)...
So I just turned around and walked back to my car, still enjoying
the tree silhouettes and the cloudy sky. 6 miles seemed enough to walk
in one morning...
Oh these trees... Isn't it gorgeous?
So the second part of the hike was half as long (and I also forgot
to start tracking, so the first quarter was lost), but when I put it on
the map I realized that I didn't walk along the shore at all but always
stayed in the water and I didn't remember that... Crazy, huh?
The pictures were taken on January 11, 2025.
Hauntingly beautiful silhouettes
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