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Backyard Pool

The Tiny Wedding venue is sometimes in the backyard of the people who run the business.  It was my first time being there~~oh, to have a pool like this... 

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Flower Decor

I went to the Abilene Mall and outside one of the doors was this display of plants and flowers.

I just thought it looked so nice, so I grabbed an shot of it with my cellphone.

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Japanese Garden

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Cheetah at the Zoo

Even though the holidays are over and all the decorations have been taken down at the local zoo, I decided to go there because the weather was so beautiful and I thought the animals might be a little more active because of the coolers temps.  

This Cheetah was walking around its enclosure and then it finally settled high up on the rock formation.  I was able to get an image that pretty much blurred out the bars.

Just gorgeous!

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Rustic Steps at the State Park

I took a drive to the state park about ½ hour from here.  It's really not a very exciting park, but there were a lot of people wandering the trails and a lot of campers, probably because it was a holiday and the weather was so beautiful.  I love these stairs, but one can only make just so many images of them.  I've made one or two images in the summer when things are more green, but it still doesn't look much different.

At least it was some outdoor exercise and it was great to be walking through a forested-looking area rather than the track around the gym at the Y.

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Zoo enclosure fence

At the abandoned zoo in Sisco, Texas, there are still remnants of fences that, once-upon-a-time, provided enclosures for the animals.   

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Lighted Poles on ACU campus

These lighted poles are seen on the campus of Abilene Christian University.  It seems there must be some kind of scavenger hunt with the lights since there is a sign to scan a bar code about the lights.

I didn't scan the code, I just wanted to grab a photo or two.

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End of Track

One set of train tracks in Abilene, TX comes to an end.  Another set goes straight through the downtown area.  

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Another animal enclosure

This is one of the animal enclosures in the abandoned zoo in Cisco, TX.  

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Abandoned Animal enclosure

In Cisco, TX there's an abandoned zoo.  It was active in the 1920s-1930s.  As primitive as it seems now, it was state of the art at the time.  It closed because of several suspicious animal deaths within the zoo.

Now there's about a mile of walking trail through what once was the zoo grounds and you can see the remnants of the enclosures and some of the fencing.

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Railway Spike

I saw this while walking around downtown where there are many railroad cars that look like they've been abandoned.

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Stream in Great Smokey Mountain National Park

It was a dreary day, sometimes rainy.  The wind was blowing and the roads through the park were closed because of falling branches.  Sigh

I'm grateful for:

winter scenery 

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Jaguar

This Jaguar is resting in his enclosure at the Abilene, Texas Zoo.  Jaguars have two color palettes, the one seen here and total black.  They're local to South America.

My heart is grateful today that:

it was such a peaceful day

Second Pond Trail,  5.4 RT

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Another hike.  Another spectacular day.  However, I think I'm going to have to stop posting about our hikes.  Not that they aren't great, at least so far.  Not that they aren't worth writing about.  Not that they aren't a great opportunity to get outdoors and spend time with good friends. 

Just that they're beginning to look an awful lot alike.  Really....the woods are the woods are the woods, and even I'm beginning to think I don't really need to take photos every time we set foot on a trail.  So maybe I'll only post the images of whatever might be a little out of the ordinary.  

Now that we have a few "moderate" hikes under our belts, we're talking about tackling longer ones.  

Oi !!!  

But I digress.  Today's hike ended at a small lake, at a not-too-hiker-friendly area.  No comfortable place to sit, no way to get close to the water.  But we managed to eat our lunch and enjoy the breeze.  

the photographer

the doctor

the office receptionist

Just as we were getting ready to trek our way back to the car, one of the ladies  ventured off the trail for a few yards and found the real camping area where there was a wide open area and comfortable rocks.  Whatever~  we still had a great time. 

Variations

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No new images taken today. Waterfall images from last Sat. with just a wee bit of post-production adjustment.  A little color correction, a little sharpening--that's it.

These three images are variations of the same falls, taken from the practically the same spot.

The Waterfalls

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A couple of weeks ago, I signed up to attend a photo field trip today to a location that is a short hike to a really beautiful waterfall.  After my hike yesterday I was pretty weary and half determined not to get up at 5:15 am this morning to get to the carpool location on time.

But then I thought that if I didn't go, I'd just sit around the house, bored and unproductive, so why not get up and go?

Although it was very cloudy and drizzly this morning, it never actually rained, thank goodness. 

The cloudy conditions contributed to the intense colors of the foliage and rocks, and it was easy to 

avoid the sky at this particular location.  So all in all, it was a good day

and I'm glad I convinced myself to get out of bed and get there on time.   

I don't know the people in this first image, but I love the image anyway.  I love how they are relatively sharp, while the waterfall in the background and the tree branch in the foreground are soft.  

I recently purchased Photoshop Elements 10.  It has some fun special effects that are very easy to do.  Since the images in most of my recent posts have been straight, traditional images, I decided to try a couple of the special effects in Elements 10.  All but one of the images in this post have had an effect applied.  Such fun.