Join Me On The Butte

I’m not sure about anyone else, but I simply can’t enough of the rolling hills and farmlands of eastern Washington state, so get ready for more of the Palouse region. The weather couldn’t have been nicer either. So glad that I remembered to bring the clouds with me too. 🙂Poppies, amongst other species of wildflowers, were seemingly everywhere, which truly added to the country feel of the area.These green grasslands almost look like someone rolled out the green carpet over the hilly landscape. Place a lone tree in the distance, blue skies with a dash of clouds overhead, and you’ve got some type of “allergy-preventative medicine” scenery. LOLAlong our ways, we spotted a beautiful great horned owl sitting in a nearby tree with its eye glued on us. Looks like a wise, old owl too.Of course, the bees were out in force doing their pollinator thing on all of the beautiful wildflowers.
We drove up to the top of Steptoe Butte again. I had Tom walk over to the railing to give perspective to the area of farmlands that it overlooks. It’s an entire 360 degree view.Every slight turn of your head yields a different perspective, as different fields are growing different crops to be harvested. The struggle for me is always … do I want an encompassing shot that’s more wide angle or do I want to zone in midway or perhaps tightly to show more detail?Then there’s always … do I want a traditional landscape orientation or do I want to use a portrait orientation to bring out some of the variations in the farmlands?Decisions, decisions, decisions … usually it’s a bit of each … or when the beauty is so endless, a lot of each. LOLEven the clouds play a role in how the scenery plays out. Literally after just shooting a scene, you can look back momentarily later and see something totally different, as the light and shadows are dancing on the landscape.We just can never seem to get enough of being up in the Palouse and eastern Washington area.Check out this fascinating cloud display! Yep, you can be sure that just like visits in the past, we’ll be back to get more.Before we go, we wanted to be sure to give a big THANK YOU to Rebecca Tifft. She played host to us when we were in town. Look for her images on her Facebook page “Rebecca Tifft Photography”. She has not only many images from the rural farmlands of the area, but also many from her years spent in Alaska, Denali NP specifically, as a tour driver. She’s seen it all. Not to be forgotten, we visited with Phil & Karen Kunst who live also in the area. Phil’s photography work is in a class of its own. If you aren’t aware of it, check it out on flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/phils-pixels/. While Phil couldn’t join us for some photography outings, we understood … he was helping Karen as she hobbled about after having foot surgery. What a great guy! Of course, Karen’s a sweetie too. Don’t forget Teddy … woof, woof. Getting together with friends made along the way, bonded initially by photography, but now considered to be like family. Thanks everyone.