Lake Morning June 5 2022 (Digital)

Another in a soon to become too repeated series here at Lake Pend Oreille. This will last probably until I at last I move into my permanent residence. Bear with me I until I change location!

This morning I could not get back to sleep (strange surroundings and missing my wife) so I went out at 5:00AM. The lake is so quiet early in the morning and yesterday's rain had passed leaving partly clouded skies and low patches of cloud and fog around the mountains. As I looked out I cursed as I realized I had missed some of the best light. Of course I hadn’t planned to be up so the cursing was undeserved.

I am continuing to enjoy the Zuiko 135mm f2.8 lens adapted to the Fuji GFX 50s ii as mentioned in the last couple of posts. It has enough telephoto to suite my intimate landscape work but is capable of taking in larger vistas as well. Previously in the film domain I enjoyed the 150mm f3.5 on my Mamiya 645 Pro so it was easy to adapt to this new lens. (I can still use that lens on the Fuji GFX.)

This morning I went a little further along the lake and ended up being out about 2 hours. The timing was great because the rain came in heavy soon after I got back. Some of the lake scenes are similar to those taken on prior days but the sky does change up and the sun did peak through enough to give some different lighting. It can also be good to revisit a previously traveled area to pick up missed images.

The lake is kept at its maximum level only during the summer I would guess for recreational use. After the summer the level is run down about 6-8 feet until the next summer when it is allowed to fill in May through part of June. Today the lake has about 2-3 feet left to go which means more of the shore can be accessed without beating your way through brush or wading in cold water. The shore is mostly sharp coarse gravel and small rocks. There are few water-rounded stones as this was crushed under the weight and movement of glaciers thousands of years ago.

This firsts image was the marvellous light as I started out.

A swallow stopped on a fence and seemed intent of getting his picture taken so I obliged. They were out early rounding up insects before the rain.

There is an old tugboat wreck on the shore and I made the obligatory photo of it hoping to catch some of the glow from the clouds wreathing the mountain tops.

The lupines are abundant in some of the meadows but not so much on the lake’s edge.

The lake presents a blue color palette while the other side of the road is dominated by fresh saturated green. Here a dead conifer provides relief from the wall of greenery.

With lake not quite full it is easier to walk the rocky shoreline dereft of vegetation and this enable some uniques scenery. This little garden lodged in a piece of driftwood.