Today we decided not to follow our normal path on a road less traveled. Instead, we got on a set of roads we’ve never traveled not knowing for sure exactly how to get to where we wanted to go.
To start we were looking for some lunch in Charles Town, WV at a place we’ve eaten before. We didn’t understand why it was so hard to find until we go there and saw that it was closed. It was Mediterranean food where we’ve only eaten once but it was one of the best meals I’ve had in some time. It’s a bummer to see it go.
We ended up across the street at a diner run by Grandma. All of the comfort foods you could want were under that roof. Even an egg salad sandwich on white toast with fries and a sweet tea. I’m definitely going back there!
We set out for “Sleepy Creek Lake” in West Virginia to see what is there. Maybe a place to camp, take some photos, scope out some new motorcycle roads. It’s not far from home. The roads between home and Charlestown are well traveled for us. Beyond that it was all new to us.
Yesterday I put a 50mm lens on my camera to play with depth of field. This is something I haven’t done in some time and want to relearn. The lens I have is super nice and lets ton of light in to play with. Unfortunately, it taught me some lessons that I’m going to have to pay closer attention to. In this panoramic view of the small lake you can see the focal point is in the center of the lake but I had it so tight nothing beyond that in the background or foreground is in focus. Oh well, next time I’ll be more careful.
On the way to the lake we randomly came upon a grass air strip that was also home to the local RC flying club. We turned in to find two gentlemen taking a break from flying their gas powered scale aircraft. It’s a ton of well groomed land and apparently a very active club. Something to check out It’s called the PropBusters RC Airplan Club.
I was headed out to take pictures of the sun going down tonight and saw this plant on the table reaching for the last rays of the day. I really don’t know what kind of plant this is but it has very long arms reaching as far out as it can to soak up all of the sun’s rays.
Speaking of sunsets, the sun was very harsh today in a mostly clear sky. In order not to get a totally washed out image I had to pull the “stand behind a tree for shade” trick. Even still, there was a ton of light to deal with.
I was about to rotate the wheels on my car when I saw the moon rise in the eastern sky. You can’t do much with a 50mm non-zoom lens so this is all I can do to show the moon today.
Sock joined me for some of my picture taking. Sockies is getting older these days. Not moving as fast as she used to. Here eyes are getting a bit cloudy, she’s missing a tooth or two but otherwise doing OK for a cat her age.
In that photo you can see the effect of strong depth of field. Her eye are super focused and detailed but everything else is out of focus. That was taken at f2.5 at 1/800th of a second with an ISO of 80. Clearly it’s letting a ton of light end to be able to use these settings. And it’s an f1.4 lens so the focal point can be even that much more narrow. It’s very, very hard to shoot a moving target with this kind of a narrow depth of field.
It was a fun Labor Day holiday. We did as much as we could with the time we were given. We’ve found a new place to get some grub and a few new roads to explore more. Maybe even a place to pitch a tent for the night.
What will we find tomorrow?
Aw sockies is so sweet!
She is a sweet girl. Moving slow these days.
All of us are moving slow today in this rainy weather. Boy cat is protesting and frustrated he can’t go out without getting paws wet. So he’s sleeping now instead. Big baby.