Photography · Travel

Cades Cove Camping

Had the awesome opportunity of going camping with my husband’s family this year. It’s an annual tradition on their part but this was my first time attending. It certainly was an experience, I don’t think I’ve been camping since I was about 5 or 6 years old.

But I enjoyed it. Huge family gathering in the mountains, no cell service, no internet, if you needed to make a phone call you had to drive down to the ranger station to use their phone. It was a completely tech free  vacation… except for my camera.

To be honest, I was a little worried about sleeping in a tent. Mainly I was worried about falling off the inflatable mattress! But I was glad we weren’t sleeping on the ground, it was freezing at night. One thing I was not expecting, were the pretty frequent visits from Black Bears. They generally skirted the edges of the camp ground but always managed to slip away before I had a chance to capture them on camera, only picture I got below is pretty blurry but managed to see this bear cub as well.

Of course seeing a couple of bears right outside your tent door so to speak (it was really probably 200 feet away) made it even harder to sleep at night.

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But anyways. Other than the wildlife and cold, the trip was over all very fun, I can’t wait to go again next year. We had fun in the streams, checked out the nearby historic sites, and just overall had fun. I also caught up on some reading. I will admit, this was a much needed, reprieve from the harsh realities of life. Didn’t have to talk to anyone on the phone or have customers yelling at me for trivial things. I wish I could do this once a month.

 

Photography · Travel

Hello 2017

The new year has gotten off to a VERY BUSY start. Work and life have been preventing me from doing a lot. There has just been so much to do. But I’m starting to get that balance back. Have started drawing more and reading again. Still taking pictures even though I don’t have quite as much time as I hoped I would.

I’m working on starting my photography business. I’d like to start using this to make some additional income on the side. I’m building my profile up currently but I’ll get that started soon. I think everyone should work towards their dreams and goals.

2017

Is definitely going to be a great year. After all, I have my wonderful husband to spend it with. And one thing we’ve decided this year is to get out and have fun. For my birthday we went to visit West Virginia, somewhere neither of us has visited. It was definitely a lot of fun, a nice little getaway.

We have another trip planned in two weeks for Joshua’s birthday. Another weekend trip up in the mountains. Should prove promising for some great pictures. Not going to say where we are going, though. You will have to wait until my next post. Sorry being away for so long. I promise I will try my hardest to post more pictures and more often.

 

Photography · Travel

Key West… Day 3

Today was another moderately late day. Mainly because it was actually storming pretty bad here this morning. But all is well we were still able to investigate a little bit. I do feel terrible that my poor husband seems to have caught a cold so he isn’t getting to enjoy himself to the fullest. :( But we are still enjoying our adventure because it’s just the two of us together, and that’s what it’s all about. Me and him together. Forever.

IMG_4507_editedWe adventured around the streets, there’s so many colors every, just off the sidewalk honestly. It was pretty cool and I event decided to try the “local hydration” (those of you who’ve been here I do NOT mean beer…) I actually mean Coconut Water, straight from the source.

You don’t even have to travel very far to see something interesting or pretty. I love the bikes that were occasionally seen. Covered in flowers, locks, keychains and what not. They’re beautiful. There are a bunch of shops and stores that have really beautiful items for sale. Artwork, photographs, pottery, souvenirs. It’s and array of items for sale for anyone who wants them. We grabbed a few items here and there but for the most part we are trying to wait until tomorrow or Friday to do all of our Souvenir shopping.

After breakfast we came back to the cottage to chill a little, Josh wasn’t feeling great so we relaxed, and I took to the pool. I love this pool. I wish I could have a small private pool like this. It’s absolutely adorable and just perfect. I took the GoPro swimming too so we could get some interesting underwater shots too. HA HA I am in no way a pro GoPro photographer or some extreme underwater shots or anything. I just like to have fun.

And once the pool was done we had dinner. It’s been a seafood kind of week, probably since we are on the coast. But today was more of a gastropub, fish and chips kind of place.

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Grilled fish.

Pulled pork.

AMAZING FRIES.

It was a good place. Doesn’t look like much from the outside but the food was on par. After our filling and yet not too filling dinner we were back on the streets. Just walking around again. We checked hours on some of the places, like the butterfly house, and a few other places and just wandered around. Went to the beach again, watched the gulls. With travelling most would probably make a list of all the places they want to go and see. I do that too, I did it with the D.C trip too. But this trip is for Josh and I. It’s our honeymoon. And truthfully for us all that matters is being together. I know there’s a lot of things that maybe we aren’t doing that we should be. But this is our time to relax and enjoy our time together. We will have all of our lives to do what we want to do together… maybe when we don’t have colds. So if we want to walk around, enjoy the sights of the streets, stop at used bookstores (which are RIDICULOUSLY expensive) and buy 1 book. Then we are going to do what we want to do.