White Memorial 10/12/10

Finally got back out on the bike tonight after way way too long since the last ride. I decided to hit up my old stomping grounds for a ride, I think this was the first time this year I've been there. Since I was riding solo I decided to take my DSLR with me to get some pics. That meant more stopping than usual, but I still had a pretty good ride. I also got the chance to see a bunch of wildlife which was cool. The best (while also unnerving) was a deer that was running along side of me while I rode a section of road. I was pretty worried that he was going to jump right into me. I was riding up an incline so I didn't want to back off too much and I had a car coming up behind me at the same time. Luckily he finally found a hole in the vegetation a dove in just before the car passed. Not too long after that as I was scanning the left hand side of the road for the trail head I needed to take I can across a pair of yellow eyes staring back at me. I was a little freaked out because I don't know what it was, but I know it wasn't another deer. I put the hammer down and took off, not really too interested in finding out.

All in all it was probably around 7.5 miles and was a good workout to get back into the swing of things. I'll check the GPS track tomorrow.

Here's a few of the pics from the ride:

IMG_6440 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr


IMG_6449 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr


IMG_6451 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr


IMG_6521 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr


IMG_6538 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr


IMG_6576 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr


IMG_6584 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr


IMG_6598 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr

My first self timer shot (well technically my second, this one was slightly better).

IMG_6600 by Brian Vibert, on Flickr

A few more shots, as well as larger versions of most of the above, can be found here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bvibert/sets/72157625153445776/with/5077444372/

Nice photos guy!!! My personal fav is 6491 - the pic of the bright yellow tree with the reflection in the water. (It looks like the tree is on fire) Really well done. The foliage down there seems to be in prime form down there.

Glad you were able to get back out on the trails!

Where's the picture of the deer and the eyes? That"s the reason I really haven't made an effort to ride at night.

Nice pic!

Sounds like quite the freaky night! Pretty cool though and very nice shots!

BackLoafRiver said:

Nice photos guy!!! My personal fav is 6491 - the pic of the bright yellow tree with the reflection in the water. (It looks like the tree is on fire) Really well done. The foliage down there seems to be in prime form down there.

Glad you were able to get back out on the trails!

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Thanks. I really like that one too, I just wish the focus was a little better. Though I think something happened to it when I converted it to jpeg. I swear it was more clear and crisp when I was editing. :?

But yeah, the colors are really good down here right now!

Nice pics!

o3jeff said:

Where's the picture of the deer and the eyes? That"s the reason I really haven't made an effort to ride at night.

Nice pic!

Click to expand...

severine said:

Sounds like quite the freaky night! Pretty cool though and very nice shots!

Click to expand...

All told I saw a beaver (from a distance, see the first picture in this thread), two deer (possibly the same one two different times), a rabbit, the yellow eyes, a very small mouse, and I heard a lot of birds and other small critters scattering about while I was stopped to take pictures.

The first time I saw the deer was right when it was getting dark, just after I turned on my lights. She took off into the woods when she heard me coming and watched me pass from a distance behind some trees. The second time I was way more worried about being sandwiched between a deer and a car to be worrying about pictures.

The yellow eyed thing, the best I could figure, was some large cat. I wasn't about to hang around to find out if I was right or not.

The mouse I heard scurrying through the leaves when I stopped to do the timer shots. He was about the size of a quarter, so it took me a minute to discover the source of the rustling leaves.

Here's the track for anyone interested.

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=U....716941,-73.192892&spn=0.024346,0.076303&z=14

7.3 miles. According to the GPS I spent 45 minutes riding and an hour taking pictures. :-? Average moving speed was 9.6 MPH though, which was probably helped by the ~1 mile stint on the road.