05/27 Daily Recap - Goose Pond

Another day without much to do around Keene meant I needed to try and get adventurous in order to keep boredom at bay. Of course, this meant going somewhere scenic in an effort to get some interesting photos. My close friend Nelson (who also enjoys photography) and I decided we'd bring his dog, Charlie, to the nearby "Goose Pond" for the afternoon. She was very excited...

Now it's been about 7 years since I last was at Goose Pond, and frankly, it was nothing like I remembered. It's very beautiful and I'd imagine very peaceful most of the time, although there were some campers being a bit rowdy while we were there. I almost fell on my face at least once in a shallow stream we had to walk through, but stubbornly stopped in the middle of the stream to snap this three photo panorama.

Of course, I was hoping to encounter some sort of interesting subject and naturally, I assumed it would be something like a snapping turtle or some geese (we were at "Goose Pond", after all). No such luck, but we did come across this most interesting fellow who after a bit of dialog, we determined to be slightly off his rocker.

He'd just come out of the pond from a long swim when we reached him.

I'm very pleasantly surprised with how this one turned out. I was not expecting the camera's dynamic range to be able to handle the bright sunlight reflecting off the water, but I was able to recover some strong detail.

Of course, the main reason we'd brought Charlie along in the first place was because she has always loved to swim in the pond. Nelson was disappointed in her lack of enthusiasm here, but she did play fetch for us a few times.

And here's a shot of her right after she came out of the pond. I love the lighting here.

Throughout our time on the pond, Nelson and I had made it our mission of sorts to get some good shots of the old man seen above. But, neither one of us had the courage to either ask him for permission or blatantly snap photos of him up close. So, on our way out of the woods, we noticed he'd followed behind us and we posted up in anticipation. Here's the result.

All in all, a good afternoon of shooting. I do wish for faster autofocus speed on my camera which becomes especially obvious with energetic pets and the like, but I'm happy with these results for now. I'm also thankful for the bit of luck that provided me with this most interesting subject to shoot, it helped liven up the afternoon. Be sure to check out the rest of the photos from the day here: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjzEAADA