A snowy wonderland

 

Last Sunday, January 22, 2023, dawned cool and crisp, with the world covered in a gorgeous veneer of soft fluffy snow. Such scenes are not to be missed, especially around here when pure winter days are a rarity. Time is usually of the essence as soft snowy cloaks like this are typically ephemeral and begin melting by midday or so. I rolled out early and only had to head five minutes away, to a section of older-growth riparian woodlands along the Olentangy River in Worthington, Ohio.

It's hard to make much progress - as if that matters - when the landscape looks like this. Every new position and turn of the head offer interesting perspectives. I tend to dawdle along, looking for inspiration and love trying to capture interesting scenes with my camera.

I wondered what these Mallards thought of their breathtaking environs. While the ducks issued soft quacks, I could not interpret their thoughts.

A White-tailed Deer stands in a snowy forest. When I head out into a landscape like this, with intentions of capturing large-scale beauty, I often carry only two lenses: a 16-35mm wide-angle, and a 70-200mm for tighter views. I saw the deer before it saw me and bolted on the bigger lens as I was shooting across the river. As soon as I trained the camera on the deer, it looked over, but distance and a wide intervening river kept its fear at bay.

We'll be lucky to have one or two more days like this before winter's end. I hope we do and if so, that I am able to get out somewhere interesting to relish them. Unfortunately, these situations are often tough to predict. You awake, look out the window, and there it is. None of the weather people called this one, surprise, surprise.