Surrey

Pokin’ about City Hall

Managed to get out for a couple of hours on Saturday, so I poked around City Hall for some pictures. Quite a few daffodils and early flowers breaking out, and looking very colourful, given that most of the place was still tucked in for winter.

I did find this plant with its undecided leaves. Not sure if it is a usual thing, but the two tones seemed odd. I’m use to dark and lime green as leaves mature, but green and brown? Interesting. Must learn more.

Judging by the expanding buds on most of the trees, it won’t be long until everything is out in bloom here on the wet coast.

Fishing in the Serpentine Fen

On Sunday, I took a couple of hours for a walk around the Serpentine Fen in Surrey. The Fen is a bird sanctuary in one of the busiest migration routes on the west coast. Depending on the time of year, you’ll find various species of ducks, geese, and other water fowl, along with bald eagles searching for food.

I was out with my Nikon 70-300 lens and caught this little fellow just after he caught a fish. Between him swimming and thrashing the fish about, and my excitement about catching him in the act, the pictures are not as sharp as I’d like. You know, hand-held, full tele, etc.

Anyway, I took a series of photos over the several minutes it took him to devour the fish. It was an interesting process, I must say. The pics are posted on Flickr. They are really cropped from the original. Even with a 300mm lens, I couldn’t get close enough to get a tight shot of this little fella.

Shows ta go ya, you never have just the right equipment, so you need to do what you can with what you’ve got. I mean, I could have just walked by with a sigh, but instead I salvaged a series of (I think) interesting shots.

Surrey Fusion Festival 2009

By all accounts, Surrey’s Fusion Festival was a huge success. Apparently more than 60,000 people showed up for the party on July 18-19. It was an amazing blend of food, music, arts and crafts all in Surrey City Centre’s Holland Park.

Over the two days, the party was hot and crowded, and the air was filled with wonderful smells and sounds that included everything from the Beatles to regge (sp?) and ballet.

It’s hard to fit it all in, with constantly changing performances and at least 3 stages to choose from. Some musicians even performed in their country’s tent.

Every tent had samples of food native to the country at hand. There was way to much to appreciate a taste of everything. So sad.

The timing was the same as the Vancouver Folk Festival, so there might have been even more people if the dates were separate. Just the same, living south of the Fraser, it’s nice not to have to cross a river to enjoy this type of thing.

I was there on Saturday, but living close by, I could hear the party through my open windows all the next day. Not sure I’d want to live next door, but from a half mile away, it was quite a treat.

I met a few current friends, some old friends, and made some new friends. Wish I was better with names though. They go in one ear and out the other, but I seldom forget a face. I’m better than I was, but it’s still embarrassing some times.

The stilt walkers were popular, as always. They seem to be at every outdoor party I go to. Goes with the territory, I guess. Hard to stilt walk in an auditorium or club, eh 😉

They sure are good at entertaining the kids. Wish I knew what their business was called, so I could give them credit. After all, this one was nice enough to pose for me and give me one of the best pictures all day. If anyone knows who they are, send me a note and let me know, please.

Here’s lookin’ at next year. This festival seems to be growing, and as Surrey’s ethnic communities become more diverse, we need to exposure to the positive parts of every culture. We hear too much about the troubling stuff every day in the news. Positive stuff is nice for a change.

Interurban 1304 returns to Sullivan Station

This morning the old interurban rail car ‘1304’ returned to Surrey – the wheels were on one truck, the coach was on an other. After being on display in the US for many years, she’s back home now, thanks to the dedication of the Fraser Valley Heritage Railway Society and many generous donors.

They use a crane to sling the pieces off the trucks. The parts were fit together on some waiting railway tracks, where it will be moved into the Sullivan Station barn in Cloverdale.

The 1304 is one of the last remaining cars from the old interurban line, operated by BC Electric on the commuter track from Chilliwhack to New Westminster. Apparently the 1304 underwent a re-fit a couple of times, once to spruce it up for a visit by the Duke of Connaught and once to effect repairs after a fire.

If you’re lucky enough to score a ride on the Royal Hudson when it travels from New Westminster to Cloverdale on May 2/3 this year, you can stop in and see the new addition to the Fraser Valley Heritage Railway Society collection. The Society has been restoring a sister car, the 1225, for a few years now. It’s looking sharp after all the hours of volunteer work.

Plans are that the 1304 and its sister will shuttle tourists between Cloverdale and Sullivan Station in the not too distant future. It would be nice if it shared the track with a light rail commuter train south of the Fraser.

Eagles are still around

I pushed myself off the couch on Sunday morning and headed out to the area around the Boundary Bay airport to take some pictures. What luck. An instant lawn company was mixing up some compost that smelled like rotting chicken manure. I guess either that, or the rats and mice they were disturbing in the piles had attracted a bunch of eagles (do eagles flock?).

The eagles would spend a few minutes fighting for territory with the seagulls and crows, and then they’d head off to various trees to rest. Some gathered together with others; some chose to perch on their own.

Anyway, I spent about an hour watching them and taking pictures. I used my Nikon D300 and a Sigma 120-400 lens. When I could, I braced it against the side of the car, but other times that wasn’t possible. This picture of an eagle in a tree was the first I took and it was handheld. The rest varied substantially in sharpness – too much coffee before I left, I guess.

Tracking and panning proved too much. Everything I took was really blurry. I’ll have to experiment some more with that.

Glad to see some sunshine. The day had a cold wind, but at least the morning was bright.

Trying MarsEdit for posting

This will be my first post with MarsEdit. Unfortunately Ecto seems to have lost the ability to see my flickr photos, so I’m trying this as a replacement.

Anyway, I just love this picture of a wet leaf. Not sure why, but I think the lighting worked out just right for what I was trying to get: An isolated leaf, fairly sharp, with some texture and interest, that tells a bit of a story (it just rained).

I made a run to the local Chapters store this morning, and picked up a copy of the Hotshoe Diaries by Joe McNally. Really looking forward to reading it. His book The Moment it Clicks was a real eye opener.

Just recovering from a couple of weeks of a devastating flu. That’s why things have been so quiet. Hope to get more pictures and posts up soon.

Catching up

It’s been a busy couple of weeks, so I’d better catch up.

Last week we put on a big dinner at work to hear the Premier talk about his latest budget. It was interesting to hear the broad strokes from him.

I was one of the photogs taking pictures that night. Unfortunately I drew the back of the room, while my colleague drew the up-front view. Still, it gave me a chance to test out the D700 in low light with my 70-300 lens. Ever learning.

Still have to process the pics properly, but I’ve posted a quick sample, after two minutes in Lightroom.

Last weekend I attended the grand opening of the new Green Timbers Nature Centre in Surrey. It’s part of a huge new park that the City of Surrey is putting together, after purchasing the land from the province. I was lucky enough to work on the site for the province for a few years while much of the land was still a reforestation nursery and extension centre. The site has an interesting historical link to forestry back to the 1930s. My office was smack dab in the middle of the park and my commute to work took about 5 minutes. Nice.

At the grand opening, several local politicians made the required speeches and thanked the local Green Timbers Heritage Society for their hard work to preserve the site. The City has renovated an old 1940s nursery building as a start, and done some upgrades to paths, etc. Should be a great addition to our city and a valuable resource in learning about the coastal forest.

Busy learning about my Mac

Some days the sky just amazes me. As it was clearing up today, I noticed some big, low, fluffy clouds and just couldn’t help but take a picture. Nice.

It was great to get outside. After I bought my MacBook Pro last week, I started to realize how much I had to learn about working with a new operating system! That’s kept me inside for most of my free time. And no matter what the rumors say – Macs don’t ‘just work’ all the time. At least they don’t if you know nothing about them to start with.

So far I’ve grazed through networking, installing software, copying and pasting files, syncing up my google account for mail and calendaring. I’m getting there, but there is still a long way to go. I mean, what’s with the delete key that works backwards?

Don’t get me wrong. I like the interface, how fast the thing boots up compared to Windows, the trackpad, and other stuff I’m finding out. It’s just a big learning curve right now. Just need to find some time for taking pictures too 😉

Out for a walk in the park

What a beautiful day for a walk.

I trundled off after lunch to Bear Creek Park, near King George Hwy and 88th Ave in Surrey. The sun was out and it was fairly warm. A nice change from the last week or so with the snow, ice, rain and cloudy skies.

While the main paths had been cleared at sometime over the last couple of weeks, most of the trails were still just paths cleared by stalwart, walking visitors. One path I followed had been cut by a skier and someone else walking the tracks.

I took a few pictures and surprisingly, met a few people. It’s amazing how some things just seem to attract a conversation with strangers. A dog, a baby, or a honkin’ big camera all seem to do the trick. Ok, I can’t vouch for the baby, but from what I’ve seen…

I stopped to look for a picture at the station for the park’s miniature railway. A gentleman and his partner approached and said, “You’ve got a camera.”

Smiling, I said yes, and while he started reaching for something, he asked if I’d take his picture.

I thought he was going for a business card, so I could email the picture to him. Nope. He pulled out his Canon point and shoot and set it up for me to use.

There was no viewfinder on his Canon and I only had one hand free, so while holding the little LCD screen out in front of me, I took the picture. Didn’t tell him I’d been drinking coffee all day and that it was probably going to have a characteristic caffeine blur. . Sigh, there goes my cred as a photographer ;-(

They seemed happy though, and we talked photography for a while. He drives trucks and takes his little camera everywhere. She loves his pictures.

Later as I was leaving, I ran into another family. The gentleman saw my camera and he had to tell me that he had seen some owls hunkered down on the tracks under the miniature train. Then he pointed to some birds flitting around the bushes beside us and insisted I take a picture. Too bad the little birds were too far away, too small, in the shadows, etc. But I took a picture anyway. He seemed happy, even though he didn’t see the picture 😉

It was a beautiful day for a walk. I met a few people, and I learned a few things about shooting in the snow. What’s better than that!

SFU opens up in Surrey

Yes, SFU now has a campus in Surrey. In Whalley, er…City Center as a matter of fact. And that’s a good thing.

I’ve watched the city try to bring this area to life for over 10 years now, and an institution like SFU might just be one of the catalysts they need to pull it off. Especially when you combine the new campus with close to 5000 more people coming to live in the area, once some of the new housing developments are completed.

The opening ceremonies on Friday were nice. After an inspirational introduction from SFU President Michael Stevenson, we had a letter from Stephen H, read out by one of the local MPs. The Premier was there, and so was our Mayor, Diane Watts. They all had positive things to say – natch.

The one frustration with Friday’s event was that the Bing Thom lecture -the reason I went in the first place- got restricted to those that registered ahead of time. Wish I’d seen that note. I did register and say I was coming to the open house and ceremony, but there was nothing that I remember about exclusive lectures. Sigh. Perhaps some other time.

On Saturday, they held an open house to show off some of the new digs and let people know what students and faculty are working on. As usual, it was quite inspiring. There was everything from high-tech computer imagery and interaction, to clothes that reacted to your environment. There just wasn’t enough time to get around and give the displays the attention they deserved.

There were a number of lectures during the day, but because of time constraints, I only fit one in. Gail Anderson was talking about Murder and Maggots. As a bug guy in the past, I just had to hear what she had to say. Surprisingly, there are very few forensic entomologists around. Well, I guess that really doesn’t surprise me. The last entomology meeting I went to consisted of multiple iterations of ‘how we identified the pheromone for (insert your favorite pest insect here)’. That’s important work, but it’s nice to see that there are other reasons to be interested in bugs.

Good job, folks. We’ll look forward to hearing more next year.