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Showing posts from December, 2022

Look Up!

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These were two of the skydivers who dropped from the sky yesterday as part of the pre-game show for the Arizona Bowl.

Oh Dear

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This handsome fellow was among several young deer spotted on the side of Tumamoc Hill in Tucson.  I've walked up that hill many times and have never seen a single deer.  Yesterday, they were aplenty.

Mountain Vista

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 This is another beautiful mountain view in Sabino Canyon.  

Early Morning in Arizona

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Here's a lovely sunrise from a couple of weeks ago when I was up in time to see the sun starting to climb over the Santa Catalina Mountains.

Fore!

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This is on hole #1 at Pusch Ridge golf course looking back toward the Santa Catalina Mountains.  We love the mountain vistas on this course.

Blooming Cactus

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Most cacti will bloom in springtime, but this fellow decided to go for Christmas Day.  Here are some lovely blooms.  Could Spring be that close around the corner?????

Merry Christmas!

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Christmas has finally arrived! This Merry Christmas wish was created using a photo of an angel on a front yard, running the photo through the MirrorArt app on my iPad.

Here Comes Santa Claus

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It's Christmas Eve and Santa will be on his way!

Polar Bears

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These festive polar bears are a bright feature on this house front display.

Inspired by Clark W Griswald

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 Plenty of action in this front yard!

Joy to the World

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Here's a little Christmas joy in house decorations.

A Wonderful Time

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With the Christmas season now upon us, the next few days of blog posts will include photos of Christmas lights.  This one is not a great photo but it does have a great sign!

Holy Morning

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This is an early morning photo of St. Mark the Evangelist church in Oro Valley.   The 'night mode' in the iPhone 14 series is improved over the previous iPhone models and I like the way the phone handles the different levels of lighting in a low light shot.

Bridge to the Mountains

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I like the colour effect that the Prisma app did to this photo of a cyclist on the bike trail in Oro Valley, Arizona.  

Shy Coyote

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Coyotes like to do their hunting and partying through the night.  This lovely lady at the Sonoran-Desert Museum is having a lazy afternoon of rest.  She only looked our way once, but as soon as the iPhone was pointed her way she looked off to her right and didn't look back.  (Photo edits: There was a chain link fence between us and the coyote, but the Touch Retouch app easily took care of removing the fence from the photo.)

Snow in the Mountains

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Rain last week at ground level in Tucson was snow atop the Catalina Mountains.  It's much better to see snow in the mountains than having to shovel it on your sidewalk or drive in it on the road!  At a friend's insistence, I submitted this one to CHCH TV to show during their weather report.  It was selected to go on air and was the seventh one of my photos that CHCH has selected.

Lemon After the Rain

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The rain finally stopped and I looked out the window to see lovely lemons on the tree covered in rain drops.  This photo highlights the lemon colour by using the Color Accent app to remove all other colours in the shot.

Sleeping Snoopy

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It is true that Sedona Arizona has a "Snoopy" rock formation with a Snoopy Rock hiking trail to view it.  In Tucson, Sabino Canyon has its own version of Snoopy asleep on top of his doghouse. Here is the view from just below tram stop #9 at Sabino. 

Painted Hikers

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This is not really a painting of hikers.  It is a photo of two friends of mine hiking in Oracle State Park.  I ran the photo through the Prisma app which gives it a more painterly look.

Big Fish

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I'm not 100% sure why the Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum has some creatures who don't reside here, but .... in behind the gift shop, they have  a set of salt water tanks with fish not native to Arizona.  I took a photo of this big fellow and added some colour to it using the Prisma app on my iPad. 

Shallow Waters

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 Though water levels in Sabino Creek are very low, there are still some beautiful locations in Sabino Canyon for walking, hiking, having a picnic and taking photos.

Sunset Painting?

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People who have seen this photo say it looks like a painting or perhaps a completed jigsaw puzzle.  It is a photo, not a painting.   And I think it would be a difficult jigsaw puzzle!

Seahorsing Around

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I took this photo last week at the Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum and decided to play around with the Prisma app to see what I could do to make it more interesting. Here are a couple of Prisma outputs.  

Sabino Waterfall

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The absence of rain has slowed diminished the water level in Sabino Creek.  While hiking in Sabino Canyon last week, I was able to capture this little waterfall.  It was taken with iPhone 14 Pro Max, handheld using the 'live' setting.

Butterflies at the Desert Museum

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The Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum has a wide variety of visit areas from large mammals to reptiles to hummingbirds.  They also have an interesting butterfly area with many species of butterfly.  I thought one of these looked like a moth and the other a Monarch.   The Docent on duty assured me that I was wrong on both of those guesses.  Both are butterflies and the one that looks like a Monarch is actually a Queen Butterfly, not a Monarch.  The other is a Gulf Fritillary or Passion Butterfly, not a moth.  It shows you how much I know about these colourful creatures!

Bighorn Sheep

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This handsome fellow was surveying his domain at the Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum.

Feathered Friend or Foe

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 On a visit last week to the Arizona-Sonoran Desert Museum, I came across a Cardinal who looked quite angry and a Hummingbird.  that looked more friendly.

Romance

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These two javelinas were apparently on a date night when the flashlight caught them doing nasty things.  They don't look very happy at the interruption to their amorous escapades!

Sun Dog

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Here was a beautiful sun dog we saw while golfing on a sunny day last week.  What is a sun dog?  It is a refraction of sunlight by ice crystals in the atmosphere.  

Old Days

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 I saw this old typewriter and sign at a diner in downtown Albuquerque, New Mexico.  The typewriter wanted to have its picture taken so I obliged.

Kannally Ranch House (2 of 2)

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 As promised in yesterday's blog entry, here are a couple more photos from the Kannally Ranch House in Oracle State Park.  They have been edited using the Prisma app on the iPad.  The kitchen is given a more painterly look and the main staircase a bit more of a dramatic view.