Guess what I got out for a bit today. Of course it was to take my son to a appointment but we made the best of it. It was a rainy morning and after his appointment we stopped to check out the nature path near the creek. It was still raining but only drizzle at the time. We parked the Van and went to the bridge. 

My son found something very cool and this is the photo story of this finding.

place_of_Snapping Turtle Paradise

waters_of_Snapping turtle Paradise

the_bridge_to_Snapping turtle paradise

flowers_of_the same

water_lilleys_from

the_dance_of Snapping turtle love

wrestling_snapping turtles

trying_to_flip_over

snapping_turtle_love

My son is old enough to what is going on here. lol!

Enjoy and smile for the snapping turtles in Love. ;)

All photos were taken with my Nikon 70-300 VR lens.

(I am sorry but I tried to do the slide show for this and again I could not get it to work. I have done slide shows befor and had no problems. Whats up)        

At the elk sanctuary there is a little pond with a dock.   I like to walk on the dock, usually the geese come begging for food, but this day I had about a dozen turtles begging.  It was fun to watch them. 

 turtle swimming 

turtle under water

turtle looking

 Thanks for looking.  Have a great Weekend!  :o)

Today I took a group to Crystal River Fla so they could swim with the manantees (sea cow) I did not go swiming with the group this time , but stayed on shore. But with camera in hand I caught some interesting photos. Posting them all on this story.

man3 man4 mama and baby baby manantee then I caught a pair in the throws of love (believe it or not they do the missionary position)man1 man2  man6 man7 man8 she then just moves away man9  watched by freefloater2 freefloater and a white_pelican then the bouquet is thrown to the blushing bride reedbloom bluebell bluebell2  all in all a fun day.

the thumbnail above_below 

Last 2 from the turtle farm. justfriends  love_ya_big_boy 

and hidden_rabbit in the shadows followed by a blackiguana dragon 

I've been enjoying summer!
Here's some shots:
2 wild ones Beach Grasses Beach With St. Joseph MI Lighthouse Unusual Orange Body Beach Umbrellas (it was raining) White One Fawn Fawn2 Hosta Hosta2 Poppies! Turtle Black & White
Sorry for so many...
Thanks for looking

I won't be back until Monday or Tuesday.  Man this is going to be along time without this site!!  I need to numbers for a support group.  I will have fun!  We are going to the NASCAR race.  So I will have some interesting pics when I get back.  But until then here is....not one for the road...but 4!
Slow moving
Not happy to get his pic taken
Not much action here Had to throw in awww factor

I went back to take some pictures of it later in the season and came across this lovely lady laying her eggs.
1
2
3
4
I didn't want to get too close and upset her or because she's a snapping turtle and they can move pretty quick, I stayed back out of self preservation. For me this was a first. I've seen turtles lay eggs on TV, never thought to see it in person!

Also, thank you goes out to everyone who helped with thier tips on setting my camera for the speed shots. It definately made a difference last night and I'm not sure but I thought I saw  wildman last night! J/K

Here's my last installment for the theme; thanks, Jimmy, it's been fun!

the  end

We went fishing this afternoon, and I was just walking around and spotted this fella.  Anybody got a clue what kind he is?  He was rather large and didn't scurry away when I was taking his pic.....he was kinda strange looking, though.....thanks in advance for helping me.......

Hope y'all enjoy!

More Weeping Cherry
Ray of sunshine
My son: The shot I like the shot he likes
Hangin' out in the sun
Posing
Really dusty
The exit

Tree
Deer
Blue heron, goose, swan and turtles.
Do you like
uncropped or cropped better?

Here are a few more shot from Golden Gate Park that I took over the weekend. Enjoy!

Turtles 1

Turtles 2

Here are my shots for the theme.  I hope I can get them all.
Half
 On the edge of death. (But don't worry she is okay now.)  This was an Easter Sunday good deed.
Tiny things
Too much light

I see you

Decided to check out the creek by my place. It was very quiet and clear . As I made my way down the bank towards the weeds . I saw a turtle swimming away. I looked down and saw the head of a frog . There were many rocks and moss in the water. There was a tree stump sticking out of the water. I also saw a mushroom growing on the side of a tree. I took one more pic before I left. And is you look closely there another frog looking up at me.

Nature has it's own way of showing off in a very colorful way...  A study in...
Red...
Blue...  and
Green...

I went out today with the express purpose of finding a "falls" that I'd heard was beautiful.  In my mind, for some reason, I thought you could drive to it.  NO PROBLEM!!  As I was going there, there was a pull-off where you could see for miles.  Here's the pano of the view.  (I messed up on the first stitch, tried to fix it, but couldn't.)  So, I get to where I'm going only to find that you have to hike a  trail that takes between 2-3 hours!  I wasn't dressed for this, but I thought, what the heck, I'm here.  I'll go for it.  So, we (my dog, Baby and I) take off walking.  A L O N G ways into the hike, I see some water.  And, then I see a little  falls.  Not what I had imagined I'd see.  We kept going.  And getting hotter and  hotter.  We did meet a  friend or two along the way.  I saw a lot of trees like this.  We kept going, but never did find the "big falls".  Just when I thought I couldn't go another step farther, I spotted these.  But, we were real troopers and kept going 'cause I'd seen a sign that said the parking lot was only a few hundred yards away.  We made it back to the car in record time, I thought.  It took us 2 hours to make the "loop".  Driving out of the park, I spotted   these, these,  these and  this.  Hope y'all enjoyed the walk!  Man, my feet hurt......

I was going through some pictures and found that I had a lot of pictures of animals. So here's a little story of some animals. Our journey is going to start at Sea World. Where they have dolphins,  baluga whales,  turtles and the world famous Shamu. Who is not the only one who knows how to  wave. We can't forget the pink flamingoes, and  hungry seals. And of course my personal favorite the always hard to photograph  bat ray.

After Sea World we go to the domestic animals, my personal favorite,  Anubis, my kitty and  Coconut, my fiance's kitty. Here is them being  shy, Coconut had some knotts in her fur and wasn't thrilled about getting a hair cut.  Here's Coconut looking at something, curious. And Anubis doing what he does best.  

And now a trip to the beach where for some reason there was a large number of sea clams, and later that night there was a  jellyfish, kinda startling since we set up 'camp' for surf fishing right behind there.

Now back to Colorado where we met Guiness at the wolf santuary. And at the Mountain Zoo we met some sleepy river otters, a  little monkey, and a  hippo. Back at the Royal Gorge there were some natives a  buffalo, and an elk.

And that concludes todays lesson. Enjoy.

These are some pics I had taken of my grandkids and fixed up for them. Kayla 1 Kayla 2 Cody 1 Cody 2 These turtles were taken at the St. Louis Zoo Turtles Hope y'all enjoy!

Well my sister is away in Mexico, so I got the job of taking care of her baby: turtle and turtle 2