Vote for your favorite photo from 2009 in the poll to the right! 

I had the chance to travel quite a bit in 2009.  Here are some of my favorite photos from this year and why they are my favorites.  Above is a white tail buck leaping over a fence in Cades Cove, Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  I really like this photo for the surreal effect of the backlighting in the scene and the light mist in the air.  Having a nice sized buck as the subject doesn't hurt either.  The early morning light and autumn colors complete this scene and it quickly became one of my favorites for 2009.

The above image of Multnomah Falls also is one of my favorite shots of 2009.  I've seen photos of this place before and was always amazed by it's beauty.  So when we decided to visit Oregon in October, I knew we needed to stop here.

This image was taken in April of this year.  The young female grizzly had been watched and photographed for an hour or so before it moved on.  As it did, the crowd dispersed too.  I stayed and sure enough, she came back.  Dropping onto her back, she rolled around in the snow before sitting upright, as seen here.

This image brings back a lot of great memories.  On our Oregon trip, one of the best places we visited was Cannon Beach.  This image was made as Edyta photographed the sunset.

And of course, my Poland trip was unforgettable.  I have several shots from that trip that could appear here, but I chose this one for the simple elegance of the overall scene.The textures, shapes, and colors all came together nicely with this image and the person walking along the street with the flowers was icing on the cake and made the shot what it is, which is one of my favorites from this past year.

I could easily add twenty or more images to this post, but the above are some of my favorites for the reasons stated.  I look forward to 2010 being just as wonderful as was 2009.  Thanks to everyone for visiting Travels in Bear Country this year.

Happy Holidays from Old Faithful!  Here's some images taken today in the Upper Geyser Basin at Old Faithful.  This first image is of a mid-morning eruption of Old Faithful Geyser.  Perhaps the first thing to notice in this image is the lack of any serious snowpack.  The official NPS measurement of snowpack at Old Faithful is just over 7 inches (just under 18 centimeters).  Yep, that's it.  I woke up this morning to a low temperature of minus 8 degrees farenheit (minus 22 celcius) and it was clear, so I headed off into the geyser basin.  It dropped as low as minus 12 F (minus 24 C) while I was out but the cold temps and nice fog made for some great images.  I missed the first Old Faithful eruption, so finished my morning with the eruption seen above.  The runoff channels made nice leading lines and I was able to put my new 17-40 L lens to the test.

This image is of Castle Geyser, another one of my favorite photo subjects in the Upper Geyser Basin.  The shapes and textures in the snow made a great foreground for this image, which was shot shortly after the sun rose above a low ridge of clouds to the east.  It was also shot with the new lens, which performed really well.

This final image from this morning is of Sawmill Geyser.  Sawmill is frequently in eruption and can be quite photogenic.  The 17-40 did a good job shooting into the sun.  While there was some lens flare, it wasn't bad, and the resulting sunstar was pretty nice.  Cold temps are forecasted for tonight, so I'll head out again in the morning to see what I can find.  But with little snow in the forecast for the next week, things could get a bit dire.  We definitely need some snow here.

The above photo was not taken in Yellowstone National Park, or anywhere in North America.  This was actually taken in Poland in Bialowieza National Park.  There, one of the last herds of European Bison roam.  In Poland, these bison are called Zubr.  There are slight differences between Zubr and North American bison.  Zubr have longer horns, longer tails, and the head is slightly different in shape with the nose farther forward in comparsion with the forehead.

Here's a final shot of a konik, or Polish pony.  This horse was pretty close to me, so I zoomed in, using a vertical composition, focusing on just the eye.  A shallow depth of field worked very nicely here too.

This lynx is a captive animal, of course, as there are very few photos of actual lynx in the wild.  I really just wanted a tight head portrait of the lynx for fun, but then he began to yawn, so I got more than I hoped for with this shot.  While I usually don't post shots of captive animals, this one was too good to pass up.

The following is from an email that was reportedly taken from Elle magazine in France regarding Poland.  Edyta translated this for me and I found it very appropriate and humorous.  Poland. There we are, in the world of absurd. The country in which every fifth person was killed in the Second World War, in which 1/5 of the nation live somewhere abroad and every third inhabitant is about 20 years old.  The country where there are two times more students than in France, and the engineer earns less money than an average worker. The country where people spend two times more money than they earn, and where the average pay is about the price of three pairs of nice shoes. The country where is no poverty and the foreign capital flocks. The country where the price for a car is about three year's earnings, but it's still difficult to find a parking place. The country where ex-socialists are in power and church holidays are days off.  The foreigner has to give up any logic, if he doesn't want to feel as if his world is collapsing around him. A country where you can talk to the waiter in English, with a cook in French, a salesperson in German, but with any public official only by way of the translator.  Poles!  How can you do that...?

The photo above is a black and white version of this week's Photo of the Week.  The color version can be seen by clicking here.  I like both versions of this image, which happened, as usual, by chance.  Edyta and I were walking around her city in a misty rain.  I wanted to photograph this building and we were waiting for traffic to lighten up so I could get some shots of it.  The person walking along the street was going to a funeral in the cathedral next door.  I was able to shoot one image with the person walking along the street before a large bus drove past and then the person was gone.

The image above is the interior of one of the large cathedrals we visited.  Shooting the interior like this was difficult as I was shooting handheld and it was very dark.  A high ISO and large aperture helped.  I converted this one to black and white but didn't like the results at first.  I played around with the exposure and added a slight color cast to end up with this shot, which I do like.

Finally, the above image is of a young colt and it's mother.  These are traditional Polish ponies, or Konik, and they are rare now.  Polish have a long history and strong relationship with horses.  Perhaps some of the most famous horse warriors were the Polish Hussars.    These two horses were photographed near Bialowieza.  Horses are great photo subjects but the color and thickness of their coats made these horses in particular especially appealing.

I recently returned from my first trip to Poland a few days ago.  Even though Edyta had told me quite a bit about Poland, I wasn't sure what to expect.  Despite the challenge of not speaking the language, I quickly became enamoured with Poland, it's food, it's history, and it's people.

Before I write much more, I'd like to thank Edyta for showing me some wonderful places and for being such a good guide as I made my first trip to a new land.  I also want to thank her family for making me feel so welcome and treating me as if I were a part of their family.  I will always remember the delicious cooking of Edyta's mother and be thankful to her father who was some times our driver.  And of course, I want to thank Justyna for showing us the places around her home and her family's farm (and of course for her mother's delicious pirogies).

For someone who has never left the United States, Poland was a very unique experience.  Not speaking Polish was a challenge  but Edyta and Justyna made every effort to help me understand what was going on.  As we travelled, I couldn't keep my eyes off the architecture of the buildings.  From old farms and barns, to huge, gothic cathedrals, and wonderful town squares, Poland was a visual treat.  Of course, being there in Spring or Autumn, would only make this better with fresh Spring green or Autumn golds.  Outside the cities, the landscape was either covered in forest or was rolling farmlands.  The huge nests of storks dotted the landscape.  The rural environment was broken up by small, charming villages and every where were markets selling fresh food, not overly processed food like I was used to.  We spent most of our time in Edyta's home city, where her family was extremely welcoming and warm.  Below are a couple of photos from when we travelled elsewhere.

The above photo is the Photo of the Week for December 6 and was taken near the small village of Nowogrod (pronounced novogrud).  This building is part of an open air museum that depicted Polish life in the 16th and 17th centuries.  As soon as I saw this window, I had to photograph it. The intricate carvings on the window along with the flowers made for a wonderful subject.

This image was taken on the farmland owned by Justyna's family.  It is from inside a World War 2 Russian bunker.  The front between Russia and Germany ran through their farmland and is marked by a line of Russian bunkers.  This bunker was the only one safe to enter.  This image was made near the entrance looking through to an opening for a large gun emplacement. The setting sun provides the light.  Near the middle of the image can be seen a hole that leads to a tunnel network, most likely connecting the bunkers underground.

This image was also taken on Justyna's family farm.  I was immediately drawn to the contrasting red bricks and green moss on the thatched roof.  I'll post some more photos soon as well as write more about my travels in Poland.