Enchanted Rock

Explanation

After leaving Amarillo and Palo Duro Canyon, I ended up taking a pit stop in Fredericksburg. Part of this is because the drive from Amarillo to Austin is somewhere around 6-8 hours long while the trip from Amarillo to Fredericksburg is only around 4-5 hours. The other part of this is that I wanted to visit Enchanted Rock State Park before heading home and Fredericksburg is only about half an hour away. It also makes the following trip home a much more manageable hour and a half or so.

I won't spend too much time talking about Fredericksburg except to say that it's a bit of an interesting city/town. Its main street is very much fashioned in an old West style with a mix of Germantown vibes. At the time I was visiting, I did notice a very large older population as I was walking about. I think there might have been an event going on too as there were people with lanyards that looked kind of like festival or event id passes.

Instead, let's talk about Enchanted Rock. Enchanted Rock is a Texas State Park that consists mainly of one large sloped dome, the Enchanted Rock, and a pretty expansive set of trails around it. Hiking from the bottom of the rock to the top, the Summit Trail, is relatively difficult. In fact, the last time I visited was when a couple of old highschool friends were visiting and I didn't make it to the top. Although it only takes about 40 minutes to an hour to go up, the slope and pace can be an issue. At that time, I must have pushed my body harder than I could handle and felt faint and overall not well. I recall my eyes dilating causing everything to be super bright and not being able to hear well, along with a fast heart beat. Instead of continuing to the top, I decided to stop and rest and wait for my friends to come back down. There's no shame in not being able to do a hike, it's better to be safe and listen to your body.

This time however, I did make it to the top. I definitely went a bit slower than the previous time, partially because I was on my own and partially because I didn't want to push myself too hard. I also had to stop more than once because, like at Palo Duro Canyon, it was quite windy and I stopped occasionally to wait for the wind to die down. Also, I kind of hurt my left knee a bit while coming down the Rock Garden Trail back at Palo Duro. So overall, I was entirely ok with taking a leisurely pace up to the top.

That said, the view from the top is quite spectacular. This first picture here was taken somewhere close to the peak. Overlooking a small lake in the distance, I knew I wanted to line up this picture in this exact way. I would have preferred a more telephoto lens so I could bring the lake forward a bit, flattening the depth of the picture more than here. However, I only have 50mm and 28mm lenses at the moment. I did switch away from the 28mm to the 50mm because I did want to bring the lake forward a bit. At the end of the day, you do what you can with what you've got on hand. Regardless, I still think this picture turned out pretty well. While it might be a bit better if there were more clarity through the picture, I don't actually mind the depth of field being a bit shallow. I think if it were clear all the way through you might focus towards the center of the picture more than I'd intend as the frog and flower up front are much more important anyways. A hint of the distance is more than good enough here. One note, because film cameras don't have the sort of flip up preview screens that modern digital cameras have, this picture was quite annoying to take. I ended up lying down on my stomach to take this picture because to align this shot I had to be in line with the frog, right at ground level.

For the second picture, sometimes I just like having a bit of fun and a bit of a laugh. I saw this flowering scarlet hedgehog cactus, or at least I think that's what it is, I'm neither a botanist or horticulture expert, and went, you know what would be funny? Putting a whale next to that and taking a picture. There's really not much else to that story. The picture's a bit messed up because my camera was having issues during this roll of film with the curtain not fully engaging. I think that's what's causing the dark area to the right of the picture at least. It's hard to say and as of me writing this post sometime in June, yes I'm behind, I actually have a different camera (same model though). I'll talk more about that issue in the roll roundup for the Kodak Gold 200. But yea, I really like this picture. It doesn't tell a particularly engaging story, but it's a bit cheeky, a bit silly, and a bit fun. Sometimes that's more than enough. That's all for this post and next up's the roll round ups for the Portra 160, LomoChrome Metropolis, and Kodak Gold 200.