Beautiful weather makes for great photos, but lots of rain makes for beautiful waterfalls.

   Last weekend, I drove to Frostburg to visit my friends Mandy and Frank.  They were generous enough to not only let me stay at their house, but also to come along with me while I attempted to take pictures. 
   On Friday night, I tried to take star trail pictures for the first time...with mixed results.  The moon was mostly full, so that caused some light pollution and once we finally found a nice, dark place, a few cars messed up the shot.  I did, however, capture a few shots that I liked.  I'd like to try the star trails again, and soon, but it really needs to stop raining for a while!  I love how green my yard is, I really do, and I know that it's great for the trees and plants, but I could use a break. 
   So, Mandy, Frank, and I at dinner at D'Atris in Lavale and then came back to their house to chill for a bit.  After it was dark, we headed out looking for dark places.  We tried a couple places before going to this place in Garrett County where there are twin churches overlooking fields and a ridge.  It's pretty there.  One of the churches is no longer an active church and actually looks sort of run down and creepy - which I think makes for an interesting photo.  I had a difficult time getting the settings on my camera and the remote to work at first (lesson learned:  do that before leaving the house next time), but then I tried a few different lengths of time.  I got one picture that is approaching what I'd like to have as far as a circular shot of the stars and then another shot that just shows how pretty the night sky is and how many stars are out there.  It always makes me realize how very few stars that I can see living in the city.  Blasted light pollution!

First real attempt at star trails - you can kinda see the circle that I was going for here.

Just look at all those stars!

The Casselman River Bridge at night with stars.

   So, after the bridge, it was pretty darn late and it was chilly out, so we went back to their house. It was 1 am before we went to bed.  I woke up at my normal time of 7 AM (without an alarm clock!) and got ready to go to Swallow Falls State Park.  I had never been out in that area, so I was really excited that we were going to go there.  We stopped at this scenic overlook.  On the right side, there is a giant corn maze at the farm.  I couldn't make out the design, but it looked neat.  We drove past and next to Deep Creek Lake (which I had never seen before) and it was beautiful. 

   Finally, we turned onto this road that led us to this tiny parking area...and a closed bridge...which we needed to cross to enter the park.  We found out later, on our way back home, that we should have gone straight instead of turning right and we could have driven into the park.  If we had done that though, I wouldn't have gotten the cool shots on the scary metal bridge (that I was afraid to walk on because you could see straight down) or risk my life walking around the construction barrier.  Scary!  We walked up the driveway (for lack of a better word) into the park and enjoyed all the light and the trees on the way there.  I would have missed that if we had driven.  I was really loving the light - it made for some really great shots.

The sky was a perfect shade of blue.  I loved all the colors against it, but particularly the reds.

Muddy Water Falls - hordes of old people descended on us as I was trying to photograph it - and then they WOULDN'T MOVE FROM THESE STAIRS - so we gave up and moved on to the other falls.

I loved this scene the most.  The light was perfect and there are so many details to be seen.

I finally figured out/remembered how to make silky waterfalls at the 4th waterfall we visited.  At least I finally got a couple silky water pictures.

The Youghiogheny River - looking upstream - after our visit and on our way back to the car.

  After leaving the park, we ate a late lunch at a Perkin's in Deep Creek.  It was the best chicken friend steak I've ever had!  I was super hungry after all that walking.  My left knee, leg, and ankle swelled up after all that walking and driving (the clutch kills me sometimes), but it was worth it to experience such beauty.  I hope to return again some day.