Day Hike at Antelope Island

March 20, 2019

It was a lovely day in Salt Lake, so Gerry and I went to scout out some possible camping spots (and to test his new hiking boots) at Antelope Island.

While we looked around the west side of the island where most of the campsites are, we also took to a decent hike through the White Rock Loop trail. It took us up and around one of the closer mountain peaks, filled mostly with tall grass and shrubs. Very few trees were around, which I suspect was because of the lack of abundant fresh water.

 

In terms of wildlife, there wasn't much beyond the many beetles and the few bison we saw, but we did see a pronghorn antelope and caught a few lizards.

Also saw a Chukar partridge, of the pheasant family

Came across a decent number of these small lizards,
which I believe to be the Plateau subspecies of side-blotched lizards
(Uta stansburiana uniformis), due to its blue spots on its back.

 

After hiking the loop trail for almost 5 hours (burning nearly 1500 calories), we came away from Antelope Island feeling accomplished and excited for summer time.

Weekend Visit to New Jersey

March 7 - 11, 2019

This week I flew back to my mom's place in Pennington, NJ, not far off from Princeton. I got the chance to spend time with my brother, reconnect with some of my college friends, and catch up with my previous Target coworkers.

I got in on Friday morning and met up with a friend for lunch later that day, after watching a few Netflix films. The following day, I slept in and dropped my brother off at his friend's house while I went to downtown Princeton. I toured the Morven Museum, a historical landmark building filled with history since the 1700s, with a simple garden and pool house out back.

 

I love the sassy title of this report from one of the former owners of the house

 

 

 

On the way home, I took the scenic route and stopped by a farming field full of sheep, goats and a couple cows. Pretty peaceful time.

     

I also practiced some more car photography with my mom's car.

On Sunday, my brother and I, plus some friends, went to downtown New York. It was a cloudy/foggy day so I thought it would be a great chance for some street photography on my film camera.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of my shots were way underexposed, probably because I kept the aperture too small. The following are the only ones that actually turned out well.

This first roll of film, started back in Salt Lake, was my first go at Ilford HP5 Plus.

This is the first roll back in TriX400; this is in the New York Public Library,
in an area where photography isn't permitted (oops)

After eating lunch at Grand Central Station, we met up with my friend Kim, who led us to the Nintendo shop; funnily enough, it was Mario Day (Mar 10), so we got some nice Nintendo merch, like a Mario washcloth, a Gameboy throw blanket, a Zelda keychain, and some Zelda manga.

After that, we walked further down to the New York Public Library. Unfortunately, they did not encourage photography there, and the lighting was pretty bad anyway, so I got very few pictures there.

Finally, it was about night time when we found a McDonald's to eat at for dinner, then on the way back to Penn Station, I and Kim got these few shots:

 

 

 

After a long day at New York, I was anxious to pay my college campus a visit, reconnecting with my friend Laurie. The original plan was for I, Laurie, and Kim to visit the Rutgers Farm, but some things got in the way, so it was just me and Laurie after a fair amount of taking pictures around campus first.

 

 

 

 

 

  

After meeting up, we caught up with our instructor Rebecca, and got the chance to see the goats and sheep we befriended during our class, plus some horsies.

 

 

Of course, I had to see my goat baby Jasper, who's gotten so big in the year that I've left him. I wouldn't have expected him to remember who I was, but it would've been nice if he did.

I hope to make it a yearly thing to visit campus and see my favorite farm animals, and reconnect with some of the friend's I've made in my 5-year stay in NJ.