Gone Fishing
Taken in the “Africa” section of Disney’s Animal Kingdom. The water in this aquarium went half way up the window, giving me an opportunity to shoot this image with the bird preying on the shore, and the fish below the water.
St. Elias’ Bell Tower
The Bell Tower of St. Elias Church in Norval, at sunset. A favourite place of mine to photograph. I dropped by here on my way home from work – it was almost a race as I watched the sun dipping closer to the western horizon, but I managed to make it here with a good 5 minutes before the sunset. Good thing too, as the biting temperature sure kept my session short …. fingers and camera battery both wanted to keep things quick!
RAW photo processed as single file HDR, then I used the graduated filter in Lightroom to darken the sky a bit more.
Reeds
Reeds, originally uploaded by Gregory Pleau.
Here’s another photo from my winter photography/geocaching outing last Friday. These reeds are poking out of the ice on a (very) frozen Guelph Lake. When I was shooting this, I was thinking black and white but of course I shoot in colour on the Nikon, then convert in post. Even with the expodisc this came out very blue but I suppose that’s the nature of snow and ice. I used a high contrast blue filter in software when I converted to black and white, then I pushed the midpoint in the levels way toward highlights to give the photo it’s final effect. I’m rather happy with this one.
Acton Snowscape
Geocaching in the Winter can be a beauty that people can easily miss. Head outside on a sunny day after a snowfall, and you’re in for a real treat.
This is a 9 photo HDR taken at a geocache near Acton, Ontario
Ontario Trails Project – 0.70
Another update to the Ontario Trails Project is posted, with a bunch of new trails and updates.
Thanks to Avernar, we now have a build that works with Basecamp! Also watch for the new trail designation – trails on roads and also parking areas have been added.
There WAS a 0.69 beta, but we’ve skipped that and gone straight to 0.70 for the Basecamp support.
Ont-Trails 0.70 – 13 FEB 2010
Changed Line Types:
– Added dotted line to designate trails that follow roadways / shoulders
– Added Parking Area POI type. A $ in the name indicates payment required
Updated build files to accomodate Garmin Basecamp (thanks Avernar!)
Updated build files to properly track Map version number internally
Added – Stouffville Town Trail portions (northernpenguin, GPS/Aerial)
Ont-Trails 0.69 BETA 6 – 4 FEB 2010
Added – *** MNR Trails from June 2009 – January 2010 Merged – Province Wide Updates ***
Added – Durham Regional Forest Trails – (Dennis Anderson, GPS)
Added – More municipal trails in Markham/North York (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Unopened Rail Trails in West Brantford, details to be added when available (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Millenium Trail System – Woodstock (northernpenguin Aerial)
Added – Lynn Valley Trail – Port Dover/Simcoe (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Howard Watson Nature Trail – Sarnia (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Municpal Trails in Sarnia (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Veteran’s Memorial Walk – Tillsonburg (northernpenguin, Aerial/GPS)
Added – Watts Creek Pathway – Ottawa (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – West Greenbelt Pathway – Ottawa (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Shoreline Trail – Ottawa (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Old Quarry Trail – Ottawa (northernpenguin)
Added – Sarsaparilla Trail – Ottawa (northernpenguin)
Updated – John Lawson Trail – Ingersoll (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Updated – Thomas Ingersoll Scenic Trail – Ingersoll (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Updated – Iroquois Shoreline Trails – Oakville (Avernar, GPS)
Updated – BPACH Trail – Brantford (Avernar, GPS)
Ontario Trails Project – 0.68 Release
I just posted the newest version of the Ontario Trails Project to the site.
This is a full release, all file formats (except GPX, which will be up in a day or so). I updated the MapSource, KML, ESRI Shape File formats, and added a new download type to support the newer Garmin handheld GPS unit firmwares that allow multiple map files – you can download the Garmin IMG file from the site and just copy it to your GPS, no more fussing with MapSource (unless you want to).
http://trailmaps.torontogeocaching.com
Here’s what we changed in this release
Updated – Bruce Trail Iroquois Section – Trail Closures from October 2009
Updated – Bruce Trail Niagara Section – Reroutes near Mountainview CA (northernpenguin, GPS)
Updated – Bruce Trail – Hockley Heights Side Trail, Dufferin County (northernpenguin, GPS)
Updated – Seaton Trail portions (ky.m.guy, GPS)
Updated – Oshawa-Whitby Waterfront Trail (ky.m.guy, GPS)
Updated – Oshawa, Whitby Municipal Trails (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Updated – Jacyee Trail, Livingston Trail, Milton (northernpenguin, GPS)
Updated – Credit Meadows Trail, Orangeville (northernpenguin, GPS)
Updated – Mill Creek Trail, Orangeville (northernpenguin, GPS)
Updated – Municipal Trails in Milton, Brampton, Vaughan, Mississauga (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Porritt Tract, Aurora (fababoo, GPS)
Added – The Humber Trail, Vaughan (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Kortright Centre, Vaughan (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Ardagh Bluffs Trails, Barrie (northernpenguin)
Added – Bruce County Rail Trail (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Alton Grange Trails, Alton (northernpenguin, GPS+Aerial)
Added – Torrance Barrens Dark Sky Preserve Trails (rovers3, GPS)
Added – Rail Trail Park Trail (rovers3, GPS)
Added – Hardy Lake Provincial Parks Trails (rovers3, GPS)
Added – Ganaraska Trail Portion (rovers3, GPS)
Added – Ragged Falls Trail (rovers3, GPS)
Added – New Hungry Hollow Boardwalk Trail, Georgetown (chris-mouse, GPS)
Added – Wasaga Beach Boardwalk (ky.m.guy, GPS)
Added – Flinton Trails (ky.m.guy, GPS)
Added – Cloyne ATV Trail (ky.m.guy, GPS)
Added – Heber Down Trail Section (ky.m.guy, GPS)
Added – Presquille Beach Connections Trail (ky.m.guy, GPS)
Added – Presquille Lighthouse Trail (ky.m.guy, GPS)
Added – Sam Lawrence Park Trails, Hamilton (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Island Lake Trail (rovers3, GPS)
Added – Municipal Trails in Mississagua (northernpenguin, Aerial)
Added – Missing portion of Stubb’s Falls Trail, Arrowhead PP (chris-mouse, GPS)
Added – Beaver Meadow Trail, Arrowhead PP (chris-mouse, GPS)
Added – Portion of Famous Trail, Gould Lake CA (swimmerguy, GPS)
Added – Mica Loop, Gould Lake CA (swimmerguy, GPS)
Added – Mizzy Lake Trail, Algonquin PP (swimmerguy, GPS)
Added – Tom Dixon Trail, Gould Lake CA (swimmerguy, GPS)
Added – Portions of Wagon Trail, Gould Lake CA (swimmerguy, GPS)
Added – Centennial Ridges Trail – Coon Lake Loop, Algonquin PP (swimmerguy, GPS)
Added – Missing portions of Old Railway Rail Trail, Algonquin PP (swimmerguy, GPS)
Added – Track and Tower Trail – Algonquin (swimmerguy, GPS)
Added – Missing portion of GRLT near Acton (res2100, rovers3, GPS)
Added – Kelso MTB Trails in Milton (Robert Prouse, GPS)
Added – Municipal Trails in Guelph (northernpenguin GPS, Aerial)
Added – Unnamed trail in Speyside Tract (Avernar GPS)
Bruce Trail Magazine Cover
Yesterday I got my Quarterly Bruce Trail Magazine in the mail. I was pretty happy to receive this one, as this is the issue where my photograph of Webster’s Falls in Dundas was used for the cover image. This is the Winter 2009/2010 edition, and it is distributed to all Bruce Trail Conservacy members.
I also have an image on page 7 of the magazine. The page 7 image is an HDR image taken near Speyside, used for a donation campaign.
This is actually the third Bruce Trail Magazine that has featured some of my work inside – previously I have had images in their spring photo contest and a previous donation drive in the Summer edition.
In a related note, I have been hiking the Bruce Trail with a group of geocachers with the goal of completing the entire 800+ km route by 2017. This year I’ve hiked from the Southern Cairn at Niagara to Hamilton Mountain. Previous years I’ve hiked from Milton to Mulmur. Every time I participate in these hikes, which are typically 20 to 40 km in length, I am always carrying my DSLR, and a couple lenses.
Featured Artist on Imagekind
Today I received a pleasant e-mail telling me I’m one of the Featured Artists on the Imagekind.com website front page. That really makes my day!
I have a gallery on Imagekind where a person can view or purchase prints of my photos for personal use. I tend to pick from what I consider my ‘better’ photos on my Flickr gallery to put in my Imagekind gallery.
So, do me a favour and check out my Member Gallery on Imagekind.com sometime. If you like something there, buy a print.
The Ontario Trails Project
Just a quick post to discuss a new project I’ve started up. I’m calling this the Ontario Trails Project.
At the heart of it is my desire to have accurate trail maps on my GPS unit. I presently wander the trails with a Garmin Colorado, which has a fantastic ability to show a ton of location data. I’ve been hiking the entire 800km-long Bruce Trail with a group of Geocachers. So far, we’re about 300km completed – we hike a couple times in the spring, and a couple times in autumn. What I have noticed along the hikes we have completed so far, is that the 4-6 year old topographical data tends to mis a lot of trail reroutes, and it quickly becomes not so useful. The other thing I noticed is that, after the hike events I have 300km of GPS tracklogs.
That’s when it hit me.
I need to get this information on my GPS somehow. Two weeks ago, I didn’t have a clue how to do this, except maybe clutter up my ‘routes’ and waypoints, not leaving room for any other information I might want. One of my twitter contacts, Moun10bike, tweeted that his North West trails project was updating and people could download maps to their GPS units with all the trails in the North West USA, BC and Alberta. A few tweets back and forth, and I had enough information to start poking around with a custom map.
After a few days of dabbling, I created my first ‘custom’ map for my Colorado. Boy was I proud of myself at the time. A few more days, and I’ve learned about merging more tracklines and I decided it was time to take this a little farther. The next step was to create a website, and invite others to share their GPS track logs – after all, I can’t hike all the trails in Ontario, and frankly I don’t need a trail map for the trails I’ve been on – I need a map for the ones I don’t know all that well.
I’ve released 4 maps so far, growing from a few scattered trails around my hometown, to now covering most of the more well known trails. The maps will load on any of the Garmin handheld units, maybe more. I’ve also released the source data so others can expand upon my work and create maps for their devices. I will eventually start categorizing the trails by usage type and trail type. If you have any GPS tracklogs for hiking or biking trails in Ontario, send them to me and I’ll be sure to include the trail on the next map release. You can find contact information on the official website:
The software I’m using to make these maps?
cGPSMapper – converts the Polish format to Garmin IMG, GPSMapEdit combines my track data from Garmin GDB files, and Mapsource is where I edit specific trail trackline nodes.
BFL Boot Camp III
Night Caching at BFL 3, originally uploaded by Gregory Pleau.
This saturday we held our annual night caching event. It’s the third year that we’ve held the gathering and the first year we centered it on Georgetown. The first two editions in 2006, 2007 were centered on Milton.
BFL Boot Camp is a twist on the traditional “pub style” event that takes place in southern Ontario. What usually happens at these events is people visit geocaches during the day and meet at a pub for dinner afterward, or the pub is the entire event (say, on a weeknight). These pub events will draw anywhere from 40-120 people, depending on the pub’s capacity. The Boot Camp starts at the pub and waits until it is good and dark outside – then we send people out to find the caches we’ve placed.
Georgetown is a fairly small community, and does not have many large pubs like the nearby major cities like Brampton or Mississauga. We asked Groundspeak and they graciously allowed us to have a little experiment this time around – rather than trying to find one massive pub (likely a good 30km away from the caches), we booked three pubs and filled them. Each pub was listed as a separate event on geocaching.com, and hosted by three different people.
I hosted the “Alpha” pub with my wife Kristen at our favourite local pub – the Shepherd’s Crook in downtown Georgetown. The pub features an Irish fare in a small (intimate) setting. Many of the attendees commented that they were happy to discover hard to find menu items like a Ploughman’s Lunch or Steak and Stout. As for me, I was happy once we found the Bailey’s and Coffee.
My friend John (Avernar) hosted the “Bravo” pub at Shoeless Joe’s, and Al (Dreadnaught) hosted the “Charlie” pub at the local Kelsey’s.
All three pubs handled the crowds admirably and the geocachers enjoyed the Santa Claus parade beforehand, even if it did make getting to the pubs a little difficult at times.
At 8:30 we handed out the “launch kits” to the attendees and 10 minutes later the pubs were completely empty, save for the organizers. Everyone was off to visit the 9 geocaches we placed for their entertainment tonight.
Another BFL Boot Camp tradition is the “command centre”. This is a central location that the event organizers go to after the pubs are completed. We put up a shelter and prepare some hot chocolate to share with everyone. We also use the location as a communication centre and provide assistance to cachers that may need some help to finish one of the caches. This can be a very welcome respite, as we had typical mid-November weather for the event, rain that turned to a snowstorm.
As for the caches, we had nine caches placed
- Team Goju’s – GC1BDT0: Creepshow, Episode 2
This cache is one I still have to visit. From what I’ve heard it’s great fun - Crystal Dawn’s – GC1JOYD: By The Dawn’s Early Light
One of the simpler caches from the evening, and welcomed by the cachers that were visiting some of the more complex caches. This one is a straightforward follow the reflectors to the cache type of hunt - Chris-Mouse’s – GC1HDKV: Binary Blackout
So far, this one is my favourite of the series. Kelly (Chris-Mouse) placed reflectors on trees but arranged them as a binary sequence. Very fun as a group activity – I went out to “beta test” this one with some of the BFL crew before the event day. We had people on either side of the trail calling out the numbers and I acted as a secretary recording them as I stood at the beginning. - Res2100’s – GC16R3K: George Caceras
The photo attached to this post is from Ralph’s (Res2100’s) cache. This was a continuation of his “Pure Evil” cache and describes the story of a young OPP Officer that disappeared in, shall I say, “Unusual” circumstances. I wandered off from the BFL Command Centre for a little while to hunt this with Kristen and 15 other people. Good fun, spelunking in a snow storm at midnight! - Avernar’s – GC1HF85: Sunglasses At Night
John used polarizing film/gel to a great effect on this cache, and it was clearly one of the more popular caches of the night. He used the polarizing film in a way that some things would ‘disappear’ when viewed using polarized sunglasses. People don’t normally take sunglasses on a night time hike which made this one most unusual indeed. - Kitten on the Hunt’s – GC1HCFF: LOLCAT
Great fun on this one. Kristen pulled out all the creativity she had and “littered” the woods with cats and fish. The listing was written up in LOLSpeak, an homage to the icanhazcheesburger site. People found it fun, and people found it frustrating. What can I say? This was a cache that gave me the opportunity to explain to Halton Regional Police just what we were doing in the woods, at midnight, with an 8 foot step ladder. Good fun, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see a couple of our local officers running around with a GPS next weekend. - HikerT’s – GC18XHJ: Deja Vu
Tanya placed a count the reflectors type night cache. Lots of people hit this one and from what I hear, it is another one that was great fun as a group. I still need to visit this one. - Mine – BFLiGo (Episode 1)
This one is an interactive cartridge that can be played on the devices that support it (Garmin Colorado/Oregon, PocketPC). I spent a good 20 hours programming this one, and while it can be frustrating it is also very rewarding. It’s the first night cache themed Wherigo that I’m aware of. It’s also a bit longish so it hasn’t had the visits the other caches of the night had. - The Series Final – The Tree (Of Light)
This cache is a follow the reflectors cache – with a twist. You need to get the co-ordinates written on each reflector to find the final.
We wrapped up at the command centre at 4:00 AM and went home a little colder, and a little wetter than we started. Everyone was smiling at the end of the night (morning?) and we’re already planning BFL Boot Camp 4 for sometime in October next year. With 25 active night caches in the area, I’m quite sure North Halton is now the night caching capitol of Canada.