March 2011 - Photography Assignment - Show us your favourite park(s)

[Marko]

We all have parks in our various neighbourhoods from small playgrounds to wildlife conservation parks. Let's showcase our parks and recreation areas. Make a photograph(s) that shows your favourite park and tell us why this park is your favourite.

Thanks for that suggestion Iggy - Ok then who will post first?

[Realist]

Well these aren't great quality as they're coming from my cell phone.
This is Stanley Draper lake in oklahoma city, it's my recreational playground. I hike, bike, and kayak here all the time. This is from a kayak trip to the island, now it's a peninsula because the water level is so low! It's been carved by the wind, and it's an amazing site to see in person. Eventually I'll go back and take some good photos.

http://i739.photobucket.com/albums/xx31/Litmus0001/IMG00032.jpg

http://i739.photobucket.com/albums/xx31/Litmus0001/IMG00028.jpg

http://i739.photobucket.com/albums/xx31/Litmus0001/IMG00024.jpg

[Iguanasan]

Nice shots, Realist. The water level is amazingly low! Looks like a nice place to go for a walk though.

For reference, the monthly challenge is designed to get you out and get you shooting so it's generally images taken during the month of the challenge. Not a hard and fast rule but more of a guideline.

[Realist]

Nice shots, Realist. The water level is amazingly low! Looks like a nice place to go for a walk though.

For reference, the monthly challenge is designed to get you out and get you shooting so it's generally images taken during the month of the challenge. Not a hard and fast rule but more of a guideline.

Oh didn't really know that. Seeing as I'm in afghanistan with no camera, can't really do that right now :S

[Bambi]

Oh didn't really know that. Seeing as I'm in afghanistan with no camera, can't really do that right now :S

in that case, post what you have :)

[Iguanasan]

Oh didn't really know that. Seeing as I'm in afghanistan with no camera, can't really do that right now :S

As Bambi said, post what you want in that case. We're nothing if not accommodating! :)

[Michaelaw]

Deer Lake...It's my favorite local park because of the year round animal and bird population:)

http://www.redzonefilms.com/pics4/dl01.jpg

[tbransco]

Here are few from a greenway in Saanich (Victoria), B.C., reclaimed from a railbed last used in the 1920s by a streetcar named the 'Galloping Goose'. Locals call the entire trail system the Galloping Goose Trail. I live between two lakes on the trail, each about 10 minutes walk from my door. Both lakes support a large population of local and migratory birds due to limited human access to the shorelines.

[Lizardqing]

My favorite would have to be Chattahoochee National Forrest. Mainly because it is my backyard playground that I can be in the middle of no where with in minutes of my home and since mountain streams are one of my favorite stress relievers to use by fishing, photographing or just sitting on a rock in the middle of and they are plentiful. With each having it's own personality.
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[Andrew]

Chattahoochee National Forrest looks like a great place to get lost in for a few weeks. 2 & 5 are my choices.

[scorpio_e]

It's an oasis in the middle of a big city. A great place to kick back and people watch. Rumor has it that the aches of an exorcist are buried below the statue in the foreground.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5092/5507130321_51424a2d54_b.jpg

[Iguanasan]

This is part of Seaview Memorial Park created on part of Africville (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africville) to preserve the land and prevent development on it. Map (http://maps.google.com/maps?ie=UTF8&q=seaview+park+halifax+ns&fb=1&hq=seaview+park+halifax+ns&hnear=seaview+park+halifax+ns&cid=0,0,16428619404191425565&z=16&iwloc=A)

Preparing for the Moment

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[Skippy599]

Idlewild Lake, Cranbrook B.C.

[Iguanasan]

Point Pleasant Park (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_Pleasant_Park) is a large wooded park in the south end of the Halifax peninsula.

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[Marko]

Wow some very cool catches everyone - Nice!

Here's my image taken just yesterday during a storm.

[Hillbillygirl]

Wow Marko, absolutely love this shot! Excellent choice of pp.

[mbrager]

At the foot of downtown Calgary right on the Bow River. Lots of wildlife and art, footpaths and bike paths. A treasure, always something interesting to see.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5016/5545326189_9f76abd97a_b.jpg

[Marko]

Thx HBG!
nice one mbrager.

[Wicked Dark]

I have lots of favorites, but I haven't visited most of them in March, so here's a new one I did visit in March that I know will become a favorite. It's the Fox State Research and Demonstration Forest (http://www.nhdfl.org/new-hampshire-state-lands/state-owned-reservations/fox-state-forest.aspx). Not only does it have gorgeous brooks, but also a black-gum swamp, a tract of virgin (unlogged) forest, and a kettle hole bog rich with orchids and rhodora. I'm definitely going back when those bloom.

http://wickeddark.smugmug.com/Landscapes/The-View-from-Here/Enjoy-the/1218368895_e4pF6-XL.jpg

[QuietOne]

Don't have favorites so much as ones I can escape to during lunch. One is Parkcenter Park on Parkcenter Blvd, one of the main drags for that side of town. The park is in amongst office buildings and restaurants, with a footbridge to the medical center in back of it. Once rafting season starts there will be beginning kayaking lessons. During the winter, if it freezes over (most winters), the dive and rescue team practices under the ice dives.

There are 2 floating docks to fish off of (the pond is stocked). You can fish from the banks, as well.
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2 small picnic areas, with grills.
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One nesting platform, usually used by herons. Not sure about the birdhouse. The glass on the building in the background is an atrium in one of the Albertsons headquarters buildings.
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These are in all the popular fishing spots, to keep wildlife from getting tangled up in abandoned line.
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Like I said, a very urban area. The buildings across the street are the Albertsons headquarters.
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[Wicked Dark]

I like the monofilament recycling tube...great idea, that stuff is deadly.

[QuietOne]

I like the monofilament recycling tube...great idea, that stuff is deadly.

It's in the early stages, there's a campaign trying to raise awareness of them, so that people use them. Every little bit helps, though.

[Iguanasan]

Point Pleasant Park (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_Pleasant_Park) has many treasures but one of the things I like the most is that it's well used. People love to go jogging in the park and here's an example of someone doing just that.

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[jude01]

So I'm gonna break the rules a little here, I don't really have a favorite park near me, I have the waterfront walk I always do but you have all seen a ton of photos from there.

So this is Kokanee Creek Park
Kokanee Creek Provincial Park - BC Parks (http://www.env.gov.bc.ca/bcparks/explore/parkpgs/kokanee_crk/)
near my home town of Nelson B.C. I spent many summers here as a kid, camping, swimming, hiking, fishing, birdwatching etc.
Ive done the best I could to tidy up these photos but they where taken before I was into photography

there are many trails through the woods, ponds, marsh, and to the waterfall

http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l189/selenaxrt123/kokaneepark1.jpg

There are white sandy beaches, it is surrounded by Kootenay lake

http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l189/selenaxrt123/kokaneepark5.jpg

The lake is glacier fed, so your doing a polar bear swim in the middle of august! but this is the lagoon " kid pool" a shallow spot where it gets up to warm bath water temperatures, There are also strings of frog eggs, tadpoles and garter snakes!

http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l189/selenaxrt123/kokaneepark3.jpg

When the lake gets low in the summer, this sandbar is revealed and you can almost walk across the whole lake

http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l189/selenaxrt123/kokaneepark2.jpg

and at the end of summer, the Kokanee (land locked salmon) come back to the spawning channels, this is a great place to see osprey and eagles and little American dippers diving into the creek after the eggs

http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l189/selenaxrt123/kokaneepark4.jpg

[Iguanasan]

What a cool set, Jude. Thanks for sharing.

[QuietOne]

Looks like a great place to spend summers, Jude. And Iguanasan, yours looks like a great place to take a break from the office in.

Here's one more I visit regularly during lunch. Officially, it's a park. There's a sign saying so. Practically, it's a little man-made wetland, complete with educational signs. It's just off part of the Greenbelt near the golf course on one side and a water park across the tiny irrigation channel on the other.

The walk up the middle of the plantings. There's very shallow water to each side, with rock filled channels to move the water to different sections.
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The main pool of water. The redwings are already singing their heads off. The mallards like it, as do the occasional wood ducks and heron. There are also lily pads in the late summer, complete with flowers, but the reeds surround everything, so the only way you'll get a photo of those is with a ladder and a long lens.
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Sediment basin. It actually handles runoff from the little parking lot nearby, and cleans the water before releasing it into the wetland.
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One of the educational signs. There are half a dozen, a pretty good number considering the size of the site.
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[asnow]

This is a park in downtown Mississauga, only a few hundred meters from City Hall. It is named after Mississauga's twin city in Japan.