November 17th, 2025

Happy Monday to you!!  How about a teeny little Photo Safari Report to start your week off with nature photos!

I'll be really real with ya'll. Since my mysterious foot injury (of several posts ago) I haven't been able to hike very far which, obviously,  negatively impacts any Photo Safari's at all.  Last week report was more of a drive through "hike" with small walks interspersed rather than an actual hike.  This week's is a real hike, but a super short one. Which also means fewer photos.

I'm calling this one the Slo Poke Hike because that's how I'm moving these days, Reallllllllllly Sloooooow.  In the Tortoise and the Hare scenario, I'm the tortoise.  No, wait, that's  unfair. The tortoise looks like a speed demon compared to me.  And all of that speaks to how very kind and Patient Joy truly is.  Tip of the hat to Joy and her endless bucket of patience!

It's funny, some hikes, we can stand in one spot for a half hour and take 50 really great shots (and 100 others that we delete).  But this particular hike, required the entire preserve to come up with just these few.  Different day, different hikes, different shots.  Just how the dice rolls, y'know?

At any rate, there were a few birdies:

But mostly I captured botanicals. Botanicals tend to not move around so much and therefore hit my sweet spot, photography-wise.  My best photography subject:  Things that don't move:

Oh! And one cutiecute butterfly who insisted on landing on the ground in the midst of a bunch of old orangey pine needles and therefore is pretty well camouflaged.

And there you go, quick and relatively painless, The Slow Poke Hike Photo Safari Report!  Hope this is the kick off to an amazing week!