This has been a frustrating October. I came down with COVID the day after my niece’s wedding and even though I had a three day weekend the following weekend, and we had gorgeous weather, I still felt crummy enough, even after a week, to not want to do much of anything. It wasn’t a serious case; it just felt like a bad cold, but it hung on for about ten days. So last weekend, I moped around the house looking out at the gorgeous weather, and hoped that it would still be nice the next weekend, and that I’d finally be over the COVID enough to be able to do something fun.

It was, I was, and I did.

This past Saturday was cloudless and in the mid-seventies. I made a point of visiting my mother in the morning, so I’d be free to spend the afternoon kayaking on the Charles. I put in at Newton, across from Charles River Canoe and Kayak, and paddled upstream.

I had the Nikon with me, and I took my time, stopping frequently to take pictures. The foliage was at or near peak, and with the sunlit sky, the colors were bright. I made the colors even brighter by using a polarizer to cut down glare and bring out the colors

It was a long paddle; I went as far as the old converted railroad bridge upstream of the footbridge. After the footbridge, the current picked up noticeably, and was fairly stiff by the time I turned around. By this point, it was past four, and the sun was starting to get low. The trees are fairly close in that far upstream, so it was mostly shady and definitely getting chilly.

I was shooting with both the Nikon and the iPhone; the sensor is bigger on the Nikon, and it has the advantage of the bigger sensor, zoom lens, and the ability to use the polarizer. The iPhone uses computational photography to merge several images together to obtain a higher dynamic range. I found the iPhone pictures look great on the phone, but seem a little over sharpened on the Mac. All but one of these pictures was taken with the Nikon.

After weeks of dealing with wedding stuff, and Mum stuff, and COVID stuff, it was so nice to have an afternoon to myself, just enjoying the river and my photography.