This is my first post to DGrin.
I'm from Sydney, and in August I made the long trip to Calgary to start a 10 day photographic tour of the Canadian Rockies. Before I left, my travel agent said it was the most beautiful place she has seen, and I can see why she said that - it was simply stunning.
I knew I was in for a great time when I was shooting stuff like this on the first morning (near Banff):




At Peyto lake I saw the most intensely coloured water I think I've ever seen (see why it's called Dog's Head Lake?):




This is one of my favourites - I think it's Pyramid Lake (there were so many lakes, I lost track of the names ):




I forget the name of this one, but it's where I bumped into some other Aussies - it was so nice to hear a familiar accent!




And we saw a bit of flora and fauna too:
























Maligne Lake and the boat trip to Spirit Island were magic:





Lake Louise was an early and chilly start to the day, but well worth it:






Emerald Lake was probably the most picturesque:




...but Moraine Lake was great too:



All in all, I took 2500 shots in 10 days. It was my first organised photo tour (7 photographer clients + 2 tour leaders) and it was fantastic - great people and absolutely sublime scenery.
You can check out more photos from my trip at http://frankenstein.smugmug.com/
Thanks for looking

Frank

Not seeing any pictures with your post.

Jamie

Hi and Welcome, Frankenstein!

WE want to see your pics
You have to go to your gallery customization on SmugMug, and be SURE that external links, are enabled.... otherwise, we cannot see them

Hi Frank, welcome!

I checked out your photos on your smugmug link. You got some really great stuff. I didn't see any pictures of Castle Mountain though, which was surprising. It' a short drive from Lake Louise and probably one of the most photographed mountains in the Rockies. However, I'm glad to see that the tour took you to Morant's Curve and that you got to see some black bears.

HOW EMBARRASING!!! WHAT A START!!!

But external linking was already on, and when I checked my post this morning there were no links at all within the post to the images - just blank lines between the text - I would have expected something there . AND now the medium-size images are gone from my Smugmug site (these were the ones I linked) - thumbnails are there, but as soon as the thumbnail is clicked, no medium image comes up. Very strange. So I've linked the large images to this post - hope that's ok - and that the images are now visible (I can see them.

dkoyanagi - Castle Mountain? The name rings a bell, but I'm not sure if I got any shots of it.

Frank

Frank
These are gorgeous. I'd like to learn more about the trip/tour and the instructors. Lovely lighting and composition. I like the tree trunk shot a lot, but they are all really nice.

Where did you find the big nest?

ann

Originally Posted by Ann McRae Frank These are gorgeous. I'd like to learn more about the trip/tour and the instructors. Lovely lighting and composition. I like the tree trunk shot a lot, but they are all really nice. Where did you find the big nest? ann

Thanks Ann.
Moderators - Am I allowed to mention the tour group I travelled with? (edit: I've put the name in the description of the Canadian Rockies gallery on my Smugmug site)

The birds are ospreys, and obviously John and Kathy (the leaders) knew it was there as it wasn't visible from the road. I have no idea where it was (Canada somewhere!) but we were actually quite a bit above the nest on the roadside - we were on the side of a hill and the nest was perched on top of a telegraph pole next to a railway line. We sat there waiting for quite a while, as we saw the adult bird leave the nest and were hoping he/she would return soon. I used a 300mm lens to zoom in and turned on the motor drive - and was lucky enough to get this shot.

Frank

Hi Frank:
No worries about getting the pictures to load properly. They are well worth the wait. Looks like you had a great trip.
I really like the lake shots

Thanks for posting

Dan

the first and the last ones are jaw-dropping! great work

Hell of a way to make an intro

Very nice and thanks for sharing with us!

Just spectacular! These are just gorgeous shots of an amazing area! Thanks for sharing.

Super post.

Great pics of one of my favorite places. The only places in the America's I've found that offer more spectacular landscapes are Alaska and Patagonia.

Stunning work. Beautiful.

Wow, absolutely gorgeous color and composition on all of these. I've never been to the Rockies but it looks like you saw some great views as well as some furry woodlyn creeturs!

absolutly amazing landscapes! wow nice job

This is top stuff and a place to fall in love with.
Great images.

I bet there were some real duds in your 2500 photos, but these ones are terrific. Some of those lakes are almost too picturesque .

Lovely series of photos. Stunning landscapes. Lots of dgrinners will be in the area next fall I suspect.

Feel free to mention the tour group you were with. While we hate spammers here, we like to see good vendors get recommended by satisfied clients.

Your pictures might be easier to see without the frames. Just a personal preference, but you are giving up a third of your pixels to the frame area.

Originally Posted by pathfinder Lovely series of photos. Stunning landscapes. Lots of dgrinners will be in the area next fall I suspect. Feel free to mention the tour group you were with. While we hate spammers here, we like to see good vendors get recommended by satisfied clients. Your pictures might be easier to see without the frames. Just a personal preference, but you are giving up a third of your pixels to the frame area.

OK, here's the plug: I travelled with Travel Images (http://www.travelimages.com/index.html). It was my first organised photographic tour, and it was great fun. John and Kathy were wonderful tour leaders, and catered to the different levels of expertise very well. I can highly recommend them, and I'm considering another trip with them in 2007.
Pug8 - yes there were a few duds, but surprisingly (to me) not too many. There were a fair few duplicate shots with slightly different exposures and/or viewpoints. The scenery was so good that it was almost impossible not to take a great shot each time - I actually commented to one of my fellow travellers that I was getting bored with taking shots of picture-perfect scenes day after day (not really). The trouble is that, back home now, nothing compares, and it's hard to get motivated to go shooting again, although I have been busy in photoshop and playing with my Smugmug site. That's why I'm busy saving for another photo tour - it really was an ideal way to get some great images, and without the family (who I REALLY do love ), I had more than 3.5 seconds per shot before being dragged to the next amusement ride/food stall/giftshop!

Pathfinder - thanks for your comment about the frames (I remember a long thread about frames on another photo forum). I do like them, but I take your point about them taking up space, and as I'm considering upgrading to a Smugmug pro account to dip my toe into selling images, I'm re-doing the images without frames.

And a big thank you for everyone's kind comments about the images - it's been a very warm welcome to the community.

Frank