Such an amazing night photographing the milky way. The previous day the family and I visited this beach, Glass beach, and saw a Hawaiian monk seal basking in the sun on the beach. As I was making my way down to the beach I remembered that there might be a chance that the seal might be back sleeping on the beach. So I turned on my flashlight and scanned the beach real quick, but didn't see anything. Then I took this amazing shot of the milky way. After a few shots I picked up my camera gear and decided to move further down the beach right under the tree pictured on the left. I almost got to the tree and got this feeling that I should check one more time for that seal. Luckily I did. When I turned on my light, what I previously thougt on my first scan was a rock turned out to be a Hawaiian monk seal fast asleep, less than 10 feet in front of me! I almost stepped on a monk seal! This particular monk seal was about 6 feet long and around 200 to 300 pounds. The reason I didn't see him was that it was pointed in my direction. It was horizontal to the water line.
View from the top of Sleeping Giant mountain. This was our second attempt at hiking Sleeping Giant with a toddler. On our frist attempt last year we made it about 3/4 of the way to the top. This year we made it all the way to the chin of sleeping giant. Next year we are shooting for the nose of Sleeping Giant.
There was a lot more light pollution at this location than I was expecting. Behind me there was a really bright sodium vapor light aimed at the beach. Then there was a bright green light to my left shining on the trees. Then a car showed up and drove through my scene. I guess you could say that I used my surroundings to light paint my scene.