Summer: hot temps, long days and short nights! Unfortunately, it also seems like an unending rainy season with dull, gray skies! Even my annual visit to the Western North Carolina mountains was very windy, foggy and/or overcast. Yet, I was lucky to capture a great sunset at Julian Price Lake, off the Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock. I was so focused on what was happening in my viewfinder, I was caught off guard when rain drops started falling. Within seconds after taking this shot, my son, Mark VanDyke Photography, and I were drenched and running to our car.
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- Julian Price Lake
Another hopeful attempt to capture a great sky took me to Symmes Chapel (also known as Pretty Place), but I saw lots of haze. Luckily, a small toddler added innocence and awe to an incredible mountain chapel view.
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- Symmes Chapel
Couldn’t catch a sunrise at Wilburn Ridge, but did meet and greet some of the wild ponies that graze on the mountain range at Grayson Highlands State Park in Virginia.
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- Mare and Stallion Wild Ponies
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- Wild Ponies
Some of my favorite summer activities include picking fresh fruit. Starting with black raspberries, adding some tart cherries, and then blueberries was great fun and delicious eating. Flowers are also a summer treat – was happy to find daylily, bachelor button, Gray’s Lily, Fire Pink, coneflower, sunflower, dahlia and butterflies.
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- Black raspberries
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- Tart cherries ripen on tree
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- Blueberry fruit ripens on bush
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- Day Lily
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- Bachelor Button Wildflower
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- Gray’s Lily
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- Gray’s Lily
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- Fire Pink Wildflower
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- Coneflower attracts pollinator
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- Dahlia in bloom
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- Sunflower seasonal
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- Sunflower in bloom
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- butterfly silhouette on flower
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- Butterflies on Flowering Plant
Hope you are enjoying your summer! Thanks for stopping by. Photos available for purchase through the gallery.
