I’m backkkkkk! Wow, almost three days without internet…. I’m always critical about people who are addicted to the internet but you soon realize how dependent you are on it while traveling. I couldn’t research anything, set up my daily rides, check the weather, and most importantly, bring you your daily dose of Davefaitlemonde! Hopefully this is resolved but I don’t have a ton of confidence. If I go dark again, you know why! Below is a shot at the same location as in the last post except with my 14mm wide angle lens. I love to shoot the front of this place but behind the tree is a fairly bright sign which makes for an overexposed door…. I’ve tried everything to reduce that exposure short of asking the owners if they would turn off the light for a while. Hummmm
I spun around and shot this image with a strange light in the sky. I’m reasonably certain that this was the international space station flying over and being lit up by the rising sun. Still dark here but 140 miles above, they are being lit up by the rising sun. The long exposure made for an interesting image. That is about a 20ish second exposure and that is how far the station traveled in that amount of time. It goes around the earth about every 45 minutes.
Hints of sunlight on the horizon, this time shot in 14mm glory. A couple things to notice about this image, first, it was almost pitch dark. This lens is about the size of my fist and gobbles light like crazy. I could play with the exposure and make this look almost like the middle of the day. Also check out the power lines and especially the tree on the far right. The wind is gently blowing making anything that moves look a little blurry with the long exposure.
It wasn’t long before I had my standard lens back on. The 70 mm zoom makes for better sunrise photography, especially when the colors are on the distant horizon. Again, notice the blurriness of the leaves in the foreground.
You will see this scene again, it is right out of my apartment and is different every morning.
Those of you who know me, know that I am an early riser. Since breakfast isn’t served until 8h00 every morning, I gotta kill some time and you get sunrise images!
New ways to photograph the sunrise!
Back to the tree with red grape vines now visible in the increasing ambient light.
Oak branch with sunrise.
Actual sunrise! About 8h12……time for breakfast!
After breakfast, it is a hike day. Today, I’m headed towards that peak.
A quick note on the trail markings here. This is apparently the yellow/red trail and you just follow these marks.
Sometimes on the rocks, sometimes on the trees.
Can you guess what this one means? Tournez à droite! (they are French markings.) Sometimes you see a red and yellow X, that means wrong way. (Duh!)
Forested trails.
Views of Lauret below.
Finally, back at the hotel, I think one of the workers rides this scooter to work every day. I liked it so much that I photographed it twice, one in close up and one in wide angle.
davefaitlemonde.com 
Man the weather looks fantastic. Been raining here for days and snow is starting to build up on the peaks. A break today.
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