Eagle Island

There is a spot where Route 107 and the Wisconsin river come very close together and there is a wide place where you can pull over and a lot of people do when it’s ice fishing season. I use it as well, but to take pictures of this little island –

That’s the latest one as of this writing, but I thought would be fun to do a post showing all the photos I’ve made of this island, mostly from this spot. Often I’m on my way to or from another place to photograph, but who could resist? It’s hard to see in this next fall shot, but the local bald eagle pair is actually perched in kind of the center of the trees (they’re specks). I often see them here or in a tree on shore and sometimes in one on the opposite bank. It’s got to be the heart of their territory since I see their newly fledged offspring nearby as well. Eagles that just got their wings don’t usually go far from the nest, but unfortunately I’ve never spotted it. It’s somewhere in the forest back there since I’ve actually heard the youngsters yelling from the Ice Age Trail that runs right behind those trees. This is one week earlier than the shot above. One week!

So I have dubbed it Eagle Island. Clever, what? Ha! Here it is with some gorgeous frost. This image was actually taken from the dam that is down river to the left in the photos above.

And in spring just after sunrise with some misty goodness –

More fog. I’m sensing a theme here.

Being that I can paddle to this spot from the backyard, I thought I should try to photograph it from the kayak. A tough assignment since finding foreground elements took some effort. Between the road and the island are some big rocks and maybe what you could consider smaller islands and near one of those I found these lily pads, so it was something. I had a heck of a time keeping the boat still because of the wind, but upping the ISO worked fine to get shutter speeds fast enough to cope. Managing the polarizer was fun, too, since I didn’t want to cut all the glare. I find that doing that makes foliage kind of muddy, but I still wanted the lily pads to be visible. I think this works pretty well. And the water has some nice texture, too.

So when I was done with that I got between and behind two of those rocky islands I mentioned and framed Eagle Island with them –

The water is REALLY shallow here so positioning the boat was funny because I kept getting one end or the other stuck on something under the water. Kind of a different shot though and I like it for that.

And since I won’t have a place to put this final photo I’ll put it here. I took it from next to Eagle Island in the weeds and wedged up against a big rock to help steady the kayak –

Part of the reason for my fall paddle on this day was to find expressions of the season that aren’t all about the trees. Oh sure that far hill is a beauty, but I really liked the grasses, too. They have just a hint of green left.

Since, as I mentioned above, the Ice Age Trail runs just behind the trees on the opposite bank, I should make a point to see about getting Eagle Island from over there. Oh no. Not another project!