2011 Trip across the US
2012 Trip across the US
2014 Trip across the US
2015 Trip to Alaska
2015-16 Southwest Trip
2016 New England Trip
2016 - 17 Southwest Trip
2017 - 18 Trip to Pick Up a New Escape 21 Trailer & More
Thursday, March 7, 2019 - City of Rocks State Park, Deming, NM, Day 3 - 0 Miles,8,882.4 Miles for the Trip
A warm night, only going down to 48°. I went out a little after 9:00, and the clouds mostly cleared, so I tried for a star circle photo. It would have been better if I aimed the camera a bit lower, but there were still trailers with outside lights on, and they would have burned out the image. So, a bit crooked but here it is:
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| Star Circle |
For those that want to try taking one, first find the North Star (use the front of the big dipper to find it). aim the camera at it, use your lowest ISO & around f: 3.5 or so &, with the shutter on bulb, expose for at least 1/2 hour. This one was a 78.5 minute exposure. The darker the skies, the longer you can do the exposure, and the longer the streaks. I think they are more effective if you can include some of the landscape below the sky in the image, but if there is much in the way of visible light, it may not work. If it is pitch black, you may be able to use a flashlight to "paint" light on the landscape. It takes a bit of practice to get the right amount, which is a bit of a pain since each exposure is hours long! There is also the technique of taking a large number of short exposures and stacking them with Photoshop or Lightroom, but being an old film guy, I prefer long exposures.
It does take a very dark night. It looked completely dark when I took this (other than the lights on trailers I mentioned) but you can see the afterglow of the sunset that was hours before the photo was taken.
Today was laundry day. I stripped the bed, filled up the laundry basket & headed to Deming. Somewhere along the line, I lost one of the pillow cases. Of course it wasn't an easily replaced white, but part of a red set. I took an extra look through both the washers & dryers, but no luck. I suspect if fell out of the laundry basket going into the truck at the campground, or going out of the truck at the laundromat. In both cases there were 28 - 30 MPH winds, so it would have quickly blown away. Well, I found it. It was behind the vertical cushion at the back of the trailer where I keep my laundry bag, so while it didn't get washed, at least I still have it.
While the clothes were in the dryer, I picked up my back up 200 amp fuse at NAPA, then folded the clothes & headed back to the campground.
The plan for dinner was to make a burger out of the left over turkey I used to make the tacos the other day, but the wind is still shaking the trailer so grilling outside probably is out. The average wind speed is down to 19 MPH, but there are still higher gusts. So, since the wind is still blowing, I made tacos inside.
Until Tomorrow -
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Last Update:
March 8, 2019