Cathedral park, Errol Heights and more / February 10, 2025 by David Jacobo

Just popping in with a few photos from these areas. I love these parks for different reasons.

Cathedral Park sits in St Johns which is in North Portland. Although if you look at a map, it’s really the most northwestern of all the places in Portland. Northwest Portland is not only more east than St. Johns but also way more south. I don’t know it’s these little quirks about cities that I like to think about.

I’ve always wondered about the Love sign in the back. After some digging, I found the sculpture’s facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/savethelovepdx/

The description on the page reads: “The "Love Sign" on the Willamette River, just downstream the St Johns bridge, was built in 2017 by Artist Roman Sorensen. The origional sign deteriorated in the weather, and was re-built in 2020 in collaboration with artist Korbin Bennett-Gold.”

Ghost bikes or bicycles painted in white have been a normal yet somber sight around Portland for many years. They are in memory of cyclists that have been killed by motorists and are a tradition specific to Portland from what I know. I have never seen a child’s bike and noticed this one wasn’t in white. It was purple and yellow. Thinking it was a child that had been killed, I looked it up and found out it was actually put there by an artist who goes by the name Dr. Nik from Sarasota, Florida some 10 + years ago. He is a peace activist and says the bikes he put up have “ghost bike mentality”

Check one of the article I found here: https://bikeportland.org/2023/01/17/mysterious-white-bikes-in-northeast-portland-are-work-of-artist-and-peace-activist-369382

Went to Elk Rock Island with the hope of finding some wildlife but the way to the actual island was blocked off with water from the high tide so I’ll have to go again next time. So far now, here’s more squirrels.

Errol Heights is a new park and wildlife refuge that provides a lot of amenities like trails, picnic areas, and play areas. I particularly love the wildlife and bird watching. So I come here often.

Mallard? and Wood Duck. I want to say that’s a mallard but I could be wrong.

Boise Depot/Boise Christmas Part 3 / January 30, 2025 by David Jacobo

This is my final entry for this part series. I definitely wanted to save some of the best photographs for the last post. I really had meant to do more in Boise but we had contracted Covid and so we spent our last days recovering before heading back to Portland. On this day I decided to head to the Boise Depot. My plan was to just shoot from Depot which stands perpendicular and slightly above Capitol Blvd, overlooking the city. It’s a very popular spot for visitors and photoshoots alike. I myself found out about it because my partner’s family had a photo of themselves in the same spot hanging at the house.

A little history lesson, the Boise Depot was historically a train station that ran between 1925 to 1997 when it finally closed down after 99 years of service. It is now a venue that you can reserve here.

Most of these photos if not all are long exposures as there was very little light and I was using an ND filter

*Photo Courtesy: Boise City Archives, circa 1930*

View of the foothills from the Depot late afternoon.
crop sensor 135mm, 1/500th sec, f/5.6, 800 ISO

From behind the Depot.
28mm, 8 sec, f/7.1, 160 ISO

I must have been here for several hours trying to get the perfect shot with the cars passing by

Overlooking Capitol Blvd
98mm, 20 sec, f/8, 200 ISO

the Spanish style architecture is seen very prominently all over the building
105mm, 6 sec, f/7.1, 160 ISO

Retired Engine No. 2295
28mm, 8 sec, f/10, 100 ISO

While I was out shooting, I noticed that some of the wildlife were a lot less scared to get near me here than in Portland. Wasn’t sure if it was because it was a smaller city or if people here are generally less scary to wildlife.

Great Blue Heron
105mm, 3 sec, f/9, 100 ISO

Ghost of a Great Blue Heron
or
When the Great Blue Heron Flew Away Mid-exposure.
105mm, 2 sec, f/4.5, 100 ISO

Thanks for reading!

Boise Christmas Part 2 2024 / January 8, 2025 by David Jacobo

This time around I tried going out and taking more landscape and nature type pictures in order to practice my long exposure using an ND filter as well just experimenting with post editing. First off is Eagle Island State Park. It’s exciting to go to new places but then you realize that you have a lot of exploring to do before you take your first picture. 80% of time you spend is just merely looking around. Which is fine if you have all the time in the world. I didn’t.

I didn’t realize that most of the area was actually a disc golf course. Not my cup of tea when it comes to exploring a natural area (I always feel like I’m gonna get hit in the head when I’m trying to figure out my settings). But it was a lot quieter than I expected. A lot of my time was spent during the later part of the afternoon. I would love to come back and do more bird shots some time.

This Hairy Woodpecker got so close I wasn’t sure I had enough time to capture it with my hulking 200-500mm. I also had to manually focus on it which made me extra hot and fogged up my glasses while looking through the viewfinder. I think I did okay. I’m definitely learning to be patient while I am in a spot, waiting for birds and wildlife to feel comfortable enough to get close.

Always a sucker for downed trees and their curved tangles. 50mm f2.5 1/2500 sec. 800 ISO

To be honest I am not sure what this is except maybe some sort of dam

50mm 1/4000 sec. f/1.4 800 ISO

Panorama stitch of the view of the foothills. Best viewed if you right click on the image to view in new tab.
210mm 1/100 sec. f/16 1600 ISO

My next stop was at Hyatt Hidden Lakes Reserve. But by that time it was getting really dark so I didn’t anticipate getting any more wildlife shots. I ended up trying out some more long exposure shots. The one below turned out to be the best of the bunch in my opinion.

Finally, I was able to head to a creek near where we were staying at my parent’s in law the next day. A lot of ducks for sure. I tried my best at getting one or two in flight but I’m still no pro at capturing birds in flight with my 200-500mm. So I practiced more long exposure and some duck posing

BONUS SQUIRREL BELOW

Boise Christmas 2024 / January 2, 2025 by David Jacobo

Hi. This is my first blog post. I’m not sure why i’m doing this except that maybe I’m a little tired of posting on IG and feeling like the algorithm isn’t what it used to be. I also think it’s nice to give context to photographs rather than just posting them willy nilly. I’m not an avid writer but maybe this is good practice. Who knows, perhaps something good will come of it.

Part 1

There weren’t a lot of opportunities for photographs on the way there because we drove 7.5 hours or so straight to Boise and didn’t wanna drive in the dark that much as we left kinda late. Only stops for our baby and bathroom breaks. We really wanted to get past Meacham and the Blues in case of snow during daylight but it turned out to be a breeze. Honestly traveling with an infant is 5 times harder and slower. Simply because you have to bring so many things to accommodate him.

In the future I would love to stop and get some shots around this area. The mountainous terrain is beautiful.

Rest area. iphone 15 pro. Right outside Baker City, Oregon.

After this it was night time driving all the way. Not my favorite. But even after years of driving, I’m finally learning that snacks really help you stay awake. Not sure why it took me that long to figure out. We arrived around 8pm because of the time difference.

*Our second night we went out and roamed downtown. A lot of Christmas happenings. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to photograph everything or just enjoy it. I did the latter.*

To our surprise we found a taco stand nearby after having a couple drinks at a very christmas-fied bar. My partner, Sarita, is from Boise and per her experience, Boise has always been a very white dominant populated area. She was often one of the few if not only person of color in any place she visited. However twenty years later it seems that there’s been an increasing number of Latinos moving here. Our guess was due to the ranching immigrant that lived around the area and their kids moving into town. Boise is known as one of the fastest growing cities in the USA so it makes sense.

He was literally dancing because he just got his tacos.

Taco stand Boise downtown. Panasonic Lumix LX100II.
There was a vibrant club scene nearby and everyone was happy for some very good tacos. We gave them 8/10. I regretted not getting my own instead of sharing with her.

That’s it for now! Come back for part 2 soon!