Tag Archives: Skywatch Friday

Skywatch Friday – In the Air and Over the Water

From a drone flight in early June. Usually June is boring blue but we are getting lots of clouds this month.

And another flight a few days later. It looks like a giant hammer is fixing to pound Tulsa.

And from my first post-surgery bike ride. I had a knee replacement back in mid-February and have done a lot of Physical Therapy and exercise on my own as well. Earlier this month I went on my first ride. Six miles. The first two of which were ouch, ouch, ouch, on every pedal rotation until I got warmed up. So it is just a small ride. Earlier this week I did another of eight miles and it went well also.

It rained here a few days later and so for my hiking I went a park that has paved trails. Less erosion that way and I am all about Leave No Trace principles. (Hit the link to find out about the Seven Principles of Leave No Trace.)

Last week, my wife and I went to a free concert at Jenks Riverwalk. It’s a nice shopping/eating center right on the Arkansas River. I took a little break from the music to take some photos.

Linking with Skywatch Friday

Skywatch Friday – Colored Skies and Subtle Skies

I fired the drone up over the backyard last week toward the end of the day.

It had been raining and I wanted to go hiking so I went to Broken Arrow’s Ray Harral Nature Center. A beautiful place with many paved hiking trails so one can go hiking while adhering to Leave No Trace guidelines. The end of the hike I found this composition with flowers, trees, and a sky. Nothing earth shattering, just kind of pleasant.

Skywatch Friday

Skywatch Friday – Late Afternoon in the Neighborhood

drone shot cloud_DAP_Azo

I launched the drone the other day. It wasn’t sunset time but there were clouds and light so off I went. This is 40 meters over my backyard in Tulsa, Oklahoma, looking west.

drone hood view_DAP_Azo

And then I turned the drone 180 degrees to the east and pointed the camera closer to the ground.

And, as you can tell, I played with the photos a little bit. I used a program called Dynamic Auto Painter and used one of their watercolor presets.

I’m linking with Skywatch Friday

Rainbow Mania Takes Over Tulsa, Oklahoma

The other day we had a fast moving rainstorm move through Tulsa. It was very intense and didn’t last long.

It left a calling card, a beautiful rainbow to the east. It was rainbow mania on Tulsa social media. Everybody got rainbow shots that were a lot better than mine. But hey, I’ll take mine. I don’t get too many rainbows.

Looking west you can see the tail end of the clouds coming through.

I’m a pretty down to earth guy but I regard rainbows as a sign of good luck.

Skywatch Friday

Skywatch Friday – Urban and Other Skies

I fired up the drone again and flew over the backyard in between rain storms. This is looking to the west. You can see everything is very green in Tulsa right now with all the rain we are getting.

A stopped in traffic, crepuscular ray shot one afternoon.

And another shot from almost the same spot yesterday.

The City of Broken Arrow has a Veteran’s Park with all sorts of monuments in honor of veterans. This is the “War at Home” Memorial. It honors veterans who came home from war but committed suicide later. It’s a huge issue. War is hard on people mentally and emotionally and we need to make sure they are cared for when they come home even though their wounds are not physical.

And I went on a short hike at our Turkey Mountain Urban Wilderness Area. The John and Kate Kaiser YMCA tucked to the very northwest corner of the Wilderness Area. I am a Y member so I just check in at the office and take off. I hardly ever see anyone else on the trails there. It’s pretty remote from the rest of Turkey Mountain.

Skywatch Friday

Tulsa Skies

I fired up my drone for the first time in a long time. It is Chinese made and partly due to the recent trade squabbles it is a little less friendly than before. But I navigated the changes in controls, got the batteries charged, and launched it right after a wave of thunderstorms came in and right before the next wave. That kind of thing can result in decent sky shots if you are lucky and I guess that I was lucky.

Another neighborhood sky shot, this one from ground level.

And yet another neighborhood shot, same street, different location, different day.

Not all my adventures result in a great time. I hit up my bride for a hike at Oxley Nature Center’s Northwoods Area. She said sounds good and we loaded up and went. Turns out that they are doing some road repairs on the access road, so they have closed it. So I said lets go anyway, so parked alongside the road and walked to the trailhead, about 0.4 miles away. And oops with the access road closed to the trailhead they are not maintaining the trail. We forged on ahead. We had sprayed on some deet at the car but left the bug spray in the car. The mosquitoes were hungry and were about to carry us off. The bride was getting eat up but we marched on ahead anyway but got stopped by a dead fall across the trail at the one mile mark. The brush was too thick to go around it so we came back on a slightly different route.

Not a whole lot of fun but still out in nature.

And I apologize but for some reason this post is not accepting comments from people. I have no idea why.

Skywatch Friday

Skywatch Friday – Sunny Days are Here

It’s May and we have rainy cloudy days and we have sunny days. I like the sunny days best because I like to be outside. Right now the sunny days are also cool days and those are the best of all.

We won’t have our California weather forever. Soon it will be hot and muggy.

I’m not going to worry about that now!

I try and get outside at least a little bit every single day.

Skywatch Friday

Skywatch Friday – On the Trail Again!

I was feeling all energetic and everything so I thought that I would go for a little hike on Tulsa’s Turkey Mountain Urban Wilderness. I probably should have gone to the gym, but I’m gymed out, Physical Therapy is all gym, and not the fun kind.

So off I went, the trails were all wet, not very muddy though but rain was in the forecast and the park warned that they might close the park to everybody if it got bad enough.

The upside of rain is that all the ponds were full. Nice to see.

I used a mixture of the new trails and the old trails. The Stay Gold and Tree Hugger respectively.

This pond was dry the last time I came by.

I was going down the trail with my Merlin app trying to figure out the birds that were singing and a mountain biker came by and said to be sure to watch out for the copperhead snake on the trail up ahead. Yes sir! Time to put the eyes on the trail and not the device.

Do you know how many sticks look like snakes!! A bunch. The thing about copperheads is that they are the slugs of the poisonous snake families. They are not vicious and once they find a spot they like, they don’t like to move, and they are hard to see. So watch where you step!

The only snake I saw was this chain snake.

This is a Skywatch Friday post so I need to have one view of the sky. Here’s the overlook on Turkey Mountain on the very southeast side of the park. That’s the Arkansas River down below. To the left are the funky old office towers that used to be the televangelist Oral Roberts hospital. (Don’t ask me why a faith healer needs a hospital.)

And then back to the parking lot. Never did see that copperhead. I am not complaining about it, just saying.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday and Our Corner of the World.

Skywatch Friday – Late April 2025

A sunrise this morning. We have a new dog, Sadie, and she gets up early, and that means we get up early with her. You dog owners know that when the dog gets up you better take it outside right away or face the consequences.

A neighborhood skyshot and reflection.

My volunteer gig with the Tulsa Urban Wilderness Coalition is kicking in. It’s Earth Day season. Here is me and my friend Marci at the local electric utilities employee Earth Day event.

And at a community event a couple days later in downtown Tulsa.

_DSC0727

And speaking of electric utility, here is there power plant on the Arkansas River.

_DSC0692

And the boat shed at Tulsa’s Gathering Place.

Here is my wife Heather. We attended a fund raiser for the local botanic garden. It was called “Sip and Stroll” so that we sipped and strolled, noshed appetizers and talked to people. Our first grownup date in a while and it was fun.

It had been raining in the gardens so the iris’s had raindrops on them. I love raindrops on flowers.

I am linking with Skywatch Friday and My Corner of the World.