A visual chronicle of suburban NJ
I was surprised to find this snowy egret in Shallcross Pond in Kenilworth. Just, y’know, hangin’ out, four feet from the bike path.
When I got a liiiiiiittle too close, it flew across the pond.
Don’t worry, it came back later! I didn’t scare it off too badly.
When Union County purchased the land for Hidden Valley Park, apparently there were some residents living there. Union County probably said, “Hey, we’re trying to build a park here, why don’t we buy your land from you, that’d be great” and the residents said, “WTF? Hell no!”
So there is a resident-shaped hole in Hidden Valley Park, with all kinds of “NO TRESPASSING” “PRIVATE PROPERTY” “NO FISHING” signs all over the place, presumably to dissuade curious hikers (like me) from skulking about and investigating this mysterious house on the lake.
Everyone loves a generic sunset over a generic lake!
(This is actually Echo Lake, which I suppose is a very specific lake.)
Ducks! At Echo Lake in Mountainside. This is the east end of the lake.
I specify this because Echo Lake is a very long, narrow lake, and it matters.
Finally, FINALLY, we had a nice foggy morning on a weekend! I can’t tell you how long I’ve been waiting for this, and how psyched I am to have gotten this photo.
Without going into too much detail, there are two tips I read recently that directed me to this shot:
For me, personally, “better stuff” often includes water. But this is still a working hypothesis.
Anyway. This is Briant Park (in Summit, NJ, no relation to Bryant Park in New York, NY).
* On the subject of taking photos within two hours of sunrise, Daylight Savings is helping me an awful lot on that front!
No idea what the story behind this is.
I’d prefer to ignore Occam’s Razor and instead believe it’s some crazy explanation involving the Spectacle Goblins, who mischievously steal people’s glasses in the night and leave them in strange places. The Spectacle Goblins are in fact an offshoot sect of the Sock Goblins, who are best known for stealing socks from the dryer.
But this here is clearly not the work of Sock Goblins.
As far as I can tell, this nifty light effect was caused by the setting sun casting a shadow from the Second Watchung Mountain onto the First Watchung Mountain.
(On the map, the photo location is indicated [approximately] by a little pin-marker-thing.)
The red is entirely from the sun, not leaves. Believe me, this time of year? No colors anywhere.
Bonus fact: This is Seeley’s Pond.
Behind New Providence’s A&P, there is a possibly-abandoned bank drive-through. I could be wrong about its “abandoned” status. But there is, as far as I can tell, no identifying mark on it, and the asphalt hasn’t been repaved in probably twenty years. Maybe ten.
Given that the construction of the new A&P basically closed down Village Shopping for four years, it’s entirely plausible that this thing really hasn’t seen any customers since 2006. On the other hand, I visited on a Saturday, so maybe it just wasn’t open, and it happens to be falling into disrepair.
Also: that’s me! with my “fifteenth time’s a charm” expression. I don’t know why I didn’t just hold the damn camera up to my eyeball; I kept missing the shot.
I love autumn!
Here in New Jersey, it looks like peak won’t be until next week, but things are definitely getting very pretty around here.
(Just in case this is a local terminology: “peak” refers to when the leaves are collectively at their most colorful.)
