We have been saying goodbye to summer by first cruising Desolation Sound and then hiking Olympic National Park. The waters of Homfray Channel are so quiet in mid-September; even the summer breeze has left the area to make room for the gales of October and November.
While we still had calm skies and warm mornings we took the Black Ball Ferry from Victoria to Port Angeles, Washington to hike in the Olympic Mountains. It was fascinating to read that for thousands of years during the ice ages, these mountains were like an island surrounded by moving seas of ice.
The deep forests of the Olympic peninsula are a constant study in shifting light, and I am always anticipating that an image for one of my realist paintings of nature might be hiding in my camera.
I am especially drawn to the tiny views and fleeting moments of nature, for these create the language of symbol and metaphor that the unseen world uses to communicate. The brief existence of a single raindrop contains all the wisdom of the Oracle.
