Travels - A Journal of My Travels with LD

Glide Slope, Sandhill Cranes, Bosque National Wildlife Refuge, San Antonio NM, January 30, 2010

You'll find a larger version of this picture over on my Birds Series of photos.

This boy wants another new toy

I was kindly given the chance to play with a Canon EF 100-400mm f4.5-5.6L IS USM Telephoto Zoom Lens on my new Canon EOS 7D camera as the Sandhill Cranes and Snow Geese gathered at the roost this afternoon.

I was surprised to find I could easily hand hold this lens at 300mm and with occasional success even at 400mm, like in the image above. A 400mm focal length on this 1.6 x crop sensor camera is equivalent to a 640mm focal length on a 35mm full frame sensor camera. The camera would nearly always hold focus and the lens' onboard Image Stabilization system would deal with the camera shake if I was careful in following the flight path of the incoming birds. Taking bursts at 8 frames per second with the 7D sure filled up my 16 gig card in a hurry but it gave me lots of images to pick the best of the litter from.

An amazing combination. I want one. Thank you George.

Night camp

Site 16 - Bosque Bird Watcher's RV Park, San Antonio NM

• This is a basic, small Mom & Pop RV Park with full hookups.
• Verizon cell phone and Broadband service are available here with a strong signal.
• Locate Bosque Bird Watcher's RV Park on my Night Camps map
• Check the weather here