February 17,2013. The first six rivers I have visited have been relatively close to home. Now it’s time to venture further off and use my camper as my home base. The learning curve has been steep when it comes to understanding how to safely tow a camper, take care of the propane tanks, figure out the sewage system, hot water tank, refrigerator, heater, etc. etc. But I think I get it. In fact, like everything else, once you learn it, it’s easy.
The most important thing for me to remember is that I will be making mistakes. For some reason, as we get older we tend to think that we should know things that we’ve never had the chance to learn. For example I’ve never used a fire extinguisher and never been taught how to use one (and never asked for that matter.) I found it interesting that the way it was explained to me was just pull the pin – you know like in a hand grenade – and then spray. Oh yeah, I know just what it’s like to pull the pin of a hand grenade. Was that supposed to be a helpful learning aid?
I am also relearning all my photography skills. I bought a great new Nikon D7000 and took my third class today up at Red Rocks. What an incredibly beautiful spot to shoot photos, especially in 50 degree weather. The curriculum today was all hands on so we practiced changing from aperture to shutter speed priority to fully manual. We practiced changing our ISO speed and the various focus settings. We shot fast actions photos, close ups, and distance. We shot the same object sometimes 10 times with different settings to see what works and what doesn’t. I came away knowing that I will never shoot in fully automatic again because the quality of your photos doesn’t begin to compare.
So off I go. I have a lot to learn about a lot of things. And I thought I would be so smart once I was retired. I feel like I’m a teenager again… although hardly from the outside in.
I don’t know if I am going to have any Internet connection with my Verizon hot spot in little Dutch John, Utah by the Green River. I may have to post everything I write at the end of the week.
