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Posts Tagged ‘Quantico Creek’

A Hike in the Forest

Posted in Landscape, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged , , , , on April 4, 2025| 5 Comments »

Most of the time when I am out in nature, I am focused on wildlife and often neglect to take landscape photos. Last week, though, was a notable exception when I went for a hike in Prince William Forest Park, an installation administered by the National Park Service located about 25 miles from where I live.

Most of the park is forested and hilly and there was not much wildlife to observe, so I enjoyed the natural beauty that surrounded me. My iPhone tracks the number of steps that I take and it shows that I walked about 12 thousand steps that day. That may not sound like a lot of steps, but the statistics also indicated that I climbed the equivalent of 37 flights of stairs.

One of the highlights of my hike was walking along Quantico Creek that runs through a portion of the park—I love the sound of rushing water. At several places along the creek there are dams, as you can see in several photos below, that tend to slow the flow of the water.

It was a wonderful way to spend the day and I left the park physically tired, but mentally refreshed and rejuvenated.

Prince William Forest Park

Prince William Forest Park

Prince William Forest Park

Prince William Forest Park

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Hiking in the forest

Posted in Landscape, Nature, Photography, spring, tagged , , , , , on March 19, 2024| 6 Comments »

Most of the time when I go out with my camera, I am focused on taking pictures. I have a general idea of which subjects I want to photograph and choose locations where I am likely to encounter them.

Sometimes, though, I am much less goal-oriented and I will visit a place primarily to experience nature. Oh, I will have my camera with me, but I am likely to take significantly fewer photos and to log a lot more steps in between photos. Usually I will have my Tamron 18-400mm lens on my camera that provides me with the greatest flexibility in capturing both wide-angle and telephoto shots.

That was certainly the case last week when I visited Prince William Forest Park, a wildlife area administered by the National Park Service. I did not see a lot of wildlife and the images that I capture tended to focus on the landscape. The first photo shows you one of the larger trails in the park that is wide enough for a vehicle and is used as an emergency route. Most of the other trails in the park are narrow and winding and accessible only on foot.

The second photos shows one of the dams along Quantico Creek. I really like the step-like shape of this dam. As you can see, some logs have accumulated along the top of the dam. They do not interfere much with the flow of the water, however, so I am not sure if the park authorities will eventually remove them.

My iPhone records my steps and I noticed recently that I tend to log the most steps each year in April, when spring is in full bloom. Last year, for example, I averaged over 6500 steps a day over the entire month of April versus an average step count of about 4000 steps for the whole year. I feel a kind of resurgence in energy in the spring, a sense of new life after the long gray days of winter.

Prince William Forest Park

Prince William Forest Park

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Along the creek

Posted in Language, Nature, Photography, Winter, tagged , , , , on February 11, 2024| 3 Comments »

There is something special and soothing about the sound of flowing water. During my hike last week in Prince William Forest Park, I spent much of my time following  Quantico Creek and listening to the different noises that it made as it moved through the varying landscapes.

The terrain I traversed was hilly and the elevation diagram below from my GPS software shows the ups and downs of my hike. From the area where I parked my car I had a rather steep descent to the creek. The first photo was my first view of the creek and gives you an idea of its size. Although the water appears quite still, it was moving towards the dam shown in the second photo that was only a short distance downstream.

To get to the next section of the creek, I had to climb up and over a ridge before beginning a long descent to a series of small cascades, one of which is shown in the penultimate photo. I followed the creek for a while as it continued to flow downhill, gradually flattening out a bit and giving me views like the one in the final photo.

Eventually, I turned around and headed back toward my car, partially retracing my steps and then taking a more direct and steeper route. During the three hours or so that I was on the trails I did not see another person. It is a little selfish, I know, but I prefer not to share my nature experiences with others. I like to proceed at my own pace, stopping whenever I choose, immersing myself in the beauty of nature, reviving and refreshing my soul.

Quantico Creek

Quantico Creek

Quantico Creek

Quantico Creek

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

 

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Crossing the water

Posted in Landscape, Nature, Photography, Winter, tagged , , , , , , , on February 9, 2024| 4 Comments »

Prince William Forest Park is the largest protected natural area in the Washington D.C. metropolitan region  at over 13,000 acres (53 sq km). As its name suggests, it is is a heavily wooded area that is criss-crossed by numerous streams and creeks, most notably Quantico Creek.

There are over 37 miles of hiking trails in the park and this past Tuesday I walked a little over 6 miles (10 km) along some of my favorite trails. I knew that I would not see very much wildlife, but I really wanted to stretch my legs on a beautiful, sunny winter day. Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge, where I most frequently go to photograph wildlife, is part of a flat, coastal plain, but Prince William Forest Park is hilly—according to my iPhone I climbed the equivalent of 19 flights of stairs that day.

Some of the trails at Prince William Forest Park get mucky after a rain and I encountered two-board walkways like the ones in the first and last photos below at several spots while wandering about in the park on Tuesday. There were also some small bridges across streams (see second photo) and one larger bridge across Quantico Creek (see third photo). It really enjoyed checking out all of the different means that were in place to assist hikers in crossing wet areas and photographing subjects that are not my “usual” ones.

Prince William Forest Park is administered by the National Park Service and is wonderfully maintained. The trails are kept clear and are well-marked. I visit it most often in the spring, when wild flowers begin to appear on the forest floor and dragonflies start to emerge. If my memory serves me well, the earliest that I have seen dragonflies in my area was around the beginning of April, so I am waiting patiently for that time to come as we move through winter.

bridge

bridge

two-board bridge

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Along the creek

Posted in Landscape, Nature, Photography, Winter, tagged , , , , , , , on January 21, 2020| 7 Comments »

Last Thursday I went for a hike in Prince William Forest Park in Triangle, Virginia. According to Wikipedia, the park is the largest protected natural area in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area at over 16,000 acres (65 square kilometers) and has over 37 miles (60 km) of hiking trails.

One of my favorite trails runs along Quantico Creek, a swiftly moving creek that flows through a large part of the eastern portion of the park. The trail, which runs roughly parallel to the creek, is hilly in places and the creek is sometimes not visible, but I can always hear the therapeutic sound of the flowing water.

The first two photos show waterfalls just below a dammed section of the creek—there is a small pond/lake just upstream. The smaller waterfall in the second photo is just to the right of the one shown in the first photo.

Parts of most of the trails, including the creekside one, were covered with wet fallen leaves, but occasionally I would come across narrow bridges that helped me cross marshy areas with relatively dry feet, like the one in the final photo.

I did not see much wildlife during my hike, but that was ok—the solitary walk in the forest was its own reward.

waterfall

waterfall

path in the woods

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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Walking along a creek

Posted in Landscape, Nature, Photography, Summer, wildlife, tagged , , , , on August 12, 2019| 9 Comments »

Like dragonflies, there are many species of nature photographers—some prefer to perch in one location for long periods of time, waiting for the action to come to them, while others are in constant motion, aggressively seeking potential prey. As most of you probably suspect, I put myself primarily in the latter group and spend a lot of time walking when I am out in the wild with my camera.

Last week I visited Prince William Forest Park, a hilly, tree-covered oasis that is the largest protected natural area in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan region at over 16,000 acres, according to Wikipedia. I have explored this park on numerous occasions and one of my favorite activities is walking on the trails that run parallel to creeks that run trough the park. Normally when I am doing so, I am scouring the shorelines looking for dragonflies and other wildlife.

This time, though, I was in a contemplative mood and was repeatedly struck by the interplay of the light and shadows and by the textures and sounds created by the flowing water. I obviously can’t convey the sounds in still photos, but here are a few photos that capture some of my impressions from my walk along Quantico Creek that day.

I realize that these are quite different from my usual photos and are a bit more “artsy.” It’s fun for me to mix things up a bit from time to time and attempt to photograph some different subjects.

Quantico Creek

Quantico Creek

leaf

© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.

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