Spring on the Ridge

The first four pictures on this week's blog are things that I have sitting on my desk.  Every once in awhile I get in the mood to do closeups.   The morning sun shines thru the window in this area and gives some good light for these shots.

My daughter surprised me with a gift of this cactus when we visited her last year. She had purchased it at a store in Denver, CO.

The blue color on this close-up of the cactus is created by the morning light shining through a stained glass clown that hangs in the window.

Although this started out as a vertical picture of the turtle hanging onto the side of a planter, I thought it looked better on the horizontal plane.

A duck sitting in a water feature that occupies the edge of my desk.

House finch trying to maintain its balance in what was hopefully our last snow of the season.

Grey squirrel checking me out as I try to snap another photograph of it.

We have a resident Sharp-shinned Hawk that visits our bird feeders from time to time.  The next three photographs show it in three different places, on three different days in a row.

 

 

 

Sunday was a very atypical March day. We took advantage of the weather and headed over to Glendale Lake at Prince Gallitzin State Park for some bird and nature watching.

Canada Geese made a nice reflection in the calm waters as they took off from the lake.

A view of the opposite shore from the east side of the lake.

This is a shot from the area of the lake where Slate Lick runs into Glendale Lake.

Early last fall the state closed down all the boat mooring in the park so that they could lower the level of the lake and do some upgrades to the various marinas along the 26 mile shoreline.  Over the winter the lake has refilled itself and the boaters are once again able to use the half dozen or so boat launch points.

After dropping my wife off at the doctor's office I decided that rather than sitting in the parking lot and waiting for her I'd drive up the road and see what kind of photographs I could get at the Norfolk Southern manufacturing plant in Altoona, PA.

This little yard engine is pushing a diesel engine onto the round table in order to get it onto the track that will take it inside the facility.

As you can see there are numerous engines being worked on at any time.

Engine 999, an experimental, battery-powered, yard switcher.  What I've found out so far is that there are still some bugs to be worked out and the unit is not yet fully operation.

CEFX Unit 6010 waiting its turn for refurbishing.

From the position of the turntable you can get a view of the various tracks that lead into the Juniata Works of Norfolk Southern.

Two helper engines sit idle along the Mainline waiting for their next assignment assisting another line of cars up the mountain and around the Horseshoe Curve.

Another one bites the dust as this wall is about to come down in order to make room for a new building along this section of Plank Road in Blair County, PA.