Last Monday (Nov 10) I took a trip down to the southern part of the Hill Country to Lost Maples State Natural Area, in order to get a bit of what counts as autumn in Texas. Unfortunately, peak color was the Thursday and Friday previous, but between class and having two out-of-state friends visiting that weekend (both of whom I was happy to see), taking a day-long excursion was just not feasible. On top of that, the night before I arrived, there was also a big gust of wind that came through the valley and knocked off most of the leaves. Alas!

Nevertheless, there was still color – much more, as I have said, than is typical in Texas – although a lot of it was on the ground. But I tried to take advantage of this, incorporating the ground color into my pictures.

While out and about I ran into some older gents who were shooting some fairly serious photography (you can just tell these things), and engaged in a bit of talk with them, getting a few pointers about what regions in the park to check for color. They seemed to notice and respect me as well, which was a bit exciting. I felt like I’d passed some secret rite for being noticed as a photographer. And as I thought about it, I realized there is at least one fairly obvious giveaway about whether you know what you’re doing or not: an unskilled amateur will not walk around his subject and take it in from different angles before he starts shooting away; a more skilled amateur or professional most certainly will. There were some other folks come to enjoy the color whom I also got to meet, and for those that had a camera, this failure to study or even look critically at their subject stood out to me. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that – they’re not there for the photography.) There were of course fewer folks out toward the back of the park than toward the front – but it turned out that most of the color (with the exception of one brilliantly red tree) was not very far in. In any case, the Merry Band of Photographers went back to the parking lot and around to the other side, and I just hiked it. We later met again, passing each other near the creek on the other side.

Without further commentary, here are some of the pictures: