Featured Photo: Taughannock Falls – Late Fall

Taughannock Falls - Taughannock Falls State Park, New York

A couple weeks back I was out for a day of birding and exploration traveling north on the west side of Lake Cayuga and into the Montezuma Wetlands complex to see the Scissor-tailed Flycatcher.  On the way up the lake I decided to stop briefly at the overlook for Taughannock Falls, the tallest waterfall east of the Mississippi River in New York state (Thanks Earl).  Having never been there before, I was expecting to have to walk a mile or so to visit the site and while that wasn’t in the cards for the day, I thought I would at least drive by.  Turns out you don’t have to walk anywhere and this photograph was taken about 10 feet from the parking lot.

Fall color was starting to wrap up as the reds had faded leaving only the yellows, golds, and oranges.  Seeing the scene, I quickly grabbed my lens and set up to take a series of pictures from the overlook.  It is possible to hike all the way down to the bottom, and I will sometime in the near future, but that day was all about birding so after grabbing a couple frames I headed off to eventually find my Scissor-tailed Flycatcher and explore and scout other new areas.

Sure, it is a well photographed icon of the area, but it is a beautiful scene nonetheless and I hadn’t been there before.  Part of my reasoning for creating this image stemmed from the beauty of the scene and part was to create a record for future trips, so I can plan to photograph this gorgeous location more thoroughly.  I plan to return at least once or twice each season for the next year to create images of this region across the seasons.