Some Local Color

After a few days of isolating myself in my house so as not to spread chickenpox, I was going totally stir crazy with cabin fever. And despite plenty of training and playing fetch in the yard, I think the dogs were too.

I wanted to go do something without risking spreading chickenpox to other people. I ended up taking a drive out to the country. When I went past a sign for Harris Covered Bridge, I decided on the spur of the moment that I wanted to stop and see the bridge. I don't know how common covered bridges are in other parts of the country, but we have quite a few of them in Oregon. Each one is different and unique in its own ways. I'd never seen the Harris bridge before.

It was difficult to get a good picture that both showed the bridge itself and had a dog in it. I ended up really liking the one of Pallo, above. I got a similar photo of Koira, below, posing in the same place. But she was a bit more nervous about standing on the railing, so I didn't want to back up as far as I had with Pallo. The vertical photo isn't my favorite for a covered bridge, but I think it turned out okay.

Part of the appeal of the covered bridges is the architecture on the inside. All of the exposed beams and supports make a really intricate background, with the outside visible on the far end and right below the ceiling.

I ended up getting two shots I really liked of both dogs in the bridge. This first one is a close up of both dogs, but with the bridge architecture prominent enough to make the photo interesting. Don't worry- while the bridge is still in use, it is back on a very small gravel road with very little traffic. We saw two vehicles the entire time we were there, and were off the bridge in plenty of time.

I think I like this photo even better. It is still just the dogs in the bridge, but the bridge itself is so much more prominent in this photo. I love the back lighting on the tresses above the dogs especially. Don't be fooled. It was a very cloudy, rainy day. The inside the bridge shots were mostly taken towards the north end of the bridge during the rain downpours, while the outside shots were during the clear times of the afternoon.

When I got Pallo out to pose for a shot by himself, he flopped onto his belly with his hind legs in their frog pose. This is a pretty unusual pose for him to stay in for very long, and I'm not really sure why he chose to lay like that in the first place, since it wasn't particularly hot out. But either way, it is seriously adorable. Asking him if he wanted some breakfast resulted in the intense eyes and cute head tilt.

Koira's alone shots were a little more difficult. We had a little bit of lightening and thunder along with the rain, so she wasn't relaxed enough to lay down and didn't particularly want to sit down for very long. I did get a nice shot of her standing in the bridge, though. And I am glad that she doesn't look too nervous in the photo. I don't think she was too worried about the thunder, since she was still willing to listen to me, perk her ears at my noises, etc., she just didn't want me to get too far away from her.

If you couldn't guess with the wooden decking of the bridge, this is also where I took the "always by my feet" photos from the Wordless Wednesday post. I'm still trying to decide if I like those pictures better the orientation I posted them with, or flipped 180. Overall, I had a great time on our outing, and am really pleased with the photos I ended up with. 

Between our impromptu trip to the covered bridge and a nice hike in the forest, we managed to stave off cabin fever for a while. Now, I am finally getting over being sick, so can go back out into public. Just in time for me to be gone from home for a week. I'll still be trying to get some posts up this week, and I'll try to stop by everyone's blogs (I read all the new posts, I just don't comment as often as I should). Hope everyone has a great first day of summer tomorrow!