Dale Blake Photography

Wow!! It’s hard to believe that 2023 passed by so quickly and 2024 is well on the way. They say that time flies faster as we get older. I didn’t know they meant it would be this fast though. We did have a great 2023 and I’m preparing to post many of the new photos that were created this year on the Website. I am writing this tonight from Chincoteague, Virginia, overlooking the bridge that accesses the island. The sunset is going to be wonderful again. Check out the photo of the Chincoteague Bridge sunset on the website for one that I posted in 2022. We’ve been out most of the day photographing the beach, marsh, and wildlife as well as the ponies on Assateague Island.

With this said, the website has been down for a while, but we expect to have it back up and running in April 2024. Unfortunately, the company that was hosting and taking care of the website apparently lost the talent that they needed to maintain the website and keep it running. We have separated from them and are now moving to a company that we believe will better attend to the website and keep it available for you. Enough about that for now and more to follow. I’ll send out an email to all our subscribers and let you know when it is up and running. As soon as it is up, please pass the word and let everyone know to check it out and subscribe to it for regular updates.

Now, about 2023:

2023 was a busy year with photographing at the nuclear power plants and other Commercial and Industrial Photography efforts. Despite this, I have managed to find time for doing some creative photography as well.

I have spent several weekends at the Outer Banks photographing the many sights and opportunities offered there and have made quite a few photographs that we have either placed on the website or will be placing them on the new website. The sunsets over the Pamlico Sound and the Sunrises over the Atlantic Ocean are spectacular. I always enjoy the time there to hunt for new vantage points and get new photos.

In addition to the Outer Banks of North Carolina, I have also made quite a few photographs at the Mattamuskeet Lake National Wildlife Refuge in Hyde County, NC. Lake Mattamuskeet Lake is twenty-one miles long and seven miles wide and is home to many migrant birds, deer, bears, and many other creatures that are fun and challenging to photograph. Every season at the lake is new photographic opportunity. This as well as the landscape there makes it a great photo opportunity. In 2024 we will showcase this area as well as the Outer Banks on the Website.

In July we made a trip to Florida to St Petersburg and Vero Beach. This is a great area for photographing the ocean and Florida tropics. I added quite a few photos to my collection from there during this trip.

Donna and I made a trip to Alaska for three weeks in September which included a 7-day cruise from Vancouver, CA, to Anchorage, AK. We also did several shore excursions that allowed me to photograph black bears, the salmon run, and a lot of the Alaska landscape. The landscape there is spectacular. We got a few moose shots, but most were too far away to use. The highlight of the trip was at Fairbanks, photographing the Aurora Borealis. I have always wanted to photograph this, and we got a special treat. We found a group named Viator that actively chased the Aurora and had a good success rate of finding it. (I highly recommend them if you are atter the Aroura Borealis – The Northern LIghts.) We left the hotel in Fairbanks at 10:00 PM in one of their two large vans. We traveled north from there toward the Arctic Circle and they found a spot to stop and wait for a while to see what the aurora was going to do. It was a cloudy night, and I wasn’t sure how well this was going to work out. After cooking reindeer sausages and marshmallows over a fire pot, the tour guides said the computers and their information indicated that the clouds were likely to clear in an area about twenty minutes from where we were. We loaded up and headed that way.

As we arrived on the site the clouds were still present but starting to clear. In about 10 minutes we could see the green glow of the aurora which was lighting up the entire sky. As we watched, sky cleared, and we watched the most incredible light show that I have ever seen. The aurora danced and weaved and showed us many different shades and colors. Even our Alaskan Guides were excited at what it was doing. I made approximately 70 photographs of it, some of which are being placed on the website. Check below for a preview of these. We arrived back at our hotel in Fairbanks at around 4:00 AM, tired but very happy. We fell into bed and slept soundly until we had to get moving to catch our flight home at 4:00 PM. Great trip with lots of great memories and many photos.

On to 2024

We’re looking forward to 2024 and plan traveling quite a bit and will add many photos to the website. First stop of the year is to West Virginia to visit Blackwater Falls State Park and hope to get all the falls there photographed. Following that is another trip to Hatteras Island and then to Breaks Meadow State Park in Tennessee to photograph the Elk Preserve. In fall we will be travelling for about six weeks out west to photograph many of the areas there (Yellowstone, Arches, Glacier State Park, Badlands and many more).

We are setting up an Instagram site and you will be able to follow us and see some of the photos as we travel. We will also be posting new photos on the website.

The website is now DaleBlakePhotography.net, but very soon you will be able to reach with either that or DaleBlakePhotography.com. Below are a few of the new photos on the website. Feel free to call us if you are interested in having any of the photos printed or framed for your wall.