It’s hard to pick just twelve.
I enjoyed photography in 2023 and decided to share my pick of favorites. It was not easy! 12 photos for 12 months – not one per month, but just the twelve that I felt were especially beautiful or interesting. See the full gallery – where I recommend clicking the “play” button to see them as a slideshow – and read on for some commentary about each one.
Winter is here?
At daybreak today we woke to our first proper snowfall – with an inch of fresh snow on the ground by 7am. We’d seen snow flurries once or twice in the past week, but now we can confidently say that fall has ended and we’re entering stick season. It appears raspberry season has ended, as well!
Back again, after 41.5 years.
The first (and last) time I climbed Mount Monadnock, in southern New Hampshire, was over four decades ago… as a senior in high school. Despite living in New Hampshire for nearly all the years since then, I have never returned. Why? my impression is that it is always crowded. It was true in May 1982, and it was true now in November 2023. (Some say it is the second most-climbed mountain in the world, behind Mount Fuji in Japan.) Read on for the story of my visit this weekend, and for the gallery of photos!
all good things…
I enjoy sculling (rowing) on the river, in the early mornings, from May through October. Prior to May, the water is too cold for to be out on the water alone; after October, the air is often too cold. (My personal threshold is forty degrees; rowing in 30-degree weather is far too chilly!) Darkness is also a factor this time of year… it’s too dark to see before 7am.
Some years, though, I manage to sneak in one or two more outings in the first days of November, when the weather holds and my calendar allows. This morning I enjoyed one final spin up the river, passing the few remaining ducks, geese, and other migrating birdlife. (On a recent outing, I saw four bald eagles!)
Time to wash and stow the shell until spring… and with snow flurries in the air three days ago, it’s time to dig out the snow-season equipment!
Finally!
It has been an incredibly warm fall – with temperatures hitting the 80s(!) in September and often in the 70s in October. Historically, local gardeners could never count on frost-free weather after Labor Day (first weekend in September)… though in recent years it was not uncommon to make it through September without a frost. This year, as recently as Saturday (75ºF and sunny) it was looking like we might get through October, too, without a frost.
Today, the last day of October – Halloween! – the first frost finally arrived, applying a crisp coating to the yard and the fallen leaves.
Below are plots of temperature in our garden, at head height, over the past week and over the past month.
For those not from around here, these are crazy warm temps for October!
A bountiful harvest.
Fall is here, and that leads to one of my favorite parts of the year: raspberry season. Pam’s garden has a highly productive raspberry patch, partly due to the unusually warm fall weather so far. (It is October 4th and we have yet to see a frost, or even come close!) I’m picking about a quart every day. Yum!
Winter is coming.
When I first moved to this region it was generally understood that gardeners should put their garden to bed for the winter around Labor Day, because one could expect a frost to kill off any remaining vegetables soon afterward. As four decades have passed, I’ve noticed the frost arriving later and later. This year, we didn’t even have a hint of frost until mid-October. Today was the first true frost, with the leaf-covered lawns thoroughly tinged with gray, and where one’s fingernail could scratch patterns in frost-covered railings or other wooden surfaces. The good news, at least, is that clear skies bring us warm sunny afternoons as well as frosty mornings!
A lovely outing in late-fall conditions.
Today I went out with a friend for a short hike in the hills on the eastern side of Hanover. It was a warm afternoon, but we were surprised to see an inch of fresh snow on the leaf-covered forest floor, with melting snow dripping from the fir trees overhead. It rained hard here last night – down along the Connecticut River – but only a few hundred feet higher it had apparently snowed.
It was nonetheless a lovely hike through the forest along a set of trails managed by the Hanover Conservancy, culminating in a series of rocky overlooks on the ledges of the ridge that extends south from Moose Mountain.
We wore bright-orange vests, because this weekend is the first big weekend of deer season, and we could frequently hear the report of rifle shots in the valley to the east. The sight of snow – as much as an inch of heavy, wet snow in some areas – reminds me of how quickly winter is coming.
Hike stats:
Distance: 3.94km
Time: 1h12m
Map: see red route below. (The green route refers to my prior visit)
Likely my last sculling opportunity this year.
The cold and darkness of late autumn has made it increasingly difficult to get out sculling on the river. With the end of Daylight Savings Time in a few days, I will regain the morning daylight but mornings are now too cold to row – my lower limit is 40ºF. Afternoon rowing has been feasible for the past week, but will surely be impossible (with my work schedule) next week. So today I bid farewell to the river, recalling the Great Blue Heron I saw browsing the reeds a few days ago, and the ducks I saw heading south this evening. Even the hunters have shifted inland, with duck season ending and deer season opening in a few days. Now my attention turns to winter – and six months later, back to the river.
A chance encounter.
October has ended but the fall foliage is still brilliant – at least in certain pockets of our valley, and in valleys further to the south. On Sunday October 31, after photographing Dummerston Falls in southern Vermont, there were spectacular colors along the hillsides lining the interstate highway heading northward. So in Windsor I pulled off the highway to cross the Connecticut River on the iconic Cornish-Windsor covered bridge (the longest wooden covered bridge in North America, dating back to 1866), where I knew there was an opportunity for a view of the river, the bridge, and Mount Ascutney beyond.
I was not disappointed; there is an informal pullout for parking nearby, and a quick dash across the road and a hop over the guardrail gives one access to this spectacular view. As I turned to head back to my car, I noticed a wooden post – rather new looking, with a square board screwed atop as if to form a seat. I looked up to see a man approaching, dressed for the weather, wearing a hunter-orange cap and carrying a camouflage bag. After a short greeting he sat on the wooden post, pulled a Canon camera out of his bag, and we began to chat as he began to photograph the same scene.
Dan lives and works nearby, and stops to sit on this post every day. He has captured a new photograph here pretty much every day for the past ten years, posting them to his blog The Shape of the Year. It’s quite interesting to see, for example, what this scene looked like on November 3, February 3, May 3, and August 3. It was fun to meet another photographer, and to exchange our calling cards. Here’s my shot of the similar scene, October 31.
See a gallery with a few more of my roadside fall-foliage photos from across the month and around the region.
David Kotz 