Castaway Island Preserve--Another Amazing Jacksonville, Florida Park

Looking for some new reference photos for landscape painting, I recently visited the Castaway Island Preserve and found it fascinating. My photos don't fully capture its charms, I fear, but have given me much raw material for paintings. Sometimes all I need is good background information (a unique tree, a winding channel in the salt marsh, a particular bird) to meld into a composition that represents the area without copying any particular spot exactly. Although I had neglected to check the tidal schedule for the day, I was in luck to be there when the high tide was just receding. Thus, the marsh was quite wet, and birds, crabs, and other critters were active.

This wonderful small preserve includes both woodland and salt marsh ecosystems with views out to the intracoastal waterway, which runs between our off-shore beach island and the North Florida mainland in this area. We are parched for rain, unfortunately, and have some wildfires in the area. The day I explored Castaway Island, smoke hung in the air--sad to see and smell. However, I did the photo documentation I could under these conditions and have a nice packet of about 4 dozen prints to carry along with other photos to a painting workshop I will be taking this weekend. I hope to start two 9" x 12" canvases at the workshop.

In one photo, you see the dock at the end of the park area, where a woman had put a something on a line into the water (crabbing perhaps?). The intracoastal waterway is in the smoky background with a sailboat and a powerboat passing each other, going in opposite directions. Another photo shows the beginning of the path to Castaway Island (a short bridge crossing a channel in the marsh is the only clue that one is has crossed to an island). On the island part of the preserve, there are about 12 informative big boards along the main path, each one describing the life of one of the preserve's "survivor" species--other than that, the area is quite untouched. Two other photos show the wetlands, grasses, etc.--one includes a great blue heron fishing (actually blue-grey in color) which will take sharp eyes to see, even if you click on the photos to enlarge them.

For this visit, I took the paths through the salt marsh; the park provides extensive boardwalks over the wettest areas, helping to protect the natural habitat as well as making exploration convenient for the visitor. Another time, I'll explore the wooded areas further from the intracoastal. We are fortunate indeed in the Jacksonville, Florida area to enjoy a rich variety of habitats and to have many thousands of acres in these areas protected in preserves and parks.

Question of the day: Isn't it amazing how deep the creative and spiritual renewal available to us when we explore natural areas?

Savoring--Contrasts in Jacksonville Harbor, Nature & Commerce

Following up on the previous post, I have two more photos to show you from our dinner cruise on Jacksonville's beautiful, wide St. John's River. At one point, three dolphins greeted us, playing all around the boat as we enjoyed their company. I wish I had a better picture of them. Although I did my best to capture an image, snapping away as they circled and leapt, many of my photos are of ripples where there had been dolphins a second before. Oh well, with or without boast-worthy pictures, I will not forget the experience. We were awed and privileged to be near these sleek, intelligent animals. They seemed to be riding the rising tide of the salt water sweeping into the river, a twice-daily flow that enriches the variety of marine life we see in the river. Even where we dock our sailboat, about 14 miles from the mouth of this mighty river, the water is brackish enough to support many salt water creatures from small crabs to those gentle giant sea mammals, manatees.

The other photo is a contrast to the rich marine life in the river and shows a ship in port--just one glimpse of the heavy shipping Jacksonville's active port supports. The graceful bridge in the background is called the Dames Point Bridge--one of our favorites among the many river crossings. Reviewing my photos from that evening, I realized again how much I enjoy living in this area. I love the varied natural habitats and extensive nature preserves in our forests, meadows, salt marshes, and ocean coastal areas. However, I am also a city kid through and through. Growing up just north of industrial Muskegon, Michigan, on the shore of Lake Michigan, I loved to watch the activity at the commercial docks. Once the St. Lawrence Seaway opened the lake to international shipping, the loading and unloading of ships, the transfer of goods to trucks and trains, and other dockside activities increased exponentially. Yet, there too, we were near gorgeous natural habitats and preserves and enjoyed the best of both worlds, in my view.

Question of the day: No particular question comes to mind--just the thought that we are very fortunate in our home area and all the places we have lived. I hope you find beauty and fascination all around, as well.

Exploring--A Pocket Park in Jacksonville--Hunting for Painting Subjects

Yesterday, Maggie The Wonder Dog, and I took advantage of an hour of free time to go hunting for landscape painting subjects. I pulled out my trusty Jacksonville map and looked for green patches--trying to find a park we had not yet explored. The goal was not to find a grand, well-landscaped, or popular park, but rather to discover one of our wonderful city's numerous "pocket parks". All over Jacksonville, FL, small patches of preserved land hold onto nature's charm, whether they boast ancient live oak trees dripping with Spanish moss, salt marsh wetlands, or one of our countless lazy creeks, reflecting images of cypress or palm trees in murky water.

River Oaks Park shows as a curved sliver of green on the map, not far from our home on Jacksonville's south side, set along a dirty, neglected creek where it empties into the mighty St. John's River. Grand homes claim most of the land area along and near the prized riverfront, but this one small stretch of scrubby wild land has been saved from development. Perhaps it remains partly because it is anything but premium building land, with lots of squishy low spots along a muddy creek.

Since we were alone in the park, Maggie could be off leash and was in doggie heaven, tearing around on the large grassy area, sniffing interesting smelly, dank low spots, and cocking her head to discern individuals in the symphony of bird songs and calls. Although there was heavy overcast, the light was a bit too intense for ideal photography but I couldn't resist snapping away. The park is no garden spot, but is instead exactly the sort of unlikely place I discover interesting painting subjects. There were several old live oak trees on the drier grassy stretch, while the skeletons of dead cypress and many fallen trees and branches created tangled sculptures on the creek banks. Dark, still water perfectly reflected each scene in the clear light of an overcast winter day.

Can't say yet what I might paint from this outing, if anything. Even so, recalling the park's sights, sounds, and smells provides painting inspiration and these sensations will sink into my subconscious to percolate and bubble up in unexpected creative insights sometime in the future. I look forward to returning to this quirky little park some sunny late afternoon for a different perspective on the scene. Although the light was bright yesterday, the pervasive overcast created no shadows at all, and I missed them. The character-filled trees I photographed seemed to be lacking something without long shadows to attest to their dignity.

Question of the day: What unexpected source provides creative inspiration for you?