Earth Day is celebrated globally on April 22 each year.

I’m a witness to the first Earth Day in 1970 when I was a young college student. This was 56 years ago. For many years since, I’ve written essays about this topic. You can read one of my previous Earth Day articles here.

Subsequent Earth Days have been filled with forceful calls to conserve and protect our natural resources. The difficult and controversial task was to improve the way the worldwide economy functions so as to reduce and/or prevent harm to our environment with a goal to keep our planet viable into the future.

It’s widely agreed that we have a long way to go to change the trajectory of our collective and personal behavior to reach that goal. I’m not here to judge or criticize. Rather I’ve tried to minimize my carbon footprint and encourage those that I can influence to do the same.

I’ve spent a considerable amount of time roaming the outdoors USA visiting many wonderful places that Mother Nature has generously provided for all of us to enjoy.

Following is a gallery of photos from our visits to some of our nation’s National Parks.

I hope that you have chosen a way to both celebrate and remember Earth Day.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

The post Let’s Celebrate Earth Day 2026 first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

Here in western Michigan, the sun is finally making an appearance and the winter’s cold is fading. That signals the time for the migrating birds to make their way back to our northern location.

Reaching back to Christmas, my wife received a gift that is perfect for this warming weather.

It’s called BirdBuddy.

This is a bird feeder with addition of a built-in camera.

She was anxious to see how it works but we thought it best to wait until the weather was more hospitable to the both the birds and to me (I’d have to get it working in the cold).

The BirdBuddy has a solar panel roof to power the camera. While we’ve used it only a few days, we’re not sure if the panel will charge the unit without having to use conventional USB charging.

The camera has a motion sensor to start recording when a bird (or other animal) approaches the unit.

Assembly is simple – snap the front and rear feed walls to the blue platform, attach the roof, insert the camera unit front facing into its slot and add some bird feed.

After downloading the BirdBuddy app from the internet you set up an account with your email address and finally connect the unit to your wi-fi network.

When we had it assembled and were ready to go, we hung the unit in the backyard.

Sure enough an hour later we had a feathered visitor.

The BirdBuddy app notified us and sent this message with a picture of the unidentifed bird.

When we clicked Identify this visitor we were told that the bird is a House Finch.

We’re happy that this BirdBuddy is now ready to serve up more sightings as Spring continues to bring more visitors back to Michigan.

If you’re interested find more information about BirdBuddy here.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

The post The Birds are Returning first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium is a tranquil place where you can enjoy the underwater scenery.

We spent a few hours feeling the solitude that some of the creatures of the sea offer their guests with their eye-catching beauty and graceful movements. Some are tiny and some are gigantic but they all seem to move with such ease.

Below are a few of our visual experiences.

I hope you enjoyed the quietness of these clips.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

The post Happenings At the Shedd first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

Let me point out the selection of my photographs available for sale.

These photos fall into four categories – National Parks, Nature, Travel and Scenic .

Prints are available in multiple sizes.

View the collections here.

Thanks,

Arnie

The post My Photos for Sale first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

As I was reviewing my collection of photos, I realized that I had overlooked a bunch of pictures from a couple of months ago.

At the time, we were enjoying the very pleasant weather in Chicago when my granddaughter asked to visit the famous Shedd Aquarium.

Here are Kris and our granddaughter Eden in front of one of the huge displays at the museum.

Rather than letting the pictures go unnoticed I created a short gallery. There isn’t any detail except for an identifying name.

Hopefully you’ll enjoy viewing some of the amazing creatures in and around our planet’s waters..

If you want to see some of the creatures that inhabit Earth’s fresh and ocean waters you’ll find a very large collection at the Shedd Aquarium. We certainly enjoyed seeing them last fall.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

The post Going Underwater first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

My website has articles on topics that have been of interest to me over the years. Some are informational and others casual but in either case they’re heavily illustrated with photographs and/or videos that I’ve taken. Browse the site by clicking on a Search by keyword item to the right. For those interested, you can now buy some of my best selling photographs here at  Fine Art Photos. Arnie

The post Welcome first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

Walking through the endless aisles at this past January’s Consumer Electronics Show I came upon a familiar name Potensic.

Since I have one of their Atom 2 compact drones, I stopped to talk to Dean one of their representatives. I wanted to find out if they had any other accessories that I might use with my device.

The first thing he pointed out were the grey propeller guards.

I asked Dean about these and he said they were for users who fly their drones indoors and protect both the drone and any users from the rotating propellers. They are also useful for added safety when flying near trees or buildings.

While the guards add a few ounces of weight to the drone and require slightly more battery power when taking off and flying they help stabilize flight in windy conditions. Targeted at the beginner drone pilot, the are not required but are helpful when learning to fly the device.

The second thing he pointed out is their new PTD-1 controller. It has a built-in screen, internal memory for video recording and slot for mini-SD card for expanded storage for movies and photos.

It eliminates the need to use a mobile phone (either iPhone or Android) with their standard controller.

For those interested the propeller guards costs about $30 per set .

The new PTD-1 controller costs about $280.

Not long after I returned home from CES I ended up ordering a set of propeller guards for my Atom 2.

Since I’m closer to a beginner than an advanced pilot I feel more comfortable using the guards.

Although the Consumer Electronics Show has been over for two months now, I keep looking back to some of my encounters there with so many interesting electronic devices.

I’m looking forward to CES 2027.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

The post Drone Time first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

From our home in Grand Rapids, it’s just over a two hour drive to Detroit. In the past, we were frequent visitors to the “motor city” however we haven’t traveled to Detroit for several years.

Yesterday four of us decided to take a day trip to visit the well-known Detroit Institute of Arts. DIA is located in the downtown area adjacent to Wayne State University

We arrived in the morning and walked through the many halls to view the collections from various geographic areas: Africa, Middle East, Korea, Japan, China.

After a short lunch break in the museum’s cafeteria we continued viewing other collections for a few hours – modern, British, Dutch and Impressionist.

Below are some of my photos I took of the amazing works of art from our visit:

The museum is extremely well laid out and organized. It’s definitely a first class public attraction.

We very much enjoyed our one-day visit.

If you’re in the Detroit area, it’s worth your time to the stop at the Detroit Institute of Arts.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

The post An Artful Visit first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

I enjoy attending the Consumer Electronics Show to see the plethora of different devices that are available to a gadget junkie such as myself. This past January I again walked through the miles of the Las Vegas Convention Center to see what might attract my attention. One of the booths was Hohen.

Hohen makes a series of handheld gimbal equipped devices.

These devices are for enthusiasts and professionals who want to shoot better quality movies by stabilizing their videos. They also have other features such as remote control, built-in lighting, subject tracking and more.

Their representative demonstrated a few of the features for me and I was impressed.

The unit communicates with your mobile phone with bluetooth. The mobile app has multiple templates to make it easy to produce fun and exciting movies. You can add various filters and create slow-motion and timelapse content.

Hohem’s V3 model sells for about $125 and has so far proven to be a good investment. I’ve happily added this gimbal to my photography accessory bag and am hoping that the quality of my movies improves.

The Hohem X3 model lacks the telescoping extension and the builtin fill light but sells for about $65.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

The post Better Videos first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

I was able to make it to this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in early January. I try to make CES an annual event having attended fairly regularly since 1978. The last few years I’ve chosen to go to the show for two days and spend a few other days visiting other places nearby.

Red Rock Canyon is a national conservation area and is located less than 20 miles from Las Vegas proper.

Red Rock mountainous area with many canyons and perfect for visitors who enjoy the outdoors with hiking. It’s hilly paths are attractive to bikers.

You don’t have to gamble out here. You’ll be a winner just by enjoying this peaceful and scenic area.

Written by: Arnie Lee

The post Outside of Sin City first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

Over the decades I’ve pressed my camera shutter many, many times and have amassed a large portfolio of photographs.

My favorites are now available for sale.

Browse through my collections to find one or more to decorate your home or office.

I’ve selected about 50 photos and arranged them into four categories. Prints are available in four sizes: 5×7, 8×10, 11×14 and 13×19 for immediate delivery in USA and Canada.

I hope you enjoy browsing through these collections from my portfolio.  And a big thank you for your interest.

Regards,

Arnie Lee

The post Fine Art Photos first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

Last night we enjoyed our last outdoor concert of the summer.

The venue was the well-known Frederick Meijer Garden Amphitheater in Grand Rapids. FMG is the Best Sculpture Garden in the USA and its amphitheater host dozens of concerts during the warm weather.

We luckily secured two tickets to the sold out concert for Alison Krauss and the Union Station. Having been a fan for many years, I was eager to hear her voice in the live.

Below are a few of their songs that I was able to capture.

We were sitting on the lawn more than 50 yards away but my compact camera performed well recording the video at a distance with quite good quality audio. Excuse several focus issues and attendees walking in front of me.

Alison with a long, warm coat. The temperature was about 50 degrees and she has been used to the warmer weather in more southern venues.

My granddaughter Ezra and myself on one of the lawn chairs enjoying the concert.

With this concert we’ve left the summer behind, having heard the fabulous voice of Alison Krauss and the talented music of the Union Station. This group really takes bluegrass to the highest level.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

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Out west there’s still lots of snow in March for an excursion to the slopes. The Lake Tahoe area is surrounded by lots of ski resorts. We took the hour drive from Reno, NV to Truckee, CA at the north end of the lake to visit Northstar.

I gave up skiing a few years ago, but my son and two of our grandkids are still active.

Since our son lives in Reno, we’ve often had the chance to visit the areas around Lake Tahoe. The Northstar ski resort is one of them and I have a feeling that we’ll be back again.

Written by:

Arnie Lee

The post Spring Ski first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

It’s been several years since we last visited, but our granddaughter was on a spring break from college and wanted to visit San Francisco. We made a short list of must do’s and headed to town for a couple of days.

While two days isn’t a lot of time to spend in San Francisco, our granddaughter throughly enjoyed seeing a few of the city’s sites.

The post Streets of San Francisco first appeared on ArnieLee.com.

This “western” style town is a short thirty minute drive from downtown Reno.

A very winding road takes you about 1500 feet above Reno where you’ll have a view of the attractive high plains landscape.

Then you’ll immediately see the town’s historical likeness to a mining town of the past.

One of the first sites you’ll see is the tall, picturesque St Mary in the Mountains Church.

The town maintains the look of the 1800s having storefronts with wooden sidewalks.

The town was founded in the 1850’s as a mining town because of the discovery of gold and silver known as the Comstock Lode. By the late 1800s the output of the mines fell of and the large population declined.

Some of the older readers may remember a western television program from the 1960s and 1970s called Bonanza. The Cartwright Family owed the fictitious Ponderosa Ranch located near Virginia City.

If you’re in the Reno area, take a ride to see the charm of an old western town.

The post Afternoon in Virginia City first appeared on ArnieLee.com.