March 6, 2022
Ride to Pine Mountain covid-19: day 708 | US: GA | info | act
It was just what I needed. Giles suggested a long ride to cheer me up, so we ventured west toward one of the best roads in west Georgia: GA-190. I took a few back roads over, and the ride took about two hours. The day was pretty perfect for riding, as the temperature hovered around 80 for the entire afternoon.
I asked Giles to bring along my Ultron 1.8/21 he'd been borrowing for a while, so the Leica SL wore that the whole day. Here's a shot from the FDR Overlook at Dowdell Knob, our first stop.
Quite a view. Yes, I boosted the saturation a bit; this shot is at f/8, I believe. After a brief poke around and few photos, we continued west until 190 ended at the Callaway Gardens Country Kitchen where we stopped for a bathroom break. Giles led heading back east, and we stopped a bit more for photos.
At the Pine Mountain Trail Info Center.
Outside Woodland City Hall.
Extreme closeup of a peach blossom. (f/1.8)
Peach blossoms! Spring is springing. (f/5.6)
This Ultron does impress, I have to say. Look at the perfect focus and falloff of the peach blossom. There is a bit of close-focus adapter working here, and it looks great. I've been itching for something wider than my trusty Summicron 35 lately, and this might suffice for a while. I have had my eye on the new Ultron 2/28 from Voigtlander, so I might say my pennies for that one. People seem to like it.
By the time we got back home, I was pretty beat. We traveled close to 200 miles, so that's a pretty good first ride of the season. The BMW R 1200 GS was up for it. Thanks, Giles. I see many more rides like this ahead of us.
