Twas A Few Days Before Christmas !

I'll be on a mission early Christmas Eve! I'm grabbing my camera and tripod to head out to find Santa and his sleigh! As soon as it gets dark I'm going to look skyward and see if I can capture Santa flying over Gloucester. It's not going to be easy but I'm determined to do it. If I'm successful I'll post the photo just below the Cape Ann Images logo probably between 7:00pm and 8:00pm.

In the meantime below are images from the past few days including more of the first winter storm of the season.

Winter Begins With A Blast !

With the first snow of the season on the way I thought I'd begin with images from the day before the storm..... as the sky darkened. This morning I looked out to a snow covered landscape with a plan on capturing any snow scenes around the docks. So with that in mind I did just that. Once on the waterfront I needed to break away to take care of my job duties that came up. Later I scheduled to meet up with one of my colleagues and had about 45 minutes to kill so I headed over to Good Harbor Beach and the Back Shore just to see if there was any surf worth shooting. To my surprise the surf was up and the opposing winds were shearing off the top of the waves!
So much for plans! So here it is without captions. I figure the images tell the story.

A Real Lobster Trap Christmas Tree and Then Some !

Ever since Gloucester constructed a Christmas tree made out of lobster traps many years ago, the idea has been catching on along the coast. From Maine to Cape Cod towns have claimed they have the biggest,oldest and the prettiest. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder I guess but one thing separates Gloucester's from all the others.....It's got character! Made of over 400 used traps that have caught lobster and will catch'm again after the holidays. Also the buoys used to decorate the tree are hand painted by the children of Gloucester!

20 degree F sail!

"Horizon" pulls in to off load shrimp.

Ice coated "Foxy Lady".

Lift off!

Late afternoon.

"Padre Pio" pulls in to offload.

Loading bait aboard the lobster boat "Jean Elizabeth".

Among the bait and gulls.

Shove off.

Lobster Trap Christmas Tree!

Looking up!

Thank you sign.

A Hint of Christmas !

As Christmas creeps closer the signs are all around, even on the docks. More and more decorations go up as shopping traffic picks up. And do you notice how many UPS and Fed Ex trucks are showing up on neighborhood streets? Cyber shopping is on the rise!

Dock built manger scene!

Johnny on the dock yelled out: "There's a penquin in the harbor"! Knowing there are no penguins in the northern hemisphere I grabbed the camera anyway and found this bird. I don't know what it is but it's either a small gull or a large sandpiper.

Gull is caught on the sorting table.

Cold gull!

A gull on ice.

"Amanda & Andy" steams by.

Haul away!

Cod

Eric "Ninja" Josephson holds up large cod.

Clean up time.

Christmas lights!

Boats at rest.