What a great photo. How did you manage to get so close?
I just bought a Nikon D70s and am looking forward to really having control over my photos now. It's been a while since I've used an SLR, but in spite of my short love affair with compact cameras, SLR's still are the way to go for control.

Thanks. My videocamera has a 15X zoom. Have been thinking of buying the Canos EOS Digital Kiss for a while now, but (a) it's a lot of money, (b) good photographers can take good photos with bad cameras, (c) bad photographers can take bad photographs with good cameras, and (d) Photoshop can do some of what an SLR can do anyway.

Will probably cave in eventurally, but that's my logic for now. Let me know how the new camera goes.

Hiking books: got great use from the both, thanks. Can give them back whenever you like. If you need them quickly, I'll send them by takyubin.