This is my first post for the Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge.

Thanks to Terri at Perspectives On… for nominating me for this challenge. I had been planning to try some photo challenge blogging events recently, but hadn’t quite to started yet so this little nudge helps.

I live on the north shore of Lake Travis, which is a large reservoir lake that was created as part of a chain of seven Highland Lakes on the Colorado River in central Texas.

We have been in a drought for the past six years, and the lake is about 53 feet below full (37% full), and about 42 feet below monthly historical averages; of course, it will drop further during the summer months (maybe another 10 feet or so). Even though we have actually had quite a bit of rain recently, it has hardly raised the lakes much at all since the ground is so dry and everything gets absorbed rather than running off.

Recently, I took some photos with my iPhone 5 to capture what it looks like, especially since it’s fairly dramatic in places with high cliffs or large dry areas normally covered. For example, down by the Mansfield Dam there are the “Sometimes Islands” that have risen out of the water, or actually the water dropped and  shows them “sometimes” when the water gets very low.

When you walk down to the end of my street, you can look out over the lake where it bends around the Pace Bend Park peninsula visible across from my house. You can see how far on the left side in the brown area where the water used to be, with the limestone cliffs on the right side.

I went over to Arrowpoint Park, one of the many parks available to property owners, for some additional photos since the cliffs on the far side are closer and easier to see there. You can walk on the near side of the lake for quite a ways which used to covered with water, so you see a lot of interesting rocks, etc. Also, the marinas for boats have had to relocate multiple times further out into the lake so that they are still in the water.

Finally, I drove over to Cody Park, which is another park that we have often gone to swim in the lake, but it’s now much lower and you can walk way out further before coming to the water. It’s amazing how much stuff there was under the water, like tree stumps, etc and how much has already grown in since the drought.

The first several photos here who an inlet that really illustrates how low the water is now, and all that area was previously covered with water (including where I was standing and way up further). The other photos show how high some of the cliffs are on the other side.

The Five Photos, Five Stories Challenge rules require you to post a photo each day for five consecutive days and attach a story to the photo. It can be fiction or non-fiction, a poem or simply a short paragraph – it’s entirely up to you.

Then each day, nominate another blogger to carry on this challenge. Accepting the challenge is entirely up to the person nominated, it is not a command. And actually everyone can join in. So feel free to if you like the idea.

I would like to invite Julia at Julia’s Odyssey to join the party. She participated in Blogging 101 and Photo 101  with me, and I notice that she has been taking part in the Weekly Photo Challenges. Also, I appreciate that she mentioned that my blog gave her inspiration. As mentioned before, it is totally up to you to accept this challenge.