My Pentax K20d, probably my favorite camera of all time, has lived its last day as a working camera.  It went down valiantly in a canoe accident that was also one of the more exciting moments of my life! Here is the last photo that it ever took.  It is a photo of Sarah and Eric laughing at Jessica and Amber as they tried to right their canoe(Michael Snow is helping them out).

Canoeing the new riverCanoeing the new river

I didn't think that the trip would be all that crazy, since we were canoeing a short section in between the Byllesby and Buck dams.  Most of the water was flat, but all it took was that one crazy spot.  After a short time in the rapid, our canoe had taken on so much water that it basically sunk out from under us!  Next thing I knew I was clinging to my backpack floating down the river next to the canoe.  The canoe then became lodged on a rock, to which I had to swim up and free. It was heavily dented, but Jessica and Amber's Canoe was in even worse shape!  Theirs had a big crack in the front of it!

All in all it was a crazy awesome day that only cost me a camera and a smartphone, but I'm not emotionally attached to my smartphone.  

The k20d had a long and rough life, as you can see in the following photos, this incident was just the last of many encounters with trouble.

The first real shock it had, was when I left it on the roof of a car, and found it later on the side of the highway... the door covering the ports was damaged, but it was mostly intact after that.

Broken k20dbroken k20d

Then came a cold day in South Dakota.  I was pulling the camera out of my trunk(by this time it wasn't my primary camera) when it hit the ground and broke the bottom off of it.  Fortunately it wasn't something that a little black tape couldn't fix!

Then, after surviving all of that, the water rushed in.

water damaged camerawater damaged camera water damaged lenswater damaged camera

Now, a look back at my favorite images.  I really don't think my Pentax days are over, but next time I may consider the WG-3 Point and shoot(It's waterproof).  Hell, I might even use a dry bag:)

This first one is from Shenandoah National Park.  It's of a very young crescent moon setting just after sunset.  It was shot with my very old Sears 135mm 2.8.  The cool part about Pentax is the fact that you can use all the old lenses!

Very thin crescent moon setting over shenandoah national park. This shot of the puddles on the Rimrocks above Billings Montana is also a favorite.  I took it as I was really figuring out graduated filters.

Water puddles on Billings' rimrocks at sunrise Blazing a trail on a solo hike to Mystic Lake on fresh powder!

Fresh powder in West Rosebud The first time I ever tried for a good 'sunstar'

Double Sunstar over the south hills

A photo of Bison during winter in Yellowstone National Park

Bison in winter in Lamar Valley And one of my favorite sunrise scenes over one of my favorite places, the Bighorn Canyon.

A pink and purple sunrise over devil canyon - Bighorn Canyon

All in all the Pentax and me had a good run.  Fortunately at the time of it's passing, it was simply a backup that I only took on trips like the one that did it in:)