What gear to take to Seattle (and surrounding areas)

[KevinBarrett]

Thanks, Almazar80. We've already worked out itineraries for ferry rides, trips to Mt Rainier and the Olympic Peninsula, and socialization with our Seattle-ite friends. We're going to see a lot of things this time that we hadn't seen before, including sea stacks and much deeper parts of much bigger rainforests.

About the gear, and my enabling wife...nobody can say I'm afflicted with G.A.S. after turning down a lens and getting a backpack instead!

[KevinBarrett]

I ended up using my brother's tripod just once, at Ruby Beach, after which quickly hauled it back up to the car so that I could have fun and not worry about that burden. The 70-400 G, as I suspected, would have been all but useless on this trip. I'm glad I didn't get it just yet. I used my 85/2.8 only very minimally, also, just a few long shots at the beach, and a couple of pseudo-macros in the woods. The beercan I used for a sunset at the beach. Mostly I relied on my Tamron 17-50/2.8, Sony 35/1.8, and (to my surprise) the little Cyber-Shot TX7.

BTW, after lugging around that kit, I'm thinking about an NEX now more than ever before. But more than that, I'm looking at compact P&S models with a keen eye to find the feature set I want.