Photography Adventure at Lost Lagoon

So I was just trying to capture how we're almost the only place in sight of Lost Lagoon - out of hundreds of apartments and condos - to have our Xmas lights up.

I started of with a photo of a nearby apartment high-rise, showing how only 3 apartments put up Xmas lights - two, one 3 floors above the other, on the left, and only one on the right-facing side of the building:

Then I went around Lost Lagoon looking back at our place, and got my shot of the Xmas tree and the light on the water. We are the thin line of coloured lights just a smidge left of the exact centre of the shot - there's a high-rise behind us but only darkness below our lights.

That I was screwing up! The moon was right in the shot if I zoomed out a bit.

Now, I have to stop to explain. This is on a gravel park path around the lagoon, at the edge of one of the most densely-populated downtowns on the continent...and I was quite alone. It was cold out, and while that tree is lovely, nobody was within a few hundred yards.

Then there was a noise behind me and I jumped a foot in the air.

The Swans. The swans of Lost Lagoon don't go home at night, they're already there. So I watched this guy eating for a while, and tried to take pictures in near-pitch blackness, nearest streetlight is half a block away.

Then there was another noise behind me...which is to say, where I'd been looking a few minutes earlier. Jumped again.

So I grabbed one last dim shot as the swan departed. Not an award-winning photo (now I know why people spend $3000 on a camera...) but an amazing moment.