A Walk Around Town

It was gorgeous yesterday! Sunshine, a slight breeze, temperatures in the upper 70s... My kind of weather. I had to go to the post office, so I used that as an excuse to hit our little downtown area for a stroll. The idea was to do some reading for class outside, but as you can see, I distracted myself with picture-taking.

Here's one of three covered bridges along what's called the Riverwalk.

We took our wedding pictures here and it's still one of my favorite spots, especially when empty.

This part is fairly landscaped, with lots of stonework and little seating areas.

But if you go over the middle bridge--look out! Some real nature in the city.

Closer to the street, it turns into more of a manicured park with several sculptures. (There is also a Dick Tracy statue, which I forgot to photograph. My bad.)

While I was wandering around taking pictures on my iPhone, which I find myself doing more and more, I realized it might be time to upgrade my "real" camera. Now that I have Photoshop and other picture apps on my phone, my poor Canon PowerShot seems extra lame. I only use it for product shots these days, and those are getting iffy.  Its little brain gets tired when I try to do anything manually. And heaven forbid I need to change the exposure.

So I need to know: what kind of camera do you use? What do you like about it? How hard was it to learn? Any brands/models to avoid? I might be willing to shell out the beans for a DSLR, but I need some recommendations on which one. Any advice would be awesome.