Here are the next in a series.

We recently moved to a lake and I had an opportunity to observe this Harvest moon rise over the lake.

(Download)

Chip speed will affect read/write times which may or may not be noticeable, depending on your hardware. Chip quality will affect card failure rate, which is quite low with the better cards. Image quality should be the same with all cards.

You can also walk Oak Creek, or north of Sedona, West Fork of Oak Creek, also the Red Rock State Park is interesting and provides views of Cathedral Rock and other natural formations in the area. You might consider a hot air balloon ride to capture some unique images as well.

Tony tries to oversimplify, and in the process makes some misleading statements, and I believe has some biases that others have now pointed out. A lens F stop rating means that the lens will produce the same exposure at the same F stop as any other lens at that same F stop, not that it will have the same amount of total light output or DOF. The Admiring Light link does a good job of putting all of this in perspective.
Fortunately we can make excellent photographs with almost any of the advanced camera systems now available. One should choose a system best suited to his needs and budget and go out and shoot. Of course a better understanding of photographic principles and the properties of your particular equipment can improve ones quality and creativity significantly, but equipment bashing is probably not helpful.

You might consider the new Olympus Stylus SH-1. It is very compact and has a very wide zoom range and an excellent 5 axis image stabilization.

Yes, it appears to be a non-issue. Thanks for the suggestions. I consider this a dead topic at this point.

Very impressive scene! Not an nice day for a swim though.

Nice. Thanks for the info- interesting site.

Just as an update for any interested- I could not find any manufacturer willing to comment on card slot wear.

Yes, I agree, if we look at noise alone, however I have seen evidence that dynamic range is significantly greater with larger pixels. This is a function of initial light gathering and is more difficult to post process.
And I definitely agree with a primary lens if possible, or high quality "tele-zoom" rather than a full range zoom for better IQ and hopefully faster lens as well.

Test results I have seen indicate a one to two f-stop increase in ISO performance. That plus a higher IQ sensor will allow higher shutter speeds and allow some cropping to "zoom in" even further to get closer and clearer shots in low light situations.

I prefer the rear shot. A bit more going on.

A lot of opinions in this area. I agree with SS for the most part although I doubt that 10MP is an issue with IQ unless you are making very large prints or like to crop a lot. There is a case to be made for camera design using moderate pixel density to achieve even better low light capability rather than reducing the pixel size and increasing MPs. This is something to consider when choosing a new camera since a sensor with 16MP will outperform a sensor with 34MP in light gathering ability (if both are the same size).
I would suggest a new camera with the best high ISO performance in its class along with a current 2-300 mm primary lens. This will provide the ability to increase shutter speed as necessary for telephoto shots and greatly increase the IQ of your camera and lens. A lot depends on your style of shooting, certainly if you like to attempt handheld bird shots this approach has some merit.

It seems like your lighting is fairly even and you should be able to get adequate DOF with a 50mm perspective. I think flash would be too complex to insure proper even exposure with multiple units and probably not necessary.
I like the idea of using a normal perspective lens as you have chosen and increase contrast as necessary in post production. Moving closer will increase distortion of perspective and panning complicates the shot unnecessarily.