I have an R6 and love it. I know it only has 20MP, but I get great pictures and for birds, I crop a lot and still end up with darn good pictures. I am always surprised how much I can crop, since everybody says 20MP is not enough for cropping. Of course more is better, so?

R6 is really good in low light. I'm intrigued with the R7, extra reach, more MP, but at the cost of low light performance. Both R6 and R7 have IBIS. I might get an R7 as a second body for wildlife when it is bright enough. I would guess you would be happy with either the R7 or the R6. The R5 is what I want but at the price, is not what I need.

Just make sure both camera and lens are weather sealed. The otherwise great Panny/Leica 12-60 lens does not have a gasket. I used my G9 in the light rain for a few hours on our exciting first day at Gritviken, South Georgia, by the time we got back on the zodiac, the camera was fritzed. Luckily after a night to dry out, it came back to life! Remember, you need a gasket to be truly weather sealed. Learned my lesson!

We stayed at Zion for Christmas a few years ago and had no snow problems, there was a dusting at Bryce, did a day trip from there to Bryce Canyon, both are awesome. Have not been to Grand Canyon yet except to raft it. Your family will love the west! Might be freezing in the morning and warm/hot in the afternoon, you can never tell. Remember the best photos are at dawn when all the kids are still asleep!

I bought my EOS 650 new with a 35-135mm f4-5.6 Ultrasonic Lens, silent motor and Quartz Date Back. I still have it sitting on a shelf as a decoration, have no idea whether it works, I don't think so. My first Canon! Cost about $1,000 with lens, an enormous expense for me in 1987!

I have the R6 and RF100-500 with 1.4X extender. Works great, AF great, f10 at 700mm. Use the extender when I go for birds unless they are big and close. The RF extenders for this lens limit its zoom from 300 to 500 which is a bit of a pain. If birds come close to you, yikes, back up! Won't fit in camera bag is another side effect. Still I love the combo. Not sure how the 2X works unfortunately. I also have the RF800 f11, it is amazingly good. I mostly go with the RF100-500 due to versatility and close focusing capability.

I agree on the R6 with the 24-240, I have R6 with 24-105 non-L and have thought that I wish I had gone for the 24-240 instead. Not that there is anything wrong with the 24-105, just that more reach would be more fun!

I have both 100-500 with 1.4X and the 800 f11. I tend to use the 100-500 with 1.4X more than the 800, have not really tried the 800 with the 1.4X. Both are great, the 800 is inexpensive with some compromises, but 800!. If you have neither and are budget conscious, get the 800, if you have the 100-500, get the extender. I find that I really need the 700 or 800 for small birds, I am only happy with the 500 when going after big birds. You really can't go wrong with these lenses.

I was so confused that I got a friend of mine to download it on a Windows machine and give it to me, was later that I saw it sitting in the Finder! Ooops!

Installed on my R6 with no camera problems. On my iMac, this downloaded zip file acted differently than past updates which threw me for a loop. When you double click it, instead of opening right up where you can see it, it opens in Finder as a mounted drive. Go there, click on it and you are in business. Or wonder for days where it is, LOL like me!

I was recently in Costa Rica, very humid. I decided to take my extender out, afterward noticed some fog in my camera. Put it down for 15 or 20 minutes and it sorted itself out. No harm done but it reminded my that you do need to be careful!

EVF's can be ugly compared to the optical DSLR viewfinder, but once you get to 3.69mill dots (Canon R6 for example) or more (R5), they look very close to "real life" in my opinion. Then the advantages outweigh the negatives. Being able to see the exposure change as you adjust exposure compensation is awesome. Don't fear EVF's just fear poor EVFs.

Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge Shovelers Pond, Smith Oaks Bird Refuge in High Island, Bolivar Flats. These are great places across the Bolivar Ferry from Galveston.

Canon RF100-500

If it costs $2000 it is not "nifty". If it costs $199, it is "nifty".

I had this same problem, maybe worse, my hard drive crashed and all I had was the Time Machine Back-up to work with. I did NOT do a "restore" from Time Machine, I just copied select folders from it to the new machine as suggested by Apple support. As long as you get the same folder structure and bring over the LRCAT file, cross your fingers, and Bob's your Uncle!