Purple Club Coral / Clavaria purpuria

Two days ago, I went with a few friends to Upper Kananaskis Lake, where we hiked the Sarrail Creek Falls Trail. Our original plans had been to hike the Mt. Everest Trail, but coming across a Grizzly Bear sow and cub right near the parking lot, made us change our plans : ) I was thrilled that we found this fungus along the trail - I've only ever seen it once before (in West Bragg Creek, Kananaskis). Had a bit of a problem photographing it, partly because of the light. Photos using flash, like this one, came out sharper but paler. Photos without flash were darker but rather blurry .... sigh. I had similar problems a year ago, on the same trail. Also, my camera is developing similar problems to problems I had with previous FZ models - maybe I just wear out my cameras, as I do take a lot of photos!