No trip to Charleston, South Carolina, would be complete without a horse-drawn carriage ride through this historic city. The ride takes you down tree-lined streets and the differing styles of architecture of the southern homes. It is also a great way to start a visit that gives an overview of the museums and attractions. There are a number of carriage companies that give tours of Charleston but the one we recommend is Palmetto Carriage. They have won a number of awards as the best in the city and they are easy to find. Just look for the big red barn. I couldn't help snapping a shot of this unique sign. I now know where I am taking my mule to get washed and have my hoofs shined. What a bargain.
Fallen Window
This is another visit to the Lonaconing Silk Mill in western Maryland. The mill is quite large with many areas to explore. We literally spent the better part of 12 hours wandering around every nook and cranny of the place. Every time I thought I was finished, I found another hallway or room to explore. When I headed to the basement, it was quite dark in many areas. I spotted a dim light toward the back of the mill, and, when I turned the corner, I spotted this scene where the window had either fallen onto the machinery, or someone had placed it there. Not really caring how it ended up there, I fired off a bracketed series that I knew would be a terrific HDR subject.
Gondola Ride
What better way is there to take in the great city of Venice, Italy, than on your own gondola ride? The number of gondolas once numbered above 10,000, when horses were outlawed in the 14th century. Only about 500 remain today, and they are used primarily for the tourist trade, as their cost is exorbitant for everyday transportation. Rates are regulated, and if you try to negotiate a lower price, the gondolier will reduce the length of the ride accordingly. This photo was taken from our gondola with the famed Rialto Bridge in the background.
Morning Light
This past July, I posted this pre-dawn image of the historic Thomas Moulton barn, located in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming. The reason photographers get up before dawn and set up for this shot is that the window of opportunity to get the morning light shining on the front of the barn is quite small. There are many mornings when the cloud cover to the east blocks the sun totally. That is what we worried about on this morning. There were enough clouds and fog that threatened the light, but the sun finally made its appearance, which gave the barn this golden glow. The moment lasted for only 10 minutes before the magical light disappeared. The fog in the background was simply icing on the cake.
Out for a Ride
This photo is from my archives and is one of my favorite subjects. I originally edited this when my post processing skills were poor. I came across this when looking at my Lightroom library and thought it deserved a new life. The plane is actually a statue outside the Air Force Academy's Chapel in Colorado Springs. I composed the image from an angle that only had the sky as the background. A little Photoshop magic to make the support column disappear and there you have it.
September 1957
One of the coolest things about shooting in abandoned buildings is capturing the grit and decay of walls in disrepair and machines that haven't been used in decades. This is what attracts the Urbex photographer. A side benefit of visiting these abandoned places is discovering the history of days long gone. The Lonaconing Silk Mill in western Maryland is one of those places where history is on display. The mill, also known as the Klotz Throwing Company, closed its doors in 1957. Its closure ended the industry in the United States and it is the last intact silk mill remaining. Who knows when this mill will disappear, despite the owner's attempts to continues to transform the mill into a museum.
Behind the Tetons
When I headed to Grand Teton National Park for a photo tour this past July, I arrived in Jackson, Wyoming, in mid-afternoon. I always try to fly out very early when I travel to make sure that if something goes awry, I have some time to make new arrangements. Even though I was tired from the travel, I hadn't been to Jackson in almost 10 years so I wanted to make sure that no time was wasted.
When planning my trip, my fellow blogger, Rick Louie, suggested that I spend some time on the far less visited Idaho side of the Tetons. To get there, you head out of Jackson and travel over Teton Pass, and then head north toward the town of Driggs. Once downtown, turn east, and you come to Alta. The town is quite small (less than 400 residents), but the attraction is a very different look to the Tetons. While not quite as captivating as the national park, the landscape is still pretty compelling. I thoroughly enjoyed this drive, and fully expect to revisit it the next time I head to Jackson. Thanks for the tip Rick.
Kotor Reflections
When embarking on a cruise, first impressions of each stop can be deceiving. The areas where these ships dock are more than likely not the best ones. They are typically industrial areas on the outskirts of the port of call. So it came as a pleasant surprise when we docked in Kotor, Montenegro, on our Mediterranean cruise a few years ago.
While Kotor is technically a port on the Adriatic Sea, to get there requires entering a twisting and winding journey through the Bay of Kotor. The bay is actually 17 miles long, and, along the way, there aren't any industrial areas to be seen. In fact, the bay is surrounded by large towering mountains with scenic little towns. I guess that I shouldn't have been surprised, as the translation of Montenegro is Black Mountain and 60% of the country is made up of mountains. The scenery can't be beat, and it remains my favorite port of call.
The Spectacles
The southwestern region of the US is home to the largest concentration of national parks, national monuments, state parks and scenic roads. The area known as the Grand Circle includes five states (Utah, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada). Nowhere else in the country has the diversity and colors of the landscape. It seems like everyone who visits there has a favorite spot, and it is hard to argue with any choice. My two favorites are Arches National Park and Monument Valley.
The formations in Arches all have their own names. This one is comprised of two "windows", the North Window and the South Window. These openings in the formation are huge, as a person standing at the bottom of one would be a mere speck in the photo. Many visitors go to visit each window separately but unless you look at it from the side, they don't realize that the whole formation takes the form of eyeglasses, resulting in the name of "The Spectacles".
Ghosts of the Past
There is a type of photography generally described as "Urbex" (for Urban Exploration), where the subjects are abandoned buildings of all kinds. It is becoming a very popular genre of the hobby. While I don't go out of my way to shoot urbex, when I see a photo tour to abandoned places in the northeast, I usually try to attend. This past June, I visited the abandoned Pennhurst Asylum in Spring City, Pennsylvania.
The Asylum was built in 1908 and was designed "for the Feeble-Minded and Epileptic". It closed it's doors in 1987 after being exposed for horrific conditions and tales of abusing patients, including those in wheelchairs. The visions of what may have happened there was clear in my mind when taking and editing this photo. I wonder if this wheelchair was involved in the atrocities, and what the purported ghosts that are rumored to still walk the floors of the asylum could tell me.
I Love Bark
Grand Teton National Park is a terrific place for landscapes, which is why I love going there. I never go looking for wildlife ,but many others do. The rule of thumb when looking for wildlife is to look for them early in the morning and the hours approaching dusk. Another is to look for other cars that are pulled over at the side of the road for no apparent reason. That usually means that there has been a wildlife sighting.
On my photo tour to the park in July, our tour leader, Jeff Clow, was driving back and forth on Moose-Wilson Road (a favorite area for spotting wildlife), scouting. Just when we were ready to give up, he spotted this beaver in the underbrush. We piled out, and before you know it, there were probably 10 cars there within 5 minutes (there must be some communication network that I am not aware of). Despite the crowd of people and photographers, the beaver was only interested in eating the bark off of tree branches to be used in building his dam. It was quite amazing to see how fast he could get the branch clean as a whistle.
Golden Rock
It has become obvious to me that I have developed quite an affinity to Badlands National Park. Ever since I visited the park in September, I find myself gravitating toward the South Dakota folder to pick photos to edit for the following week's blog. This "elite" status has often been reserved for my favorite places, namely Yosemite, Banff, Grand Teton and Arches. It is clear to me that they need to move over to make room for Badlands. The only regret that I have is that it took me so long to finally visit there.
While it is remote and can be harsh during parts of the year, once you get there the landscape is among the most diverse and accessible and is worth the trip. Where else can you walk out of your hotel room and within minutes get sunset shots like this one? I hope that you bear with me as I continue to post images from my new favorite location.
Exploring Venice
There is no better city to roam around in with no destination in mind than Venice, Italy. The history and age-old architecture is something to see. The city has such a romantic feel to it with all of it's canals and gondolas. What I really like is getting out from the main tourist areas to see what the real Venice is all about. There are gems found in almost every nook and cranny of the the city's back alleyways (canalways?).
For the photographer, the city is found almost everywhere. The challenge in capturing some of these "backstreets" is balancing out the light and the shadows of the scenes. Cameras try to average out the light resulting in poor results (the human eye is much more effective in this). The advances in editing software like Lightroom (my editing program of choice) allow for easy fixing of the scene's highlights and shadows. This image, for example, was quite dark in the shadows, which hid the details and darkened the reflections. With a quick adjustment of the shadow slider, the details and reflection just popped on out.
Columbia Gorge Gem
The Columbia River Gorge outside of Portland, Oregon, is a great location for waterfalls. There are 77 waterfalls on the Oregon side of the Columbia River alone, and you would need to spend a lot of time to visit them all. Many of them require hikes, some of which are medium to difficult ones. Fortunately, some of the waterfalls are easily accessible, and some require no hiking at all. For those who only have limited time, take a drive on the Historic Columbia River Highway.
The highway allows the visitor to get to 8 waterfalls in a few hours. This is one of those waterfalls, namely Horsetail Falls. It requires no hiking and can be viewed without any obstructions for almost 180 degrees. This image shows the bottom half of the "horsetail" falling into it's small pond.
Steam
This year, I was able to revisit a location that I first visited in 2005, namely Yellowstone National Park. On that first visit, I wasn't into photography, and the images from that trip were awful. When I started to get back into the hobby, I vowed to revisit some of the places and reshoot them. In some cases, I wanted to get the same composition as I did then but in better light. This is one of those compositions. It is of Mud Volcano, a thermal feature on the eastern side of the park. It has a nice boardwalk where you can get different vantage points to shoot from. I visited just after dawn when there was no one around, and had great morning light. I was hoping for and got some nice blue skies that I used as a nice color backdrop to make the steam stand out. All in all, a much better result that my first visit. On my next visit, I wonder if there is a way to deal with that bad sulfur smell of these thermal features.
Crazy Horse
When we were selecting stops on our cross country drive, we decided to stay in Rapid City, South Dakota. This location was in the center of many of the attractions that we had targeted, namely Badlands National Park, Wind Cave National Park, Mount Rushmore and Custer State Park. Even though we had an interest in visiting the Crazy Horse Memorial, there wasn't time to fit it in.
There are times when fate intervenes. We had left Mount Rushmore and I must have missed my turn when heading for Custer State Park. Lo and behold, we were only 10 miles from the site of the memorial, so we headed there. It turned out to be quite the inspirational visit.
On site is a wonderful museum with great displays and exhibits of the American Indian culture. If you visit there, don't miss the movie that tells the story of how the sculptor, Korczak Ziolkowski came to the project and the work he performed on it from 1947 through his death in 1982. Since that time, his family has continued his work. The family will not accept government funds because Korczak believed in individual initiative and private enterprise. The project is funded by admission fees and donations and it's completion date cannot be determined.
The monument, when it is completed, will be about 10 times larger than Mount Rushmore. The statue to the left shows what the monument will look like when finished. As you can see, there is an awful lot to finish (if you look closely at the top photo, you can see the outline of the horse's head outlined in white. It was quite impressive to see in person and will be even more amazing when it is finished. I highly recommend spending time there if you visit the area. I am glad we ended up there.
Cruising Glacier Bay
What can you say about Glacier Bay National Park that probably hasn't been said before? The Alaskan Coast is one of the most scenic areas in the world and the park is, in my opinion, the best spot. Most people visiting the park can only view it from a cruise ship deck, as we did. Cruising is not the most ideal way to photograph landscapes as you can't control the time you get there and oftentimes you find yourself shooting in midday harsh sunlight. If you are lucky, you get there before dawn or late evening when you get the great golden hour light. That rarely happens. For this photo, I wasn't able to shoot the park at these ideal times but got better light than I expected. We arrived in late afternoon and had the sun behind me. This allowed for great color in the water and a clear view of the mountains.
Barcelona Drive By
I have been fortunate to be able to travel quite a lot over the past few years, and, over that time, I have taken thousands of images. One of the challenges of a photographer is taking the time to go through the images and decide which one is "edit" worthy. My unedited images number in the tens of thousands, most of which will never see (and shouldn't) the light of day.
There is also a tendency to look at your most recent photographs and ignore some fine older ones. For example, this year has been my busiest from a travel standpoint and I have begun to realize that I have been ignoring many of the images that I took over the past several years.
This realization will result in a purposeful effort on my part to post some older images. This image, for example, was taken on a Hop On - Hop Off bus in Barcelona, Spain. I love taking these types of buses on the first day we visit a new location to get a lay of the land and figure out which ones we will visit over the rest of our stay. I don't remember which part of Barcelona this building was located in, but I really loved it's shape and the evening light on it. It can be a challenge capturing it on a moving bus and my recommendation is to shoot in burst mode. You may get 19 bad images but there is usually one (like this one) that works.
Harsh Landscape
I have posted a number of photos from my first visit to the Badlands last month. The more that I look at the photos, the more I realize how amazing and harsh the landscape is. What is even more amazing is that the initial formations in the park began over 60 million years ago during the early days of the formation of the Rocky Mountains. Streams carried rocks, dirt and other materials eastward. This buildup continued for about 40 million years, but it wasn't until a half-million years ago when erosion began to form the landscape that we see today.
While my previous posts focused on some of the rugged rock formations, this photo illustrates how diverse Badlands is, with the effects of the constant erosion on full display. This section is part of the 100-mile Wall that forms the "spine" of the park. This particular composition looks southward, while the northward views are typically either large rock formations or flat plains. The more I think about the Badlands, the more it is becoming one of my favorite places in the US.
Ruh Roh
Yesterday, I posted an image from Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota. One of the features of the park are the several Prairie Dog Towns located in both the North and South Divisions. I have never seen a town such as this before. It is basically an open area that has tons of holes in it. When you pull into town, there are quite the number of prairie dogs scampering around. After getting out of the car, the prairie dogs run for cover making them really hard to photograph (at least for me). They are really, really fast.
I finally was able to catch one in the South Division. All of the other prairie dogs had taken off and only this one remained. I don't know if he was deaf or not but he finally turned and looked at me as I pressed the shutter. I thought the favorite saying ("ruh roh") of Astro the Dog in the cartoon the Jetsons (okay, I am dating myself) probably went through his head when he saw me. For you fans of Scooby Doo, Astro originated the saying. I know that it is true because I read it on the internet.