marksda1

Ah, time for a bit of a catch up post!

First off, my book Egyptian Dreams, which you may recall is available through Blurb, is entered in a contest at Blurb.  I would MUCH appreciate if you could take a few moments to go and vote for it if you have not already done so!

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Vote for my book in the
Best Blurb Books Contest!

</p> Voting ends Nov. 9

For those who have already voted, thank you so much!  For those who haven’t yet, there’s less than 2 weeks, what are you waiting for!?

As long as I’m shamelessly self promoting, I felt like I should point out that there’s currently a special running at Zazzle, another online Print on Demand shop where I host some of my work.  It runs through 10/31 and is appropriately 10.31% off any purchase.  So, a great time to start or finish your Christmas shopping and save some money on the way.  To take advantage of this special, enter the code TRICKORTREAT
at checkout.  Here’s all the lovely tiny print for the offer.

Mark’s Zazzle Store

* 10.31% of the net sale price will be deducted when the coupon code TRICKORTREAT is applied at checkout. For most products, the net sale price is the price of the product (excluding shipping and taxes). For Zazzle Custom Stamps, the net sale price is the difference between the price of the Zazzle Custom Stamps (excluding shipping and taxes) and the face value of the postage. Offer is valid from October 19, 2009 at 12:01am PT through October 31, 2009 at 11:59pm PT. This promotional offer may not combine with any other Zazzle promotional or discount offers.

A little less self-promotion but partially so is reminding everyone that this weekend is Montezuma’s annual Fall Festival, known as the Beaver Creek Festival.  Keep your fingers crossed for good weather because I’m told that the 15th annual festival should be a good one!  And I will have a booth there – that’s all my self promotion for one post!  Here’s a quote from one of the organizers about what to expect this year.

There will be GREAT children’s games, yummy food, cool art, excellent musicians, and worthwhile prizes! Don’t forget the Duck Doodle: $300 would come in handy for Christmas Shopping!

Okay, now for a few photos!  I completed editing and uploading photos from my brief stop in Savannah last month.  I still have to work on the NYC photos, but at least some progress.  Savannah was beautiful and I hope you’ll all enjoy some photos!

Savannah River Sunrise

From my first morning in Savannah, Sunrise on the River near Battery Hamilton.  It was a bit subdued by the clouds but pretty nonetheless!

Tybee Light at Dawn

Tybee light was beautiful in the morning and I love the cottage that the lighthouse keeper lived in back in the day.  It’s been restored inside.  All in all a very well kept monument to the history of the area.

East River Street

I didn’t get a lot of photos of the town itself.  Spent so much time out on the coast or on the bus that I never really explored like I’d like to, but this photo from East River Street gives you a bit of a feel.

Cathedral of St. John The Baptist

Savannah’s lovely cathedral – simply gorgeous – be sure to check out the gallery for some interior shots as well!

Moon River

The natural beauty near Savannah actually inspired several Panorama shots.  It’s hard to pick just one to show here, but this is Moon River near dusk and the colors were very special!

Angels of Bonaventure

In case you’re unaware the statue on the front of the book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, was photographed in Bonaventure.  Not the oldest cemetery in Savannah but a lovely one!  The statue from the book had to be moved to protect it but there’s still some incredible statuary there!

Sunset Sea

My last evening in Savannah was back out to Tybee Island where I enjoyed strolling the beach.  It was a subdued sky with a lot of clouds, but the colors and light was still pretty perfect.  The above is a long exposure shot.  I’ll pick one more, but I hope you’ll go check them all out.  It’s hard for me to pick out my own favorites never mind yours!

Tybee Blue

One of the last from that evening on Tybee, the sun had sunk down and twilight was almost a solid cast of blue from the sky to the reflecting water on the beach.

For more of Savannah, check out the Savannah gallery.

It took four visits to London to finally make a call on London’s Tate Modern.  In my defense, I had visited the British Museum (twice), The National Gallery, The National Portrait Gallery, and the Victoria And Albert Museum.  I think I may be missing a couple in that list.  The point is that London overflows with opportunity to take in the arts and the history of said human activity.  I am less so a fan of modern art than what we would term traditional art, so it was not surprising that it took me so long to get to the Tate Modern.

Tate Modern

This is a view of the Tate Modern from the opposite side of the Thames.  The Tate Modern actually occupies what was formerly the Bankside power station, a massive post-war building that embodies much of the modern in its blocky architecture.  The power plant was shuttered in 1981 and in recent years converted into a wing of the Tate musuem, housing modern and contemporary art from 1900 and forward.  Seen also in this view is the Millennium pedestrian bridge built to celebrate the 21st century.

Turbine Hall

The interior of the museum is as much a work of modern art as the extensive and revolving collection it houses.  Stripped of much of the original and mammoth machinery this building once housed, you get massive spaces such as this, the Turbine Hall, in the middle of the structure.  The lines of this place have to be seen to truly be experienced but I feel this print goes a long way towards conveying the proportions.

If modern art is not your thing, you’ll be forgiven for seeking out other places if you visit London with limited time, but if you have time to spare, or you are a fan of modern art, you must check out this place.  As with many of the galleries and museums in London, the Tate Modern is free (temporary exhibitions are the exception).

New York Rhythm

It’s always funny to meet people in other parts of the world who have been to cities in your own country that you’ve never seen before.  I’ve often felt I was saving those for later years when I might be less able or willing to endure 8 to 12 hour flights, or maybe I just needed an excuse.  An excuse finally entered the picture for New York City, a place until recently that I had seen out the window of a plane a few times but in which I had never set foot before.  But having two friends from a past trip (Costa Rica and Nicaragua) in town was all the excuse I needed to finally wet my feet in the city that never sleeps.

I flew out of Savannah’s airport.  For some mystic reason known only to the airlines, it was the cheapest place relatively nearby to fly directly to New York.  Atlanta’s only cheaper flight involved a connection in Fort Lauderdale – c’mon that’s not even in the right direction!  And I have to say, if you ever have reason to use Savannah’s airport, it’s really nice.  I mean, like the resort spa of airports, clean and new with rocking chairs in the terminal!  Now, there aren’t a ton of options for eats after you’ve cleared security but security is so short, you could grab  a meal before!

New York’s Laguardia was the antithesis of Savannah’s airport.  While it was no dump, it was pretty much just another airport, and the only public transit connection to Laguardia is the bus.  There are a  few Queens buses, but I had to jump aboard the only Manhattan bound bus, the M60!  This is almost an experience on par with chicken buses in Latin America!  I could never understand the driver’s communications regarding stops and as it was peak travel time, the bus got more and more crowded as we made our way across the top of Manhattan.  I ended up getting off several stops early – a bit of confusion over where I thought he said we were combined with the maddening crush of people entering through the rear door of the bus (thus avoiding paying a fare).  It was only after I walked to the nearest station that I realized I either had a long jumble of trains and stations to make my destination on the upper West side or a walk to the correct train station.  I guess hypothetically joining another M60 bus was an option, but I was having none of that, so I proceeded to walk along 125th Street in, yes, Harlem.  Now, I’ve heard Harlem is far and away not the place of our collective historic memory today, but I can tell you I was a bit out of place.  Still, I was pretty much ignored as I beat the street with my bloody heavy pack (my camera stuff probably weighed as much if not more than my clothes).

I spent only 5 nights there, and that’s not nearly enough time to even begin to take in all there is to see and do in the Big Apple.  The first night I had dinner and caught up with Lenny and James, who had both been before.  This of course meant that I was doing a lot of my own stuff since I was a newbie there.  And I definitely think I squeezed in as much as I could, not even having time to blog about it while there – very unusual for me while traveling!  If I hadn’t had my iPhone, I wouldn’t have even checked email, etc.

The first full day I had a late start but made my way to an office near Times Square to trade in a voucher I pre-purchased for a few bus loops around the city to get my bearings.  I’ve done similar tours in other cities and found they were a pretty good way to see a city, getting to hop on and off a pre-calculated route.  In retrospect, I definitely bit off more than I could chew, having paid for ALL of their bus loops plus a boat tour!  This all had to be completed in 48 hours, which means a lot of my first two days were spent on buses!  If you’re ever going to NYC and you think you might do a bus trip, just get one loop, my advice would be the downtown bus tour.  Save Brooklyn and the upper end of Manhattan for either another trip or your own wanderings.  I felt obligated to take the bus rides but just didn’t have time to get off in either place.

The boat ride was probably one of the highlights for me.  We saw the city from the water and it’s here that you can really appreciate how unreal New York is.  With every square inch bustling with towering buildings, it feels like something computer generated.  Maybe a New Yorker wouldn’t feel this way, but when you grow up in a town with nothing over 2 stories, anything this big seems impossible!  The boat tour also included a run out to the Statue of Liberty where we could appreciate her from the water and get some photos.  This would turn out to be my only really good view of the statue the whole week I was there!  But you could almost imagine seeing it as all those people processed through Ellis Island must have.

I definitely felt like I saw all the highlights, either from the bus or on my own two feet.  I walked across the Brooklyn Bridge three times!  And no one tried to sell it to me even once!  Darn it!  I went to the top of Rockefeller Center – The Top of the Rock as it’s known to see the sunset with Lenny and James.  The view was phenomenal, more of that vast city stretching to the water on one end and vanishing past the green tranquility of Central Park on the other.  If you can only pick one building to go up, I’d probably make it this one, but I also went up to the 86th floor of the Empire State building one cool and blustery evening.  I skipped the chance to shell out more $ to see the 104th floor as I was already blown to bits by the wind on the 86th!  The view from way up is still magical even on a not so pretty night, I have to say!

The morning I had planned to go see the Statue of Liberty in person turned out to be a rainy morning.  I decided that despite having paid the handsome sum of $12 for my tickets, seeing it in a driving rain didn’t make my heart go pitter pat and instead decided it was museum day!  There are enough choices to make your head spin in NYC, but I ended up going with the venerable MoMA – Museum of Modern Art.  It was an excellent choice even though my appreciation of modern art varies.  I love the photography exhibit.  They had a lot of quite old examples of photography with all sorts of mystical methods of creating the shots on up to examples of photos taken to document the times in the 1930’s in the US.  I spent the bulk of my time right there before doing a, by comparison, world wind tour of the rest of the building.  Where in the photography area, I pretty dutifully looked at every photo, once I got loose in the rest, it didn’t bother my conscience to bypass the works that didn’t call to me.  I was at least impressed when I did like something enough to check it out to see the names of Picasso, Matisse, van Gogh, Dali, and Warhol.  I guessed if I was picking those artists works I wasn’t a complete cretin.  Maybe I have a little taste after all.  LOL

During my time in NYC, although meals were not cheap, they were certainly varied, I had some good New York style Pizza at Grimaldi’s in Brooklyn (supposedly the best there is and I can attest it was good – and there was a line stretching down the block even for take out!).  I had scrumptious cheesecake at the Junior’s in Time’s Square, and I ate Brazilian food at Rice n Beans!  While I am and always have been terribly finicky, New York is definitely the place to go for any of you foodies out there, I suspect you could live there for years and keep finding new foods!  I mostly sampled the “must tries” but thanks to being there with friends also scored a few new things such as the Brazilian place.

The last day in NYC was reserved for a group activity since the weather, which turned gloomy mid-week was better and most of the trip was us catching up over dinner since I was off doing my own thing.  We took a bus out to East Hampton to see where the rich and famous like to spend their holidays.  The Hamptons weren’t all about celebs, but the property prices in East Hampton certainly seemed to be aimed at folks with above average means.  So, of course, it goes without saying that all the buildings were fairly gorgeous, the shops were high end, and my favorite part was still walking on that long beach, even if sand was blowing at us pretty much the whole time.  It was a nice laid back way to end a hectic week.  In fact, we even had Mexican at lunch, my favorite comfort food.

By contrast, my dinner that night was an Italian chicken sandwich and, oh my gosh, real gelato!  I had tried some in Savannah, and it was okay but this was definitely the real deal.  And of all  places to find it, the food court at Grand Central Station (a phenom place to visit even if you aren’t going to board a train).   Grand Central was very much a microcosm of the US.  Gorgeous old architecture, renovated not so long ago, many dining options including sit down restaurants and a food court, plus something akin to a high end farmer’s market, and I got to watch homeless people dig through the trash for the left overs.  Sad to say, this is America.

In the grand scheme of things, NYC was quite a fun place to visit, and ironically I’ve felt more ill at ease in many places in Atlanta than I felt anywhere I went in New York.  Yet still, I’m going to have to say that it was not a place that spoke to my heart the way some others have.  I may well go back one day but I also don’t feel an urgent need to just now.  If you ever decide to visit, don’t overload on the bus tours (book one maybe and then get a good subway/bus map and do the rest yourself), and be prepared not to do everything you thought you would do, because even if the city never sleeps, you will!

This is the second in my series of Atlanta Icons, while the first focused on Restaurants, this one will be all the rest of the Atlanta area scenery that I captured while working on this body of work.

Checkmate

In my opinion, a couple of the most recognizable buildings in Atlanta will be familiar to any commuter on the north side of the City.  These towers, officially Concourse Corporate Center V and VI, are known to the locals as the King and Queen towers due to the stylized decorations at the pinnacles of each building.  These buildings are located in Sandy Springs just north of I-285 and east of Georgia 400.  They were completed in 1988 and 1991 and have the distinction of being the tallest towers in a suburban setting in the USA.  This photo captures them against a vibrant winter sky just before dusk.

Fabulous Fox

There’s a joke that every street in Atlanta has the word “Peachtree” in it.  And it’s no joke that there are a lot of Peachtree courts, and avenues, and boulevards named for Georgia’s official fruit, but there’s only one Peachtree Street and only one Fabulous Fox.  The Fox Theater was one of several old movie houses in the city and one of the last of the grand ones left.  It opened in the 1920’s and came close to being destroyed in the 1970’s.  But the local populace, having watched one movie palace after another razed, fought to save the Fox for future generations to enjoy.

Fox On Peachtree

One photo of this old dear on Peachtree was not enough!  This one, taken with a fisheye lens, allows you to really take in the full street scene and almost feel as if you’re standing there right in front of the marquee for the Fabulous Fox.  This was actually taken not long before I bid farewell to Altanta on a final walk through the city.

Atlanta Roxy

The Roxy Theater in the Buckhead neighborhood in Atlanta started life as the Buckhead Theater in 1930, so it’s a bit younger than the Fox, but in that same general age range.  It, however, was built for movies with their own soundtracks rather than subtitles and organ music.  It changed names a few times over the years and eventually settled into life in the Buckhead Bar district that grew up around it, becoming a venue for live music.  The city eventually squashed the bar scene in Buckhead when the headlines around it became a bit too big.  The last I heard the Roxy was being renovated and possibly redeveloped for other uses.

The Future Is Today

I’m not sure if everyone would put this into the icon category, but for me the title fits.  This is the rooftop lounge at the Atlanta Hyatt Regency Hotel.  It’s been diminished by the buildings surrounding it, but when it was built, this space age restaurant sat at the top of Atlanta’s skyline and its said that it was the place to gofor noon meetings.  The building was designed by John Portman, and this modernist gem features the first use of a full atrium in a hotel – a now common feature of hotels all over.  Much of Atlanta’s modernist architecture has met with the wrecking ball, but one hopes this one will stick around.

The High

Atlanta has a pretty long history of supporting the arts.  What we know today as the High Museum began life in 1905 as The Atlanta Art Association. It came to be known as the High when the High family donated their home on Peachtree Street to house the growing collection in 1926.  It’s changed a lot since and continues to evolve.  The current modern buildings began in 1983 and were expanded upon in 2002.  The High continues to be one of the leading museums of the Southeastern US having a diverse and growing collection as well as working with museums around the world to bring temporary exhibitions such as works from the Louvre and the Terracotta Army from China in recent years.

To see even more of Atlanta and prints from other cities around the USA, please check out my Urban America Prints.  For part one of this series, please check out Atlanta Icons – Let’s Eat.

Once upon a time, I started a series of photographs of what I thought were Atlanta’s iconic places.  I was inspired because I had been traveling and kept coming back with what I though (hoped) were icons of the cities I visited.  And until the recent idea of staycations, it wasn’t so common that people took the time to visit the things in their own backyards.  My energy for the series eventually waned and unless I move back to Atlanta one day, it may be done, but I’m still proud of the images I did for this series!  There’s no doubt that there are iconic places absent, but I think I hit some of the highlights (some more than once).

What'll Ya Have?

Without a doubt, my most popular print from the series is this of the sign for Atlanta’s Varsity Restaurant.  This striking sign is visible from the I-75/85 Connector that bisects Atlanta’s downtown.   The original Varsity (it’s now a chain) was opened by Frank Gordy in 1928 to serve students at nearby Georgia Tech.  It eventually became the world’s largest drive in restaurant at more than two acres in size!  If you go inside ot order, the inside is a bit of a madhouse as the cashiers are all yelling “what’ll ya have, what’ll ya have?”

This photo won an award for Best Use Of Color in the 2006 Atlanta Celebrates Photography’s annual competition – the theme for that year was “My Atlanta.”  It was a perfect marriage of their theme and the series I had just started.

The Big Chicken

Next on the menu, one of the best known landmarks in Atlanta’s suburb of Marietta is The Big Chicken.  Directions around Marietta tend to include the relative location of your destination as compared to the Big Chicken.  For instance, turn right at the Big Chicken, or  1 mile north of the Big Chicken, etc.  The Big Chicken came into being as the signage above Johnny Reb’s Chick, Chuck and Shake restaurant in 1963.  It features a moving beak and rolling eyes.  In 1974, it was bought out by KFC and despite one time thoughts of moving it, the public uproar quelled that idea and the Big Chicken seems to be there to stay.  This photo was processed to appear like a vintage Polaroid image.  I felt the vivid colors from the afternoon sun fit this take on Marietta’s Big Chicken.

Open Wide

Atlanta’s oldest bohemian neighborhood is Little Five Points where Moreland Avenue meets Euclid.  When I moved to Atlanta, it was a place I had to see, and it’s a wonderful place for people watching.  One of many colorful restaurants is the Vortex, which makes a mean hamburger and one of the few places I would rarely think of getting a plain jane burger.  The main entrance to the Vortex in L5P is the mouth of a giant Skull. It’s truly one of the most unsforgettable sights on Moreland.  This ismage captures the feeling of entering the skull.

For more of Atlanta’s Icons and images from around the states, please check out my Urban America Prints.

St Paul’s Cathedral is certainly an icon of London.  The images of the great dome standing above the smoke of WWII is certainly one that will live in our collective conscious for years to come.  Officially the Cathedral Church of Paul the Apostle, the church is at least the 5th St Paul’s to sit on this site.  The first according to Bede was built in 604 AD.

Crossing Over

This photo was taken from the pedestrian bridge that connects Bankside with the City of London.  It’s taken at a very shallow depth of field in order to accomplish the dreamy feel of this image.  The only thing in focus at all is the dome and the mass of humanity before it become little more than a blur.    This church was built after the last was destroyed by the great fire in 1666.  The fire leveled the city but remarkably took no human life.  The fire shaped everything about the city we know today, built in stone to lower the risk of fire consuming it.  The dome was a point of much debate.  The architect, the renowned Sir Christopher Wren was determined that the new St Paul’s would have a dome like St. Peter’s in Rome.  Several iterations of the design were rejected before Wren decided not to show any more models to the public for criticism.  When it was completed in 1708, some loved it, some hated it, and others couldn’t care either way.  Today it’s hard to imagine the sky line of the old city without it.

Old And New

Another view of St. Paul’s From Bankside.  The view is much changed since WWII.  The buildings adjacent to the Thames were destroyed in the war and newer generations of buildings have grown up between the River and the cathedral.  And more recently, the millennium bridge was built as a pedestrian walkway to connect the City of London with Bankside on opposite sides of the River Thames.  London as a city has never gotten stuck in a particular style.  As a growing metropolis, new and exciting architecture is always fighting for space beside the classics.  Much as the classics, these are sometimes met with mixed reactions.  When the Millennium bridge  was completed in 2000, there was a noticeable wobble and the bridge was closed, repaired and reopened in 2002.  This led to its nickname The Wobbly Bridge.

Iconic St Paul's

Another black and white image of St. Paul’s.  The depth of field and processing was intended to provide a little of the feel of the old images of St. Paul’s amidst the smoke from the Blitz of WWII.

To see more of London and Great Britain, please check out my Britain Prints Gallery.

The University of Cambridge (informally Cambridge University) is the second oldest university in the English speaking world.  It was established  in 1209 and consists of 31 colleges dotted around the landscape of modern Cambridge.

Kings From The Cam

The Backs is the view of the colleges from the River Cam.  The chapel on the right is quintessential Cambridge.  This Chapel is both the symbol of Kings and the logo of the city council of Cambridge.  Although locally the college is simply referred to as  Kings, this is King’s College of Our Lady and St. Nicholas in Cambridge. Established in 1441 by Henry VI, the gothic styled chapel took a hundred years to complete.

Kings

This is the street side view of Kings – you can really feel that gorgeous gothic style in this black and white print.  The exterior height of the chapel is 94 feet tall and the interior ceiling contains the largest fan vaulting in the world.

Emma

This college is known as “Emma” locally – it is Emmanuel College.  It was established in 1584 and intended to be a place of religious training for puritans.  It’s scope has broadened over the years, but it had strong ties to the Puritans of New England.  In fact, Harvard University was named for an alumni of Emma, John Harvard.  The baroque building in the center is the chapel and was designed by the renowned English architect, Sir Christopher Wren in 1677.  The care of the lawn here is apparent down to the little green garden tractor you’ll see waiting parked in front of the chapel!

This is only a taste of Cambridge.  It would easily take days to document all the colleges never mind the rest of the architecture in this city.  I hope I get the opportunity to some day.  To see more of England and the UK, please check out my Britain Prints Gallery.

This probably won’t be an especially long post since on phone. The hotel has two pcs in the lobby and I’ve yet to see them free even on a fairly empty Sunday night.

This is my third night here and I consider it little more than a taste but I understand why people have so often spoken kindly of Savannah when they heard I was from Georgia. The irony always was I’d only seen Georgia’s coast once and Savannah only from I-95 at night.

My trip has shown me I must come back! The funny thing is it’s not the city I’ve enjoyed so much as the coast. There’s something in the sea air that has always agreed with me. I think my brain protects itself when I get away from the ocean and blots it out, but it’s the same reason I have always enjoyed storms that blow inland from the sea. There’s something markedly different about the air.

I’ve been out to Tybee Island every day I’ve been here and out to Skidaway Island as well and saw Moon River of Johnny Mercer fame. I took some panoramas of Moon River – fingers crossed that they turn out as planned!

Got here late afternoon on Friday and after dinner took my first turn out on Tybee after a wander through downtown in my car. I saw the sun set behind me as I made my way out and dusk on the tidal marshes, my first moment of really getting the beauty of this place. I ended the night with a few night shots of Tybee Lighthouse.

The next morning I tried my best to make it to Tybee fir sunrise but missed by a bit, but I managed to get to a few spots in the marshes as people started to head out in their boats. Then on to Tybee and got a few early photos if the lighthouse and wandered on the beach until the opened the light.

I climbed the 170ish steps to the top. Think I may have been the first of the morning, but at least there was no one up there to see me spazzing at the height! I have never like bridges and apparently the little metal walk projecting out at the top is close enough! I clung to the wall and inched around for the view! At this point I was glad they had a sign up allowing no big bags as pulling out my point and shoot was more than enough for me. By the time others showed up I had chilled out a little but I still didn’t want too many people on it and headed down Toured the rest of the restored buildings and headed back to Savannah to finally see the city!

And I didn’t see a lot! If you’re planning to do a trolley tour my suggestion is to start first thing! I only got off at two stops of the dozen or so offerred and before I knew it, it was time to get on the last trolley back to the visitor center. I considered riding back in and wandering now that I had my bearings a little but decided instead for the ride to Skidaway Island.

There’s not a lot to say about the island from what I saw of it. It’s entirely possible that there’s something great out there, but all I found to take photos if was the view from a fishing pier at Moon River, but it was a great way to end the day.

Sunday was an incredibly lazy day. I had planned to check in and see if I could get on a ghost tour and walk around the city. The alarm went off and I decided not an early morning day which was probably just as well because it was a very overcast day – sunrise was probably disapointing. I finally got out and had lunch.

Over lunch I decided I’d go see Bonaventure cemetery and then back downtown to wander the historic district. Found Bonaventure fairly easily. At first I was disappointed. It was pretty but nothing super special. For those who don’t know Bonaventure is where the cover for Midnigt in The Garden of Good and Evil was photographed. I had wandered fir a good while before looping around to the much older part of the cemetery and it is quite beautiful in the way a lot of basically Victorian cemeteries are, massive monuments to death and egos but hauntingly lovely especially cloaked I. The canopies of live oaks. I wish I had found that area first, but maybe it’s good I was walked out! I started back fir the parking lot and sudenly realized it was a few minutes after 5pm! Not only was my car on the other side of a six foot fence, the gate was locked! Before I could panic and call the “emergency” number on the gate, I saw someone drive up to a gate about 25 feet away and made a mad dash to get there before she locked it! LOL. The fun thing was as I sat in the car, I could see people still driving around inside… I guess they have to let a lot of people out (there was a caretaker’s house).

At this point, it seemed too late to go downtown again so I decided that will wait for another visit. Instead, yes, I drove out to Tybee once more. I spent over two hours wandering the beach with my camera and soaking in the sea air and ocassionally wishing I had a beach towel with me but walking with the camera and just breathing the air was incredibly relaxing anyway!

Thus ends my first journey to the coast, not my last I trust! Tomorrow, bound for the airport for the next leg of this trip! Stay tuned!

The city of Cambridge is well known as the home of the University of Cambridge.  The heritage of the area is ancient, having been the site of habitation since well into pre-history.  It was occupied in Roman times as Duroliponte.  In Saxon times, it was Grantebrycge.  The name of the place continued to mutate through the ages, becoming Grentabrige or Cantebrigge with the river at the heart of it becoming known as the Granta.  Eventually, the name became Cambridge, and just the part of the River in Cambridge became the River Cam.  Even today, north of Cambridge, it’s still the River Granta.

Punting On The Cam

This photo was taken while punting on the River Cam.  Punting is simply gliding on the River in a flat wooden boat while someone propels it with a long stick pushed against the river bottom.  I say simply because it can be very amusing to watch an amateur try it and since boats can be rented without pilot, you can do this yourself.  My London Walks group gladly allowed someone else to do the piloting.  The views on the river are pretty gorgeous.  As pretty as Cambridge is, there’s no doubt some of the best of the architecture is reserved for what they call The Backs.  This view is most likely one of the many colleges that form Cambridge but I’m not sure which one.  Loved the lone duck in this one.  He had been attempting to solicit food from us.

Streets of Cambridge

This is another little slice of Cambridge, a fairly typical street view of this storied city.  Gorgeous architecture from across the centuries.  And a ubiquitous bicycle!  Cambridge has the highest level of bicycle use in the UK, with over 25% of residents using a bicycle to commute.  This photo for me really reflects what you’d gather of Cambridge from your average day trip.

Fields Of The Lost

Now, my fellow Americans can feel free to tell me if this was my personal ignorance or not, but I had never heard of the American Cemetery near Cambridge.  One of our early stops, this is the place of burial for over 3,000 members of the American forces who died during WWII.  There’s also a memorial wall with the names of the missing and a chapel.  As most war memorials tend to be, it’s both a sobering and beautiful place with row upon row of white crosses in a park like setting.

For more prints from England and the rest of the UK, please visit my Britain Gallery.

St Albans has a long history connected to London.  It was once a day’s ride from London, so became a major stop for the coach trade.  Today at  about a half hour by train, it’s become a charming bedroom community.  But the history here is longer still, being the site of an ancient Roman town and the first Christian martyr from Britain.

St Albans Clock Tower

St Albans is home to the only remaining 15th century clock towers in England.  This tower was apparently something of a snub to the nearby monastery clock tower also visible from the town.  The locals were basically saying we run our own lives here.  It was nearly demolished in the 18th century but was saved and restored and stands today as a museum in the center of town.

St Albans Abbey

This is known as the Abbey to the locals, although it’s actually in current times a cathedral of the Anglican church.  There have been a succession of buildings in this general area dedicated to St Alban.  The original roman town was in fact relocated to be nearer this place because of its heritage as the site of the death of St Alban.  He was martyred in this area sometime before 324 AD and became the first Christian martyr in Briain.  For years this was a site of pilgrimage, hence the relocation of the village to be nearer the visitors (and their trade).  The tower at the rear of this picture is what remains of the original Norman structure from 1077.  The rest is romanticized Gothic from a 19th century restoration.  The wealthy benefactor fancied himself an architect and chose the style of the restoration, apparently not in keeping with what had been there.  This shot includes an interesting atmospheric anomaly.  As you can tell by the light on the church, the sun was behind me, but there was some sort of reflection/diffraction of light in the cloudy sky, so truly a unique photo of this old church!

For more photo prints of Britain, please check out my British prints gallery.

There’s a special charm to the small villages I’ve seen in southern England, centuries of history, often with one or two grand old building but otherwise fairly simple places.

Church of St Cyriac

More often than not, the village’s church is one of the grander buildings.  In the small village of Lacock in Wiltshire, their Church of St. Cyriac was very picturesque.  Granted the whole village is lovely – and because of its vintage charm often used in period movies/serials like Pride and Prejudice.  Although there has been a church here at least since Norman times, the present one was built in the 15th century when  times were prosperous due to the wool and cloth trade.

St Johns Church Glastonbury

Another grand church also from the 15th century is St Johns Church in Glastonbury.  Glastonbury is a bit bigger and is well known because of the annual Glastonbury music festival.  The towns shops reflect a lot of this free spirit but like any old English town, it has a long history.  Archaeology shows that there’s been a church on this site since at least the 9th century.  The current church, though, is most impressive and imposing!

Dark Tor

I hinted a bit at the history of this place, not unlike many places in this part of the country, there are many legends about this place, chiefly of Arthur.  Some believe that this Tor, which once rose out of a marshy land long since drained, is fabled Avalon.  The gorgeous old tower in this shot, however, is much more modern.  It’s all that remains of a 14th century church that once stood here.  It was destroyed during the dissolution of the monastic system in 1539 and the tower was restored in modern times.  It’s a bit of a climb through pastures, but on a paved path and affords a wonderful view of the town.  The darkness of this shot definitely feels like something from a legend or tale.

For more prints of Britain, please check out my Britain Gallery.

The countryside of Cornwall is dotted with old treasures, ruins that could range in age from centuries to millennia.  But they all have a rich history.

Memory Of The Land

Lanyon Quoit is on the older end.  Built around 2500 BC, this neolithic dolmen is a also known as The Giants Table.  In later times, people, who couldn’t fathom how they were constructed, believed objects like this to be the work of a race of giants.  Possibly part of a tomb mound or possibly a ritual site, this was undoubtedly a place of great significance to the builders.  It does not appear as it originally did.  In the 19th century, it ws knocked down in a strong storm.  Originally it had four supports and was much taller.  It was rebuilt by the locals in 1875 as we see it today.  Not surprisingly, there are also stories that King Arthur visited here.

Legends Of Arthur

Some sites are less ancient, despite appearances.  This is Tintagel Castle, built in the 13th century by an earl of Cornwall.  He was convinced that this site on the coast was the place where Arthur was conceived in the legends of the fabled King.  He had the castle built to appear older than it was.   The site didn’t hold much importance and the castle was largely abandoned within a century and left to fall into the ruins we see today.  In the time of the Victorians, there was a resurgence in interest in the legends of Arthur and Tintagel became a tourist destination.  Images like this are less common in my portfolio to date, but is actually a composite image.  My photo of Tintagel castle was overlaid over an early 1900’s letter from my great grandfather to great grandmother.  The yellowed tones and the script helps add to a romantic feeling I was hoping to achieve with this image.

For more prints from the United Kingdom, please check out my Britain Gallery.

Among many stops on my Haggis Tour wander to and from Cornwall was the City of Bath.  I was quite looking forward to seeing the old Roman Baths that give the modern city its name, but I knew very little else about the city.  What I learned was that the night and half day we were there was not nearly enough and I intend to return one day.

Sulis Minerva

First of course, I have to get in a little detail about the history of Bath.  Back in the days when the ancient Romans occupied Britannia, Bath was the site of one of their outposts, Aquae Sulis (the waters of Sul).  But the history of the site reaches back in time further than the Romans, it was a holy site to the Britons.  They felt the healing waters of the natural springs here were the work of their goddess, Sul.  Sul represented the boundary between the worlds.  The Romans liked to incorporate the local deities into their pantheon and they felt that Sul was the equivalent of their Minerva.  Thus, they dedicated the site to Sulis Minerva.   This head is the remnants of a beautiful Roman statue that would have once stood in the temple dedicated to Sulis Minerva at what we now know as Bath.  The baths themselves are still present and if you are even an armchair archaeologist/historian, you’ll enjoy getting to see the inner workings of the Roman baths (which still hold water), but everything pretty much above ground level at the baths is a Victorian re-imagining of what would have been there so I was only mildly interested in photographing it.  Still, an amazing site to visit for a few hours, but not all there is to Bath!

Shopping on Pulteney Bridge

Bath is known for it’s Georgian Architecture.  It’s the time period when Bath became the place to be among the affluent and the city really boomed.  And I have to say again, that I really didn’t have sufficient time to really capture it all, but this is one shot I really  liked from Pulteney Bridge.   This bridge over the River Avon is one of four like it in the world where shops fully line both sides of the bridge.  Built in 1773, there have been alterations over the years, but restoration of the facades was completed in 1951 and this is a grade 1 listed building with English Heritage.

The Abbey Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul

Another must see if you only have a little bit of time in Bath is Bath Abbey.  Although the site started life as a Benedictine Monastery, today it is an Anglican parish church – quite a grand one though!  It’s style is perpendicular Gothic, owing to the last major constructions done on the building in the 16th century.  It’s been restored since but the style from that period remains.  Ths church is widely known for its elaborate fan vaulting in the ceilings in the nave (although it’s a Victorian restoration of what was originally there in the 1600’s).  This photo was shot in the particularly dreary early morning hours on the day we left Bath.  Still, it gives a lot to the drama in this photo that you would never have gotten on a beautiful clear day.

Bath Abbey

One more photo of that gorgeous old Abbey.  This one was taken at dusk as darkness was descending and they had turned on the lights on the outside of the Abbey.  There’s obvious distortion because this was taken with what’s known as a Fish eye lens – it’s ultra wide angle but also due to its shape produces a very exaggerated field of view.  I try to use it sparingly, but sometime you can produce some really beautiful images like this one with it.

For more photos of England and the rest of the United Kingdom, be sure to check out my Britain Prints!

On my trip through Cornwall, we saw a lot of gorgeous coastline.  The coast is full of dramatic cliffs and gorgeous views.  Since Cornwall has been a vacation destination for so long, there are lots of little scenic spots and walks along the coast that are easily accessible.

Road To The End

One such trail is a short walk that rises from Sennen Cove to the famed Land’s End.  Lands End is the most westward point of mainland Britain.  It’s a major tourist destination in Cornwall.  Lands End itself was honestly a bit overly touristy for me, but I loved the walk there.  As you can tell from the view here, it’s a gorgeous coastal landscape dotted with little homes.

Not Quite The End

One more view from near Lands End.  As I said, the real thing was just kind of a touristy collection of buildings and amusements.  But this is the view I remember best, gorgeous rocky coastline and a winding path filled with happy holiday makers.

Life Is But A stage

My last (and favorite) of our stops along the Cornish coast was Minack Theatre.  This theatre was the child of Miss Rowena Cade.  She built (mostly by hand) this gorgeous and somewhat chaotic little theater that hugs the cliff side near her home.  A local theater group staged A Midssumer Night’s Dream for two seasons (starting in 1929) in a nearby meadow.  When they decided to put on The Tempest, Miss Cade offered her garden and proceeded to build her cliff side theater.  The Tempest in 1932 was the first of many plays staged here and Miss Cade continued to add to her theater the rest of her life.  She passed away in 1983, aged 89.  The theatre has run as a charitable trust since 1976 and today includes a museum to Rowena Cade who will certainly be remembered by many.

For more prings of Cornwall and the UK, please check out my Britain gallery.

Newquay is a an awesome little coastal town in Cornwall.  There has been human activity here since prehistoric times and a fishing village as far back as medieval times.  It’s lovely location and accessible sandy beaches have made it a tourist destination in Britain for more than a century now.  In more recent times, it’s become a favorite of surfers.  The official population of Newquay is around 22,000 people, but in the summer it can grow to more than 100,000!  Even during my visit in September, on a decent afternoon, the water was crowded with surfers.

Moment In The Sun

My first exposure to surfing was on a drive up Highway 1 in California several years ago.  I spent hours watching surfers paddling out, getting up on their boards and trying to get that perfect balance that allows them to ride the waves back to shore.  It’s really incredible and although I’m not sure you’d ever find me trying it, I definitely understand the zen of it now.   There wasn’t any great wave action while I was there, but there was awesome light and plenty of surfers. I really enjoyed catching them going out and contemplating the waves.

Surfing Zen

Another view of the beach at Newquay – with only the little bit of ocean visible, you can see how crowded the water is even in the shoulder season.  Two of the surfers are contemplating the sea before them.  The light that afternoon was really special as you can tell.  The sky is a mix of blue and even a hint of pink from the sun low in the sky.  But the wet beach has become exceptionally reflective of the whole scene.  Would love to go here again when the waves were really up!

For more prints from the UK, please check out my Britain gallery!

On my first trip to England in April, 2004, my only day out of London was spent on a tour of, among other stops, Stonehenge – my main destination that day.  At the time, I had never heard of Avebury.  When I saw it on the itinerary for my second visit in 2008, there were no complaints.

Idyllic Meadows

This gives you an idea of what to expect in Avebury.  This, in my mind anyway, is quintessential English countryside.  Green grass and sheep and pigs (you’d have to see it larger to realize that those aren’t all sheep!).  And this pretty much sums up Avebury, a sleepy but beautiful little village in Wiltshire.  Bucolic is the word that comes to mind.

Avebury Today

There’s one thing that sets Avebury apart from other English villages, it was built in the midst of a 5,000 year old stone circle!  The stone circle at modern day Avebury was originally a large ring of standing stones with a earthen mound or “henge” and ditch surrounding it.  The site is a contemporary of Stonehenge but actually a bit older.  Here we see a few of the surviving stones and it’s obvious that the comparably modern buildings interrupt the original circle.

Avebury Days

Here we can see more of the mammoth stones used in the construction of this neolithic site.  It boggles the mind how they were moved without what most of us would consider tools necessary to the job today.  Stone tools, brute force, and human ingenuity got the job done, though!  You can also see a portion of the earthen mound that surrounded the site.

Avebury In The Sun

A  close-up of these stone sentinels of a lost era.  Their exact cause for being is lost to us, but researchers at Stonehenge believe that there were winter and spring solstice celebrations at Stonehenge.  There’s evidence of a wooden village near Stonehenge from the same era, where they believe the living came only for the solstice and the cremated remains of the dead were buried at Stonehenge, the land of the dead.  It’s possible there was a similar arrangement at Avebury.

All that’s sure is that in time the old ways were forgotten and the stones were pagan relics.  In the 17th century, the circle was still largely intact with all stones accounted for either still standing or laying near where they had once stood.  By the next century, this was not the case.  Many of the stones had been broken up in the name of making room for farming and to remove pagan relics.  Some were used in buildings in the village.  It’s a pity that the circle did not survive intact.  Today there are concrete pilings noting where the missing stones stood.

The Future Is Unwritten

My last shot from Avebury is of the mound of earth that surrounds it.  While this is a part of the site, to me this picture speaks more to the limitless future.  There’s something about that tiny thread of humanity walking along this green hill with the wide sky above them that just really speaks to me.  This is easily my favorite picture from Avebury.  And as much as I loved my first trip there, this last autumn visit was far more visually pleasing as you can tell!

For more prints from Britain, please check out my Britain Prints!

On my last trip to the UK, there was some repeat stops.  Since this was my 5th visit to Britain, this should not be a surprise, however.  The truth was, that my last visit to Stonehenge had been over 4 years earlier and before I bought a digital SLR and truly got into photography seriously, so it was time to return.

Ancient Plains

The second time through, I skipped the audio tour.  They may well have updated it in the past four years, but I really just wanted to wander around and take photos and enjoy the view in relative silence.   Unfortunately, a large road is nearby, which somewhat kills the feeling of those still plains that must have once existed, but it’s still an incredible place to visit.  The skies shifted a lot during our time there as clouds rapidly passed by and the light (when there was any light) was special.

Round The Henge

The day we visited, I noticed that a professor I’d seen on the history channel, Mike Parker Pearson, was filming a piece on Stonehenge.  The professor has put forth one of the newest theories on the purpose of Stonehenge.  He believed that there would be a second site near Stonehenge and discovered a wooden contemporary village down a nearby river.  He put forth the idea that the wooden village was occupied primarily at the spring and fall equinoxes and that on those days, the people who built Stonehenge visited it to celebrate and to mourn the fallen whose cremated remains where left behind here.  It makes logical sense for a people who were far more tied to the seasons than most of us are today.  But you have to wonder if we will ever really know the minds of the people who built this place 5,000 years ago.

Ruins Of The Lost

A last view of this incredible ancient monument to a lost people.  I’ve been twice and although I would love to see more of these ancient stone age sites, I would gladly visit Stonehenge again.  I’d love to get the chance to visit on an Equinox and see what the ancients saw.  Sadly, I’ve heard from more than one person that Stonehenge was a disappointment.  It failed to live up to their expectations!  I find it hard to believe, but it’s not as large as some people think it is, and for understandable reasons, you are not allowed close to the stones anymore.  Still, try to imagine building something like this yourself with nothing but stone tools, creativity and ingenuity!  I know I wouldn’t know where to begin designing it never mind erecting it!  You absolutely have to put a site like this into context when you visit it.

For more prints from around Great Britain, please check out my Britain Print Gallery.

An amazing part of our trip was two days relaxing on the Red Sea at the Sawa Camp near Nuweiba.

Sinai Sunrise

We literally stayed in straw huts a few steps from the waters.  Here you can see an early morning shot of the beach and huts with a mountain range as a backdrop.  After over a week of being on the move, this was a great place to just relax.  Some in the group went scuba diving and their was a wealth of options like that, but this was my chill place.  Just looking at this photos puts me back into that same state relaxed state of mind.  Check out the clouds streaking the sky with pinks and blues!

Red Sea Sunset

And this is a colorful photo of the sunset.  The mountains you can just see silhouetted on the left side of the photo is Saudi Arabia.  This was taken with a neutral density lens so that it was a long exposure – this is what creates that soft feel to the water and really gave the camera time to soak up some of that rich color.  If it looks like paradise, it’s because it was the next thing to it.  Amazing stark contrast, though, a beach location and yet so dry.  There’s very little rainfall and the water to this little community on the beach has to be brought in by truck.  Still worth it for a view like this…

For more of my photo prints from Egypt, please check out my Egypt gallery.

As you’ve probably noticed, the prints on my site are all printed by Redbubble.com – an awesome artist-oriented, print on demand service.  They periodically offer sales and specials and I wanted to let you all know about their current offering, 15% off all framed prints and canvas prints!

This sale is good now through Thursday, August 27th!  So, if there’s anything you’ve had your eye on, or you have started your Christmas shopping, this might be the time to act!

In fairness, this sale applies to anything you find on the Redbubble website.  I obviously hope you are interested in something in my portfolio but will be happy anytime you support independent artists!

Here are some of my top sellers for inspiration for this sale!  Many more available in my prints section!  If you have any questions, please let me know!

London Calling Framed Print

Unknown Horizons Framed Print

What'll Ya Have? Framed Print

Gateways To The Past Framed Print

El Castillo Framed Print

There was one part of the journey that I felt I only walked away with one shot I really liked.  I’ll explain that in a minute, but first, that one shot.

Side By Side

This photo was taken outside the walls of Saint Catherine’s Monastery on the Sinai Peninsula.  Inside the walls is a bush revered to be the original burning bush from biblical history.  It’s also the site of the oldest working Christian monastery in the world, founded  in the 6th century by Helena, mother of Constantine I.   It’s also a place where Muslims and Christians exist side by side.  Within the grounds of Saint Catherine’s is both a church and a mosque.  It’s a place of incredible and rugged beauty as you can tell from this  black and white photo.

It’s also the base of Mount Sinai, and the starting point for many for the 3,750 steps of penitence.  When you climb this route, you are supposed to be following in the footsteps of Moses.  And that most of my group did.  Frankly, I probably should not have.  I was in no shape for such a climb, but I went anyway, just arriving at the top as the last of the sunset finished.  And just in time to turn back around!  It was an incredible trek and I’m very proud to have completed it, but I’ve done my penitence and if I was ever near Mount Sinai again, I would take the camel route up if I went up at all!

For more prints of Egypt, please check out my Egypt Gallery.