Travel and Tourism – Page 5 – Circadianreflections Blog

Evening Color in the Eastern Sierras

October 16, 2016October 16, 2016Posted in Eastern Sierras, Landscape Photography, Mountain Peaks, Nikon, Photography, Sunsets, Travel and TourismTagged Ansel Adams Wilderness, Eastern Sierras, landscape, Minarets, Nikon, Photography, Ritter Range, Sierra Mountain Range, Silhouettes, Sunset21 Comments

On the first night of the Fall Color week-end in the Eastern Sierras my friends and I had very little time to go far to photograph sunset, and it was looking like the sunset might be a pretty one because there were good clouds in the sky.

I knew a spot with a good view of the Minarets that had been a good sunset spot for me in the past, and it was close by so that’s where we headed.

To our delight it was a gorgeous sunset.

Minarets Sunset

The Minarets are the jagged, saw-tooth peaks in the mountains in the heart of Ansel Adams Wilderness. They’re located in a part of the Sierras called Ritter Range. The highest peaks in the Minarets are Clyde at 12, 261ft, Eichorn at 12,255ft, and Michael at 12,240ft. There are 17 minarets that have been named. They were named after the first mountain climbers to climb the peaks, but in some cases the second mountain climbers name was used to avoid duplication.

For the History Buffs:

“While both Ritter and Banner were climbed in the 19th century, the Minarets did not see activity until the 1920’s. Charles Michael, a Yosemite postmaster, along with his wife Enid were the first to record an ascent in 1923 of Michael Minaret. Over the next ten years most of the remaining minarets were climbed by various parties involving many of the famous climbers of the era, including Norman Clyde, Walter Starr, Jules Eichorn and Glen Dawson, among others. In 1948, Dyer Minaret was the last (and most difficult) of the group to be climbed. In 1933, Walter Starr’s son went missing on a solo trip to the area. An intense search ensued, culminating in the discovery of his fallen body high on the slopes of Michael Minaret. His body was interred where it lay, and still rests there to this day.

Today, there are dozens of routes among the many pinnacles, but the reputation for poor rock quality keeps most enthusiasts away. The picturesque lakes that lie on the approach routes are very popular with backpackers, but only a small portion of the visitors venture to the summits of the Minarets where solitude and a grand sense of adventure are certain to be found.” ~http://www.summitpost.org/minarets/247994

Nikon Df| Nikkor 17-35mm| Delkin Digital Film| Singh-Ray Reverse Grad| Tripod

More to come…

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33/52 Thursday Doors

August 18, 2016August 18, 2016Posted in Adorned Doors, Doors, Legoland California, Nikon, Photography, Thursday's Doors, Toys, Travel and TourismTagged Doors, Legoland California, Nikon, Photography, Thursday Doors, Toys, Travel and Tourism33 Comments

For this week’s Thursday Doors post I’m sharing more doors from Legoland California. The displays are really, really good.

There’s a section in the park with iconic buildings; some of which one must take a river cruise to see, but this display of the United States Capitol Building located in Washington D.C. wasn’t part of the cruise. There are quite a few doors on it, but I have no close ups of the front doors due to the columns.

Legoland United States Capitol Building

Here’s close up of the Marching Band’s Drum Major though. Both my children were in their school bands all through their school years beginning in 4th grade so I’m rather fond of marching bands. 🙂 Baby Girl was a flutist, and Big Baby Boy was a drummer.

All the while they were growing up I was trying to play piano with weekly lessons. Just like I had them doing. There was for many years music, and a beat in our house. I miss it! I do hope #1 Grandson picks up an instrument. He plays my piano…without trying he picks out notes, chords and riffs! I have hope that he has the gift that skipped me. Drum Major Marching Band LegoLand CA

That’s the Washington Monument you see sticking up behind the Capitol Bldg.

I have no idea how many Lego bricks it took to build this monument/display, but I know it took many, many hours to complete. I was in awe looking at all the displays. Really, they are amazing.

Around the back side of the Capitol Bldg. is a replica of Georgetown.

Another fact about me I don’t think I’ve shared on this blog is that I’m a huge fan of Americana art. Geez, tonight I’m really opening up! Must be the Full Sturgeon Moon. 🙂

I LOVE Charles Wysocki, and Linda Nelson Stocks who are Americana artists. I’ve crossed stitched a Wysocki Autumn Americana Village which took me nearly 9 months to complete. I had it framed. Before our remodel last year it hung over my mantle. It’s still packed…like most of my art at the moment. I feel really blessed to own one of Linda Nelson Stocks pieces. It is currently hanging over my mantle. It’s called the Village of Brewster.

I have 3 more seasons of Wysocki cross stitch pieces to complete; winter is started, but I have no idea when or if I’ll ever complete them. Fall I completed b/c it’s my favorite season.

Anyway, when I saw this colonial red house with white door with black and gray trim I oohed, and aaahhed. Oh, who am I kidding. I SWOONED! Then I took a photo for Thursday Doors. 🙂 I want this house with street lamps. and gate sold as a kit. I’d buy it, put it together with some sort of Loctite glue so it wouldn’t come apart, and I’d put it in my family room. Probably on top of my Entertainment Center where my Victorian Dollhouse resides. 🙂 I love and collect miniatures too. FWIW: I have stopped collecting Dolls, Teacup sets, and Teapots. I ran out of room! TMI? Okay, I know I’m a chatter duck! 🙂

I really like the gate on the left of the house too. The little blue door down the street was a bonus. 🙂 I’m sorry I have no idea how many Lego bricks it took to build this part of Georgetown either.

Warning! I have one or two more post of doors from Legoland California!

BTW: If this week’s post looks funky I apologize! I’m trying to get my images to display a bit larger. This theme is behaving differently the last month or so; my images are a good deal smaller than they used to be. I may end up changing themes! I hope you hang in there with me through this process! Believe me I am not looking forward to changing! It will be hard for me too!

This post is part of Norm 2.0’s Thursday Doors. If you love doors and would like to see the doors others are posting, or post doors you’ve photographed and join other door lovers from around the world click here.

At the end of Norm’s latest Thursday Door post is a little Blue Link-up/View button click it to be taken to a page with all the links to view all the posts, and add your own if you’re a door enthusiast too.

More to come…

Humpback Whales

July 18, 2016July 17, 2016Posted in Monterey Bay, Nature, Nature Photography, Photography, Travel and Tourism, WhalesTagged Blue Ocean Cruises, Humpback Whales, Monterey Submarine Canyon, Nature, Nikon, Photography, Sea Mammals, Travel and Tourism, Whale Watching40 Comments

Saturday I spent late morning until early afternoon at sea Whale Watching outside of Monterey, CA. We sailed about 12 miles off shore to the Monterey Submarine Canyon where there were quite a number of Humpback Whales, Gray Whales, and a Blue Whale feeding on Krill, and other little fishes that were abundant on Saturday.

“The Monterey Submarine Canyon is quite large…an undersea Grand Canyon. It’s 470 kilometers (292 miles) long and approximately 12 kilometers (39 ft) at its widest point with a maximum rim to floor relief of 1,700 meters (5,577feet).” ~Simon Sanctuary

It’s was quite exciting seeing the Whales! I didn’t see a Breach this time out, but saw lots of Spouting, or Blowing.

Humpback Whale Spouting

It was overcast, windy, and a bit choppy out at sea the whole time. The Sun only peeked out a couple of times.

I saw some Fluking when the whales are going to dive down as much as 50 meters.

Humpback Whale Fluking

Once they reach the depth they want they begin to slowly rise by spiraling up to the surface often in teams creating a Bubble Net. The purpose of the bubble is to congregate the Krill and prey and force them to the surface. The Krill and fish see the bubbles as a net and feeling trapped they stay in the center of the Bubble Net. The Whales come up with an explosion of air with their mouths wide open eating all they can.

Here are two images of a fin of a Humpback Whale when it breaks the surface while they’re under the surface spinning.

Humpback Whale Spouting w Flipper showing

Humpback Whale Flipper;

The Humpback often get under that Bubble Net and Lunge up with their mouths gaping open scooping up the prey. Here you see at least 3 working as a team.

Humpback Whale Lunge Feeding

I see four working together here.

Humpback Whales Lunge Feeding

Humpback Whale Lunge feeding.

Humpback Whale Lunge Feeding

Humpback Whales spend the winter in the warm waters near Costa Rica and Hawaii. Humpbacks, including mothers with calves travel thousands of miles to feast on krill, and schooling fish in the Monterey Bay while they migrate north to their feeding waters in Alaska. They grow to be 45ft to 62ft (14-19 meters) long!

I missed quite a few good photo ops b/c for the first time in my life I got sea sick. It’s NOT FUN! I will go again but, I’m taking medicine before hand.

The images are not converted to Black & White. It was so gray out that they look black and white.

Nikon D700| Nikkor 80-200mm| Lexar Digital Film| Hand-held| Developed in PS CC 2015.5

More to come…

Thursday Doors 24/52 Carnegie Lakeport Library

June 16, 2016June 16, 2016Posted in Architecture, National Register of Historic Places, Nikon, Nikon DF, Photography, Thursday Doors, Travel, Travel and Tourism, Travel PhotographyTagged Andrew Carnegie, Architecture, Carnegie Lakeport Library, National Register of Historic Places, Nikon, Photography, Thursday Doors, Travel and Tourism27 Comments

My friends and I arrived in Lakeport, CA a day before our Grebe boating trip because, we had a 3 hour drive to get there, and a 5:30 a.m. boarding time Sunday morning.

We spent Saturday afternoon birding in Clear Lake State park, then went to dinner at a local Thai place, and finally we wrapped up the day in Library Park on the lake front for sunset. Image here. If you’re a foodie and in the area, and like/love Thai food; hit me up for this place. It’s great!

Before setting up for sunset I spotted a door I really wanted to photograph. It turned out to be a Carnegie Library Door!

Door

The Lakeport Library Committee submitted Carnegie’s ” Schedule of Questions” hoping they would qualify for a grant. The Carnegie Corp. approved an $8,000.00 grant in 1914. Construction started in 1917 and was completed in 1918.

Carnegie Lakeport Library

The lake was actually all the way up here prior to dredging for Yolo County’s Power Plant which built Clear Lake Dam also in 1914. White & Co., investment bankers in New York financed YWP’s dredging in Clear Lake and filling in the area along Lakeport’s waterfront. Owners of the new land deeded their property to Lakeport for a city park.

The library and building might have been lost to a fire in 1953 had not librarian Gertrude Benson smelled the smoke and called the Fire Department! It was an electrical fire which started in the attic. The fire department was able to extinguish the fire before major damage occurred.

In 1986 the county library moved from the cramped Carnegie to a new library on High Street in Lakeport.

In 2008 the Carnegie Library was entered into the National Parks Service’s National Register of Historic Places.

Just after the lights came on at the Gazebo, and the colors in the sky faded T, and Dali were hailing me from my reverie to come see it. They know me so well. They knew I’d want a photograph of that. 🙂

Library Park Gazebo Lakeport CA

In 2014 the building was vacant. The city contracted with Garavaglia Architecture, Inc. to prepare a Feasibility Study to see what needed to be done to preserve and save the building, and put to it other use.

The plaque/sign beside the door reads: City of Lakeport

CARNEGIE LIBRARY

I can’t make out the small font below that- then

LAKEPORT REDEVLOPMENT AGENGY

Redevelopment

Housing

Economic Development

CITY ATTORNEY

I could not find any current information about the building beyond 2014 in my surfing the Internet. I don’t know if it’s in use now or still vacant. It looks quite old and in need of some TLC en mon avis.

I love the lamps, which were in the design tastes of Carnegie’s secretary James Bertram. They symbolized enlightenment.

“Every Library was simple yet formal and entered through a prominent doorway, nearly always accessed by a staircase which symbolized a person’s elevation by learning.” ~Wiki-pedia.org

I really love how people think of that stuff ahead of time and incorporate it in their plans during the design/planning stage. Me. I never think of stuff like this ahead of time. It’s always a day, or month later!

Carnegie was a Scottish-American business man and philanthropist. There were 2,509 Carnegie libraries built between 1883, and 1929. 1,689 were built in the United States of America. ~ Wiki-pedia

The History Buffs can find a pretty thorough history of the Carnegie Lakeport Library’s History here.

At the end of Norm’s latest Thursday Door post is a little Blue Link-up/View button click it to be taken to a page with all the links, or add your own.

Nikon Df| Nikkor 20mm f/1.8| Delkin Digital Film| Tripod| PS CC 2015

More to come…

Golden Hour in Manhattan

June 12, 2016June 12, 2016Posted in Golden Hour, Manhattan, New York, Photography, Travel, Travel and Tourism, Travel PhotographyTagged Clipper City Tall Ship, Golden Hour, I♥NYC, Lower Manhattan, Manhattan, New York, NYC, NYC Harbor, One World Observatory Tower, Skyline, Travel and Tourism, Travel Photography20 Comments

While in Manhattan my sisters and I took a Twilight/City Lights cruise around the harbor on the Clipper City Tall Ship.

Manhattan Skyline

We sailed for two hours around the harbor seeing the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, Governor’s Island, and of course Manhattan’s skyline. One World Observatory Tower stands gleaming with the last rays of the day’s sun shining on it, and the city beneath it.

Nikon Df| Nikkor 28-105mm| Delkin Digital Film| PS CC 2015 & On 1 Photo 10

More to come…

Radio City Music Hall

May 31, 2016May 31, 2016Posted in Architecture, Manhattan, New York, Night Photography, Photography, Travel and Tourism, Travel PhotographyTagged Architecture, Landmark, Manhattan, New York, Night Photography, Nikon, NYC, Radio City Music Hall, Travel Photography33 Comments

One of the iconic NYC buildings that I’ve always wanted to see is Radio City Music Hall.

We passed it while on the Big Bus Tour during the day, and it wasn’t as exciting as I had imagined, I knew it would look better at night.

We had tickets to see Wicked that night so, planning ahead I packed my tripod in order to stop on the way back after the play to take a photograph of Radio City Music Hall.

The NYU Arts & Science class of 2016 had their Baccalaureate Ceremony there earlier in the day. Everywhere you looked there were purple robes, and caps. I didn’t get one good image of that though. 😦

Radio City Music Hall

It does look much better at night.

For the history buffs-

“Radio City Music Hall is an entertainment venue located in Rockefeller Center in New York City. Its nickname is the Showplace of the Nation, and it was for a time the leading tourist destination in the city. Its interior was declared a city landmark in 1978.

The Music Hall opened to the public on December 27, 1932 with a lavish stage show featuring Ray Bolger, Doc Rockwelland Martha Graham. The opening was meant to be a return to high-class variety entertainment. The new format was not a success. The program was very long, and individual acts were lost in the cavernous hall. On January 11, 1933, the Music Hall converted to the then-familiar format of a feature film, with a spectacular stage show perfected by Rothafel at the Roxy Theatre in New York City. The first film shown on the giant screen was Frank Capra’s The Bitter Tea of General Yen, starring Barbara Stanwyck, and the Music Hall became the premiere showcase for films from the RKO-Radio Studio. The film-plus-stage-spectacle format continued at the Music Hall until 1979, with four complete performances presented every day.

By the 1970s, changes in film distribution made it difficult for Radio City to secure exclusive bookings of many films; furthermore, the theater preferred to show only G-rated movies, which further limited their film choices as the decade wore on.^[4] Regular film showings at Radio City ended in 1979. Plans were made to convert the theater into office space, but a combination of preservation and commercial interests (including an irate commentary on Saturday Night Live‘s Weekend Update given by John Belushi) resulted in the preservation of Radio City and in 1980, after a renovation, it reopened to the public.

Radio City Music Hall is currently leased to and managed by The Madison Square Garden Company^[5] Movie premieres and feature runs have occasionally taken place there such as the Harry Potter film series, but the focus of the theater throughout the year is now on concerts and live stage shows. The Radio City Christmas Spectacular continues to be an important annual event (see below). The Music Hall has presented most of the leading pop and rock performers of the last 30 years, as well as televised events including the Grammy Awards, the Tony Awards, the Daytime Emmy Awards the MTV Video Music Awards, and the NFL Draft. Starting in 2013, however, the Tony Awards will be the only major televised awards ceremony at Radio City, as the Video Music Awards relocated permanently to the Barclays Center that year. (The Grammys which alternated between New York City and Hollywood, has been held since 2004 in Los Angeles, as have the Daytime Emmys, off and on, since 2006.)”~Wiki-pedia

I had no idea it had a nickname! I am curious to see what it looks like inside. Perhaps one day I’ll get that opportunity.

Nikon Df| Nikkor 28-105mm| Delkin Digital Film| Tripod

More to come…

A New Day Dawns in Manhattan

May 25, 2016May 25, 2016Posted in Manhattan, New York, Photography, Sunrise, Travel, Travel and Tourism, Travel PhotographyTagged Manhattan, Midtown, Nikon, Penthouse View, Sunburst, Sunrise, Travel Photography38 Comments

I’m back from a fun, but busy week in Manhattan. My sisters and I crammed in as much as we could in 6 days; several iconic buildings, museums, squares and plazas, two Broadway shows, a sunset boat cruise, the subway, and a whole lotta walking, and yet…we didn’t even scratch the surface!

I fell into Eastern Standard Time (EST) really easy. I was awake by 5am most mornings and checked the sky to see if it was worth getting out of bed. Two mornings were. Mostly we had a mix of morning overcast gray skies which blued up by the early afternoon.

This image is from our Penthouse deck on our second morning.

Dawn in Manhattan

Unfortunately, now that I’m home I feel like I need to sleep until noon before waking up.

I hope to catch up with everyone this week.

Nikon Df| Nikkor 20mm f/1.8g| Delkin Digital Film| PS CC 2016| Single Frame

More to come…

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