Texas Isn't All Bad...

Okay. So. We went to Texas. In October 2011, we loaded our cameras and Mountain Dew into the new baby car and drove it like we stole it from Maryland to Texas in less than two days. The goal, as usual, was to photograph lighthouses and whatever else we found. Above, the car refuses to set foot in Texas. She relented. Eventually. Texas.

Heading southwest from the brief nightmare that was Houston, this Kansas City Southern train paced us for a while along US Rt. 59. We were quickly losing daylight, so it's not my best railfan work, but it is my first train shot in Texas. Texas.

Car. Growling at the Texas cotton fields. Texas.

Thunderheads are bigger in Texas. Texas.

Cow with horns! Texas.

This one's mostly for Mom, who dearly misses Rehoboth Beach's Purple Parrot. We're in Port Isabel, not far from the Texas-Mexico border on the Gulf. Texas.

Boom. Our first light. Point/Port Isabel. Not easy to shoot with all the people climbing all over it, and we could do without the streamers and signage advertising some town festival-y thing, but it is beautifully-restored and kept. Texas.

Still shooting film, too! Black & White, even. Texas.

Gulf-bound oil tanker passing Port Isabel. Texas.

The Queen Isabel Causeway, linking Port Isabel with the southern end of South Padre Island. Texas.

Much more to come. We followed the Gulf Coast north and east through Texas (Texas.), Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida panhandle. Come with us! Texas.

The Zoo - With Lights!

December, 2008. Zoolights, at the National Zoo in Washington, DC. It's hard to get decent long-exposure shots without a tripod, but I tried anyway. Here's what I got. Above, the blue tree. 1/4 second may not sound long, but with a hand-held camera, it really is.

Welcome to the zoo - home of the blue pandas!

The dancing trees - warming up.

The dancing trees - rockin' out to Trans-Siberian Orchestra.

Dancing trees, flowers and butterfly.

I think I like this 3/4 second zooming shot of a well-lit tree better without a tripod. It's more, um, organic. Or something.

Our favorite blue pandas with their mysterious golden bamboo.

Blue crab!

Flamingos and palm. It's like a little piece of Florida, right in the middle of Northwest DC in December!

What's cuter than a baby elephant? A baby elephant made of twinkly lights, stomping the yard while his parents watch. And maybe baby pandas.

How cool is our zoo? Our zoo has dinosaurs!

Bye!

Always In Training

All this writing about hoboes has me missing my trains. Or, missing the photographing of the trains, at least. Here's a sampling of shots from 2008 and 2009. Above, a westbound and empty coal train comes off the Old Main Line at Point of Rocks, MD in May, 2009.

Eastbound mixed freight splits the new signals at Barnesville, MD in May of 2008.

I miss the old B&O target signals. Change is bad, mmkay?

Another eastbound at Barnesville, later that same day.

Westbound Q400 rounds the big curve at Thomas Viaduct in Relay, near Baltimore. The tracks branching off to the left are the Old Main Line. This train will pass them again at their other end, in Point of Rocks.

Coal rumbles through Washington Grove, MD in the Spring of 2008.

Steam rises from the wet ties as the temperature quickly moves from the 50s to the 70s. Washington Grove, 2008.

I hate snow, but this morning at Washington Grove in January, 2009 was fun. Here comes the empty trash train, returning to the transfer station a mile or so away, to load up with more rubbish.

One spring morning in 2009, this old engine - the last un-rebuilt GP40 on the CSX - puttered by with a short work train. Just visible on the right, beyond the bridge, is a privately-owed old caboose, languishing in the sun.

At the west portal of the old Point of Rocks tunnel, empty auto-racks rattle westward, en route to Detroit to be reloaded with new cars.

Thanks for stopping by. More to come, as my hobo lifestyle permits...

Sometimes Skies Do This And Seas Do That

So, it's monsooning ridiculously hard in Maryland, tonight - might even change to snow before it's over. Normally, I head straight for my Keys or St. Thomas pics or some such warming images. Tonight, for some reason, I'm into the doom and gloom and howling wind. The sun is supposedly coming back tomorrow, anyway. The skies and seas in this post were photographed from the balcony of our favorite motel in Kill Devil Hills, NC in 2007.

See spray? I know - so do I!

Cormorants on the wing. It was really, really dark.

Then this happened. Serious coastal rain.

Gull. Yup.

Pelicans!

Wait - is that a patch of blue?

Just enough of a break to allow for a nice sunset over the Albemarle Sound.

The following morning's sunrise wasn't perfect, but I included it here because of the sheer novelty of having been awake to shoot it. Mornings are not my thing.

But this is. Early sunshine on a churning Atlantic. Looks like something else entirely.

Back soon! :)

Of Gathering Gulls And Stormy Skies - OBX '07 Continues

Okay. Where were we? Ah yes - making our way back up the Outer Banks of North Carolina in October of 2007. We had just missed the 3:00 ferry from Cedar Island to Ocracoke, and had almost three hours to kill before the next one. There's nothing but a ferry terminal at this end of Cedar Island, so this turned out to be the most peaceful respite on the whole trip.

Keep an eye on the big seagull. It's happy hour on the sandbar and he's the host.

You have to get there early to get a good spot on the bar of sand.

"Okay guys - do what I do..."

"Free sand crab appetizers until 6:00! Woohoo!"

I like ripples. Sue me.

Looking across the harbor from our room at the Anchorage Inn: Ocracoke Lighthouse.

It had stormed ferociously the night before, and the system still lingered not far offshore as we drove NC Route 12 from town to the next ferry at the north end of Ocracoke.

Serious weather.

So, [Maris] and I are not fans of gloomy weather, and we had to talk ourselves into stopping again to shoot lighthouses under threatening skies. I'm glad we did. This kind of weather is one of the major reasons lighthouses were built. This is Hatteras Light, stoic against the gathering darkness.

And here's Bodie Island Light, being rained on - hard.

Thanks for stopping by. There's still more to come, including a recently-completed excursion to the Gulf Coast.