It’s been a while since I’ve had a chance to take a look at the College St. bridge and the progress is astounding. The entire deck is finished and I was able to walk all the way across. Here is a picture looking east from the middle of the bridge. The road bed is completely finished on the west side with just a bit of railing to do along the ravine. On the east side the road bed is nearly complete except for a few sections between the road and the end of the bridge. The retention pond and roundabout are finished and John Street traffic is allowed to pass through to Newberry. The railing is being cast and it has a nice field stone pattern cast into the surface to match the retaining wall design. See the pictures here

We had a great visit to Canada to visit family and I took a few photos of downtown Toronto and the Toronto Islands. The view of downtown Toronto from the islands is really spectacular and the clouds were very dramatic. There are a few houses still remaining on the islands which are mainly parks. The ferry is the same as the ones that I took when we moved to Canada in 1963!

I went to Savannah, Georgia for the day and took a few photos of the moss-covered trees and the buildings in the center of town. The town is very charming, but it’s hot in August…

We have always gone to Menasha’s Jefferson Park to watch the fireworks. Menasha puts on a great show every year and it’s appreciated. Here are some fireworks pictures from the show in Menasha on July 4^th, 2009. With some preparation and basic settings on your camera, firework pictures are not very difficult to take. Interested in taking your own fireworks photos next year? Here is how I do it.

I like taking pictures of mushrooms. Here is a set of photos of my favorite mushroom shots.

I’ve been looking through some older slides and scanned photo sets for Helsinki, Finland and Rome, Italy. The Helsinki photos are from a weekend in the middle of a business trip over May Day 2000. The weather was sunny and fresh and I made the best use of my two days of sightseeing before boarding the ferry for Stockholm. For something completely different I scanned a photo set of Rome, also from two days of sightseeing in 1998. The weather was awful and we got very wet in the rain, but the sights were fantastic. I enjoy the contrast between these two sets.

We were really lucky to be able to visit the Seychelles Islands in 1993. I just finished scanning all of these photos on my slide scanner. It would be great to go back and take some more! The Seychelles Islands are about 1000 miles from the west coast of Africa in the middle of the Indian Ocean. They are actually a granite remnant from the time Africa, Madagascar and India drifted apart. Beautiful weathered iconic granite rocks stand on the shore framed by beautiful white sand. See my photos here. Apparently, if you eat the pickled breadfruit you will return. I hope it’s true…

I had a great opportunity to spend a few hours in Charleston SC on a stormy Sunday. We visited the aircraft carrier, the USS Yorktown, and toured the old quarter of downtown. It’s quite a nice place to see. We also visited downtown Augusta GA. See photos here including a panorama on the flight deck.

I like to take panorama photographs. I try to take them everywhere I go as it really captures what a place looks like being there.

I also like taking pictures of mushrooms. There is something magical about how they appear to sprout from nothing. We have some gigantic puffballs that appear behind our house in the fall.

I take some nature photographs and I’m pretty happy with the results. There is always an opportunity to improve in this area. Maybe I can justify some more equipment??

We went to a family wedding last summer on Vancouver Island and made a trip of it. See the elegance of Butchart Gardens and the wilds of Pacific Rim National Park on the Pacific side of Vancouver Island.

Korea - I have been to Korea several times with work and have had the opportunity to visit many different places, from the Buddhist Temple at the top of Mt. Geumo to the bustling metropolis of Seoul. Here is a sampling of people and places from this very interesting country.

Iceland - I have been fortunate to have visited Iceland twice. It is a really fantastic place to go and I'm eager to go back again for two weeks so I can go all the way around the island. There is a change in scenery every five minutes as you travel down the road and it's all spectacular!

Scandinavia - I have traveled to Sweden, Norway and Denmark many times and these are fantastic places to see. I really liked the rocky Atlantic shores of Bohuslän and the city life in Stockholm and Oslo and scenes from local towns and villages. In this photo gallery I have my best pictures from Sweden and Norway.

Minnesota Fall Colors - I travel with a friend most years to capture the fall colors. After many years of being too early or too late we finally hit the jackpot in 2008 on the north shore of Lake Superior in Minnesota. We hiked in Tettegouche State Park, and Spilt Rock Lighthouse State Park.

Hawaii - We have visited the Kauai and the Big Island on vacation. We really like the grandeur of hiking in Volcanoes National Park, the great scenery on all the great beaches and vistas.

The UP (Upper Peninsula of Michigan) and Northern Wisconsin - There are great things to see right at home. Here are some pictures hiking through the forests, along Lake Superior and watching fireworks in Copper Harbor, Wisconsin.

Ontario - Photographs from Jake Lake in the Kawarthas and downtown Toronto. I travel to Toronto often to visit family.

Disneyworld - There are lots of cool photographs to take at Disneyworld! I really like the night photography.

Places I’m Thinking About

I have a calendar on my desk from the “1000 Places to Visit Before You Die.” I’ve been fortunate to have gone to many places already. There are a lot of interesting places in the calendar and I hope to get to some of them, but I have my own list. I have been looking at Google Earth a lot and it is a great way to explore the world. Thanks to everyone who left pictures using Panoramio. Looking at Google Earth I find that I really like history and a great landscape. Here is my list, in no particular order. I appear to favor remote polar areas!

· New Zealand – Everyone I have ever talked to who has been there has just loved it. There are lots of things to do and the scenery is spectacular.

· Australia – This is a big place so you have to choose which part you would like to see. I was surprised to find that the entire northern coast is empty except for some mining.

· South Georgia Island – This is a forbidding place that was a former whaling station. Ernest Shackleton made an amazing voyage in a small boat from Elephant Island to South Georgia Island and then had to hike over the mountains. He eventually died and was buried there. It is a spectacular place.

· Tristan da Cuhna – This island has a claim on being one of the most remote islands on earth. It is a volcanic cone with a small flat spot for a village on the northern side. The procedure for getting to the island is arduous, but the scenery is spectacular.

· Iceland – I’ve had the good fortune to have visited Iceland twice, but I have only seen the major sights in the south-western corner near Reykjavik. I would like to go around the island to see the other great sights.

· The Falkland Islands – This remote group of islands became better known as the site of a war between Britain and Argentina, but the real beauty is in the remote, lonely, windswept landscape of the islands. Check out “The Neck” on Saunders Island.

· The Dempster Highway – This is a two-lane dirt highway that the Canadian government built to promote oil exploration in the far north. It goes from Dawson City, Yukon Territory to Inuvik, Northwest Territories, a distance of 471 miles. It is a fantastic adventure with beautiful unspoiled scenery.

· Greenland – This is a place we almost visited on our first trip to Iceland as a side trip. We still want to go there.

· Pompeii – I have been to Italy many times and I highly recommend a trip. The one place that I haven’t had a chance to visit is Pompeii. This old Roman town preserved at the height of its vitality is a great place to go.

· Machu Picchu – I have read a lot of history of the new world and Machu Picchu is a great example of Incan architecture that I would like to see.

· New York City – I drove through New York City a long time ago on a business trip and went to a Mets game. (It was early in the season and bitterly cold so we left after the 4^th inning!) I am interested in the museums, Central Park, the Statue of Liberty, and all the other tourist attractions. Maybe we could see a show…

· The Taj Mahal – I would like to see many different places in India so this could end up being a long trip, but I am particularly interested in seeing the Taj Mahal.

· Lamu, Kenya is an old Swahili trading base on the Indian Ocean founded in the 14^th century with lots of local architecture and tradition. It’s a World Heritage Site.