Ocean Shipping

I selected today's title based on my profile. When I say I'm interested in "ocean shipping" I'm mostly talking about large ships, which I find fascinating. On the afternoon of January 26th, I spotted this cargo ship anchored in Elliott Bay. The late afternoon sunshine created a bright reflection. Be sure to click on the photos for larger views.

The ship is waiting to be loaded with grain at the Louis Dreyfus Grain Terminal, which you can see in the picture below. This picture was taken last March from the Space Needle. Note the fireboat practicing at the left.

Winter Sunset

I posted last night's sunset online and was honored to have it featured on KING5 along with several beautiful shots by others.  From KING's post: "We had another beautiful sunset in the Puget Sound area tonight.  Meteorologist Jeff Renner says the colors are caused by water vapor and dust in the atmosphere that scatter the light."


Click on the photo for a full-size view.

Gravelly Range Road

High up in the Rocky Mountains of southwest Montana is a road less travelled known as the Gravelly Range Road. Up in this high country cattle graze in the summer, and for a few days each year it's full of color when wildflowers bloom. In 2005 I spent a day up there and snapped quite a few pictures. Here are a few to brighten up the mid-winter doldrums.

If you must see where this is all located, I have placed a link to Google Maps here.  Zoom out to get the relationship to the rest of the country.

The Mighty Eleven-Ninety KLIF

If you’ve looked at my profile you’ll know that one of my interests is radio. There are many facets to that interest. One of them is vintage broadcasting. Vintage as in when I was a lot younger! Growing up, I lived not too far from one of America’s classic Top 40 AM radio stations, KLIF, 1190 on the “dial”.  Well, even the “dial” no longer applies for most of today’s listeners.


My fascination with broadcasting led me to visit KLIF and they were kind enough to allow me to take some pictures. It’s pretty interesting to look at these pictures today and see that just about everything has changed. In those days everything was analog. The clock on wall, the 45-rpm vinyl records, the tape cartridges. The top 40 songs of the day were stored right there in a record holder on the DJ’s console.



I wish I remembered the DJ’s name. I think it was Charlie. Things are so different now in broadcasting. Programming is all digitized right down to the time announcements and everything can be recorded days, months or even years in advance. I often wonder if there is actually a living person at most stations. Of course there is, for talk radio, which is so prolific
today, but otherwise I’m not sure. In the time since these photos were taken, KLIF has changed frequencies and format. Read about the station and its history here 

People are always asking me, What are you going to do with all those pictures? Here’s a good example. Fun to go back and relive that visit through pictures.

Full Wolf Moon

According to the Mother Nature Network Full Moon names originated with early Native Americans. Each full moon of the year has its own name. 


One of my Twitter friends mentioned the beautiful moon last night and, although I missed it then, I did manage to capture a shot of it this morning just as it was setting over the city.


The January 19th full moon is called the Full Wolf. According to MNN: "Amid the zero cold and deep snows of midwinter, the wolf packs howled hungrily outside Indian villages. The Full Wolf Moon was also known as the Old Moon or the Moon After Yule. In some tribes, this was also known as the Full Snow Moon; most applied that name to the next moon."


The building with the blue light near the top is the Olive 8 which is a combination hotel/condominium.  Yes, it was lucky that the clouds parted long enough for this shot!

Railfanning Auburn, Washington

You may have noticed in my profile that I'm interested in railroads. As a kid I bugged my grandmother to take me on a train trip. She finally relented and ever since I've been fascinated with trains and railroads. Those of us who are fascinated with trains are called railfans. (Among other things.) I enjoy getting out and taking videos of trains.  Here is one I shot in Auburn, Washington in February, 2009, of the Sounder Commuter.  Some great horn sounds near the end of the clip as the train departs the station.

The rail portion of the Sounder service runs between Tacoma and Everett, WA. Separate trains are used for the portions between Tacoma and Seattle and between Seattle and Everett. The station in Seattle is called King Street Station and is shared with AMTRAK.

To Honor the Memory of Christina Taylor Green

My Twitter friends may recognize this photo which I posted last May.  It's one of my favorites.  One beautiful flower for another.  May God be with Christina's family and all the victims of last Saturday's tragic shooting.

Read about Christina

Late Afternoon on a Winter's Day

The sun is low, the days are short, the light is soft on a late afternoon in early January.  Please click here to see a larger view.

It's All About the Light

A while back I was down at Pike Place Market, aka Public Market or Farmer's Market, in downtown.  It was mid-morning and the sun was up high enough to be flooding some parts of the market with brilliant sunshine.  Although we see produce in the grocery market all the time, and it looks good, the sun on this little vegetable stand really made it stand out.

The Pike Market has been a fixture in Seattle since 1907.  Per Wikipedia , it is the longest continually run farmer's market in the United States.

Missing the Bougainvillea

Looking back to January, 2008, and my visit to Mazatlan, Mexico.  A couple of unforgettable things:  the flowers and the Immaculate Conception Church.

Seattle's Kerry Park View

In my last post I mentioned taking a bunch of pics of the view from this little park overlooking the city. I've stitched those into a panorama for today's post. These panoramas become huge files, so the pic below is very reduced.

The view here looks to the south and, if you look carefully, you'll see Mt. Rainier in the distance. The pros like to wait for a sunset to get the light just right on the mountain along with reflections from the buildings for a really spectacular photo.

The pictures were taken on Sunday, January 2, which was one of several beautiful, but cold, sunny days in a row. The body of water on the right side is Elliott Bay, a part of Puget Sound.  The Sound connects to the Pacific Ocean via the Strait of Juan de Fuca.  Seattle is not actually on the coast of the Pacific Ocean.

If you would like to see a slightly larger view, I posted one here.

Thanks for visiting the Island.

Emerald City

Sunny weather encouraged me to get out and take some photos the last few days. One place I stopped was Kerry Park, possibly the best-known Seattle overlook. Almost any time you stop by here there will be a few people enjoying the view. When the TV networks do their evening news from Seattle they like to use this park for the backdrop. I took several pics to stitch together for a panorama and, if it turns out OK, will post it. Until then, here's the view.

This scene is often used as a sort of "The City of Seattle" view but what most folks don't get to see is the rest of Kerry Park. It's a nice little park, but not very large. Here's a shot showing some of the "backstage" view.

Spent quite a bit of time this morning looking at other blogs to get some ideas. Have lots of work to do -- there are so many great blogs out there. Thanks for visiting!

January 1, 2011

January 1, 2011

Seattle starts the new year with a cold, clear day.  I don't recall too many New Year's Days with such a gorgeous beginning.  Hopefully this bodes well for the rest of the year.  We've been under a high pressure system bringing in cold, clear air, and sunny skies for several days now. Yesterday afternoon a fire broke out on the 24th floor of the Crown Plaza Hotel.  The fire blew out the windows in the room and due to the very cold air outside, the room never got hot enough to set off the automatic fire sprinklers.  It caused quite a lot of excitement, but the fire department had the fire out in short order.  The damage was mostly limited to one room and no one was injured. Since I live in a high rise building the lesson was not lost on me:  Although the building may be fire resistant, what's inside most likely is not.