Lake Keowee Trip

Wow, it's been a while since I posted. Then again, I haven't been traveling much. So, my buddy David and I took a trip up to Lake Keowee in South Carolina yesterday, 6 Nov. David has his pontoon boat in a slip up there. On the way we made our usual stop at Cracker Barrel restaurant for breakfast. We always enjoy stopping there as they do a great breakfast. When we eat there we don't need to worry about lunch that day which is good since often we are somewhere  where food is not readily available.

Traffic leaving Atlanta was not bad as we left early Sunday morning. On the way out I got my first look at the new HOT lanes on I-85N. I don't think the state and DOT realize these lanes announce the fact they have failed at planning but here is a way to get home quicker if you're willing to let us fleece you even more for the opportunity.

Once at the lake, we quickly went through the process of prepping the boat. This means removing the canvas cover, loading all the things we brought and getting David's dog, Page, on board. See earlier post for a photo of Page.

This trip was to be more significant for me. I've decided to learn to operate the boat rather than just be a passenger. So I asked David to explain to me everything he did when getting the boat started, warming up and leaving the slip. It was all straight forward and really simple. It's sort of like driving a really old car with mechanical brakes. It doesn't stop quickly so you have to plan moves well in advance.

Once on the water, we slowly motored out of the no-wake zone and into open water. It was a beautiful, cool November morning and there was almost no one else on the lake. Actually, standing still it was cool. Motoring across the open water was cold. But if you like such experiences, it was a great time to be out.

David and I spent the morning discussing and observing the ins-and-outs of navigation and the protocols of boating. We came to the agreement that many boaters think the water is just a place where you can do whatever you want and no one bothers you. Of course that means you are generally bothering the Hell out of other people. Of note is the fact the last time we were out in the Summer a DNR cop was inspecting every boat in a cove where we were. He didn't check us and he didn't miss a boat where there was loud music and open containers. Nuff' said.

We stopped at David's favorite island to play with Page and let her run around. Page had a large time retrieving a tennis ball from the water that David had thrown. She also did a good bit of running around in the treeline as well. I did a little shore-walking on the island looking for whatever. I must say the shore was remarkably clean for the amount of use the lake gets in warmer months. After my walk I took the opportunity to lay down on one of the seats and enjoy the warm sun and blue sky. In total, we spent about an hour on the island. It was a very nice time.

After leaving the island we motored around the lake some more looking for some good Fall color for David to photograph. Unfortunately we were unable to find any. Too early?

Looking at the time we decided it was time to motor back to the marina. It was then I asked David if I could drive for a while. He said "Sure" and let me have the wheel. He suggested I follow the GPS course and keep an eye on the depth as we headed in. I kept a pretty good eye on both as we traveled but failed to see some markers we were approaching. Dang! And I was really trying to get this right the first time! No problem, David pointed them out and I corrected course and drove almost all the way back to the marina.

Once docked at the marina we began the process of unpacking the boat and putting the cover back in place. The cover, by the way, is a pain in the neck as when you try to press the snaps on the boat moves away. You have to find the right position to work from or it's a very frustrating process. An older couple who had also been on the lake was also having somewhat of a time with their boat's cover. David, good soul that he is, showed them the tool he has for cover removal and placement which make the process much easier. They were very grateful to learn of the device and vowed to get one as soon as possible.

The trip home was uneventful and we enjoyed some good conversation on many subjects. Traffic coming back into Atlanta was the usual for a Sunday afternoon. We arrived home in plenty of time to clean up and be ready for dinner. This is always a plus as far as my wife is concerned.

I'm looking forward to the next invitation to go boating and get some more time handling the boat. Hopefully this will occur sometime during Thanksgiving week. We'll see.

Sandy Springs Heritage Center

I did a quick trip this past weekend with my friend David, owner of BlueStarPhotos. We went to the Sandy Springs Heritage center to shoot some pics since neither of us was in the mood for a road trip.

The trip started out with a stop at a local camera equipment rental business. David rented a wide angle Nikon lens to try-before-buy. Being the lens is $900 to buy and $50 to rent I think it's a good idea to rent first unless you're dead-sure you need it.

Now this is where I have to admit my shortcomings. We all have them. So, I realized once I started to attempt shooting some pics my D70's battery was dead. Dang! How did I let that happen? Borrowing David's keys and walking back to the car I discovered I had not returned all my equipment to the camera bag after the last adventure! Now that's a problem! And the only solution to the problem was to use my wife's Canon A570 IS. A handy little point & shoot for sure but it's no DSLR. After swapping the tripod mount to the 570 I walked back to the park telling myself "You are going to get everything together soon as you get back home, no waiting!"

I enjoyed going through the heritage center shooting pictures. The site is well maintained and has been nicely landscaped. The main buildings consist of the Heritage Center itself and a small outbuilding which is a Summer kitchen or servant's quarters.

Outbuilding with bell

Like most photographers I like to try and take pictures in filtered light.  Filtered light means cloud cover, so, of course, it rained on us! It actually started just as I was getting ready to snap a pic of the backside of the building above. Not to be defeated, I placed my hand over the camera and got the pic in spite of the rain. I then shot up the stairs as quick as I could to try and miss the heavier rain. I almost make it too. Luckily the rain didn't last long it just upped the humidity from "horrid" to beyond description. 

After the rain we spent time getting some close shots of some of the flowers and foliage present around the center. Some of the shots came out rather well for a PS camera.

Now if you're a photographer at heart you know you can't take all the pictures that could be taken in one day. So we decided we'd shot enough at the Heritage Center and went to find some lunch. As fortune would have it, we found a good place across the street that served oyster & shrimp po' boys. Yum!

After lunch we went to scout one of our future shoots, Sope Creek. It's a creek not too far from home that has some Civil War history attached to it. We drove by and found the ruins to be very close to the road. The parking lot to get to them is about a half mile away however. When we do get to visit this site you can be sure we'll have all our equipment ready as the parking lot is uphill from the ruins! We won't want to walk that hill but once I promise.

All-in-all it was a good day. Some goofs were made but that's how you get to be "Pro" at something. We had a good time and look forward to our next adventure be it near or far away.

Vacation - Western New York

Vacation time for so many of us! A week or so of doing what you want to in an effort to erase 50, or so, weeks of what is required of you. Doesn't seem fair, does it? It's not! Vacations should last a minimum of four to six weeks. Then, maybe, fewer of us would die too soon from stress related disease. But.....I digress.

So, I spent a couple of weeks in Western New York state visiting my wife's family. It's always a pleasure to go this time of year as it's so hot in the South and the temps tend to be about 15-20 degrees cooler in New York.

When the kids and we were younger we always drove up to NY. It was a day or so of seeing America from the interstates. In short, we didn't see a lot of America which may be one of the points to having interstates. It's for people to get where they're going in a huge country like America. These days we fly and get to NY in a couple of hours. The hassle of flying is worth the time saved for sure. This year we flew with AirTran. The flight was essentially indistinguishable from the Delta flight. The flight was full, there were babies, slow people and those that thought the flight was all about them. They jumped up to grab their luggage from the overheads, hit someone in the head and then stand there and wait. Sometimes talking of their cell phone. They like to look important, I suppose. I wonder if they know they look anything but important? In any case, we got there and back, no problems.

The time in New York was very good. The weather was as expected, cool, some rain and some really beautiful days. I enjoyed it all. The town we were in, Springville, is located about 28 miles SE of Buffalo. It's a small town, a few thousand people at best. And, it's an agricultural town. Most of the land is used for crops. Corn seems to be the most abundant. They raise some of the best corn I've ever eaten in this area! I find the town very restful. My sons think they've been relocated to one of the lesser circles of Hell, however. Every year I tell them this was how America was for the majority of it's existence. Only in the twentieth century did large cities emerge and populations begin to migrate to them. They generally look, nod and ask how much longer are we staying.

One of the goals I set for myself on this trip was to get some photos of the wonderful farm land surrounding Springville. I spent a fair amount of time shooting barn, deserted buildings and flowers. I found this barn while we were on an exploration trip to see "where does this road go?" I really like the way this one timber is jutting out with a plant on it. Unusual for certain.

An event we celebrated while in Springville was my father-in-laws ninetieth birthday! His actual birthday isn't til October but like I told him, at his age he can have whenever he wants! We took him out to a nice restaurant and invited family & friends to join in. We sat at one of those long tables where conversations happen in islands. On my island my brother-in-law and I discussed sports and the use of performance enhancing substances. The conversation was often interrupted by jumping up and shooting photos for the group. It seems so many times where you're the photog and aim a camera people stop talking and pose for the shot. It's easy to end up with a sd card full of the same/similar shot! Next time someone points a camera at you just keep on doing whatever it is you're doing and avoid the deer-in-the-headlights look!

While at my father-in-laws house we did some work for him. He had some chores that needed to be done and us doing them would same him a lot of time. I had my boys stain the front porch which needed it badly. On the second coat my youngest complained that "this takes forever!" I told him to image how long it would have taken if I hadn't bought him the 4" wide brush to match the boards? With a 2" brush he might still be there! I did go to the trouble of masking the porch with blue tape as much as I thought it would need it which was a lot more than I would have done had I been doing the staining. They still managed to get a little stain in the wrong places but not so bad as to require actual painting over.

Another wonderful job we did was to mulch the front flower beds. For some reason my father-in-law thought two bags of mulch would cover everything. I went along with it and when he saw what a pitiful pile two bags of mulch made I was off to the Big Box store. In the end it actually required twelve bags of mulch to do the job. But it looked great! I hope the boys were happy with their work.

Once the vacation ended it was time to come back to the South. Once again the flight was full and people were crazy. I spent a good bit of time shooting photos out the cabin window. It was the first time I had ever done that. It was kind of fun!

All-in-all it was another good family vacation. Nothing like any of the Chevy Chase movies...

Gone Fishin'

Had a great weekend! My buddy David, my youngest son Aaron and myself drove up to Lake Keowee in South Carolina and spent the day boating. The weather here has been hot without a drop of rain. It was definitely time to get on the water.

The drive up was uneventful except for all the drivers thinking they owned the road. It seems like everyone around here thinks they have to get there first! It makes for some dangerous situations. We stopped for breakfast at our favorite place, Cracker Barrel. They do a very good breakfast in my opinion. On rare occasion, however, the staff can be overly perky which is annoying until you've had your coffee.

After breakfast it was onto the lake with a short stop for fuel and sandwiches for lunch at a Flying J truck stop. Checking out the sandwich selection while David fueled the van we discovered the only sandwiches available were the kink my mom 'warned me about", namely, tuna salad, chicken salad and egg salad. I had the sneaking suspicion there were a lot of turkey, ham & cheese and chicken sandwiches going down the road in other peoples coolers and we were left with the sandwiches other people's mom's had warned them about. So, it was choose the "safest" one or go hungry. Beef jerky for lunch is not a happy prospect especially as I had a tooth extracted earlier in the week. I chose the chicken salad and picked up a bag of vinegar & salt potato chips as a possible antidote. Well, in any case I knew they would be good. We paid up, saddled up and away we went. The remainder of the trip to the lake was uneventful.

Once parked, we began the job of loading up the boat. Actually, we began the job of uncovering the boat and storing all the covers, etc, etc. A bit of a pain in itself. Once the cover was off and stored we could begin to load up not that we had brought that much with us. Loading or unloading with a teenager means giving explicit directions every time something is to be loaded, carried or generally dealt with. So the loading process only took about twice as long as it should have. Not bad.

The last item to be loaded was David's dog, Page. She's a sweet little Boykin Spaniel going on five years old.

-Page-

The only "problem" with Page is that she never settles down much on the boat. She wanders back and forth, jumps up in your lap, then down again with all this to be repeated many times during the day. Her best moments come when we stop at a beach on one of the islands on the lake. She then loves to play fetch with David by swimming after tennis balls or a floating ring. It's a great thing to see although it does remind me of that scene from Jaws where the young man is throwing a stick for his Lab to fetch and then the dog no longer returns...

One of the highlights of the day is when Aaron caught a Channel Catfish. I think it surprised him and I think it was the biggest fish he has ever caught. We measured it to be 16 inches long and probably weighted about a pound and a half. After the required picture taking we threw it back and it disappeared like a shot out into deep water. In any case, "well done, Aaron."

The rest of the morning was spent cruising the lake and enjoying the day. Being on the water made the usually hot day seem quite nice with the wind blowing as we cruised down the lake. We stopped a couple of times to try our luck with fishing but didn't get even a nibble. It being around Noon it didn't surprise me as the fishing was predicted to be best at early morning and evening.

For lunch we pulled into a cove where a waterfall enters the lake. The cove was absolutely full of other boaters having a good time. Good time being defined as everything from quietly having lunch to loud music with beer and bikinis on the side. WooHoo! The first place we tried to anchor didn't work out so we moved to a little further up where we were isolated from all the other boaters. Cool, it worked for me. There we fished a little before eating lunch. No luck on the fishing by the way. Lunch as welcome as we were all ready for it. Including Page. She, like so many dogs, thinks anything at her level is at least partially hers and the cooler I parked my sandwich on was at her level. I spent a fair amount of energy convincing her the sandwich was mine no matter what level it's on. In the end she was quite happy to do crumb-detail and clean up whatever hit-the-deck. She also managed to score a potato chip or two from Aaron by staring him into submission which is a sneaky dog trick.

After lunch it was time to cool down in the lake. Now did I mention this part of the lake is fed by a waterfall? The water temperature was a great deal lower than I was expecting as I climbed down the ladder on the aft of the boat. Dang! I found myself taking it very slowly and splashing water on myself to slowly get myself used  to the temperature. Once in the water felt very refreshing as I drifted around the boat. Aaron joined me in the water and floated around on a seat-float crafted especially for the lazy Summer days on the lake. After about twenty minutes of floating and talking it was time to head back to the marina. Twenty minutes also turned out to be just long enough to give me a sunburn on the top of my head as I currently have a short, Summer haircut. Ouch!

On the return trip to the marina I begin to realize something. This trip is killing my back and not doing my jaw any good where I had the tooth extracted. I begin to contemplate taking pain medication when we get back. This day on the lake has been the roughest to-date as there have been many big boats on the water and a lot of general traffic which makes for a lot of having to deal with wakes.

Aaron spent most of the trip back trying to shade himself under a large beach towel. Unfortunately he left his legs out. I had asked him earlier about sunblock and in his best teenage reply he said "I don't sunburn!" Well, some lessons are best learned the hard way. I had done my Dad-ly duty and tried to get him to use sunblock. What happens from there is on him!

We arrived a good time later at the marina after a lot of rough moments dealing with wakes. I was definitely going to medicate at this point. One of the highlights of the trip happened on the way into the slip in the no-wake zone. As we idled in we say a DNR boat coming out. We both waved as is the custom. The next thing we saw was a jet-ski with three people aboard shooting out of the marina, in the no-wake zone, at very high speed. The ski was spotted by the officer on the DNR boat who proceeded to come about, hit the lights and catch the ski before it escaped. I think he had done this before. We all had a good chuckle as we watched the  people on the ski listen to the nice DNR man as he explained why he had detained them. Hee, hee...more lessons learned. What a day!

Once we got the boat in the slip we got it moored properly. I tied the same knots that were on the boat when I untied it earlier that morning. David has never forgotten his Boy Scout training by the way and I could not fault him in any way on his knots. Aaron and I carried our stuff up to the van while David zipped up the boat. After getting the boat "put to bed" it was time to go home. It was at this point I decided to really take my pain med.

The ride home was fairly easy as far as interstate driving goes. David and I spent a lot of time talking business concerning his website: BlueStarPhotos. He's been shooting and marketing a lot of his photography. He sells "regular" pictures and HDR's of the many places he has been. I find his photos appeal to a wide range of people which is key when trying to build up clientele.

The pain med I took earlier was now working it's magic. I was feeling much better and was able to relax. One funny side effect I have when taking pain med is I get very "chatty." I just go on-and-on which is not like me at all. I even told David about my first pet dog and a pet duck I had!

It was good to get home after such a good day. I thanked David profusely for inviting us for a boating trip that proved to be so much fun and relaxation. We both needed it for sure.

Early Summer

It looks like Summer is not going to play around this year! The temps hit 90 and went up from there. Here is where I would usually say "Well, it's Summer in Georgia. What do you expect?" True enough!

What does "Summer in Georgia mean?" It means the Farmer's Markets are open again. Wow, that's certainly a good thing. Locally grown veggies....Yum!! And there doesn't seem to be a much better lunch item than a tomato sandwich made with locally grown tomatoes. And for a lot of us, there is a certain way the sandwich must be made for it to be "Right".

First, you must start with a locally grown tomato. Picked out of your own garden if possible. Then, you must use the right bread. As a boy, we always had Wonderbread, that beautiful, white, concrete forming bread that was so common in America in the way-back. But these days it's whole wheat bread that is so necessary in the endless search for fiber in our diets. Next, and this is a "must", you have to use Hellmann's mayonnaise. I've tried other brands and no others seem to do the trick. I'm not sure what it is about this particular brand but to my taste, this is what brings the proper tomato sandwich together. Now for the tomatoes. Did I mention locally grown? How big should the tomato be? I've had good sandwiches made from tomatoes large enough for one slice to cover the entire piece of bread. This is not often the case however. Usually it takes two slices of tomato to cover the bread and make a proper sandwich. The "take away" here is that tomato size doesn't really make the sandwich although it can affect the consumption thereof.

The tomatoes must be ripe. Ripe means they are "going toward soft but still firm." This is probably a personal preference thing but, for me, the best results are obtained when using tomatoes at the aforesaid "proper" stage of ripeness. The tomato should be sliced about a quarter inch thick. Much less and you're not getting a proper helping of tomato. There are at least of couple of ways to build a tomato sandwich. The first, and least efficient way, is to build the "Over-lier". This sandwich is created by putting the first tomato slice in the upper left or right hand corner of the bread. The second slice is place in the opposite corner at the bottom of the bread. The tomato slices usually overlap and you end up with a sandwich thick in the middle which means lots of juice when bitten into. The next way to build the sandwich, what I usually do, is to place the first tomato slice in the upper left hand corner of the bread and then slice the tomato in the middle to the proper thickness and then slice the resulting two halves from the tomato. These slice-halves are then arranged to fill in the empty spots on the bread. Hey, were almost ready to eat...

Mayo - How much to use? Dang! Almost forgot! Firstly, both slices of bread must be spread with mayo. It's important. You have to use a good amount of mayo on both slices to be sure your sandwich will be up-to-par with what it should be. Mayo, spread about an eighth of an inch thick, give or take, on both slices of bread should do the trick.

A very personal choice is how to season the sandwich. I use salt. I use a good amount of salt. Less than a "good amount of salt" and the sandwich is not "right." Some people also use pepper on their tomato sandwich. I have tried this and found it to be acceptable but I don't regularly pepper any tomato sandwich I make for myself. Once properly seasoned the top slice of bread may be added and you're almost ready to eat. The last step, and this isn't negotiable, you have to "squash" the sandwich. Yep, just give it a good squash with your hand to made sure the tomatoes are "seated" in the bread. Then, and only then, is the sandwich ready to go!

To eat the sandwich you'll need napkins, towels or whatever as this will be somewhat of a messy experience or at least it will be if the sandwich is made "right." A messy tomato sandwich is always to be enjoyed!

Now this post started out talking about Summer. In my part of the world Summer is linked to tomato sandwiches and visa-versa. For my two-cents, don't even try to make one in the cooler months using “foreign” tomatos. Trust me, it just doesn't work! You have to have Summer, and that's all there is to it!

Art Fair

My latest travel took me to an art fair in Canton, Georgia. Beautiful little town in North Georgia. It's located about an hour outside Atlanta and worth the drive if you like small town USA. I sure do.

The visit started with a very nice surprise, free covered parking. That never happens in the Atlanta area. Luckily I wasn't in the Atlanta area. The day promised to be sunny and warm so the parking was great. It's always nice to return to a cool car rather than a furnace.

The first thing on the list to do in Canton was to find the pizza place for a quick lunch. After some minor wandering we found the restaurant and the 'Closed' sign in the window. How does a pizza place go under? Our second choice was a bookstore offering lunch just a couple of doors away.

The lunch offerings at the bookstore were very down-to-Earth, simple sandwiches and sides, nothing too fancy which worked out fine. As we ate lots of various people came through looking for books, kids playing and those on their way to the back of the store. I always enjoy the locals when I travel. They are, after all, what gives a place it's flavor and color.

On to the art fair! The fair was located a block off the main drag in the downtown area. On the way we say beautiful old homes and buildings with faded advertising just aching to be photographed. The fair was located in a small park which normally serves as a local greenspace. One of the best things I can say about the venue is the park was almost entirely shaded by Willow Oaks. How wonderful is that on a sunny, hot afternoon? The vendors tents/booths were scattered in clusters throughout the park in a rough order. We spent the afternoon looking at many kinds of art. There were vendors of ceramics, watercolors, photography and much more. One of the more notable booths sold photographic art, specifically HDR photography. For those that don't know, HDR, High Dynamic Range, photographs are photos that are extremely sharp and show a high degree of detail. You've undoubtedly seen HDR's but haven't realized it. This booth was of particular interest to the friend I was with as he owns the website bluestarphotos.smugmug.com where he sells his own mix of HDR and standard photography. We found this vendors work to be quite nice and the prices very reasonable. We talked to the artist for awhile as we enjoyed looking at his work.

Moving on we spoke to other artists about their work, often stopping longer at the photography booths. We found one artist who displayed many, nicely framed photos of nature scenes shot in the Southeast. We spent a good while talking to the artist sharing some laughs about how 'tough' it is to go out and photograph beautiful scenes. His thoughts on the matter, "It's tough work but somebody has to do it!" Agreed.

We passed one tent where an older gentleman was speaking to a group of people seated before him. He was talking about a book he had written and the experiences he had while writing it. As we passed around behind him on the way to more booths I heard him tell the crowd "...and it's hard to be a Southern writer having not come from a dysfunctional family". I think he nailed that one!

As we moved on the heat began to win the day. We checked out a few more booths and decided to wander back to the car. On the way, my cohort stopped to take a few pics of the faded buildings and a few test shots. Hopefully they all came out OK for him.

The day turned out to be a bit better than expected as the covered parking and shaded venue were a big plus. On the way home we talked about what we had seen, the booth structures and the artists we had talked to. It had certainly turned out to be a good day and a lot of fun enjoying the artwork on display.

OBL, again...

Well, since it was announced we "Got" OBL there have been tons of news on the subject. I just saw an article saying OBL's hideout isn't worth the million bucks America claimed it was. Who cares? I'll argue the place is worth a million bucks on U.S. soil, blah, blah, blah. I also enjoy the discussions about pictures proving OBL's death. If pictures is all it took then almost anyone with a copy of Photoshop could have showed him dead years ago. Sorry guys, its too easy to fake photo evidence these days.

Anyway, hopefully a friend of mine and I will get up to the train museum for some HDRs of that heavy metal soon. You can see some of the pics from our NC trip at BlueStarPhotos. My bud just added the gallery for the NC Arboretum. I think his pics turned out great!

Till next time...